Table of Contents

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
Chapter 79
Chapter 80
Chapter 81
Chapter 82
Chapter 83
Chapter 84
Chapter 85
Chapter 86
Chapter 87
Chapter 88
Chapter 89
Chapter 90
Chapter 91
Chapter 92
Chapter 93
Chapter 94
Chapter 95
Chapter 96
Chapter 97
Chapter 98
Chapter 99
Chapter 100
Chapter 101
Chapter 102
Chapter 103
Chapter 104
Chapter 105
Chapter 106
Chapter 107
Chapter 108
Chapter 109
Chapter 110
Chapter 111
Chapter 112
Chapter 113
Chapter 114
Chapter 115
Chapter 116
Chapter 117
Chapter 118
Chapter 119
Chapter 120
Chapter 121
Chapter 122
Chapter 123
Chapter 124
Chapter 125
Chapter 126
Chapter 127
Chapter 128
Chapter 129
Chapter 130
Chapter 131
Saye Ch. 132
Saye Ch. 133
Saye Ch. 134
Saye Ch. 135
Saye Ch. 136
Saye Ch. 137
Saye Ch. 138
Saye Ch. 139
Saye Ch. 140
Saye Ch. 141
Saye Ch. 142
Saye Ch. 143
Saye Ch. 144
Saye Ch. 145
Chapter 1
Jiang Cheng answered the phone, “Too late, I already got rid of her.”
The phone vibrated in his pocket, the fifth time in the span of three minutes.
Jiang Cheng opened his eyes.
He’d been on this train for almost three hours. The sky outside the windows remained
gloomy, and the girl sitting next to him remained asleep, her head resting solidly on his
right shoulder, which was already numb.
He shrugged his shoulders in irritation, but the girl only shifted her head. With one finger,
he nudged the girl’s head away from him, but not even a few seconds later her head was
back on his shoulder.
He had already repeated this sequence of actions many times. He felt as though she wasn’t
really sleeping, but actually comatose.
Irritation.
He didn’t know how much longer it would be until his stop. He didn’t think to check when
he got the ticket, only knew that he was going to a city that he hadn’t even heard of before
he embarked on this trip.
Life, was nothing if not absurd.
The sixth time his phone vibrated, Jiang Cheng sighed and took it out.
– What’s going on?
– How come you never mentioned anything about leaving before?
– Why did you leave so suddenly?
– Why didn’t you say anything?
What what how how why why why blahblahblahblah……
The messages were from Yu Xin, who was probably in holiday classes so she couldn’t call
him. At a glance it was all question marks.
He was about to put the phone back in his pocket when he got the seventh message.
– If you continue not replying I’ll consider us separated!
Finally it wasn’t a question mark. He let out a breath of relief, turned his phone
off, and put it back in his pocket.
Breaking up didn’t mean very much to him. Two months long high school romances like
theirs was nothing more than talking to each other a little more than to other people,
having someone bring you breakfast, and having a dedicated cheerleader by the court…
They didn’t even have time to progress to the having-done-something stage.

As he watched the ever-changing but somehow constant scenery outside the window, the
announcement finally called out Jiang Cheng’s stop. Next to him, the girl’s head shifted
slightly, as if she was about to wake up. He quickly pulled out a red marker from his
backpack, took the lid off, and twirled it between his fingers.
The girl woke up and lifted her face. There was a huge imprint on her forehead where it
pressed against his shoulder. She looked as if she had been practicing some divine power.
Upon meeting his gaze, the girl wiped the corner of her mouth before taking out her phone,
then tapped around the screen and said with her head down, “Sorry about that.”
Surprisingly, he couldn’t make out any hint of actual regret. Jiang Cheng gave her a
meaningful smile. The girl paused, then her gaze fell on the marker twirling in his hand.
Jiang Cheng popped the lid back on the pen with a loud snap.
Two seconds later the girl suddenly covered her face, then got up and rushed to the
washroom.
Jiang Cheng stood up as well and looked out the train window. The sky had been gloomy for
the whole ride here, but now it was finally snowing. He took down his suitcase from the
luggage rack, put on his jacket and walked to the door, then took out his phone and turned
it on.
His phone was quiet. There weren’t any more messages from Yu Xin, nor were there any
missed calls.
He felt that Yu Xin had never been this agreeable since they got together. A feat indeed.
Though other than Yu Xin, nobody else had tried to contact him either.
The person he thought would come pick him up, for instance.

Following the crowd out of the station, Jiang Cheng zipped his puffer all the way up to his
chin, and looked out at the city that looked bleakly grey in the chilly winter.
His first impression of the city was the decay and disarray that surrounded the train
station.
Actually, that was his second impression. His first impression was the stunned confusion in
his mind when his mom said “why don’t you go back there, that’s your real home”.
He dragged his suitcase to the southern most edge of the station square, there were less
people there. Nearby was a side street filled with all sorts of little inns that one probably
entered and never came out of, and eateries that likely gave you food poisoning.
He sat on the suitcase and checked his phone periodically. Still nobody tried to contact him.
Jiang Cheng had the phone number and address, he was just reluctant to move.
He didn’t feel like talking or moving at the moment. He pulled out a cigarette from his
pocket and put it in his mouth. Regarding how he all of a sudden came be in this place, he
was filled with a deep, inexplicable, confused, and hopeless anger.
Staring at the ice on the ground and fuming while fumbling in his pocket for a lighter, he
finally lit the cigarette with his back hunched against the icy wind. He watched the smoke
disperse before his eyes and sighed.
If only his old head teacher could see him now.
But that didn’t matter anymore, he was already here, a million miles away. If even the
people who’d lived under the same roof as him for more than ten years might never see
him again, what significance was a mere head teacher?
In the run-down school of this run-down city, there probably wouldn’t be anybody who
gave a crap whether or not he smoked.

Jiang Cheng was only halfway done with the cigarette before he could no longer stand the
cold. He stood up with the intention of hailing a cab to go get some food first, but only
managed to take one step with the suitcase. He felt something bump hard against his ankle,
and felt a surge of pain.
He frowned and turned his head, there was a skateboard on the ground behind him.
Before he even had a chance to see where this skateboard came from, somebody
fell down next to his feet.
“Are you…” Out of reflex he reached out to help, but his hand paused in mid-air.
A mess of hair was scattered on a head, the edges was uneven in length as if it had been
chewed on by a dog, the clothes were dirty too… A beggar? Homeless person? Scam artist?
Thief?
Only when this person raised their head did he clearly see that it was a little girl, probably
11 or 12 years of age. Even though her face was streaked with mud, he could still see that
she had rather fair complexion and very large eyes.
But before he had a chance to reach out a helping hand again, the girl was dragged away
roughly by four or five other little girls that followed her. One of them even landed a foot on
her back, making her stumble forward and almost fall down again.

Jiang Cheng understood immediately what was happening. He hesitated for only a moment,
then turned to continue on his way.
A wave of laughter behind him made him pause in his steps again.
He didn’t like to interfere in other people’s business when he was in a bad mood.
It just so happens that at this very moment he was in an especially extremely
extraordinarily exceptionally terrible mood. But that large-eyed little girl’s dark and clear
pupils ultimately caused him to turn around.
“Ayy!” He called out.
The girls all stopped. One that looked like she might have been their leader narrowed her
eyes at him, “What?!”
Jiang Cheng walked over, dragging his suitcase behind him slowly, all the while staring at
the girl that still had Big-Eyes’ clothes in her grasp. After two more seconds of staring, the
girl loosened her grip.
He pulled Big-Eyes to his side and looked at the other girls, “Nothing, go on then.”
“Who the hell are you?” Their leader was a little scared, but still blurted out in obvious
displeasure.
“I’m a big bro with a knife,” Jiang Cheng glanced at her. “I can give you the same haircut as
her in just thirty seconds.”
“I’m gonna get my brother to come for you!” The leader was clearly not used to this kind of
confrontation. She was a little cowed from his words, but didn’t
want to give in so easily.
“Then tell him to hurry up,” Jiang Cheng yanked on his suitcase with one hand and Big-Eyes
with the other. “I’m scared to death, so I’ll probably run really fast.”

The other girls walked away, and Big-Eyes shook off his hand.
“Are you alright?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Big-Eyes shook her head, and turned to walk back to the skateboard. She stepped on it with
one foot and looked back at him.
“Yours?” Jiang Cheng asked again.
Big-Eyes nodded. She pushed off lightly with one foot and rolled to his side, then came to a
steady stop, still looking at him.
“Then… you should go home.” Jiang Cheng nodded as well. He pulled out his phone and
walked away with the intention of calling a cab.
A few steps later he heard a noise behind him, and turned around to see that Big-Eyes was
still slowly following behind on her skateboard.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng looked at her.
Big-Eyes didn’t say anything.
“Afraid that they’ll come back?” Jiang Cheng asked again, resigned.
Big-Eyes shook her head.
“What, are you mute?” Jiang Cheng was starting to feel irritated.
Big-Eyes continued to shake her head.
“Let me tell you. Me,” Jiang Cheng pointed at himself. “I’m in a very bad mood right now,
very grumpy. I’m not gonna go easy on you just because you’re a little girl, you
understand?”
Big-Eyes didn’t move.
Jiang Cheng stared at her for a while and saw that she had no intention of speaking, so he
suppressed his anger and continued on.

The signal was poor around here, no matter how he tried he couldn’t open the
interface of the ride-hailing app. He sat down on a stone stump by the bus stop and lit
another cigarette.
Big-Eyes was still standing on her skateboard next to him.
“Is there something else?” Jiang Cheng asked impatiently. He was a little sorry now that he
interfered and brought this strange trouble onto himself.
Big-Eyes still didn’t talk, only pushed lightly on the ground and rolled up to the nearby bus
stop sign. She raised her head and stared at it for a long time.
When she rolled back to Jiang Cheng’s side, he found the cause in her confused expression,
and sighed, “Are you lost? Don’t know how to get back?”
Big-Eyes nodded.
“Do you live locally?” Jiang Cheng asked.
A nod.
“Call and tell your family to come get you.” Jiang Cheng handed his phone to her.
She accepted the phone but hesitated, tapped on the screen with her head down, then gave
back the phone.
“What do you mean?” Jiang Cheng looked at the number displayed on the screen. “You want
me to call for you?”
A nod.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng pressed call with his brows furrowed and listened to the dialing tone in
the receiver. He asked, “Which family member does this number belong to?”
Someone picked up on the other end before Big-Eyes answered.
Of course, she probably wouldn’t have answered. Jiang Cheng “hello”ed at the phone.

“Who’s this?” It was a male voice on the other end.

“A passer-by.” Jiang Cheng was a little uncertain now as to how to explain. “I have a little
girl here…”
“Not interested” Said the voice on the other end.
Before Jiang Cheng had a chance to react, the line was already dead.
“Who the hell was that?” Jiang Cheng spat out the spent cigarette and pointed at Big-Eyes.
“If you’re not gonna talk then get lost, I’m running out of patience.”
Big-Eyes crouched down beside his legs, picked up a rock, and wrote a crooked
‘哥’ [older brother] on the ground, then raised her head to look at him.
“Ok, got it.” Jiang Cheng figured this little girl might really be mute.
He called the number again, this time it didn’t ring for very long before it was picked up,
“Who’s this.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at Big-Eyes, “I have your little sister here…”
“Go ahead and get rid of her.” Was the answer on the other end. The line went dead again.
“Fuck me!” Jiang Cheng had a sudden urge to smash his phone. He pointed at Big-Eyes,
“Your name!”
Big-Eyes lowered her head and scribbled out her name with the rock.
Gu Miao.
Jiang Cheng didn’t call the number again. Instead he sent a text along with a photo of Big-
Eyes.
– Gu Miao, mute, skateboard.
Thirty seconds later he got a call back from that number.
Jiang Cheng answered the phone, “Too late, I already got rid of her.”
“Sorry about that,” The same voice said. “Can you please tell me where you are?
I want to see if I can still piece her back together.”
“…… East Station, the really run-down one.” Jiang Cheng was frowning. “She was lost. Hurry
up, I have to go.”
“Thank you, thank you so much.” The voice answered. “I’ll be there right away.
If you’re in a hurry to go you can leave first, just tell her to wait there for me.”

Jiang Cheng picked up the cigarette he tossed earlier and flicked it into a nearby garbage
can, then lit a new one.
He was going to just call a cab and go, but then thought nobody cared either way whether
he came or went, whether he was there or not. He supposed he wasn’t in any particular
rush.
Gu Miao sat on the skateboard for a while, then stood back up and started to zip back and
forth on the sidewalk with her skateboard.
After watching for a while, Jiang Cheng was a little surprised. He thought the little girl was
just fooling around, but didn’t expect to see her handle all the various uphill, downhill,
accelerations, braking, and turns with such ease.
Though the head of weed-like hair and the dirty face and clothes kept breaking his illusion.
After some time, Gu Miao rolled to a stop beside him, kicked the skateboard up with her
toes, and caught the board in her hands. She raised her hand and pointed behind Jiang
Cheng.
“Real cool.” Jiang Cheng gave her a thumbs up then turned around. There was a black
motorcycle parked behind him.
The rider was wearing a helmet that covered the face, but the legs that rested against the
curb had on form-fitting grey pants and boots. It was very eye-catching.
They were long, and very straight legs.

“Your brother?” Jiang Cheng asked Gu Miao.

Gu Miao nodded.
“What’s wrong with your head?” The rider removed his helmet and got off the bike. He
walked over and stared at Gu Miao’s hair. “And your face and clothes… Did you fall into a
crapper?”
Gu Miao shook her head.
“More like got bullied by classmates.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Thank you.” Only now did this person direct his gaze toward Jiang Cheng and extended a
hand. “Gu Fei, I’m her brother.”
Jiang Cheng stood up and shook his hand, “You’re welcome.”

Gu Fei appeared to be around the same age as himself, though it was difficult to tell that he
was Gu Miao’s brother going by his eyes alone. The shape of their eyes were similar, but his
wasn’t as large as Gu Miao’s…… though his skin was pretty fair too.
Jiang Cheng’s mood up until that moment was rather like a big bowl of rotten tomatoes.
However, Gu Fei’s hairstyle was as eye-catching as his legs, so he spared a couple extra
glances through a slit in the rotten tomatoes.
Gu Fei had a very short buzz cut with lines of music and notes carved into the shorter fuzz
on the sides of his head. There was a bass clef on one side and a quarter rest on the other,
Jiang Cheng couldn’t see how many dots it had.
“You just got off the train?” Gu Fei glanced at the suitcase.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng picked up his phone to open the ride-hailing app again.
“Where are you headed? I can give you a ride.” Gu Fei said.
“That’s OK.” Jiang Cheng glanced at his bike. However large it was, a motorcycle was still a
motorcycle.
“She doesn’t take up any space.” Gu Fei said again.
“It’s alright, thanks.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Say thank you to big brother,” Gu Fei pointed at him and said to Gu Miao.
“Ball of poop.”
Jiang Cheng turned to face the “ball of poop”, wanting to hear how she was going to speak.
But Gu Miao only clutched her skateboard and gave him a full 90-degree bow.
Gu Fei straddled the bike and put on his helmet. Gu Miao climbed deftly onto the back seat
and held on to his waist.
“Thanks again.” Gu Fei looked at him, then turned and rode away.

Jiang Cheng sat back down on the stump. The signal was sufficiently good now, but still no
one accepted his fare for a long time. The passing taxis didn’t stop either when he hailed
them.
What kind of shitty place is this?
Though he had been in a rotten mood lately, he hadn’t had a chance to savor it properly. He
felt he had been living in chaos in the days past, wrapped up in all sorts of shock and
confusion, without a chance to catch his breath. He hadn’t even considered why he had
accepted the whole arrangement, until he found himself already here.
Was it rebellion?
Just like mom said, “We never had someone as rebellious as you in our family, you’re
covered in thorns.”
Of course, they were never a family. Not to mention in these last few years they’ve became
almost like enemies. When they looked at each other, all they saw was fire.
Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows, he hadn’t had a chance to ponder all that.
Until now, until this very moment.
It was only in this strange, cold, and snowy city, that he suddenly regained his senses.
The hopelessness and pain, along with the defiance against all that was unknown made his
nose twinge.
When he lowered his head, the tears left furious streaks on his face.

Jiang Cheng was sitting in a KFC in an unspecified location when his phone rang. He glanced
at the unknown number and picked up the phone, “Hello?”
“Is this Jiang Cheng?” A middle-aged male voice sounded on the other end.
The voice was a little too loud, Jiang Cheng held the phone slightly away from his ears.
“Yes.”
“I’m your dad.” The man said.
“…… Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered. He found the conversation kind of amusing, he couldn’t
help but laugh.
The man laughed along with him for a second, “My name is Li Baoguo, you know that
right?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng took a sip of coke.
“Has your train arrived yet?” Li Baoguo asked.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng glanced down at his watch, it had been two hours since his train
arrived.
“Do you have the address? I don’t have a car to pick you up, just take a cab over, I’ll meet
you out by the street.” Li Baoguo said.
“Ok.” Jiang Cheng hung up the phone.

His luck wasn’t bad this time, he was able got a cab right away. The heat was turned on full
in the car, enough to make one feel feverish.
The driver wanted to chat, but the whole time Jiang Cheng leaned against the car window
silently and stared outside. After a few false starts, the driver finally gave up and turned on
the radio.
Jiang Cheng was trying his best to see what this city really looked like, but it was already
dark outside, and the street lamps weren’t very bright. Watching the snowflakes swirling
around in the halo of the street lamps, he felt a little dizzy.
He shut his eyes.
Then quickly opened them again.
He wondered what was wrong with him. He was acting like a girl. How lame.

The taxi arrived at its destination. Jiang Cheng got off with his suitcase and stood on the
side of the street.
There was nobody there.
Not even a shadow of “your dad” Li Baoguo, who said he would meet him out by the street.
Jiang Cheng suppressed the frustration in his heart and the pain on his wind-blown face,
and took out his phone to call Li Baoguo’s number.
“Ayyy this hand sucks…” It was a long time before Li Baoguo picked up the phone. “Yeah?”
“I’m here on the street.” Listening to the sounds from the other end, Jiang Cheng had the
sudden urge to hang up and look for a hotel instead.
“AH? You’re here already?” Li Baoguo shouted in surprise. “I’m here I’m here, I’ll be out
right away.”
This so called “right away”, was right about five minutes. Just as Jiang Cheng was pulling his
suitcase with one hand and reaching out to hail a cab with the other, a man wearing an
ushanka ran over and pressed down on his arm. He shouted in a loud voice, “Jiang Cheng,
right?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t make a sound. He saw that Li Baoguo ran out from the apartment
building right next to them.
Right away?
Then when he noticed the heads poking out from a second floor window looking in their
direction, he felt like he didn’t want to open his mouth ever again.
“I was over at a friend’s place, let’s go,” Li Baoguo patted his shoulder. “Let’s go let’s go
home… You look taller than in the photos huh.”
Jiang Cheng looked down at the muddy road and followed him.
“Ayy,” Li Baoguo slapped his back a couple of times too for good measure.
“How many years has it been now, gotta be more than ten huh? I finally get to see my son! I
should take a good look.”
Li Baoguo reached his head around the front of Jiang Cheng’s face and stared at him.
Jiang Cheng pulled up the face mask he’d left scrunched up on his chin and put it on
properly.
All of a sudden, he felt completely hollow inside. Even the air around him was filled with a
sense of wandering aimlessness.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5550
TL word count: 3756
TL time: 4:46:16
Edit: 1:39:09
Curse words: 2 fucks, 1 shit
Second edit: 02/14/21
TL’s Notes:
Apparently there’s some confusion about the girl on the train (heh), Jiang Cheng did NOT
draw on a random stranger’s face with a sharpie. If you read that part again, you’ll see that
he only pulled the pen out when she started to wake, and started twirling it right after he
popped the cap off. He couldn’t have drawn on her face without her noticing, he only made her
think he did.
I’m @StrawberryMuMa on twitter, you can follow me if you want updates on new chapters
_(:3∠)_
First posted: May 9, 2020
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 2
Not. A. Good. Bird.
Author: Wu Zhe, Translated by Ami :3
According to his mom… Jiang Cheng suddenly thought this way of referring to her was a
little strange. So much so that his train of thoughts got weirdly cut off, he suddenly couldn’t
remember what exactly she said.
In all of his seventeen odd years, parents and family were a singular presence.
Regardless of whether they had a good relationship, mom was always the woman named
Shen Yiqing, and dad was the man named Jiang Wei. And then there was the little brother
he was never close with… But now all of a sudden, he had an extra set. Li Baoguo and…
some names that he’d already forgotten.
It was difficult to wrap his mind around.
His relationship with his family was indeed a tense one. Whether it was his parents or his
brother, every time he came in contact with them there was risk of combustion. It had
already been about a year since he and his brother last spoke to each other. Even his mom
who was always calm had lost her temper a handful of times.
But even though this atmosphere lasted from the beginning of middle school all the way
until high school, even if he was always thinking about never going home again, never
seeing his parents again, especially not seeing that face that looked like it came out of the
same mould as their parents… When this moment finally descended upon him like a wish
fulfilled, it still completely blindsided him.
Yes, blindsided.
Extremely blindsided.
From the time his mom said “there’s something I have to tell you”, followed by several
months of cold war and paperwork, until now. All of it felt like a nonsensical dream.
Most of the time he wasn’t too upset about it, nor was he in a lot of pain.
Only blindsided.

“Cold, eh?” Li Baoguo turned and asked. He coughed out loud. “Way colder
than where you were huh?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered behind his mask.
“It’ll be warmer inside.” Li Baoguo said, speaking and coughing loudly, spraying spit all over
his face. “I tidied up a room especially for you.”
“Thanks.” Jiang Cheng said, and pulled his mask up more.
“No need for that between us father and son.” Li Baoguo laughed and clapped Jiang Cheng
on the back a couple times. “No need for ‘thank you’s between us.”
Jiang Cheng wasn’t able to respond; the slaps were quite forceful. He already felt like
coughing after inhaling the cold air, hearing Li Baoguo cough only made the urge to cough
stronger. After the two slaps, he bent down in a coughing fit, which almost made tears
come out of his eyes.
“You’re not in very good health huh,” Li Baoguo watched him. “You gotta exercise. When I
was your age I was strong as a bear.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, only gave him a thumbs up while still bent at the waist.
Li Baoguo laughed gleefully, “Exercise! I’m still counting on you to take care of me in the
future!”
Jiang Cheng straightened up and looked at him.
“Come on.” Li Baoguo gave him another slap on the back.
“Don’t touch me.” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“Oooh,” Li Baoguo paused, and looked at him with eyes wide. “What’s wrong?”
Jiang Cheng looked into his eyes for a while, then pulled down his mask, “Don’t slap my
back.”

Li Baoguo’s home was on an old street. On both sides were various decrepit little shops that
were also full of the smell of life. They sold food, clothes, and all sorts of daily necessities.
Above the shops were several stories of residential apartments.
Jiang Cheng raised his head and had a look through the many intersecting cables above
them. It was tough to tell whether the ambiguous colour of the outer walls was due to the
darkening skies, or because that was how it was.
He turned into a corridor behind Li Baoguo, a mess of emotions in his heart.
They passed through heaps of junk and food on the hallway of the first floor and stopped in
front of a door at the very end.
“It definitely can’t compare with what you had before,” Li Baoguo said as he unlocked the
door. “But what’s mine is yours!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything. He looked at a lightbulb in the corridor that was encased in
cobwebs, and imagined the lightbulb must be suffocating.
“What’s mine, is yours!” Li Baoguo opened the door and turned to give his shoulder a
couple of hard thumps. “What’s yours, is mine! Now that’s a real father and son!”
“I said don’t touch me.” Jiang Cheng said, irritated.
“Whoa.” Li Baoguo entered and flipped the lights on. “Spoiled you are, talking to your elders
like this. Let me tell you, I never spoiled your older brother or sister. If you grew up here, I
would have beat you to submission long ago…
Come, you’ll sleep in this room… it used to be your brother’s…”

Jiang Cheng dragged his suitcase into the room and didn’t bother listening to anything else
Li Baoguo had to say. The apartment had two bedrooms, he wondered how the whole
family managed to fit before.
This tidied room… probably wasn’t tidied very often or ever. Without even looking, he
could tell with his nose alone the smell of dust intermingled with a faint stench of mildew.
There was an old wardrobe, a desk, and a bunk bed. The upper bunk was piled with junk,
though the bottom bunk was indeed cleared out. The sheets and covers were all freshly
changed.
“Just set your stuff down, you can unpack tomorrow.” Li Baoguo said. “Let’s drink a couple
glasses first.”
“Drink what?” Jiang Cheng was a little thrown. He glanced at his phone, it was almost ten
o’clock.
“Alcohol of course.” Li Baoguo looked at him. “It’s been more than ten years, we gotta have
some drinks to celebrate!”
“…That’s ok.” Jiang Cheng was at a loss for words. “I don’t want to drink.”
“Don’t want to drink?” Li Baoguo’s eyes widened by another degree. He stared at him for a
couple of seconds then zoomed his eyes out again, then started to laugh. “Have you never
had alcohol before or something? You’re already in high school…”
“I don’t feel like drinking.” Jiang Cheng interrupted him. “I want to sleep.”
“Sleep?” Li Baoguo froze for a long time, and at last turned to walk away with a wave of his
hand. He said in a rough voice, “Ok ok ok, you sleep. Sleep away.”

Jiang Cheng closed the door to the bedroom, and stood in the middle of the room for almost
five minutes before he went and opened the wardrobe.
As soon as he opened the door he was overwhelmed by the wave of mothball smells. More
than half of this double door wardrobe was stuffed with all sorts of comforters, old
sweaters, and blanket towels with edges so torn they were almost tassels.
It was hard to describe the feeling. Jiang Cheng was sure he hadn’t yet started to miss his
family and home that was more than a few hours away, but was very sincerely and madly
missing his old room.
He pulled out some clothes at random and hung them up, leaving the rest in the suitcase
crammed under the wardrobe. Then he took out a bottle of fragrance and sprayed it fifteen
odd times into the wardrobe, and only then shut the door and sat on the edge of the bed.
His phone rang, the caller display showed “Mom”. He answered.
“You’ve arrived?” Came his mom’s voice from the other end.
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“The conditions aren’t as good as back here,” His mom said. “You might need some time to
adjust.”
“No need.” Jiang Cheng said.
His mom paused, “Xiao-Cheng, I still hope you don’t think that…”
“I don’t.” Jiang Cheng said.
“This family did not treat you poorly all these years. Isn’t it true that your dad and I never
let you know that you were adopted?” His mom’s voice took on the usual stern note.
“But now I know anyways.” Jiang Cheng said. “And got thrown out.”
“Don’t you forget, your dad had a fit and had to go to the hospital on New Year’s because of
you! And he’s still there!” His mom raised her voice.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything to that. He didn’t understand what he had to do
with his dad’s pneumonia induced hospital stay.
As to what else his mom had to say after that, amazingly, he didn’t catch much of it. It was
his superpower, he could stop the things he didn’t want to hear from entering his brain.
His mom’s stern but empty accusations and her (in his opinion) completely ineffective
communication skills might all contribute to his own breakdown.
He didn’t want to listen, didn’t want to argue in these surroundings that were so new and
strange that it made him uncomfortable all over.
When the call ended, he couldn’t remember what had been said, what his mom said, what
he said, couldn’t remember any of it.
Feeling like taking a shower, Jiang Cheng rose and opened the door. He peered into the
living room, nobody was there.
He cleared his throat and coughed a few times. Nobody answered.
“Are… you there?” He walked into the living room, unsure of how exactly to refer to Li
Baoguo.
The apartment was small, from the living room he could see at a glance all the doors in all
the rooms. Li Baoguo was not there.
Must have been off to play cards again. The man would jump in and play a few hands even
when passing by on his way to pick someone up on the streetside.
“Come now——play a few hands——got plenty of time anyway,” Jiang Cheng
sang [1] as he pushed open the bathroom door. “Come now——take a shower
——got…”
There was no hot water tank in the bathroom.
“Got…” he continued the song and turned to take a look at the kitchen next to the bathroom,
and didn’t see a hot water tank there either, only a small electrical heater on top of the
kitchen faucet. “Got…”
He couldn’t continue. After doing a couple rounds around the apartment to confirm that
indeed, there was no hot water tank, he felt a stuffiness in his chest.
He gave the faucet a smack, “Damnit.”
After traveling for the whole day, it was impossible for him to sleep without showering.
Finally he had to drag his suitcase out and pulled out a collapsible pail. In his underwear, he
carried the water in and out of the bathroom one pail at a time and managed to also clean
himself off in the meantime.
A cockroach scuttled past his feet as he walked out of the bathroom. He jumped up to get
out of its way and narrowly missed hitting his head on the door.

It was only after getting back to his room and turning off the lights in preparation for some
forced shuteye, that he noticed the room didn’t have any curtains. And that the reason he
never saw the view outside the window was because the glass was too dirty.
He pulled the covers over himself, hesitated, then sniffed at it. He let out a breath of relief
when he confirmed that it was clean, he didn’t even have the energy to sigh.
After half an hour of lying on the bed with his eyes shut, enough that his eyes were sore
from the effort, sleep still wouldn’t come. He considered getting up for a smoke when his
phone pinged.
He picked it up, it was a message from Pan Zhi.
– Wtf, you left already? What’s the status?
Jiang Cheng lit a cigarette and dialed Pan Zhi’s number. He walked to the window with the
cigarette in his mouth and tried to open it.
There was dirt and rust all over the window sill. He struggled for a while, Pan Zhi picked up
the phone in the meantime, but the window still didn’t budge.
“Cheng?” For some reason Pan Zhi was keeping his voice down as if he was a thief.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng frowned and cursed when his finger got pierced by some unknown
object. He gave up on trying to open the window.
“What’s going on with you?” Pan Zhi still kept his voice low. “I heard from Yu Xin today that
you left already? Didn’t you say that you’ll let me know when you leave? I even bought a
bunch of things to give to you!”
“Just ship it over.” Jiang Cheng put on a jacket and walked to the living room with the
cigarette. He was about to step outside when he remembered he didn’t have a key, and had
no choice but to retreat into the living room and open a window there.
The irritation in him was like a storm, all his bad mood needed was one more drop and it
could all go up in flames of rage.
“So you’re there already?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng leaned over the window sill and watched the darkness outside.
“So how is it? How’s that biological dad of yours?” Pan Zhi continued.
“You got anything important to say?” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t feel like talking right now.”
“Fuck, it’s not like I put you over there.” Pan Zhi tsked once. “What are you lashing out at
me for, you didn’t even hesitate at the time when your mom said
‘they need the adoptee’s consent’, but now you’re mad.”
“Not hesitating and being mad isn’t mutually exclusive.” Jiang Cheng breathed out a puff of
smoke.
Suddenly a small figure jumped out onto the empty street outside, and flew by on a
skateboard with shocking speed.
Jiang Cheng froze for a second and thought of the little girl named Gu Miao from earlier.
Who knew there would be so many skateboarders in this rundown city.
“How about I come over?” Pan Zhi said suddenly.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng’s attention was elsewhere.
“I said I’ll go visit you.” Pan Zhi said. “There’s still a few days before school starts right? I
can bring over the stuff I bought you.”
“No.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Don’t be stubborn, it’s not like you told anyone else about this, at this point I’m the only
one who can offer you some warmth.” Pan Zhi sighed. “Let me go comfort you.”
“Comfort how?” Jiang Cheng said. “Are you gonna blow me?”
“Screw your uncle Jiang Cheng, can you have a modicum of shame!” Pan Zhi yelled out.
“What do I need that for? If you’re so passionate about coming all this way just to see me, of
course I’d have to cooperate.” Jiang Cheng circled the apartment a few times holding the
cigarette stub, and eventually found an old Eight Treasure Porridge can that was covered
with cigarette ashes. Opening the lid, the ancient smoke stink almost made him vomit
before he even had a chance to look inside.
He threw the stubs in and closed the lid quickly, feeling in that moment that he never
wanted to smoke again.

The strange and troubling environment, the strange and troubling “family”.
Jiang Cheng thought he’d have insomnia under these circumstances, but after lying down,
the torturous sleeplessness he was feeling before was gone, he found himself surprisingly
drowsy. Not only drowsy, but tired too. It was a feeling similar to after he pulled half a
month of late nights to study for a test.
Sleep came suddenly.
After he closed his eyes he slept as if he lost all senses.
A dreamless night.

In the morning when he woke up, the first thing he felt was an all-over soreness.
When he got out of bed Jiang Cheng almost had the illusion that he had a secret identity as a
dock worker, the type that hasn’t even worked a full week.
He checked the time on his phone, it was still pretty early, just past 8 am.
Walking out of the room, he could see that everything was the same as it was the night
before, even the empty bed in the other bedroom.
Li Baoguo was out all night?
Jiang Cheng frowned. He felt a little bad after washing up. His attitude yesterday wasn’t all
that great, and it wasn’t with ill will either that Li Baoguo wanted to drag him along for
drinks. It was only a difference of habits, but he rejected it so bluntly. Was it because of this
that Li Baoguo hadn’t returned the whole night?
He hesitated for a moment, then pulled out his phone to give Li Baoguo a call.
They didn’t drink together the night before, but they could still have breakfast together.
While dialling, the sound of keys jangling came from outside the door, followed by the
sound of lock turning. The noise lasted over 20 seconds, then the door was finally open.
Li Baoguo walked in wrapped up in cold air. His face was sallow, and wore an exhausted
expression.
“You’re up already?” Li Baoguo said loudly once he spotted him. “You get up pretty early,
how did you sleep?”
“…Ok.” Jiang Cheng noticed the pungent cigarette smell coming from him as he answered. It
was mixed in with some other inexplicable stench, like the kind one
used to find on the old green and red trains.
“Did you have breakfast yet?” Li Baoguo took off his jacket and gave it a shake, the smell
only got worse. The foul stench permeated the tiny living space.
“Not yet,” Jiang Cheng said. “How about we…”
“There’s breakfast places just out the door, quite a few too, go check it out.” Li Baoguo said.
“I’m dying to sleep, let me doze for a bit. If I don’t get up by noon you just go ahead and eat
on your own.”
Jiang Cheng watched as he walked into the other bedroom, and threw himself on the bed
without taking anything off, only pulling a cover over himself.
He’s at a loss for words, “Where did you go…last night?”
“Cards, been having shit luck lately, but it wasn’t too bad yesterday! Must be you bringing
me the good fortune!” Li Baoguo happily yelled then closed his eyes.
Jiang Cheng took the keys on the table and turned to head out the door. He really was naive
for feeling bad earlier.

The snow had stopped. A bone piercing chill swept through the air.
The streets in the morning were livelier than it was at night. There were people and cars,
and even sounds of firecrackers going off. But now that the sun was out, the neglect and
decay that was concealed by the dark of night was also exposed out in the open.
Jiang Cheng walked back and forth a couple times on the street, then entered a bun shop.
He ate a few meat buns and a bowl of tofu pudding but the soreness on his body still hadn’t
subsided, not only that, but it seemed to have gotten worse as if awakened by the
nourishment.
Feeling like a cold was coming on, he finished his breakfast and went to the little pharmacy
next door and bought a box of cold medicine.
He stood on the side of the road after that, a little lost. Should he head back?
The mental image of Li Baoguo engulfed in weird smells and falling right to sleep just made
him all sorts of irritated. He didn’t even know what there was to do if he went back there.
Sleep, or stare off into space?
After standing outside the pharmacy for a few minutes, he decided to walk
around the neighbourhood and familiarize himself with this place. Even though he didn’t
know how long he would stay here.

Aimlessly he wandered from the side street to the main road, then turned a corner into
another side street that was parallel to the one he was on before.
Jiang Cheng wanted to see if there was a way up ahead that would lead him back to where
he was.
On this little street he found a very small musical instruments shop and an ice cream
parlour with very pastel decor. Though other than these two stores, there was no
discernable difference between his street and this one.
He stopped when he passed a convenience store that was masquerading as a grocery store
but was really a convenience store. He walked in, wanting to buy a bottle of water to wash
down the medicine.
At the same time as he was greeted by the indoor heating that smelled of lemons, Jiang
Cheng froze in the doorway. He felt like turning and walking back out.
Four people were squeezed together in the little plot of land behind the cash register, each
person sitting or leaning on a stool.
As soon as he came in, the idle chatter between them stopped, all the heads turned
simultaneously to stare at him.
Jiang Cheng studied these four people, from their appearances to their expressions, from
their clothing to the way they carried themselves. Each one of their faces seem to spell out a
word.
Not. A. Good. Bird. [2]
While he was wavering between turning around and leaving or going in for the water on
the shelf, Jiang Cheng’s peripheral vision caught something else. There were three other
bodies crammed in front of a row of shelves.
He turned around and first, before he was able to make out any faces, he noticed a shiny
bald head and bits of short hair littered all over the floor. Then, a pair of large eyes.
Footnote:
[1] If you didn’t catch the link in the text, Jiang Cheng was filling in his own lyrics to this
song ↩
[2] “Not a good bird” is a slang for people who aren’t average law abiding citizens, or those
who shouldn’t easily be provoked, but from now on it’s how
Jiang Cheng will remember those four friends of Gu Fei’s because his brain capacity is
precious and isn’t often used on inane things like names. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5204
TL word count: 3614
TL time: 5:46:40
Edit: 1:07:27
Curse words: 2 fucks, 1 shit, 1 damn
Chapter 3
The bigshot who bought a bottle of water just to throw away half was currently lying face
down on the sidewalk outside the store.
The shiny head between the store shelves belonged to Gu Miao, though it was now difficult
to tell that this was a little girl. She had on a blue-grey puffer in boys’ style, if it wasn’t for
her eyes, Jiang Cheng wouldn’t have realized that this was Gu Miao.
Behind her stood Gu Fei with a cigarette in his mouth, his hand holding an electric hair
trimmer paused in mid-air. He must’ve been surprised to see Jiang Cheng here.
Though Gu Fei looked different today, in a sweater and joggers, he looked relaxed and
comfortable.
The way he looked and carried himself was drastically different from his four friends by the
door. He was very eye catching, the kind you’d spot straight away in a crowd.
Emanating from every pore of his body was the message: I’m their leader.
Jiang Cheng never thought he looked like a bad guy, even though at times when his temper
flared, he would scare even himself. He assumed perhaps he just never got over the
rebellious streak and turned it into a chronic condition. But all he wanted to do today was
purchase a bottle of water in peace, he was pretty sure he looked non-threatening.
So when all eyes in the convenience-store-that-was-pretending-to-be-a-grocery-store were
simultaneously converging on him with a silent ‘you’re looking for trouble’ expression,
needless to say, he was more than a little perplexed.
While this was going on some of the ash dropped from Gu Fei’s cigarette directly onto Gu
Miao’s newly shiny scalp. She lowered her head and wiped at it roughly.
Jiang Cheng decided to disregard these gazes. Growing up, he had never shied away from
trouble, and was not intimidated by any ‘what are you looking at’
stares. Especially when both his mind and body were not feeling well.
He walked to the shelf and grabbed himself a bottle of water.
When he glanced up, he saw that Gu Fei was standing on the other side of the row of
shelves. After a brief exchange of silent eye contact in between two bags of chips, Gu Fei
finally said, “Welcome.”
“Your family’s?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei nodded.
“What a coincidence.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei said nothing, and Jiang Cheng didn’t feel much like talking anyways. He tossed the
bottle gently in his hand and turned to the checkout.
“Two bucks.” A young man had walked behind the cash register. He propped his hands on
the counter and leaned forward to stare at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng looked up at him. The quartet of ‘Not A Good Bird’ hadn’t moved from their
spots. This guy was the one standing next to Gu Fei when he came in.
He hadn’t noticed before in the dim lighting, but now under the fluorescent ceiling light he
was able to see that this person had a rather pretty face, almost feminine like. Other than
the long and narrow eyes, his other facial features actually made him seem more like Gu
Miao’s older sister… no brother. Mores so than Gu Fei anyway.
Jiang Cheng handed over a ten yuan bill from his pocket. The young man looked down and
punched it into the cash, then gave him another look, “Da-Fei’s friend? I haven’t seen you
around.”
“No.” Jiang Cheng popped out a couple pills from the pack of cold medicine he just bought
and washed it down with some water.
“No?” The guy’s gaze traveled over his shoulder and landed somewhere behind him. He
placed the change on the counter. “Ah.”
Jiang Cheng threw the half finished bottle of water into the trash by the door, then lifted the
curtains to go outside.
“Hey, you should’ve gotten a smaller size,” The guy’s voice sounded from behind. “What a
waste.”
“…I forgot.” Jiang Cheng said.
The guy was right of course. Why didn’t he get the smaller sized bottle, he wasn’t gonna
finish it anyway.
Must be because the feeling of soreness all over his body had intensified, making his brain a
little short circuited.
He stood on the steps outside, having trouble remembering where he was heading before
he turned into the store… Back? Back where? Li Baoguo’s… no, his new home?
At the mere thought of the disgusting state of the apartment and Li Baoguo’s thunderous
snores, he felt a tightness in his chest. He suddenly found it difficult to get air into his lungs.
No air at all.
A darkness dotted with stars spread across his vision.
Jiang Cheng lost control of his body, which pitched downwards like a rotating flour sack. He
sighed and thought to himself, this should be good.
Gu Miao rubbed her newly smooth head and walked towards the door,
skateboard in hand.
“Your hat.” Gu Fei picked up his jacket from a chair and pulled out a green knitted cap
decorated with little flowers from the pockets where it was bunched, and threw it on her
head.
Gu Miao yanked it onto her head roughly.
They watched her go out the door, then immediately come back in and knock on the
counter.
“What is it?” Li Yan leaned over the cash and tugged on her hat, then raised his eyes at Gu
Fei. “How could you knit her a green hat for real?” [1]
“She picked the colour herself.” Gu Fei put the hair trimmer away and directed his attention
at Gu Miao. “What is it?”
Gu Miao pointed at the front door.
“Is there a dog?” Gu Fei kicked his chair to one side and walked to the door. He lifted the
curtain.
The big shot who bought a bottle of water just to throw away half was currently lying face
down on the sidewalk outside the store.
Hugging the ground with his face.
“Hey,” Gu Fei walked outside and lightly kicked his leg. He didn’t even know the guy’s name.
“Are you ok?”
The big shot didn’t move. Gu Fei bent down and studied the face of the big shot currently
pressed against the ground and saw that the tip of his nose had been flattened. He reached
out a hand to lift the big shot’s head and tilted it slightly so he could breathe, then turned
and shouted into the store, “Hey! We got a man down!”
Li Yan was the first one out the door. He froze at the scene in front of him, “Got stabbed?”
“If that was the case then it must be you.” Gu Fei touched the big shot’s face and sensed the
high temperature. “He’s burning up.”
“You can pass out from a fever?” Li Yan was clearly a little flabberghasted. He turned to
look at the others that had followed him out. “What do we do? Call 120?”
“I say don’t bother.” Liu Fan looked around. “If any vigilant auntie sees and calls the cops,
they’ll blamed it on us for sure. I just got out yesterday…”
“Drag him inside.” Gu Fei said.
“Drag him… You know him right?” Liu Fan asked.
“Just do as you’re told, even if he didn’t know him, Da-Fei touched him just now.” Li Yan
said. “If an auntie calls the cops do you think the cops won’t know to ask you about it?”
“He’s passed out from a fever is all. It’s too bad for your parents that you guys didn’t make a
career out of screenwriting.” Gu Fei flipped the big shot over.
“Hurry it up.”
Together, the bunch of them carried the unconscious body into the store and left him in the
spare room Gu Fei usually used for naps.
“I didn’t even get to properly sleep in this bed,” Once everyone else was out, Li Yan tsked
and said. “Yet this weakling who popped out of nowhere get to enjoy it first.”
“You go out there and do a faceplant, and I’ll put you on this bed right away.”
Gu Fei said.
“No shame.” Li Yan said.
“You’ve got the most shame ok,” Gu Fei gave him a shove. “Now get out.”
“Hey,” Li Yan resisted and stayed where he was, he turned and lowered his voice. “The guy
said you’re not friends?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei pushed a little harder and Li Yan stumbled out. Gu Fei closed the door
behind them. “He’s the one who found Er-Miao yesterday.”
“He found Er-Miao?” Li Yan was a little surprised. “How serendipitous.”
Gu Fei ignored him. He sat down behind the cash and started playing a mobile game.
“He’s pretty handsome.” Li Yan leaned over the counter and said in a low voice.
Gu Fei gave him a look. Li Yan turned away and didn’t say anything more.
Gu Miao came over, stuck her hand out in front of Gu Fei’s face with her palms spread open,
and wiggled her fingers.
“Go ahead and eat. Look how much weight you gained in these last couple of months,
nobody’s gonna play with you anymore.” Gu Fei took out a ten yuan bill and pressed it into
her hand. “Your face is like a full circle now.”
Gu Miao ignored him. She put the money in her pockets, and even patted it for good
measure, then walked out skateboard in hand.
“With a bald head like that, no other kid is gonna play with her whether she’s fat or not.” Li
Yan sighed.
“Nobody plays with her anyways, even if she’s not bald.” Gu Fei continued his game. “She’s
never had any friends, who would play with a mute?”
“Don’t say that,” Liu Fan said beside them. “It’s not like she’s actually mute. She just doesn’t
talk, what’s the big deal?”
“Ay… What’s gonna happen if she goes on like this,” Li Yan sighed again.
“School’s one thing, if she doesn’t wanna go then don’t go. But this thing where she’s only
willing to talk to Da-Fei…”
“There’s a high probability the world’s gonna end if not for you worrying about it.” Gu Fei
interrupted him. “You should submit an application for the Nobel Peace Prize.”
“Fuck you.” Li Yan slapped the counter and went to sit down in a chair next to Liu Fan.
The store slipped into silence. Liu Fan and the others who sat by the radiator were slowly
nodding off to sleep with a glazed look in their eyes. It was a rather scary scene, with their
facial muscles all drooping from relaxation. There were three customers in a row who lifted
the curtains to come in, but at the sight of them immediately turned around and left.
“You guys,” Gu Fei rapped his knuckles on the counter. “Get.”
“Where to?” Li Yan asked.
“Go wild.” Gu Fei said.
“Don’t feel like going outside though.” Liu Fan stretched lazily. “Damn cold and nowhere to
go.”
“I got customers who already walked in but were scared off by you guys.” Gu Fei put a lit
cigarette in his mouth.
“I promise, the next person to come in, we’ll hold them here for you.” Liu Fan laughed and
clapped his hands together. “We won’t let a single one escape.”
“Hurry up and get out,” Gu Fei said. “Annoying shits.”
“Go go go go.” Liu Fan tsked and stood up. He gave the other chairs each a kick.
“Your Uncle Gu is throwing a fit again, another minute and he’ll come at us with a knife.”
None of the others wanted to move, but stood up anyways. They put their jackets on and
left reluctantly, all the while cursing under their breath.
Li Yan was the last one out the door, but at the last second he turned around and said,
“There’s another one in there, you’re not gonna get rid of him?”
Gu Fei just looked at him without a word.
So Li Yan didn’t say anything more, only lifted the curtain and walked out.
Gu Fei looked at the clock, he estimated that about twenty minutes had passed in the time it
took him to finish one cigarette. According to standard fainting procedure, the guy
should’ve been awake in a matter of minutes.
He pushed open the door to the spare room and peered inside. Mr. Big Shot was still
unconscious, lying there with his eyes closed in the exact same position as before.
“Hey,” Gu Fei walked over and gave him a nudge. “Don’t die here at my place.”
Still, Mr. Big Shot didn’t move.
For a while Gu Fei just stood there and stared at him.
Mr. Big Shot’s face was a little dirty, but it didn’t take away from the attractiveness of his
face. The very slightly downturned eyes made him look a little smug.
According to his standards, which disliked pretty much everybody he met, the guy was
handsome enough. It was only the first meeting yesterday that left him unimpressed with
the prickly air about this guy, even though he was only lowkey prickly, Gu Fei felt it just the
same.
After a few minutes of staring, he lifted the covers, rummaged around Mr. Big Shot’s
pockets, and found his wallet. His ID was slotted together with a number of what looked
like membership cards.
Jiang Cheng.
He put the wallet back, leaned down and shouted into Mr. Big Shot’s ears,
“HEY!”
”Mmm…” Mr. Big Shot finally stirred and murmured quietly. He sounded
extremely displeased.
Gu Fei gave the edge of the bed another kick and turned to leave.
Jiang Cheng was confused.
The moment he opened his eyes it felt as though he got amnesia: Who am I, where is this?
It took a good while for him to recall that the last thing he could remember was the not
very clean ground coming towards him, bringing with it some snow that had been trampled
to sludge.
He actually passed out? Must be once in a lifetime.
He sat up and lifted the blanket covering him. When he saw the mud all over his clothes, he
immediately grabbed the blanket and checked, there were a few spots of mud it. He gave it
a few pats in an attempt to get it off, to no avail.
Just as he was considering finding some water to see if he could rub the stain out, his brain
suddenly decided to work again.
Who am I? Jiang Cheng.
Where am I? No idea.
It was a small but well-kept room. Much cleaner than the one Li Baoguo gave him. He threw
the covers off and went to open the door.
He finally recalled when he saw the three rows of store shelves outside, he was still in Gu
Fei’s store.
“You’re finally awake.” Gu Fei leaned against a recliner by the cash register and glanced up
at him, then continued to play with his phone.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng patted the dried mud on his clothing. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.” Gu Fei kept his eyes on his phone. “It’s mostly because it’s more trouble
to leave you out there.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng turned and looked back at the small room. “That blanket…
got dirty.”
“There’s a sink at the back.” Gu Fei said. “Go ahead and wash it.”
“What?” Jiang Cheng was stunned, and a little mad, but couldn’t find an appropriate way to
express his emotions. After all, there was nothing logically
wrong with Gu Fei’s words.。
“Why mention it if you didn’t plan to wash it.” Gu Fei finally lifted his gaze from the phone
screen and trained it on his face.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, so they stared at each other in silence.
He was rather grateful to Gu Fei at first for getting him inside, but Gu Fei’s attitude at the
moment made it hard for him to express that gratitude. He only refrained from lashing out
because he hadn’t entirely recovered from fainting.
After a few more minutes of the staring contest, Gu Fei directed his eyes and attention back
to his mobile game.
Jiang Cheng turned and walked out.
It was nice and sunny outside, the sun was the only source of warmth in the north wind.
Though it wasn’t much help, it was still freezing cold.
His head was killing him. Jiang Cheng pulled a ski cap out of his pockets and pulled it over
his head, along with the hood of his jacket. He checked the time and was glad to see that he
only passed out for about half an hour. Not bad, didn’t waste too much time.
Even though he didn’t know what else there was to do.
Standing at the edge of the road and looking out to either side of him, he finally decided to
continue strolling forward, and circle back once he found the connecting lane between the
two streets.
He didn’t much like the idea of going back to listen to Li Baoguo’s snores, but he had to
change his clothes.
While trudging through the muddy snow, he suddenly felt a pang of loneliness.
There were many days like this in his past, where he spent hours leisurely wandering
around outside, sometimes not going home for days at a time. But never had he felt
loneliness the way he did now.
Wonder why.
Perhaps it was the powerful sense of loss from being abandoned and exiled, perhaps it was
this strange and decrepit environment, perhaps it was the lack of friends around him, or…
simply because he was sick.
His phone made a sound, Jiang Cheng pulled it out. It was a message from Yu Xin.
- I changed my mind.
He sighed and texted back.
- Heroes generally stick to their words.
Yu Xin didn’t send another reply. She could be mad that he didn’t give her any face, or
maybe just preserving her anger for another more suitable moment, to go off on him again.
He put the phone back in his pocket and pinched the bridge of his nose.
He hadn’t noticed before, it was only now that he realized his nose hurt like hell.
It must’ve smashed into the ground when he face planted earlier.
Tsk.
He carefully pinched his nose from bridge to tip, and made sure that nothing was broken.
After a few more steps forward he saw a small intersection up ahead. That should be the
connecting lane he was looking for.
Suddenly, a green coloured head poked out from the intersection up ahead and rolled over
like a whirlwind.
By the time Jiang Cheng made out the green head to be Gu Miao with her skateboard, she
had already zoomed past him, with such speed that he didn’t even see her face clearly.
Ah, skateboard girl.
He turned for another look. What a cool little girl, too bad all her hair was gone.
Was Gu Fei really her brother? Even if she got a bad haircut, was it that hard to find a salon
and fix it into a shorter style? He just had to shave the whole thing off, especially on chilly
days like these… Wait, was that a green hat??
When Jiang Cheng once again turned his head around to see if there was a problem with his
eyes, all that was left of Gu Miao was a distant black dot.
Before he turned back to continue on his way, three bicycles came charging out of the
intersection up ahead.
They were rather rickety and made clanging sounds as they went, but were nonetheless
very quick.
”Shit, she’s fast!” Shouted one of the people on the rickety bike.
Jiang Cheng was dumbfounded. Does this mean… Gu Miao was being chased and bullied
again?
He didn’t have the spoons to even feel sympathy this time around, only an abstract surge of
annoyance.
What the fuck kind of shitty place is this?!
Li Baoguo was still asleep when he got back to his new ‘home’. Though he had let up
somewhat on the snoring, he had been coughing from the moment that Jiang Cheng
stepped through the door, the severity of which made Jiang Cheng think he was going to
cough his lungs out.
He couldn’t help but check on him a couple times, but Li Baoguo’s eyes were closed and
appeared to be sound asleep.
That was a skill Jiang Cheng did not possess, if he coughed while sleeping, that would wake
him up for sure. This must be a Li Baoguo specialty.
After he changed, Jiang Cheng wet a towel he got out of his suitcase and wiped his jacket
clean.
Then sat on the bed and stared off into space.
He didn’t know what he could possibly do.
Li Baoguo stopped coughing next door, but his snores had started up again.
Jiang Cheng found it hard to pin down his feelings at this moment. This man was his
biological father, his blood flowed in him.
To think that he was actually born in a home like this. Despite not having met the rest of the
family members yet, Li Baoguo alone was the perfect embodiment of
‘excitement ahead’ in capital warning font.
Recently he had been careful to avoid thinking about this, but sitting here now, looking at
the decay within and without, it was no longer possible to avoid the topic.
A long time ago, he even discussed the subject of adoption with his parents.
It was a pointless exercise. Some things were simply carved into your bones, no amount of
nurture could overcome it.
He didn’t remember what they had to say on the matter, only his own words.
Those words were now like sharp slaps on his own face.
He should’ve known… His younger brother’s personality really was just like their parents:
he was prudent with few words, preferred the quiet, and was an avid reader. But Jiang
Cheng was the opposite, though it wasn’t like he was a chatterbox either…
Even their neighbour said at one point, that he didn’t seem like part of the same family.
Right… the incompatibility was built into him.
There was suddenly a torrent of coughs from Li Baoguo, as if he had choked on something.
It went on for a long time without pause, Jiang Cheng thought he must be awake this time,
then immediately heard the sound of cursing.
Not long after that the snores started up again.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a rush of fear.
It was a sense of horror that also brought with it an intense feeling of suffocation.
He stood up and grabbed the keys in the living room, wanting to go and make a copy for
himself. Perhaps look for a hospital while he was out, to get himself looked at. He really
wasn’t feeling too well, perhaps he had a fever.
Gu Fei was crouching beside a flower pot outside the store, watching Gu Miao streak past
him for the third time, as if showing off. The cold made her face almost bright red.
When she passed him for the fourth time, Gu Fei waved at her. Gu Miao made a sudden turn
and slowly rolled to a stop in front of him.。
“It’s time to go home for lunch,” Gu Fei stood up. “Go put your stuff away.”
Gu Miao walked into the store, skateboard in tow.
He lit up a cigarette and pondered what to make for lunch.。
A minute later the sound of Gu Miao’s scream rang out from inside the store.
In a flash he threw out the cigarette, shot up and dashed inside.
The screaming was coming from the washroom at the back. He went out the back and
pushed open the washroom door, Gu Miao was standing there
screaming at the sink with her hands over her eyes.
Gu Fei reached out a hand to turn off the water and carried her out of the washroom, all the
while gently patting her back, “Shh… quiet now, there’s no more water, no water…”
Gu Miao eventually stopped screaming, and said quietly with her hands around his neck,
“Hungry.”
“I’m hungry too.” Gu Fei held her in one arm and picked up the skateboard with
his free hand. “Let’s have a feast.”
Footnote
[1] a green hat is widely known as the symbol for being a cuckold, mostly used on men.
Obviously this does not apply to Gu Miao in any way, but people just shirk away from green
hats out of reflex. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5582
TL word count: 4064
TL time: 6:69:53
Edit: 1:41:27
Curse words: 2x fucks, 3x shits

Chapter 4
“He killed his own dad!”
Gu Fei brought the motorcycle around outside the store, and Gu Miao deftly climbed onto
the backseat with her skateboard in her arms, then grabbed onto Gu Fei’s sides and pressed
her face against his back.
“Let me see your face.” Gu Fei turned around.
Gu Miao tilted her face up at him.
“There’s still tears, give it a wipe.” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, then rubbed her nose with her sleeve.
“Ay……” Gu Fei sighed. “Even if you were a boy, you’d be the most rough and tumble kind.”
Gu Miao smiled and pressed her face against his back again.
Gu Fei set out with the motorcycle, heading straight for the shopping centre downtown. For
Gu Miao, a so-called feast could only mean the all-you-can-eat barbeque in the shopping
centre.
The little girl had a remarkable stubbornness when it came to certain things, one of which
was the insistence on only ever eating at one restaurant when they went out.
One of the benefits of a small city was that there was only one downtown, which didn’t take
very long to get to, no matter which neighbourhood you were starting from.
Although at this hour, it was the busiest time in the barbeque restaurant. There were
hardly any free tables left by the time they got there.
“Do you have any specials today?” Gu Fei asked the server, and pulled out his phone to
check for coupons. He flicked Gu Miao’s head once. “You, go find a table.”
Gu Miao set the skateboard on the floor and put one foot on it, but he quickly stepped on it
with his own, “Walk.”
“Do you need to keep the skateboard at the front counter?” The server smiled and asked.
Gu Miao shook her head, swiftly bent down, grabbed her board, and held it tight in her
arms.
“She’ll hold onto it herself.” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao ran inside with the skateboard.
“Geez, you’re making me hungry.” Pan Zhi gulped and said. “I’m serious, I’ll go visit you in a
couple days, and you can take me out to eat. There’s no way we can get all that food here at
that price.”
“Did your family donate all their money to charities during the New Year or something?”
Jiang Cheng held the phone between his head and his neck. He had a plate in one hand, a
pair of tongs in the other, and was methodically filling his plate: pork belly, fatty veal, pork
belly, fatty veal…… Frankly no matter how wide the selection was, it was all the same to
him. These were the things he most liked to eat.
“That’s not the same,” Pan Zhi said, his voice sounded down. “We agreed last semester to
eat barbeque together, but now not only did I not get the meat, you also went ahead and
disappeared on me.”
“You can stay at a hotel when you get here,” Jiang Cheng put the tongs down, stacked
another empty plate on top of the one piled with meats, and continued.
“And book it yourself. I don’t have the motivation to do anything these days.”
“But I can just stay with you.” Pan Zhi said.
“No,” Jiang Cheng frowned. Where he was living now, he didn’t even want to stay there any
more than he had to. “Just book a standard room, and I’ll go find you.”
“……Is your relationship with your biological dad not so good?” Pan Zhi thought about it for
a second.
“There is no relationship to speak of just yet,” Jiang Cheng carried the two plates of meat,
and went to grab a bottle of beer. “So there’s no telling if it’s good or bad……”
When he got back to his own table, he froze.
The table was a four-seater, which currently had a skateboard on one of the chairs, and a
bald little person in blue clothes on another. On the table was a……
green knitted hat adorned with pink flowers.
“Gu Miao?” Jiang Cheng looked at her in shock.
Gu Miao nodded, and didn’t seem at all surprised. She took the skateboard and put it under
the table.
“You……” He set his plates down on the table, and noticed that Gu Miao was already staring
at the grill in anticipation. He reached out a hand and waved it in front of Gu Miao’s eyes.
“Who did you come with?”
Gu Miao stood up and pointed toward the door, then waved her hands.
When Jiang Cheng turned toward where she was pointing, he spotted an equally surprised
Gu Fei.
“We’ll find a different table,” Gu Fei walked over. “Gege is already sitting here.”
Gu Miao took one look around, gulped, and continued to sit without moving.
“The server just told me that there’s still a few tables over on that side,” Gu Fei pointed to
the inside. “We’ll go sit over there.”
Still, Gu Miao sat without moving. She tilted her face up and held his gaze with no
expression on her face, who knew what she was trying to say.
Gu Fei remained in a deadlock with her for a few seconds, then turned and glanced at Jiang
Cheng.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“You’re by yourself?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mnn.” Jiang Cheng answered, and sat down.
The server came and turned on the range, then laid down some paper. He picked up a few
slices of meat and placed it on the grill, getting ready to brush on some marinade.
“Then how about……” Gu Fei seemed to be hesitating, it took him a long time to finish the
sentence. “Together?”
Jiang Cheng lifted his eyes and peered at him. To be quite honest, he very much wanted to
say “aha in your dreams why don’t you go and wash the duvet cover first”.
But Gu Miao was still sitting across the table with her two large eyes on her newly shiny
head looking at him, so he couldn’t very well let those words come out. He brushed some
marinade onto the meat, then nodded.
“Thanks.” Gu Fei said, then pointed at Gu Miao. “Sit here and wait for me, I’m going to get
food.”
Gu Miao nodded.
After Gu Fei walked away, Jiang Cheng placed another two slices of fatty veal
onto the grill, and asked Gu Miao, “Which one do you like? There’s pork belly and fatty
veal.”
Gu Miao pointed at the fatty veal.
“Pork belly is good too, wait till it’s sizzling hot with grease seeping out…… I can eat five or
six plates of it.” Jiang Cheng flipped the meat over, and brushed on some oil. “Can you
handle spice?”
Gu Miao shook her head.
Jiang Cheng put a slice of finished veal on the place in front of her, “Eat up.”
Gu Miao was a little hesitant. She turned and looked in the direction where Gu Fei went.
“It’s fine……” Before Jiang Cheng finished the sentence, he noticed with a start a line of very
obvious scar on the back of Gu Miao’s head. Just eyeing it, he figured it was at least 5
centimeters long. He was shocked.
Gu Miao didn’t spot Gu Fei, so she turned back around and stuffed the slice of veal into her
mouth, and smiled at him.
“Try a pork belly?” Jiang Cheng asked her.
Gu Miao nodded.
He picked up a slice of pork belly and set it down in front of her, and put the hat that was on
the table onto the chair beside her. He couldn’t help but cluck his tongue, “Who bought this
for you?”
Gu Miao kept her head down and munched on the meat silently.
Thou shalt not speak while eating. [1]
This little girl was probably the only person he had ever met who executed this policy to
perfection.
Gu Fei quickly came back with their food. Though he was clearly not as skilled as Jiang
Cheng when it came to grabbing food, one trip and he only managed to bring back three
plates. If Jiang Cheng wasn’t talking to Pan Zhi on the phone just then, he could easily have
taken six plates, throw some fruits in there at the end and that was that.
Their table was next to the wall, Gu Miao was happily eating away on the aisle seat across
from him, while Jiang Cheng was sitting in the seat by the wall. Gu Fei hesitated for a
moment, then sat down next to him.
Jiang Cheng was just about to reluctantly take his food and grill it for him, when
Gu Fei reached out and gently poked Gu Miao on the head, “If you want drinks go get it
yourself.”
After Gu Miao stood up and walked toward the drinks counter, Gu Fei quickly got up and
sat down across the table.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then continued to grill his pork belly and fatty veal.
“You’re eating such greasy foods while still running a fever?” Gu Fei asked.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng stilled his hands, and watched as Gu Fei grilled his rice cakes. “And you
know?”
“You were burning my hand when I dragged you inside, how could I not.” Gu Fei said.
“Drag?” Uncontrollably, an image popped up in Jiang Cheng’s mind of himself being dragged
by the hair into the store like an old sack.
“What, was I supposed to bridal-carry you instead.” Gu Fei picked up two pieces of bacon
and placed it on the grill. They each took up one side, and appeared to be in harmony.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure how to continue the conversation, so he ate a piece of pork belly
instead.
Gu Miao came back with a few bottles in her arms. She set the bottles of beer one by one
onto the table, all four of them, all opened, plus a glass of orange juice.
“Quite impressive, you are.” Jiang Cheng looked at her in surprise. “Didn’t spill it all over the
floor?”
Gu Miao shook her head and sat down by the table, then pushed a bottle of beer and the
glass of orange juice in front of him.
“I don’t……” He was just about to tell Gu Miao to drink the orange juice herself, but as he
opened his mouth, Gu Miao already grabbed a bottle of beer and poured it into her own
glass. “You……”
Gu Miao picked up the glass and took a big gulp, let out a satisfied sigh, and wiped her
mouth with the back of her hand.
Jiang Cheng looked to Gu Fei, and found that he was in the middle of wrapping a lettuce leaf
around a piece of pork belly, without so much as a glance in Gu Miao’s direction.
“She drinks?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but ask.
“Mhm, only when eating barbeque,” Gu Fei held the rolled up lettuce wrap in front of Jiang
Cheng. “Normally she doesn’t drink.”
Jiang Cheng stared at the lettuce wrap.
Gu Fei didn’t speak, just continued to hold it.
“……Thanks.” He could only accept it and take a bite.
“Doesn’t it feel greasy to eat pork belly by itself?” Gu Fei asked.
“It’s alright, I quite like it.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei put together two more wraps for Gu Miao, then asked, “You’re not from around here,
right? Based on your accent.”
“No.” Jiang Cheng answered. At the mention of this, he suddenly felt a slight irritation. The
annoyance that had so reluctantly been suppressed by pork belly and fatty veal was trying
hard to rear its head once more.
“What’s your relation to Li Baoguo?” Gu Fei continued to ask.
Jiang Cheng paused, how did Gu Fei know about Li Baoguo? But this confusion was quickly
overcome by his annoyance, “What’s it to you?”
Gu Fei lifted up his eyes and peered at him, then smiled without a word. He raised up a
bottle of beer and clanked it gently against the bottle in front of Jiang Cheng, took a sip,
then continued grilling meat.
It was the first time Jiang Cheng sat down to eat at a table face to face with a stranger. He
hadn’t felt like talking, but now he really had nothing to say.
Across the table, Gu Fei didn’t seem to be in a talking mood either, while the little sister Gu
appeared to be an actual mute; she was quite happy alternating between bites of meat and
swigs of beer.
In silence, Jiang Cheng finished four plates of meat while feeling like his head was about to
burst. It seemed like Gu Miao ate about as much as he did, Gu Fei had to go top up several
times.
Only after Jiang Cheng finished eating did she put down her chopsticks, leaned back in the
chair, and rubbed her belly.
“Full?” Gu Fei asked.
She nodded.
“You can eat way more than your brother.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but dole out this
judgment.
“How did you get here?” Gu Fei set down his chopsticks as well. “We can take you back, it’s
on the way.”
“Motorcycle?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mmn.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Drunk driving and over capacity?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He stared at Jiang Cheng for a long time with what seemed like
mockery or some other stupid thing in his eyes, then at last patted Gu Miao’s shoulder,
“Let’s go.”
After Gu Fei left with Gu Miao, Jiang Cheng got up and filled another half a plate with meat,
and took a small basket of lettuce leaves.
The pork belly lettuce wrap Gu Fei made him earlier was pretty good, it was crisp,
refreshing and not greasy.
After finishing this half plate of meat, he figured he might have to go back on foot in order
to walk all this off.
But it was way too cold outside. He shivered behind the thick curtain at the door of the
shopping center, and took his phone out to call a rideshare, though five minutes went back
and nobody accepted his fare.
It was then that Pan Zhi called him again, “There’s two stations on this line, with different
times too, which station should I buy the ticket for?”
“East,” Jiang Cheng said. “I only know the East Station.”
“Alright,” Pan Zhi said. “Come pick me up tomorrow afternoon at 4 o’clock.
Send me your address later, I’ll look up the hotels nearby.”
“There probably aren’t any,” Jiang Cheng recalled the general vibe of the area, and felt like it
didn’t seem like a place that would have hotels. “Just go ahead and book anywhere, it’s not
a very big city anyway.”
After he hung up, a driver finally picked up his fare. As Jiang Cheng sat down inside the car,
he felt unwell all over.
This must be what they called the condition of acclimatizing to the environment.
He, a person who rarely caught colds normally, had suddenly become a delicate flower
after a change of environments. After fumbling around all morning and even eating his
favourite foods, he was still showing no sign of getting better, he was practically wilting at
this point.
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and sighed.
It would appear that everyone who hid inside over the New Year were coming outside
these days, the roads were jammed with cars. The driver was trigger-happy with the gas
pedal, alternating frequently between accelerating and hard-braking. Not even ten minutes
into the ride, Jiang Cheng already felt his stomach churning.
It wasn’t a long journey, perhaps half an hour in total, but as soon as he saw the
intersection that led to Gu Fei’s store, he simply could not take it anymore. He couldn’t even
open his mouth to speak, only managed to slap the inside of the car door a few times.
“Here?” The driver asked.
He nodded, then banged the door a couple more times.
The driver stopped the car, and he bounded out the door as though propelled by the power
of farts, then rushed to a garbage can by the side of the road and started puking.
It was such a devastating scene that he couldn’t even bear to watch.
After this topsy turvy bout, he felt like his insides had finally calmed down. The only thing
that remained was an explosive headache. Leaning against the wall with one hand, he
fished for a pack of tissue in his pocket, but after rummaging for a minute he still couldn’t
manage to pull anything out.
Just as his temper was about to flare all the way from the sole of his feet, a small arm
reached in from one side, with a few pieces of tissue in hand.
He grabbed the tissue, covered his mouth, and wiped it a few times before glancing off to
the side.
The universe certainly was not lacking in coincidences.
Gu Miao was standing beside him wearing her green hat, and three steps behind her stood
Gu Fei with an expression like he was watching something
entertaining.
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng nodded toward Gu Miao. It was rather dispiriting, to be in this
place where he was embarrassed, but couldn’t simply turn and walk away, or say
something like “what the fuck are you looking at”.
Gu Miao reached out a hand and grabbed his, pulling it forward, probably wanting to help
him walk.
“That’s not necessary.” Jiang Cheng pulled his hand away.
Gu Miao grabbed his hand again, still trying to help.
“It’s really not necessary, I’m fine.” Jiang Cheng said.
When he tried to take his hand away again, Gu Miao held on tight and didn’t let go.
“Er-Miao……” Gu Fei walked up to them.
Still Gu Miao didn’t let go.
Jiang Cheng had no idea how to communicate with her, the various little irritations had
converged to this point, and he forcefully shook off Gu Miao’s hand in annoyance, “I said I
don’t need your help!”
Gu Miao didn’t move, her hand was still raised in the air; she was frozen in place.
Before Jiang Cheng’s guilt had time to spread and fester, he felt a sudden pressure on his
throat, as Gu Fei yanked on his collar from behind and forced him to stumble.
“Fuck……” He turned, and at the same time his elbow went back in a strike.
Gu Fei caught the elbow with one hand, and tightened the grip on his collar.
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to back up close and cozy with Gu Fei.
The choke on his throat made him feel nauseous again.
“She likes you a lot,” Gu Fei said into his ear in a low voice. “But sometimes she has trouble
reading other people’s emotions, I beg your pardon, and ask that you try to be
understanding.”
Jiang Cheng wanted to blurt out that I fucking lived for 17 years and had never before seen
someone beg my pardon in this manner, but that would be too many words. Instead, he
only managed to squeeze out four words from between his teeth, “I’m about to puke.”
Gu Fei let go.
Jiang Cheng braced himself against the wall and dry heaved a couple of times with no
result.
Gu Fei handed him a bottle of water, he accepted it and took in a couple of big gulps, then
after recovering looked over at Gu Miao, “I’m fine, I can walk on my own.”
Gu Miao nodded, and retreated to Gu Fei’s side.
“I’m going.” He threw the half finished bottle of water into the garbage, then turned and
walked toward the intersection ahead.
Fuck!
When he got back to Li Baoguo’s place, the first thing that hit Jiang Cheng when he opened
the door was the aroma of food cooking.
Li Baoguo was standing in the living room, calling someone on this phone.
Jiang Cheng was just about to say something, when the phone in his pocket rang.
He pulled it out and saw that the caller ID belonged to Li Baoguo, “You……”
Li Baoguo turned around when he heard the ringtone, and yelled with his usual loud voice,
“Hey! When did you get back, I was just calling you!”
“Just walked through the door,” Jiang Cheng closed the door. “You…… didn’t hear?”
“My hearing isn’t the best,” Li Baoguo pointed to his ears. “Gotta turn my head toward the
sound to hear clearly.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Where did you go?” Li Baoguo went into the kitchen and brought out a crock of soup. “I’ve
been here waiting for you to eat lunch for a while.”
“I……” Jiang Cheng hesitated, and didn’t mention that he already ate AYCE
barbeque. “Went to the hospital.”
“The hospital?” Li Baoguo immediately started hollering again, as he reached over and felt
around Jiang Cheng’s face. “You’re sick? Where does it hurt? Got a fever? Is it because
you’re not used to the new environment?”
“Already took some medicine, it’s not a big deal.” Considering this meal in front of him,
Jiang Cheng tried hard to tolerate the dirty yellow hand that stunk of cigarettes, and didn’t
slap it away with his hand.
“Let me tell you, if you’re not feeling well, you don’t have to go to the hospital.
There’s a community clinic on the next street over, it’s pretty good,” Li Baoguo said. “Only
the exterior is a little too far in to be noticed easily, it’s next to the little grocery store.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng pondered for a moment. “The little grocery store? Is it Gu Fei’s……”
“How do you know Gu Fei?” Li Baoguo turned and looked at him in shock.
“You just got here, and already you’re hanging out with him?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t bother to explain. “I went there to buy some stuff this morning.”
“I’m telling you,” Li Baoguo’s voice got louder, even though his voice had always been
pretty loud, this time it was especially boisterous. “Don’t get mixed up with him, that little
fella is bad news!”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng took off his jacket and tossed it into his room.
Li Baoguo watched him, probably waiting for him to ask why. After a while, when he didn’t
say anything, Li Baoguo leaned in again, and said with his face full of gossip, “Do you know
why he’s bad news?”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng really had no interest in all this, but still went along and asked.
“Because he killed his own dad!” Li Baoguo said. Since he was leaning a little close, his
excited spittle sprayed over half of Jiang Cheng’s face.
Jiang Cheng jumped up from the chair to get out of the way, and roughly rubbed his face a
few times, then just as he was about to erupt, it suddenly registered in his mind, “What?
Killed who?”
“His own dad!” Li Baoguo said half yelling. “Drowned his own father.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him in silence. Based on the gleeful expression on Li Baoguo’s face, he
knew that if he wanted to, they could spend a whole afternoon talking about this kind of
gossip.
Too bad Jiang Cheng didn’t believe it.
“Wouldn’t he have to go to jail for patricide.” He sat back down by the table, and pinched
the area between his brows, it felt distended.
“It was all those years ago, what jail,” Li Baoguo also sat down. “Plus there were no
witnesses.”
“Ah, so nobody saw it……” Jiang Cheng smirked.
“We all know what happened, when the police arrived his dad was in the lake, and he was
standing on the shore, with that expression……” Li Baoguo clucked his tongue several times
in a row. “It’s obvious that he did it…… Come on and eat up, see if the food is to your taste?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t respond, just picked up a piece of short rib.
“He did it for their Er-Miao,” Li Baoguo probably saw that Jiang Cheng didn’t believe him, so
he added as a way of boosting his credibility. “His dad slammed her so hard there was
blood all over her head, after that she didn’t even know how to talk anymore.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng answered as he chewed on the rib, and recalled the shocking
scar on the back of Gu Miao’s head.
Footnotes:
[1] A Confucian teaching
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 5551
* TL word count: 4048
* TL time: 3:42:25
* Edit: 0:42:47
* Curse words: 4x fucks
TL’s Notes
Ha, what a grumpy boy
Chapter 5
Jiang Cheng felt like he almost dislocated his jaw from the shock.
When Pan Zhi’s call came in, Jiang Cheng was still sleeping as though he was in hibernation.
His cell phone sang for a long time before he finally picked it up groggily, “……Hmm?”
“Fuck, I knew it.” Pan Zhi said. “Open your dog eyes and look at what time it is.”
“Is it four o’clock?” Jiang Cheng regained consciousness, and held the phone in front of his
face to look at the time, but his eyes were not yet awake, everything was a blur.
“It’s already three-thirty!” Pan Zhi said. “I knew you’d be like this, so I’m calling you early.”
“There’s time still,” Jiang Cheng sat up. “I’ll be waiting for you outside the exit gates.”
“Which exit gate?” Pan Zhi asked.
“There’s only one exit in total.” Jiang Cheng looked out the window. Through the window
that was so dirty it was practically frosted glass, he could see that the weather was pretty
good today, everything was swathed in glittering gold.
“Talk later.”
After he put on clothes and got out of bed, he felt that he was in much better shape today.
Other than not getting quite enough sleep, the all-over terrible feeling he had yesterday and
the accompanying annoyance that made him want to beat up anyone he laid eyes on was
gone.
He checked the time again, he had slept from yesterday afternoon all the way until now, it
had been a whole day. He felt a little light on his feet.
Li Baoguo wasn’t home, who knew where he’d gone off to.
Jiang Cheng found this ‘home’ a little perplexing. At the time when his mom wanted to
reverse his adoption, Li Baoguo eagerly made several trips there, even though Jiang Cheng
hadn’t wanted to see him.
But now that he was here, Li Baoguo was not showing any of the keenness of wanting this
son back here.
And ass for the rumoured older brother and sister, he’d already been here for two
days, and they were still nowhere to be found.
Jiang Cheng was not at all interested in this new ‘home’, nor did he have any kind of
expectations. However, it was still not a great feeling to wake up at any given time, every
day, and find oneself alone in a totally lifeless dwelling..
If this place wasn’t in an apartment building, he would’ve thought it was a hundred-year
old ancient hut. A sense of unsustainable decay permeated within and without.
This was also the reason why he didn’t want Pan Zhi to stay here. Compared to his clean
and immaculate old room with a piano, Pan Zhi would have to bawl for two to three days at
the disparity.
Though to be honest, even if he didn’t bring Pan Zhi back here, the state of the East Station
alone would be enough to make Pan Zhi howl for a long while.
“Oh fuck,” Pan Zhi was dragging a large suitcase and carrying a large backpack.
He started lamenting at the first sight of Jiang Cheng. “Ah this place is kind of a little
unbearable!”
“You should head back then,” Jiang Cheng pointed at the ticket booth. “Hurry up, go buy a
ticket.”
“Where is our brotherly bond!” Pan Zhi said. “I came all this way dragging all these things
just to see you! Shouldn’t you be touched!”
“Touché.” Jiang Cheng said.
Pan Zhi glared at him, then after a long pause opened his arms, “I really am starting to miss
you.”
Jiang Cheng went over and gave him a hug, “I haven’t had a chance to.”
“Do you know why I’m your only friend?” Pan Zhi let go of him.
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Because you’re a dork.”
He had quite a few friends, but they were all of the non-essential kind. They hung out
together, trudged around together, if they ran into small trouble they swarmed like bees,
and if they ran into big trouble they dispersed like birds.
Only Pan Zhi, even though they only met in grade 9, and only got sorted into the same class
in the first year of high school. It hadn’t even been three years, but they were solid.
After coming to this shitty little city, the only person he had missed was Pan Zhi.
“Hey boss, you know where this is right?” Pan Zhi asked when they got in the
cab.
“How could I not,” The driver chuckled and said. “It’s the best hotel around here.”
“You sure know how to pick them.” Jiang Cheng threw him a glance.
“Do I even need to pick, their rooms are the most expensive.” Pan Zhi rummaged in his
pocket for a long time, then finally pulled out a lighter and placed it in Jiang Cheng’s hand.
“See if you like it?”
Jiang Cheng looked at the lighter, it was a style he liked. All sleek and bare with no
decorations, there were only two letters engraved at the very bottom. He leaned in close
and squinted, “What’s this you carved here? Police?” [1]
“J, C, the initials of your name,” Pan Zhi said. “Cool, huh.”
“……Real cool,” Jiang Cheng put the lighter in his pocket. “How long are you staying for?”
“Two days,” Pan Zhi sighed. “School’s starting soon.”
“What’s there to sigh about.” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s just annoying, going to class, writing tests, homework, question banks,” Pan Zhi
frowned. “If I absorbed everything without even trying like you, ranking in top ten without
even going to class, I wouldn’t sigh either.”
“Who said I don’t try,” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye. “It’s not like you didn’t know all the
times I stayed up all night studying for tests.”
“But the point is, it doesn’t make a difference even if I stayed up for 10 nights in a row.” Pan
Zhi dragged his voice, then sighed again. “Oh fuck, I know why I missed you so much. Now
that you’re gone, I have no one to show me the answers during tests!”
“Drop out then.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Where’s your humanity?” Pan Zhi glared at him.
Jiang Cheng smiled and didn’t answer.
Pan Zhi might not be happy with this little city, but he was satisfied with the hotel. After
they arrived at his room, he inspected one by one the bed, the shower, and the toilet, then
concluded, “Not bad.”
“Let’s go eat something,” Jiang Cheng checked the time. “Barbecue?”
“Mhm,” Pan Zhi opened his suitcase. “I have another present for you.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng replied, sitting down at the edge of the bed.
“Why don’t you take a guess?” Pan Zhi reached inside the suitcase and rummaged around.
Jiang Cheng swept his gaze over the suitcase. It was filled with small and large packages of
various snacks and food, it didn’t seem capable of holding anything else.
“A tin whistle.” He said.
“Shit,” Pan Zhi laughed, and pulled out a long black leather pouch from the very bottom.
“Was that too easy or are we just too in sync?”
“It’s way too easy.” Jiang Cheng accepted the pouch and pulled out a black tin whistle,
turning it over in his hands. “It’s nice.”
“Susato, in D.” Pan Zhi said. “I bought the right one, right? Isn’t it exactly the same as your
old one?”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng gave it a try. “Thanks.”
“Don’t smash it again, this one’s a gift from me.” Pan Zhi said.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng put the tin whistle back in its pouch.
He actually didn’t have a habit of smashing things when he got angry, after all, he was
someone who had been trained for almost two decades on the virtue of restraint.
Therefore, he would get into fights and beat people up, but he very rarely smashed things.
The only reason he broke his tin whistle before was because there was no other outlet to
vent his rage, it wasn’t like he could go and have it out with his pops.
Since he wasn’t going back tonight, he hesitated for a moment about whether to text Li
Baoguo or give him a call. At last he settled on calling, it took a long time before Li Baoguo
picked up the phone, “HELLO!”
He could tell from the noise that he was playing cards again. Jiang Cheng didn’t know what
to think. He wondered if his mom knew about this habit of Li Baoguo’s, however……
compared to the family dynamic ruined by his own very existence, perhaps this wasn’t a
big deal to her at all.
“I have a classmate who’s here to visit me, I’m not going back tonight, I’ll be staying at the
hotel.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ah a visiting classmate?” Li Baoguo coughed a few times. “Then go play with your friend,
why are you calling me, I thought something’s happened.”
“…… Bye then.” Jiang Cheng said.
Li Baoguo didn’t make another sound, he simply hung up.
“This dad of yours,” Pan Zhi looked at him. “What kind of person is he?”
“Dunno, he smokes, coughs, snores, and gambles.” Jiang Cheng summarized.
“But you smoke too, coughing…… who hasn’t coughed before……” Pan Zhi
attempted to analyze it. “Snor……”
“Are you done.” Jiang Cheng cut him off.
“Barbecue!” Pan Zhi waved his hand.
The barbecue wasn’t anything special, but Pan Zhi enjoyed it immensely. Jiang Cheng didn’t
eat as much as he did yesterday, after all, he was a delicate flower freshly recovered from
illness.
Though coming out of the barbecue restaurant, he still felt like he was bloated from eating
too much.
“You really are in a bad mood,” Pan Zhi said. “The pork belly today was pretty good, but you
ate only a little……”
“Good eye.” Jiang Cheng nodded. His mood wasn’t so low that he couldn’t get anything in,
but he didn’t want Pan Zhi to know he threw up the day before, on top of running a fever.
“Let’s walk for a bit,” Pan Zhi patted his stomach. “Is there anything fun around here?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng said, then added after a pause. “Dunno.”
“Hey, where’s your new school at?” Pan Zhi said suddenly. “Let’s go check it out?”
“Now?” Jiang Cheng tugged at his collar. “Nope.”
“Tomorrow then, it’s Winter break anyway, it’s not like there’s gonna be anyone there. Let’s
go see what the school is like,” Pan Zhi put an arm around his shoulder. “Didn’t you go take
a look when you did the paperwork?”
“It’s not like you don’t know if I’ve been there or not.” Jiang Cheng was a little irritable.
“Oh right, you just got here.” Pan Zhi chuckled.
Both the new life and the new environment made him exasperated and unsettled, but Pan
Zhi did bring him a little solace. Amidst the strange and the unknown,
there was finally a familiar person by his side.
Jiang Cheng stayed up for almost the whole night chatting with Pan Zhi, though he couldn’t
remember what exactly they talked about. It was just like when they sat chatting on the
edge of the school field, talking about nothing and everything.
The topic of conversation wasn’t important, the important thing was having someone
around he could talk to in this way.
They finally dozed off for a while just before sunrise, then got woken up by the lorry horns
downstairs at just past 8.
“What the, aren’t we in the city?” Pan Zhi held on tightly to the duvet. “Since when could
lorries drive directly up to the entrance of a hotel?”
“Dunno.” Jiang Cheng kept his eyes shut.
“There’s breakfast, should I get them to send it now?” Pan Zhi asked him.
“Whatever,” Jiang Cheng said. “Did you fall asleep?”
“I might have,” Pan Zhi said while laughing. “What’s the plan for today?”
“Let’s go check out the school together,” Jiang Cheng said. “Then we can see if there’s
anything fun to do around here, though probably not in the dead of Winter.”
“It’s alright, I’m a person who’s very focused on the pleasure of the mind.” Pan Zhi said. “I
came here to see you, so I’m good as long as I’ve seen you.”
“How about I take a nap later, and you can pull up a stool and keep watching me.” Jiang
Cheng said.
“Hey,” Pan Zhi leaned in and stared at him for a while. “Have you not been talking very
much the last couple of days?”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng yawned.
“You’re talking more than you used to, have you been bottling it up?” Pan Zhi asked.
“…… Perhaps.” Jiang Cheng considered it. It might just be the case. He had nothing to say,
and nobody to say it to.
Looking at the new school on the map, it wasn’t very far from Li Baoguo’s place. And as to
what kind of school it was, Jiang Cheng hadn’t looked it up, and wasn’t especially keen to
find out.
The paperwork involved in the process of transferring high schools was a lot of hassle.
From the minute his parents started to tirelessly go through the
administrative process, he had lost interest in practically everything. He couldn’t even get
his spirit up for a fight.
It was as though something had been wrenched out of his body, he was like a pile of mud,
looking for an appropriate hollow in the ground to fill and stay there.
After looking up the route, Pan Zhi dragged him to the bus stop.
“Did you know, the view from a bus shows you the most authentic side of the city.” Pan Zhi
said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
“Don’t you think this is very profound.” Pan Zhi asked, rather proud of himself.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng continued to look at him.
Pan Zhi stared back at him for a while, “Oh. You’re the one who said this.”
Jiang Cheng shook his hand.
There weren’t that many people on the bus. The commute in a small city was clearly much
more relaxed, there were no scenes of people squished up against each other, no someone
else’s hair plastered all over your face, no instances when the bus was so crowded that you
couldn’t get on, and no instances where you might be physically squeezed off of a crowded
bus.
“This is much more comfortable than where we were.” Pan Zhi expressed his pleasure upon
getting off the bus, and checked the map on his phone. “Fourth High, go straight for 500 m
then make a turn.”
“They probably won’t let people enter.” Jiang Cheng tugged on his collar.
“Then we’ll just look around outside, and take a turn around the area. This is gonna be your
main domain of activity in the future.” Pan Zhi held his phone up to Jiang Cheng’s face and
tapped.
“What.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Just a photo,” Pan Zhi said. “Yu Xin heard that I’m coming here, and cried, yelled, and
kneeled down to beg me to take a photo of you for her. Thing is, I find it really hard to turn
a girl down……”
“She gave you money didn’t she.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yes.” Pan Zhi nodded solemnly.
Jiang Cheng looked at him and failed to hold in his laugh, “Shameless.”
“Are the two of you really done? I thought she was pretty alright.” Pan Zhi snapped another
couple of photos of him with the phone.
“There’s not much point.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Is it because she’s a girl, that’s why there’s no point?” Pan Zhi continued to point the
camera at him like it was an interview.
Jiang Cheng gave him a look and didn’t answer.
“I thiiink, if you can, then it’s still better to go with a girl. It’s too difficult to find a guy, and
the overall environment is still not the best for it.” Pan Zhi put away his phone. “Don’t be
fooled by the flocks of fujoshis on the internet, these people hardly count for anything
when you toss them into the masses in the real world.”
“You must’ve also been bottling up your words for a while huh.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ever since Winter break started and you disappeared from my view, I haven’t really talked
since.” Pan Zhi grabbed at his chest. “I’ve been so repressed I’ve bloated from an A to a B.”
“I can give you a bra set as a gift before you go home.” Jiang Cheng said.
“We’re here,” Pan Zhi pointed in front of them. “Fourth High…… The outside looks pretty
big, bigger than our school.”
The front gates were open. When they walked through the gates, the guard glanced at the
two of them but didn’t say anything.
“He doesn’t care?” Pan Zhi said.
“You’re unhappy that he doesn’t care?” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye. “Are you a
masochist or what.”
“Let’s take a stroll around.” Pan Zhi lifted his arms up and stretched.
“It’s……” Jiang Cheng took a look around. “Pretty big.”
“Has to be, it’s just our school that’s smack-dab in the heart of the city, where every inch is
worth its weight in gold, they can’t expand even if they want to.”
Pan Zhi said. “How great do you have it here, you probably have a large field too…… Let’s go
check out the gymnasium?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
The basketball courts were probably the thing he and Pan Zhi cared about the most. His old
school only had a couple of indoor basketball courts, even the
soccer field got plowed over to make space for the new lecture buildings.
Neither of them played soccer, but still felt annoyed by the decision.
In comparison, the fields at Fourth High were much more comfortable.
There was a soccer field where a bunch of people were playing a game, even though the
weather was freezing.
Beside it were two indoor basketball courts, and even a court for volleyball.
“It’s indoor, let’s go in and take a look?” Pan Zhi nudged him with his arm.
Jiang Cheng’s wretched mood over the last few days was very obviously soothed by the
state of the Fourth High campus. Compared to Li Baoguo’s home, and Li Baoguo’s street,
these wide open spaces gave him a sense of ease, as though he was finally able to catch a
proper breath again.
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath in, then let it out, before patting Pan Zhi’s
shoulder, “Let’s go.”
The indoor courts weren’t very large, but there was space for volleyball, badminton, and
basketball. They just had to be repurposed at times.
There were people on both courts. Seeing the newcomers come in, they all turned to look
this way.
Pan Zhi stopped walking, but Jiang Cheng ignored the gazes. He stuffed his hands in his
pockets, sauntered leisurely over to the benches by the courts, and sat down.
It had been a long time before he played ball, he wanted to scratch the itch by watching
others play.
The people on the court looked at them for a while, then went back to playing.
“Could this be their school team holding practice?” Pan Zhi asked as he sat down beside
him.
“Can’t be,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s amateur level.”
“Wanna go play a few rounds?” Pan Zhi smiled and said. “We can duo.”
Jiang Cheng stuck his foot in front of Pan Zhi and wiggled it. He was wearing casual shoes
today.
“Ayy,” Pan Zhi leaned back with his arms behind his head. “Who knows when we can play
together again.”
“Don’t change your style, it doesn’t suit you.” Jiang Cheng said. Somebody on
the court scored an impressive 3-pointer, he called out not very loudly. “Nice shot.”
The person glanced at him, then smiled as he clamped his fist at him.
Even though he wasn’t playing, just sitting by the court with Pan Zhi watching people play
gave him a brief feeling of respite, it cut away all the little snippets of irritation from his
mind.
As long as he didn’t pause to think about going back to his bleak life after Pan Zhi leaves
tomorrow.
He was rather engrossed in the game on the court, that he didn’t even notice when more
people entered the gymnasium. It wasn’t until the guys on the court stopped and looked
collectively at the door with incomprehensible expressions, that he finally snapped out of
it.
“Why do I feel like there’s going to be some action?” Pan Zhi whispered excitedly beside
him.
“What……” Jiang Cheng turned to look, and froze. “Action?”
One two three four five six, a total of six people had walked in.
Jiang Cheng felt like he almost dislocated his jaw from the shock.
Not, A, Good, Bird, were four. Behind them was the one who cashed him out when he
bought water the other day, followed by Gu Fei wearing a baseball cap bringing up the rear.
The hat covered the snazzy music symbols on his head.
Jiang Cheng was a little impressed with his own ability to remember faces, that he could
remember the faces of all these people when he was almost delirious with fever.
In a strange city, and a strange school, to simultaneously run into six strangers he had met
once before; it was a real miracle.
Jiang Cheng thought he must’ve been infected by Pan Zhi. He watched these guys approach
with the mentality of expecting some great drama to unfold It looked like they’d come here
to play. Gu Fei was wearing track pants and sneakers, and one of the other guys even had a
ball in his hand.
“Da-Fei?” Someone spoke up on the court.
“Ah.” Gu Fei answered.
“What are you here for?” The guy asked.
“To play ball of course.” Gu Fei said, his voice even and calm, without even a hint of
hostility.
“……Are all of you coming on?” The guy hesitated for a beat, then asked.
“The sick, weak, injured, and elderly are staying off.” Gu Fei said, then took off his jacket.
Just as he turned and was about to toss it onto the bench, he spotted Jiang Cheng sitting
there, and suddenly choked on his own saliva. He coughed for a long time, while still staring
at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng contained his expression of “wanting to see some action but so disappointed
that the action ended before it even started”, “What a coincidence.”
“Good morning.” Gu Fei said.
“Are they with you?” Someone on the court asked.
“No.” Jiang Cheng replied.
Out of Gu Fei’s group, three of them decided to play, while the remaining three came over
to sit beside Jiang Cheng and Pan Zhi.
The one who cashed him out sat down next to Jiang Cheng, and reached out a hand to him,
“My name is Li Yan.”
“Jiang Cheng,” Jiang Cheng lightly slapped his hand, then pointed to Pan Zhi.
“My bro, Pan Zhi.”
“Are you both from Fourth High?” Li Yan looked the two of them over.
“Haven’t seen you guys before.”
“I will be.” Jiang Cheng didn’t want to go into too much detail. “You’re all from Fourth
High?”
The two guys behind them started laughing. Perhaps it wasn’t intentional, but their voices
were tinged with a habitual mockery. Li Yan turned and glanced at them, “Do we look like
students?”
“Who knows,” Jiang Cheng was a little annoyed. “I don’t make a habit of staring at every
single person I come across.”
Li Yan’s face suddenly dropped. He turned back to watch the people on the court, and no
longer paid him any heed.
The guys behind must not have perceived the atmosphere between them, as one of them
piped up, “Da-Fei is in second year.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied.
What a coincidence indeed.
Footnotes:
[1] JC: Same initials as jing cha [警察], which is police. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5670
TL word count: 3952
TL time: 5:43:47
Edit: 1:17:12
Curse words: 3x fucks, 2x shits
TL’s Notes
They meet again! Jiang Cheng is still a grumpy thorny boy, Li Yan is turned off by his attitude,
and Pan Zhi is the best friend of the century!
Chapter 6
My balls are busted, I no longer exist in this world.
Jiang Cheng had his arms crossed and legs stretched out in front of him. He was a little
displeased.
The guys who were playing before were only mediocre at best; if he was wearing the
proper shoes today, he could even partner up with Pan Zhi and take them on two against
five easy. However, it was kind of fun watching them play, he enjoyed the feeling of
superiority, as though he was standing at the highest peak looking down.
But once Gu Fei and his friends went on, the whole atmosphere changed.
Because Gu Fei…… was very good. If this was at his old school, he would definitely be the
kind that got all the girls screaming during the citywide tournaments. Beside him, the “A”
and “Bird” of the “Not A Good Bird” also played pretty well. Unlike the way they slouched
and slumped like hooligans all over the chairs in the convenience store, their on-court
teamwork was exceptionally polished, almost making the remaining two players on their
team seem redundant.
Therefore to Jiang Cheng, watching this kind of game didn’t give him a sense of superiority
at all.
He didn’t harbour any particular dislike toward Gu Fei, though neither did he have a very
good impression either. At this moment, his mind was torn between thinking heyyy this
fucker’s pretty good at this and forcefully correcting himself with pretty good my ass it’s all
surface level showing off……
“This guy’s pretty good huh,” Pan Zhi said without a slightest bit of synchronicity. “How do
you know him?”
“He’s just about average compared to our old team.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ooh, you’re on the basketball team?” Before Pan Zhi was able to answer, Li Yan spoke up
beside them, his voice taunting. “How about we get one of the guys on the other team to
switch off, and you cango on?”
Jiang Cheng turned and gave him a look, “No.”
“No?” Li Yan blinked, probably assuming he would for sure rise to the challenge, he didn’t
expect him to say no. “Why?”
“Guess.” Jiang Cheng stood up and walked toward the exit.
Pan Zhi raised his arms up in a stretch, then stood up and followed, leaving the others
sitting there in confusion.
“This mood of yours certainly came out of nowhere,” Once outside the gymnasium, Pan Zhi
drew his neck back in the cold. “You got beef with that guy?”
“This is my third day here.” Jiang Cheng said.
“True, it hasn’t been long enough for you to make any enemies.” Pan Zhi sighed. “Although
right now, you’d get pissed at anyone who crossed your path.”
“You’re alright.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
Pan Zhi laughed, “Ay, for real, how do you know that guy? Is he also a junior?”
“…… A neighbour.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Same building as you?” Pan Zhi asked.
“The next street over.” Jiang Cheng answered simply.
“Ah.” Pan Zhi said.
He felt like Pan Zhi might not be able to immediately grasp the concept. They both grew up
in gated residential communities, wherein there were only two types of neighbours: those
who lived in the same building, and those who lived in the same residential community.
The first type you’d nod to in passing, and the second type you’d spare only a glance. [1]
The next street over. They’ve never even met neighbours like that before.
Jiang Cheng sighed softly. He felt a little like he was here to film an urban-country
exchange show.
“You got mountains here? Let’s go look at the snow.” Pan Zhi clapped his hands together.
“Hiking on a day as cold as this? Aren’t you afraid your brain would freeze over, not that it
works that well normally.” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not as if you haven’t seen snow before.”
“But there’s more snow here than where we were,” Pan Zhi slung an arm around his
shoulder. “Cheng-er, my dude, let me take you out to get some air. So you’ve had a change
of setting, what’s the big deal. So you’ve had a change of parents, what’s the big…… ok that’s
kind of a big deal, let’s see how I should phrase this……”
“Alright, let’s go hiking.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh. He flung his arm up and said,
“Hell, what’s the big fucking deal.”
After the game was done, Gu Fei felt like his whole body had been warmed up.
The lethargic feeling that’s been plaguing him for the last couple of days was finally gone.
He put on his jacket, and looked back at the guys on the court, their eyes were shining with
joy because he finally decided to leave, “Thanks.”
“Done playing?” Someone asked, out of habit.
“Did you wanna go again?” Gu Fei said.
They all went quiet, wearing the same awkward expression.
Gu Fei laughed and zipped up his jacket, “Let’s go.”
After they walked out of the gym, Liu Fan jumped up and skipped for a few steps, “No fun.
I suggested we go rent a court in the sports centre, but you had to come play at your
school.”
“How much more fun were you looking for exactly.” Gu Fei said.
“What’s the point of playing with highschoolers.” Liu Fan said.
“You’re only two years away from a highschooler yourself.” Li Yan gave him a side eye.
Gu Fei extended a middle finger in front of Liu Fan’s face, “If you can beat me one-on-one,
you can keep saying this all you want.”
They all laughed at that.
“Shit,” Liu Fan slapped his hand away. “Let’s go eat something, I’m hungry.”
“Count me out,” Gu Fei glanced at his phone. “I’m gonna head home.”
“To the store?” Li Yan asked. “Isn’t your mom watching the store today?”
“I have to take Er-Miao for a physical exam, we have a requisition from before, and the
appointment’s today.” Gu Fei said. “Every time she goes to the hospital I have to coax her
for a while, it’s real time-consuming.”
“We’ll come over and hang out tonight.” Liu Fan said.
“We’ll see,” Gu Fei pulled his keys out. “Bye now.”
“Don’t you usually just get up and leave,” Li Yan said. “What’s with all this affection today,
I’m not used to it.”
“You’re just asking for it.” Gu Fei turned and walked away.
When the days were meaningless and bleak, time passed slowly. But once it was imbued
with even the slightest meaning, time passed like the crashing of a waterfall, utterly
unstoppable.
 The happiness and ease Pan Zhi brought with him quickly came to an end.
“You’re really not gonna take the pile of snacks back?” Jiang Cheng stood in the lobby of the
train station, watching the departures and arrivals on the giant screen.
“If I said yes, will you go back to the hotel right now and retrieve them for me?” Pan Zhi
said.
“Don’t take it seriously, I was just making conversation.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“I brought those snacks here for you anyway, I was worried you won’t be able to find the
places to buy them here yet.” Pan Zhi sighed. “So, will you be going back for May 1st, or
should I come over again?”
“I’m not going back,” Jiang Cheng said. “I said I’m not going back there again.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re being so stubborn for.” Pan Zhi said. “I’ll come here then,
and bring those fuckers from our class too, how about that?”
“We’ll see when the time comes,” Jiang Cheng leaned against the wall. “It’s not like we were
all that close to begin with. After a few months, who knows if anyone is willing to come all
the way here, not like this is a tourist spot or anything.”
“Mn, we’ll talk about it then.” Pan Zhi nodded.
The two of them were quiet for a moment, then Pan Zhi, who had been sitting this whole
time stood up abruptly, staring face to face with Jiang Cheng.
“What the!” Jiang Cheng was startled, and pointed at him. “Keep your mouth to yourself! Or
I’ll smack you.”
“Give me a hug.” Pan Zhi opened his arms.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say, though he opened his arms and gave Pan Zhi a
hug.
“Don’t forget me,” Pan Zhi said. “I’m serious.”
Jiang Cheng let out a quiet sigh, “Come visit me for May 1st, and I won’t.”
Pan Zhi laughed out loud, “Alright.”
In the days before the start of the new semester, Li Baoguo cooked a total of one meal. He
was away during all the other meal times.
Jiang Cheng had originally thought he would try to make some noodles on his own, but his
motivation died as soon as he walked into the kitchen and saw the mess of pots and pans,
along with the various seasoning bottles covered in a thick coat of grease.
Over the last few days, he tried all the interesting looking names within a kilometer radius
in the food delivery app, and finally made it to the first day of school.
The day before school started, his new head teacher called, which was something Jiang
Cheng didn’t expect.
“Nobody’s been answering on your dad’s number.” The head teacher said.
Now that wasn’t a surprise, since Li Baoguo’s hearing wasn’t the greatest, and he was
preoccupied with mahjong all the time. Jiang Cheng passed by the building in which Li
Baoguo played, and every time he did, he could hear the raucous from all the way
downstairs.
The head teacher’s surname was Xu. Judging by his voice, he was of uncle age, and very
warm. It alleviated some of Jiang Cheng’s feelings of unease of facing a brand new
environment.
Snow had started falling from the dawn of the first day of school. It was just as Pan Zhi
said, he’d never seen snow like this before.
 It was rather satisfying.
Jiang Cheng paid a little more attention to the students around him as he walked through
the gates, and thought they all looked pretty much the same.
However, despite the fact that they were all highschoolers, despite the fact that he didn’t
recognize these faces any more than the faces at his old school, still, the sense of
foreignness was undeniable.
He even took special notice to see if Gu Fei’s face was among them. It was not.
“Jiang Cheng, not a bad name.” The uncle-like head teacher was indeed an uncle.
Apparently, he was also an uncle who’s had something to drink in the morning. “My
surname is Xu, full name Xu Qicai, I’ll be your head teacher; I teach Language Arts. My
students all call me Lao-Xu, or Xu-zong.”
“Lao-Xu…… zong.” Jiang Cheng bowed ever so slightly as he acknowledged him, but
couldn’t help feeling that something was off with this name.
“Let’s chat for a bit, the first class after the morning self-study period is Language Arts, I’ll
walk you over.” Lao-Xu gestured to a chair nearby. “Have a
seat.”
Jiang Cheng sat down.
“It’s pretty rare to see transfer students in junior year.” Lao-Xu smiled.
“Especially to a place like this…… I took a look at your old report cards, you got pretty good
grades eh.”
“Not bad I guess.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Not just not bad, they’re very good! No need to be humble.” Lao-Xu laughed, then sighed.
He said in a quiet voice. “It’s too bad you transferred here.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t respond, just looked at Lao-Xu.
His old head teacher had said the same thing: it’s too bad, the teaching resources and
quality of education aren’t good there…… Jiang Cheng didn’t expect Lao-Xu to say this too.
“I noticed that your science subjects are stronger than your liberal arts.” Lao-Xu said. “Why
did you choose to go into the Liberal Arts stream?”
It wasn’t an easy question to answer for Jiang Cheng. The answer that it was because both
his parents wanted him to pick the Science stream was so bursting with immaturity he
couldn’t bear to speak it aloud. Even though he’d done exactly that, saying it would still
make him feel like a colourful glistening dumbass.
After a lot of hesitation, he finally said, “I liked our head teacher, he led the Liberal Arts
class.”
“Ah, so that’s why,” Lao-Xu blinked. “Then I hope you will also like me, it’ll be a whole lot of
hassle to transfer to the Science stream now.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng stared at him.
Lao-Xu stared back at him for a while, then started laughing, and Jiang Cheng laughed
along. This head teacher was kind of interesting.
After the warning bell for the first class sounded, Lao-Xu stuck a briefcase under his arm
and a USB key into his pocket, “Come on, I’ll take you to class.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng slung his backpack onto his shoulder, and followed Lao-Xu out.
According to Lao-Xu, Fourth High as a school was nothing to write home about, but it had
a pretty big campus. Only, the buildings were organized in a rather strange manner. All
other classes were grouped by grade levels, except for junior and senior classes in the
Liberal Arts stream, which were singled out and
placed in an old three-story building. The stairs in the center served as a divide; to its left
were juniors, and to its right were seniors.
Jiang Cheng felt like he was quickly becoming a believer of destiny. Even on the matter of
transferring school, he still managed to end up in a run-down building. The floor turned out
to be all wood, it was so old and worn that the original colour was no longer recognizable, it
made one worry that a couple of hard stomps were all it would take to fall straight from
third floor to ground level.
“This building’s old,” Lao-Xu explained. “But don’t look down on its age, it’s very well
designed. In these classrooms, the teachers don’t have to use a mic or raise our voice for
students to hear us in the back.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Our classroom’s on the third floor,” Lao-Xu continued. “The height doesn’t grant you a
great view, but at least we can look out onto the field.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng continued to nod.
“So our school……” Lao-Xu kept talking as they walked, then after a turn in the stairwell,
suddenly yelled in a hushed voice. “Gu Fei! You’re late again!”
The name made Jiang Cheng’s eyebrow arch up instinctively, as he lifted his gaze. Ahead of
them, someone who had been slowly walking upstairs turned around, a bag of milk still
dangling from his mouth.
Even though the light was behind him, Jiang Cheng still recognized that it was indeed Gu
Fei, not just someone with the same name.
“Morning Xu-zong.” Gu Fei mumbled around the bag of milk, and swept his eyes over Jiang
Cheng’s face. He was probably as unsurprised as Jiang Cheng at this point about their
impromptu meetings.
“Why are you still loafing around when you’re late, why don’t you just crawl up the stairs!”
Lao-Xu pointed at him. “School only just started and already you’re slacking off!”
Gu Fei didn’t speak, just turned and ran up the stairs in a few strides, then disappeared
down the third floor corridor.
This Fourth High really could not compare to Jiang Cheng’s old school. The second bell had
already rung, and the teachers had already gone inside, yet the corridor was still filled with
students leaning against the railing and chatting, showing no intention of going inside.
There were a whole bunch of slackers on the juniors side, meanwhile, Jiang Cheng looked
toward the seniors side, it was the same picture of idleness. He
looked a little harder, but didn’t see the newly arrived Gu Fei among them.
Lao-Xu entered the classroom right by the stairs. As Jiang Cheng followed behind him, he
checked out the nameplate on the doorframe: Year Two (8).
Eight, not bad. Finally a good omen to get him by, even though he didn’t know how the “8”
was going to make him a fortune.
There were quite a few people standing outside Class-8 too, they didn’t stir when they saw
Lao-Xu walk into the room, but only when Jiang Cheng also walked in, did curiosity spur
them to finally go inside.
Lao-Xu stood at the lectern looking down at the dozens of students who couldn’t seem to
quiet down, and waited patiently for everyone to be quiet.
 The whole time, Jiang Cheng stood there beside him, on the receiving end of all the
different looks and hushed discussions.
He felt uncomfortable, even though he’d usually stare back at whoever was staring at him.
The typical “whatchu lookin at” never did have any effect on him.
However, right now with all these eyes on him, he was a little at loss for what to do. There
were too many targets, therefore it was easy to lose focus, all the faces blurred together.
Irritation wriggled around inside of him. He suppressed his temper and glanced toward
Lao-Xu, who was still standing there with a peaceful expression, looking out at the students
who could never be at peace.
He suddenly realized his judgment of this head teacher might have been a little off. He’s
not merely affable, he must be the kind of pushover who had no sway over his students at
all.
Another short while later, the noise in the room still showed no sign of stopping.
Struggling and toeing the line on the edge of an outburst, Jiang Cheng finally couldn’t help
but ask, “So we’re supposed to wait till all of them are quiet?”
Lao-Xu turned to him.
At the same time, the dozens of people who had been buzzing away like some kind of
demonic chanting suddenly went silent together.
It was a little difficult for Jiang Cheng to control his temper once it flared.
Normally, he tried to suppress it before he got really enraged, but if that didn’t work then it
sucks to be whoever’s on the receiving end of it.
And right now, being left here standing like a fool for at least three minutes, with all these
people’s eyes staring and blatantly discussing him, to him this was like setting off a pack of
dynamite right between his legs.
My balls are busted, I no longer exist in this world.
“Alright, let me introduce……” Lao-Xu smiled and clapped his hands.
“Jiang Cheng. Transferred here.” Jiang Cheng interrupted him in a dark voice.
“Can I sit down now?”
Lao-Xu blinked.
Someone in the room whistled, suddenly setting off another round of noise. A few louder
ones broke through the din, “Cocky, isn’t he!”
“Have a seat then, you sit……” Lao-Xu shifted his gaze toward the last row.
“Right there. Gu Fei, raise your hand for me.”
From the first row to the last row, the heads swiveled around one by one like the passing
of a baton, and Jiang Cheng’s eyes also followed them all the way to the back.
And landed on a desk in the last row, where Gu Fei had his foot propped against his desk
drawer, with half a fried dough fritter still between his teeth.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like there was a powerful force screaming inside of him, loudly
encouraging him to write a novel, the title of which would be “King of Tropes——Every
Coincidence On This Planet Belongs To Me”.
Gu Fei lifted a hand halfheartedly.
Jiang Cheng used to sit in the last row in his old school. Every week the seats in the class
would rotate to ensure everyone had a chance to sit in the front row, but he always
managed to switch back to the last row.
 He liked it there. It was quiet, often with no one to disturb him. It was also easy to take a
nap or sneak out the back door.
But sitting here the last row here was a little annoying.
None of the desks and chairs were lined up properly, and each seat had very little space;
his back was almost pressed up against the wall. On top of that, nobody was quiet.
There were people chatting, playing on their phone, not to mention the person sitting
beside him slowly and leisurely munching on a fried dough fritter.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to make of it. Despite the fact that in his old school, aside
from his grades, nothing about him was acceptable to his teachers, at the end of the day he
was still in a place that battled with other key high schools for graduation rates and elite
acceptance rates. He had truly never experienced an environment where class time felt like
attending a tea party.
He took out his textbook. The moment he flipped it open and prepared to listen to Lao-Xu
talk, he could almost feel himself becoming akin to a freak in these people’s eyes.
Gu Fei wasn’t chatting with anyone, nor did he sleep. He only took out a pair of earbuds,
stuffed them into his ears, and started listening to music.
A guy in the row in front of them started leaning back and pushing their desk, every time
he bumped it he would turn and call out, “Da-Fei.”
The desk swayed.
“Da-Fei.”
The desk swayed.
“Hey, Da-Fei.”
The desk swayed again.
“Da-Fei?”
Jiang Cheng stared at the words on the page, pondering the answer to the multiple choice
question of whether to smack this guy’s head with his hand or with a book. At last, he
reached over and yanked out Gu Fei’s earbuds.
Gu Fei glanced at him. He stared back without a word.
“Da-Fei, hey, Da-Fei.” The guy started pushing the desk again.
“Mn.” Gu Fei answered, still looking at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng looked back at him expressionlessly.
“Let me borrow your camera yeah? I’ll give it back to you tomorrow.” The guy in front of
them said.
“No.” Gu Fei turned away.
“Shit, don’t be stingy, I just need it to take a couple of photos.” The guy said.
“Go away.” Gu Fei said simply, then put his earbuds back in and continued to listen to
music.
“Just one evening,” The guy bumped the desk again. “I’ll return it first thing tomorrow.”
The desk swayed.
“Fucking hell, Da-Fei, Da-Fei……” The guy continued to bump the desk.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t understand why the guy must talk about this during class, why he
must do it while bumping his desk, and why he was so persistent even after being told no.
He also couldn’t understand why Gu Fei refused to lend out a camera, why he was so cold,
and why he was able to tolerate the desk having a seizure.
He lifted a leg and kicked it hard against the guy’s chair.
 It made a rather loud noise. “Whump!”
The kick made the guy fall forward abruptly and slam against his own desk.
“The fuck?” He whipped his head around.
All the eyes around them were suddenly drawn this way.
“Please don’t bump against the desk,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, and spoke in a level voice.
“Thank you.” The guy must’ve been a little shook, he opened his mouth, but no words
came out.
Footnotes:
[1] Residential compounds [小区]: Most city dwellers in China lived in
apartment/condo buildings, which were usually developed and built in a cluster of 3-10,
called residential compounds. The buildings within often share the same management,
security (if applicable), and sometimes have a committee made up of home owners. Often
times these communities will have some sort of
enclosure around them, with one or more gates.
Note: this is obviously not the case in the Steel Works neighbourhood. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5526
TL word count: 3882
TL time: 4:40:05
Edit time: 1:16:14
Curse words: 5x fucks, 3x shits, 2x asses
TL’s Notes:
_(:3∠)_
Chapter 7
“A round of applause please! Clap, clap, clap! Come on! “
Gu Fei lifted an eyebrow, took off his earphones, and turned to look at Jiang Cheng.
The kid really was covered in thorns, and it would seem that this outer layer did not
become any more restrained in a completely unfamiliar new environment.
Gu Fei watched with great interest at Zhou Jing in front of him, who was still in a state of
shock, with his mouth agape. If Gu Fei hadn’t already finished eating his eggs, he would
very much want to stuff one into Zhou Jing’s mouth right now.
Jiang Cheng certainly picked a good target for his kick, as Zhou Jing was an easily pushed
over annoying kid with no temper. If instead it was…… Gu Fei swept a glance to his right,
then they would be fighting right about now.
”What’s wrong? What’s going on?” Lao-Xu slapped the lectern. “We’re holding a lecture
here, Gu Fei, what are you doing?”
Gu Fei froze, pointed his finger at himself and mouthed, “Me?”
”Who else!” Lao-Xu said. “You must be feeling bored now that you finished your breakfast,
huh!”
Several desks around them all laughed, Gu Fei couldn’t help but laugh as well, then turned
to look at Jiang Cheng.
”What are you looking at him for,” Lao-Xu pointed at him. “The guy’s grades are eight
hundred and seventy-four whole blocks ahead of all of you!”
”Yo——” A round of shouts rang out in the class.
”Ah honour——student——”
”Lao-Xu finally found someone to focus his training on huh——”
Gu Fei sighed, Lao-Xu’s IQ was like a trainee teacher with a pure heart who had never
taught a bad class before. With this one sentence, he had set a three-foot-high barrier for
Jiang Cheng to integrate into his new class.
Jiang Cheng looked at Lao-Xu and seriously considered whether this man was an
undercover agent sent by his mom to torture him.
While he wasn’t afraid of any sort of provocation, nor did he make an effort to suppress his
temper since he walked into the classroom, still, he would rather not be praised for his
grades by the head teacher of a class that could only be described as rowdy.
The title of “overachiever” was practically a mockery.
”Alright,” Lao-Xu cleared his throat. “Let’s continue……we were just talking about……”
Jiang Cheng had not been listening to what Lao-Xu was saying up there, and now he gave
even less of a damn. He slumped over the desk and pulled out his phone.
In his old school, he had to sneak around like a thief every time he wanted to use his phone
in class: ringer off, volume on mute, then after he plugged in the headphones the cable had
to be snaked through his sleeve and held to his ear with his hand as cover.
The head teacher’s drawer had been akin to a second-hand sidewalk stall, filled with piles
of confiscated cell phones.
But Fourth High was different. Jiang Cheng shot a glance at Gu Fei, who had already set his
phone on the desk, and even propped it up with a kick-stand. He was very clearly wearing
earphones while leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed, watching a video.
Jiang Cheng flopped on his desk. Up on the lectern, Lao-Xu droned on like a monk chanting
scriptures, even the low frequency chatter around him sounded like chanting. Amidst this
noise, Jiang Cheng drifted in and out of consciousness for over half the class, then when he
could not suffer the boredom anymore, took out his phone to send Pan Zhi a message.
- grandson.
Pan Zhi quickly messaged back.
- Gramps, what class are you in, got time?
- Language arts, you?
- English, the old donkey gave us a pop quiz, killed me dead
- Not like it’s a formal exam, what’s the big deal
- I didn’t know a single question, but the old donkey said he wants to get a feel for our
foundation, I feel like he’s plotting something!
Pan Zhi had sent a photo along with this message. Jiang Cheng looked at it and
sighed. It was a page of multiple-choice questions, taken from a very tricky angle. He could
tell right away that Pan Zhi had taken it while running the risk of not seeing his phone
again before the summer break.
He glanced at the time and zoomed in on the picture, then grabbed a pencil and started
quickly writing the answers on a notebook as he read through the questions. Not two
questions later, Pan Zhi sent another three photos in a row.
Jiang Cheng peered at it, a little speechless. The little dude must’ve sent him all the
questions on the quiz.
- Wait
He sent a reply back to Pan Zhi, then continued to read through the questions.
Frankly these weren’t very difficult at all, he could almost guess at all the answers. He
wondered why Pan Zhi couldn’t make sense of a single one.
The classroom was still very noisy, Jiang Cheng admired Lao-Xu’s tolerance, perhaps
teachers who are used to teaching bad classes all have a strong tolerance.
He remembered the chemistry teacher they had in the freshman year of high school. Her
lectures weren’t very captivating, so people liked to chat in her class, the volume of which
was nothing compared to the noise in his ears at the moment, but it still angered her to
tears. If she was transferred here, she would surely cry herself into a transparent glass
flower.
Look at how powerful Lao-Xu is.
Jiang Cheng continued scribbling down the answers, while he lifted his eyes to look at the
teacher. Whether they were sleeping or chatting, as long as nobody got up to dance, Lao-Xu
wouldn’t even bother to pause.
Tsk tsk tsk.
Pan Zhi only sent him the multiple choice questions, which Jiang Cheng finished in very
little time. He glanced at the clock as he typed the answers into the chat box, it was still a
few minutes until the end of class, enough for him to copy everything down.
As for the other questions…… Pan Zhi had never bothered to write them, and sometimes he
was too lazy to even copy.
After sending the message, Jiang Cheng tapped open his Friend Circle in boredom, and
started slowly scrolling down. He saw that Jiang Yijun—his dear little brother—had posted
a selfie yesterday. It looked like the whole family was out eating together: in the
background was his mom and dad, a happy family of three. He felt a tightness in his chest,
and suddenly felt an uncanny wave of nausea.
He muted the whole family of three, then put the phone back in his pocket.
Just as he was about to look up, something fell on his head, and before he could figure out
what was going on, he felt more things land on his head. The feeling was like someone
pelting him with a handful of rocks.
Next, he saw a pile of white dust, and caught a whiff of a plaster dust.
”The fuck?” He looked up in surprise.
A large slab of greyish white plaster lay on his desk, with more pieces of various sizes
scattered all over the surface.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t bother with anything else, his first reaction was to dust off his head,
then he glanced toward Gu Fei’s head next to him.
Gu Fei’s cell phone was still on the desk, whatever was playing on the screen was no longer
visible, as it was also covered with a layer of dust. Gu Fei was still in the same pose as
before, unmoving, with his arms crossed.
Only, he looked a little more pissed off.
Jiang Cheng looked up at the ceiling, the section of plaster above their heads had fallen
away—it was probably all over their heads and desks at the moment—
revealing strips of wooden beam within……
This certainly is an ancient building huh.
When Jiang Cheng returned his gaze to the desk, he noticed a small black rock at the corner
of the desk that wouldn’t have been part of the ceiling.
The bell rang right on time, and Lao-Xu closed his book, “Alright, class over…… Ah, did the
plaster come off again? Who’s on janitorial duty today?
Get it cleaned up.”
As soon as Lao-Xu walked out, the class erupted into chaos, everyone turned to stare at the
last row.
It was in this instant that Jiang Cheng made the judgment. That little rock, Gu Fei’s
darkened expression, and the people who stood up as soon as the bell rang to look this way
with “the show’s about to start” written all over their faces……
The ceiling might drop plaster from time to time, but today, it definitely didn’t fall on its
own.
He sat still, pulled some tissues out of his pocket, and slowly swept the dust from the desk
to the ground.
In a situation like this when he had no clear target, it was pretty easy for him to keep his
temper under control.
Gu Fei stood up with a push of the desk, took off his jacket and shook it a few times, then
lifted his eyes to look at Wang Xu.
”Da-Fei, apologies,” Wang Xu already got up and walked over, slinging an arm around Gu
Fei’s shoulders while dusting off his jacket. “C’mon, we’ll go to the stand, I’ll buy you a
drink.”
Gu Fei flung off his arm, put his jacket on, and walked out through the back door.
Wang Xu quickly followed, walking side by side with him as he descended the stairs, “Hey,
Da-Fei, that really was friendly fire.”
”Mhm.” Gu Fei responded, he didn’t want to waste time talking to Wang Xu, the head of dust
made him very unhappy, some of it even got into his eyes.
”I just wanted to give that kid a warning,” Wang Xu said. “A transfer student, acting so
fucking arrogant on the first day of class, if nobody teaches him a lesson he wouldn’t know
that different places have different rules!”
Gu Fei did not say anything, he turned left after reaching the ground floor.
”Hey, the concession stand,” Wang Xu said. “Where are you going?”
”To pee.” Gu Fei said.
”You go to the teachers’ side to pee? It’s so far.” Wang Xu said.
”Less people.” Gu Fei said.
”All that trouble just to pee…… I’ll bring a bottle of milk tea for you then,”
Wang Xu said. “Is Assam okay?”
”Drink it yourself.” Gu Fei turned his head slightly and said.
”Assam it is!” Wang Xu said.
Gu Fei sighed.
The washroom on this side of the field was close to the teachers’ offices, and normally
students didn’t like to come over. In fact, not many teachers came here either, since there
were washrooms in the office building. It was a rare peaceful spot.
Gu Fei pulled a cigarette out of his pocket, and lit it up as he walked inside. He only
managed to get one drag in, when a door opened on a nearby stall, and Lao-Xu walked out.
”Xu-zong.” Gu Fei mumbled around the cigarette in his mouth.
”What’s your problem, you had to come have a smoke in the teacher’s washroom?!” Lao-Xu
pointed at him and said in a hushed voice. “You showing off your power or something? And
to whom?”
”What kind of power is it to smoke a cigarette,” Gu Fei laughed and stepped in front of a
urinal. “I showed off to you, are you afraid of me?”
”I don’t even know what to say to you,” Lao-Xu walked over and pointed at his cigarette.
“Put it out!”
Gu Fei sighed and flicked the cigarette backward into the squatting hole behind him, then
looked at Lao-Xu as he held onto his pants zipper, “I’m going to pee now.”
Lao-Xu sighed, then turned around to walk out.
Gu Fei pulled down his zipper and was just about to pee, when Lao-Xu suddenly stopped
again and said, “That Jiang Cheng……”
Because he was a little further now, Lao-Xu was speaking very loudly, his voice
reverberated imposingly inside the washroom.
”Holy shit……” Gu Fei braced a hand against the wall. Lao-Xu’s sudden voice startled him, he
almost pissed on his shoes. “Xu-zong, can you wait a moment sir!”
Lao-Xu walked out.
Gu Fei zipped back up, lit another cigarette, walked into a random stall, then closed the
door so he could smoke.
Besides the peace and quiet, the other, more important reason he liked to come here was
that it didn’t stink as much.
Lao-Xu was actually a very earnest teacher at heart, but was unfortunately not the best
lecturer. Nobody listened in his classes, and as the head teacher, his people skills were not
that great either. Therefore no matter how hard he tried with his students, nobody bought
it.
Gu Fei sometimes felt weary for him.
When he walked out of the washroom, Lao-Xu was standing outside in the snow waiting for
him.
”How about you find him a different seat.” Gu Fei tugged on his collar.
”Don’t want to share a desk with him? Or don’t want to share a desk, period?”
Lao-Xu looked at him. “Oh Gu Fei, it won’t do if you keep being so anti-social.”
”Don’t analyze me,” Gu Fei said. “You’ve been doing it for two years and haven’t been right
once.”
”Give it some time, it’s only the first day,” Lao-Xu smiled. “This Jiang Cheng…… His grades
really are quite good, he’ll be a positive influence on you as a desk-mate.”
Good grades? Positive influence?
Gu Fei thought back to the Jiang Cheng, who had just spent an entire class slumped over his
desk while playing on his phone, and found Lao-Xu’s
conclusion of “good grades” a little hard to accept.
”It’s time for class.” Gu Fei said.
”Let’s go back then,” Said Lao-Xu. “Give it some more time.”
On his way back to class, Gu Fei ran into Wang Xu on the third floor landing, and Wang Xu
handed him a bottle of milk tea.
”Thanks.” Gu Fei took the milk tea and went into class.
The second period was English. Their English teacher had a quick temper and a loud voice.
Although like Lao-Xu he didn’t carry a lot of authority among the students, still, they could
not stop his insults. He had a large variety of curses, and could go on for half an hour
without repeating himself. Once, he even got into a physical fight with his students, and
would always face troublemakers head on without backing down, so most people refrained
from provoking him if it was not a matter of life and death. They all entered the classroom
immediately after the warning bell.
The desk had already been cleaned up, but probably not by Jiang Cheng alone.
Gu Fei walked over just in time to see Yi Jing walk away with a rag.
”Thanks.” Gu Fei said.
”It’s nothing,” Yi Jing brushed her hair aside and smiled. “I’m on janitorial duty today.”
Gu Fei sat down in his chair and glanced at Jiang Cheng, who was sitting quite calmly,
leaning back in his seat with his eyes on the blackboard.
Gu Fei took his phone out and planned to finish the movie he didn’t finish watching earlier.
He had only just pulled up the video, when Jiang Cheng suddenly stood up.
With a swipe of his hand, he picked up his chair as well, in his other hand was a long broom.
Gu Fei froze, and quickly looked over to Wang Xu, who had just sat down and was talking
happily to his desk-mate.
He frowned a little, this guy is about to start a fight?
The other guy’s name was Wang Xu. Besides Gu Fei, this was the second name Jiang Cheng
remembered in this class.
There was very little room in the class between all the desks and chairs, and there was a
desk between theirs and Wang Xu’s seats. To get to Wang Xu while holding a metal chair
Jiang Cheng had to make a detour to the lectern at the front of the class, which was a hassle.
So Jiang Cheng put down the chair and said to the two people at the desk next to him,
“Excuse me.”
The two looked at him, baffled, but still stood up and let him squeeze through from behind.
After passing through, he dragged one of their chairs out as well.
”Hey! What are you doing!” The guy shouted.
Jiang Cheng looked at the guy, who stared back at him for two seconds, then didn’t speak
again.
The whole class looked over, Wang Xu had also realized that he was the target, and stood
up arrogantly, “Yo~ Trying to bust my head open huh? Come, come, come, let’s have the
overachiever demonstrate……”
Jiang Cheng did not speak. He set the chair down with a “clunk” next to Wang Xu’s seat,
then slowly backed away a few steps, lifted the hand holding the broomstick, and hoisted
the handle at the ceiling like he was throwing a javelin, hitting exactly the spot above Wang
Xu’s seat.
Wang Xu figured it out as soon as Jiang Cheng raised his hand, but when he turned around
to leave he was blocked by the chair Jiang Cheng had placed by his legs. He was just about
to kick the chair away, when the broomstick came crashing down, bringing a huge piece of
plaster with it.
Both his head and his desk were instantly covered in a thick layer of white dust.
After a brief moment of silence, the class erupted in an uproar of laughter and shouts, with
some even stomping their feet and thumping the desks; all at once, there was chaos.
”Motherfucker!” Wang Xu yelled, kicked away his chair and jumped out.
Jiang Cheng did not dodge, he stood still and waited for him. The way Wang Xu
came at him with a wide open stance, he didn’t even need to aim his fist to give the guy a
nose bleed.
”WHAT’S GOING ON!” A sudden roar sounded from the doorway.
The sound was probably the most powerful roar Jiang Cheng had ever heard in his life. The
boom soared straight up to the sky and into the clouds, and almost frightened him into
throwing himself at Wang Xu.
”What’s going on! Huh!” A middle-aged male teacher charged over with a pointer stick, and
pointed it first at Jiang Cheng, “Which class are you from?
What are you doing here!”
Before Jiang Cheng could answer, he jabbed the pointer in Wang Xu’s face,
“You! Are your ears growing from your armpits? Did you not hear that the bells had already
rang?! Did you go deaf? Can you hear the sound of my voice now?
Can you hear me?! Can you!”
Next, he didn’t wait for Wang Xu to speak up, before he turned the pointer at everyone else
around him, “All standing around to watch the show, aren’t we?
Well I’ll give you a performance alright! A round of applause please! Clap, clap, clap! Come
on!”
After this tirade of yelling, the class quieted down. Wang Xu glared, but showed no
intention of rushing over again. Jiang Cheng looked up worriedly at the ceiling, he was
afraid that if the teacher yelled one more time, the whole ceiling would collapse.
”Scurry back to your seats!” The teacher yelled again. “What, are you all waiting for
someone to lift you or something! Will someone take the door off its hinges so that I can
carry you!”
The classroom was filled with the sounds of low laughter and complaints as Jiang Cheng
turned around to go back to his seat.
”You!” The teacher called out to him. “Which class are you from?”
”He’s the newly transferred overachiever—” Someone piped up.
The teacher stared at him in astonishment and looked him up and down for a long time, “Go
sit down! Are you waiting for someone to carry you over?”
Jiang Cheng’s temper was so scattered by his yelling, that it was all he could do to glance at
the teacher again before returning to his desk and sitting down.
”Commencing class!” The teacher smacked the pointer stick on the lectern.
“Goodah mowning-ah, ayvreyone [Eng]! “
Jiang Cheng stiffened. This line of heavily accented English almost made him
burst out laughing.
After the lecture started, the guy who was pushing their desk earlier started to push again,
but this time it wasn’t directed at Gu Fei, instead he turned around and called to Jiang
Cheng, “Hey, overachiever. Damn impressive you are, so casually provoking Wang Xu like
that.”
Jiang Cheng did not reply.
”Fuck off.” Gu Fei said from the side.
”What the shit?” The guy said quietly. “I wasn’t even talking to you, is this just your
automatic response to me?”
”Mhm.” Gu Fei propped his phone up on the desk.
”You’re gonna have trouble,” The guy looked back at the teacher, then turned to Jiang
Cheng with a serious face. “Wang Xu is definitely not finished with you, did you know our
school has a back gate……”
”What’s your name?” Jiang Cheng interrupted him.
”Zhou Jing.” He said.
”Thanks,” Jiang Cheng said, and pointed at his chair. “Don’t, bump the desk again.”
”……Oh.” Zhou Jing blinked for a moment, then nodded.
Jiang Cheng flipped open his textbook and stared down at it.
Zhou Jing kept his neck cranked and stayed still for a while before turning back around.
Jiang Cheng thought the beginning of his new semester was eventful indeed, and it was a
shame that he did not have the habit of keeping a diary.
It did not matter to him whether this Wang Xu would come bother him again. At the
moment he only felt down: that Friend Circle post, that family selfie full of warm affection
simply because of his absence, all of it only gave him a sudden feeling of total
weightlessness.
Of course, it was logical that people he didn’t care about, also didn’t care about him.
But still, it made him feel all blocked up inside.
Jiang Cheng stared at his textbook, only to detect a faintly sweet milky smell amid the paper
and ink, and suddenly felt a little hungry. He then remembered
that he had not yet had breakfast that morning.
He turned his head and saw that sitting beside him, Gu Fei was peeling a milk candy while
watching a video.
Gu Fei exchanged a look with him, paused, then reached his hand into his pocket and
rummaged around. Then he pulled out a piece of candy and placed it on Jiang Cheng’s book,
before directing his attention back to his phone screen.
Jiang Cheng looked at the candy on his book, and felt a little perplexed. And yet, the aroma
of milk candy wafting over from Gu Fei’s side practically made his stomach roar.
After two minutes of hesitation, he picked up the candy and peeled open the wrapper.
……It was not a milk candy!
It was a fruit candy!
He couldn’t help himself from turning to glance at Gu Fei again.
Gu Fei swept his eyes over the fruit candy in Jiang Cheng’s hand, reached his hand into his
pocket again, and pulled out a whole handful of candy, which he placed directly on the
desk: there were all kinds of packaging and flavours, at least a dozen of them.
“Take your pick.” Said Gu Fei.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5621
TL word count: 3985
TL time: 3:43:49
Edit time: 1:03:46
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x shit
Chapter 8
Gu Fei tilted his head back and, leaning against the wall, gave a little whistle.
Jiang Cheng had not been so picky with candies even when he was in elementary school.
His family never really allowed the consumption of sweets, and did not allow them to eat
junk food or soda; he had always felt he was living like a cultivator. As a result, even now he
did not have a craving for junk food and sweets, usually whenever Pan Zhi had found
something good, he’d shove a bunch of it to Jiang Cheng too.
It was refreshing, to say the least, to see Gu Fei place a handful of candy on his desk for him
to pick from.
There was coffee candy, milk candy, mint candy, fruit candy…… and all these were divided
further still into soft and hard candies. He stared for a while, and finally picked out a milk
candy.
He had only just opened the wrapper, when Gu Fei reached out and took away the rest of it.
”The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was shook, then he remembered that Gu Fei had said
“take your pick”, not “take it all”. The logic was irrefutable, he immediately conceded, but
couldn’t help but look at him. “Do you cheap out like this today so you can have Wang
Jianlin prostrate at your feet tomorrow?” [1]
Gu Fei did not reply. He looked down at the sweets in his hand, picked out the other two
milk candies and placed them in front of Jiang Cheng, then put the rest back in his pocket.
…… Weirdo!
Jiang Cheng unwrapped all three pieces of milk candies, stuffed them in his mouth, and
could think of nothing else to say.
The English teacher’s surname was Lu. He was better than Lao-Xu at keeping the students’
attention and maintaining a quiet class, because he knew how to yell. It had a better effect.
Despite the fact that all the teachers he had met today were not comparable to the teachers
he had in the past, the entire period taught by teacher Lu was invigorating like no other.
Even when someone was scratching an itch, he would jab the pointer stick at the student
and ask if they needed help scratching. It had been a long time since Jiang Cheng was so
focused on a lecture, since after all, if his attention ever wandered, it would no doubt be
shocked back to reality.
The classroom became rowdy as soon as the bell rang, as if they simply could not hold it in
anymore. Some people even gave a few howls as they stretched their backs.
”You!” Teacher Lu suddenly jabbed the pointer stick at the back of the classroom. “Come
with me.”
This point and this “you” covered a fairly wide range, everyone once again whipped their
heads around one by one. Jiang Cheng did not pay much attention to it when he felt a bunch
of eyes on him. He was a new transfer, the teachers could hardly recall his name……
”Gu Fei!” Teacher Lu yelled again.
”……Ay,” Gu Fei had been looking down at his phone and, at the sound of this roar, his
phone clattered to the ground. He glanced up at teacher Lu, then gestured with his head at
Jiang Cheng. “It’s you.”
”Hm?” Jiang Cheng froze. “Me?”
”Yes, you! Gu Fei’s deskmate!” Teacher Lu’s stick was pointing at him again, and several
heads immediately under it quickly moved away.
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to stand up, he wondered what this English teacher wanted
from him.
However, as he walked towards the classroom door, he looked back at Wang Xu, who had
also stood up. If the teacher hadn’t called him away, they would have been battling it out by
now.
”The name is Jiang Cheng, right?” Teacher Lu turned and started heading downstairs.
”Yes sir,” Jiang Cheng answered and followed after him. “What do you want to see me
about?”
”Your Xu-zong has been showing off to me for days, saying that a capital real overachiever
had arrived here……” Teacher Lu said.
”What? A capital what?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
”A capital, Real, overachiever.” Teacher Lu gave him a look and explained. “Do you not get
it?”
A Real overachiever.
”……I get it now.” It was the first time Jiang Cheng heard someone actually saying the
capitalization out loud.
”Our school used to be a general high school, before it got turned into a vocational school,
then changed back to a general high school again,” Teacher Lu said. “So it can’t compare to
your old school, but I hope you won’t be affected. Just continue studying the way you were
doing it before.”
”Oh.” Jiang Cheng thought about how he studied in the past, and figured the teacher
probably did not know him very well.
”So students like Wang Xu, like Gu Fei, try not to mess with them, they’re all here to while
away the time.” Teacher Lu said. “If I didn’t call you out, he’d be looking to pick trouble with
you right about now, and wouldn’t give up until he comes out carrying another demerit
point on his head. He has a penalty on his records already.”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded. It would appear that this teacher Lu actually cared a lot about
his students.
“You’re not gonna thank me?” Teacher Lu shot him a displeased look.
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Your English grades were pretty top notch, why don’t you be the student rep of English
class.” Teacher Lu immediately said. “Your English class student rep at the moment is Yi
Jing, she’s the class leader, and also the student rep for language class……”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked, then very quickly shook his head. “Nope.”
“Why not?” Teacher Lu was a little surprised. “I heard Lao-Xu say you used to be class
leader too, you wouldn’t think a student rep for one class is too much work, right?”
“I was also only the class leader for one semester.” Jiang Cheng said.
“How come?” Teacher Lu asked.
Jiang Cheng shot him a glance, “Because I got into fights and skipped class.”
Teacher Lu’s eyes bulged as he opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
“I can go back to class now?” Jiang Cheng said.
“You……hold on.” Teacher Lu thought about it for a moment. “How about you come work on
some course materials for me some day when you get time?”
Jiang Cheng let out a sigh in his heart. He wanted to say he did not have a computer at the
moment, but figured this teacher Lu was a pretty good person, and if he rejected him once
it would be hard to do it a second time, so he nodded.
“Alright,” Teacher Lu grinned. “Go back to class then.”
“Fuck, what’s taking him so long,” Wang Xu said from his perch on Jiang Cheng’s desk. “Is he
avoiding me, does he think he can just hide from this!”
“Lao-Lu wants him for something probably.” Zhou Jing said.
“What the hell could he possibly want, when did you ever see Lao-Lu ask something of a
student! He was no doubt just asking some questions to get to know the new transfer, and
after that the asshole didn’t dare come back to class!”
Wang Xu said.
“You’re planning to deal with it here?” Gu Fei, who had been quietly playing a game on his
phone this whole time, finally asked.
“No shit!” Wang Xu bowed his head and ran his fingers through his hair in irritation. “Fuck!”
Gu Fei set his phone down and shot a glance at him.
“……Or, where else should it be?” Wang Xu was a little hesitant.
“None of my business,” Gu Fei said. “Just don’t bring your mess around here, damn
annoying don’t you think?”
“What if you just forget it,” Zhou Jing said. “You both got each other once, it’s even.”
“Your great uncle it’s even!” Wang Xu turned and glared at Zhou Jing.
“You can go down to the field or you can do it outside of school,” Gu Fei continued playing
with his game. “Just not next to me, it’s annoying.”
“He’s back.” Zhou Jing said.
Gu Fei looked up, sweeping his gaze across the front of the room, and sure enough Jiang
Cheng was slowly ambling up with both hands in his pockets and eyes on Wang Xu.
“Hiding from me, are ya?” Wang Xu sneered. “The bell hasn’t even rung and you dare to
come back?”
“Three things.” Jiang Cheng said.
Wang Xu looked at him as though not quite comprehending what he just said.
“One: get down.” Jiang Cheng said as he stuck out an index finger, then proceeded to stick
up another finger. “Two: whoever started it is the low piece of shit.”
Wang Xu finally snapped out of it. He glared, and was just about to say something when
Jiang Cheng cut him off and stuck out three fingers, “Three: just come straight out and say
how you want to resolve this, if you’re just gonna keep blabbing on then I’ll let you win.”
As he said this, everyone in class who was waiting to watch the show all quieted down.
They were all waiting to see Wang Xu’s reaction.
Gu Fei tilted his head back and, leaning against the wall, gave a little whistle.
Based on Gu Fei’s many years of experience as a popcorn-eating bystander, Jiang Cheng’s
words and the way he carried himself as he said those words immediately rendered Wang
Xu’s future path as big boss a little shaky.
The expression on Wang Xu’s face was incomprehensible. Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell what he
was thinking, but he did not miss the quick glance Wang Xu shot at Gu Fei the first chance
he got. That, he saw very clearly.
Wang Xu was scared of Gu Fei, or maybe he subconsciously viewed Gu Fei as someone to
lean on.
Ever since Jiang Cheng saw Not A Good Bird at Gu Fei’s store that day, he knew that the
somewhat polite and mellow appearance of “it’s all none of my business” that Gu Fei put up
was only that, an appearance.
Tsk.
What’s up with this guy pretending to be some old immortal wandering on the fringe of
society or something.
“I’ll be waiting for you after class at lunchtime.” Wang Xu hopped off the desk, then as he
walked back to his own seat, turned and pointed a finger at Jiang Cheng. “And don’t you run
away.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered, and sat down.
After some thought, he turned and asked Gu Fei, “Is that guy the big boss of your class?”
He only then realized that the rest note on the left side of Gu Fei’s head, shaved onto his
closely clipped hair, was made up of three dots: it was a 32nd note rest.
“Something like that.” Said Gu Fei.
“What do you mean something like that?” Jiang Cheng said.
“It means, he will fight whoever says he isn’t.” Gu Fei’s eyes were still glued to
his phone, his fingers busy swiping around on the screen.
Jiang Cheng saw that the game he was playing was Aixiaochu, the kind of thing he only
played in middle school whenever he needed to kill some time but had nothing else to play.
Whereas Gu Fei either spent his time watching short videos or playing this thing, and
seemed rather into it too. Ah, idiot.
“You like playing that?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help saying.
“Mhm it doesn’t take a lot of brainpower.” Gu Fei said. “It’s not like I’m an overachiever or
anything.”
Jiang Cheng had already been feeling irritated at everything that happened that morning,
and at these words, he almost landed a punch directly on that 32nd rest note.
One reason he clenched his jaw and stopped himself was that Gu Fei had helped him when
he passed out the other day, and the second reason was that he ate three of Gu Fei’s milk
candies just now…… if that even counts as a reason?
“It’s courage in and of itself to face one’s own hollowed brain head-on,” He said.
“Good for you.”
Gu Fei turned, took one long look at him without any expression, and said in a rather
obnoxious tone of voice, “Good luck at lunch time eh~”
Eh your great uncle’s big yellow dog!
Fuck.
Jiang Cheng didn’t listen much to class for the rest of the morning. His chest felt tight. Even
after he put the family of three into his blacklist, he couldn’t help but continue to go back
and tap into their timelines.
It was true that they did not have a good relationship, and it was true that things were
tense, but that was the ‘home’ he had had for more than ten years. It was the ‘family’ he had
seen every single day and had carved into his memory. He was not yet able to simply throw
these sentiments away.
However, it seemed as though no one was affected by his absence, or rather his permanent
departure…… Or perhaps it was simply not shown?
Seeing the calm on the other side made him feel even more miserable than being pushed
out of the home he had been in for more than ten years.
He slumped over the desk, stuffed a hat under his head, and closed his eyes.
Forget it, he thought as he decided to take a little nap. Despite not being
someone who must be in their own bed in order to fall asleep, he hadn’t slept well ever
since he got here.
Li Baoguo’s house was much too old and run-down, on top of which, the guy lived like an
utter slob. Therefore there were not only cockroaches and spiders, there were also mice.
Jiang Cheng had listened to the sounds of mice scurrying around the apartment all night,
and felt as though he was living in a dumpster.
The teachers at Fourth High were much more understanding than his previous teachers
when it came to slacking off during class. He slept all the way through breaks between
classes without once lifting his head, and not a single teacher came to disturb him.
It wasn’t until the ending bell for the last class of the morning sounded, and Wang Xu
slammed a palm onto his desk, that he straightened up with a yawn, his back felt a little stiff
from the posture.
“Let’s go.” Wang Xu glared sideways at him.
Jiang Cheng did not speak as he stuffed all his books and notebooks into the desk drawer,
and stood up with his backpack.
Wang Xu pivoted around with a flourish, and walked toward the backdoor of the classroom.
If it wasn’t for the down jacket he was wearing and the fact that there was no breeze, it
would certainly evoke the kind of air that said “oho the big boss is coming”.
There were three or four people who followed by his side, judging by their excitement they
could be his little assistants. The other people who only wanted to watch the show did not
yet have a chance to catch up.
“Hey.” Jiang Cheng called from behind them.
“Are you chickening out?” Wang Xu immediately replied.
“Are you bringing these people as your teammates, or your cheerleaders?” Jiang Cheng
asked.
Wang Xu glanced at the people beside him, then stared back at Jiang Cheng,
“What, scared?”
“Cheerleaders are fine with me,” Jiang Cheng swept his gaze over them and said as he
walked up. “But if they’re going to fight, then make sure you get the order straight among
yourselves first.”
“You guys, don’t follow.” Wang Xu waved his hand.
“Are you gonna watch?” Zhou Jing nudged the desk.
Gu Fei was still playing the Aixiaochu that only people without overachiever brains liked to
play, and finally stood up after he finished a round, “Nope.”
“Let’s just go take a look, aren’t you worried something will go wrong?” Zhou Jing said.
“Even if it does, why would that be my problem?” Gu Fei stuffed his phone in his pocket and
walked away.
When he got downstairs, those friends of Wang Xu’s were still cranking their heads in the
direction of the back gate. There was no sign of Jiang Cheng and Wang Xu anywhere.
“Da-Fei……” One of them immediately came up to him.
“Shhh,” Gu Fei put a finger to his lips. “Don’t bother me.”
Elementary students had yet to start class for the semester, so Gu Miao had probably been
waiting at the gate for him since an hour ago. He didn’t have the time to watch Wang Xu get
beaten up.
That’s right, he was that certain that when Wang Xu went up against Jiang Cheng, getting
beaten up was his only option.
That indifference in Jiang Cheng’s eyes was something that Wang Xu didn’t have. Not to
mention, the displeasure that was written densely all over his face was enough to scare off
someone with trypophobia. Either something happened recently that left him in a funk, or
there was something chronically wrong with the guy’s psyche.
How could Wang Xu, a kid who harboured a naive dream of ruling the streets, possibly go
up against a psycho in a bad mood?
A green head flew past Gu Fei like a gust of wind as soon as he walked out of the school
gate, and a chorus of surprised “wow~” rang out around him.
Gu Fei fetched his bike from the bike shed, and as soon as he got on, Gu Miao once again
flew past like the wind, pausing beside him for only two seconds, and took away a fistful of
candies from his pocket.
By the time he pedaled his bike to the intersection, Gu Miao was standing at the side of the
road, peeling open a wrapper. She had picked out all of the fruit candies.
“I’ll take you back?” Gu Fei asked. “Or do you want to trail behind?”
Gu Miao picked up her skateboard, and just as she was about to jump onto the back seat, he
reached out a hand to stop her, taking instead her chin in one hand and peered at a small
wound near one of her eyes, “Is that from a scrape or from
a fight?”
“Scrape.” Gu Miao said.
“Get on.” Gu Fei didn’t keep pressing.
Gu Miao got onto the back seat with her skateboard in her arms, then held onto his waist.
It might have been a scrape, or it might have been from a fight. Either way, the little lass
was stubborn as hell, it was useless to even ask, and he couldn’t nag her too much either.
She preferred to take care of her own business, even if it meant getting roughed up.
“What do you say we go buy a pair of gloves for you,” Gu Fei pushed down on the pedal.
“Those little leather ones you wanted last time?”
Gu Miao quickly took off the dirty down-filled gloves she was wearing and waved her
thumb at him.
The streets outside the back gate of Fourth High were more bustling than the front gate,
strangely enough.
It was probably because outside the back gate was a smaller street, and didn’t have as strict
of a street committee. All kinds of stalls and make-shift stands lined the street one next to
the other, most of which sold food, and business was booming.
As Jiang Cheng followed Wang Xu through the various aromas and smells, he felt the urge
to say “how about I treat you to some food first……”
Although, seeing that expression of indignant anger and look of determination on Wang
Xu’s face, Jiang Cheng held his tongue. He was afraid to spur the guy to tears.
This is a tour then, he thought, and decided to come back later to eat.
There were quite a lot that appealed to him, all kinds of grilled meats for example: fatty
veal, pork belly, lamb, kidneys, and tendons.
Jiang Cheng swallowed.
After they walked past the street, the smells disappeared too. He wondered where Wang Xu
was taking him.
“Are we going hiking?” He asked, hunger was making him cranky.
Wang Xu didn’t pay him any attention, but a few steps later he suddenly stopped, and
frowned as he looked ahead.
Jiang Cheng followed his gaze.
A few meters away from them, standing on the side of the road, were three people, all
looking their way with hands in their pockets. After he and Wang Xu both looked in that
direction, they slowly walked over.
Wang Xu reached a hand into his own pocket.
“What,” A tall lanky guy who looked like he had been starving for more than ten years
grinned. “Are you going to call Gu Fei? He just went home with his little sister, probably
won’t bother with your troubles.”
“What do you want!” Wang Xu said impatiently in a thick voice.
“Oho,” The tall skinny guy put on an exaggerated expression of surprise. “We got spine
today huh, not gonna run?”
He proceeded to shoot a glance at Jiang Cheng, “This your new buddy? Must be damn
impressive, with him here you don’t even need to run away.”
“In the past it’s a whole bunch of them all running together, huffing and puffing haha.”
Someone laughed and said from behind the tall skinny guy.
The tall skinny guy looked at the two of them with a face full of mockery, “How about I
count to three and you can……”
Jiang Cheng’s fist connected with the guy’s nose.
This punch not only smashed away his words, but also turned everyone on both sides to
stone.
Jiang Cheng didn’t stop there, it was important in these matters to be decisive and quick.
After the first punch, he grabbed the tall skinny guy’s hat covered head and, pulling it down,
lifted a knee to meet it.
Both times he hadn’t used a lot of force. In his experience, the nose wouldn’t break, but
blood would surely gush out, creating an effect that looked like ketchup smeared all over
one’s mouth.
Just as he thought, when he released his grasp and shoved the guy back, blood came
gushing out of his nose, and out of reflex, he lifted a hand and wiped it……
Jiang Cheng glanced at Wang Xu, stepped forward and knocked his shoulder into the arm of
another guy who was probably about to pull a knife, then for good measure, butted his
head against the guy’s nose.
The guy yelped and covered his nose with his hands.
“Run, dumbass!” Jiang Cheng shouted at Wang Xu before setting off into a sprint.
Wang Xu paused for a moment, then hurried to catch up with him.
“This way.” At an intersection, Wang Xu pointed to the left.
Jiang Cheng followed him, making many twists and turns until they were deep in a hutong,
then turned a few more times until they stopped in a clear area surrounded by the back
walls of other people’s courtyards.
“What’s this place?” Jiang Cheng looked around. They were in a dead end hutong, on three
sides were courtyard walls, looking decrepit with piles of snow and fallen branches
gathered in clumps on the ground, and all sorts of trash.
“This is……” Wang Xu took a minute to catch his breath. “Where I go when I schedule fights
with other people.”
“What unique taste you got.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Um,” Wang Xu looked at him and hesitated for a long time, then finally said,
“Thanks……for just now.”
“Why thank me,” Jiang Cheng pulled out a cigarette from his pocket and put it between his
lips. “It’s not like I did it for you.”
Wang Xu stared at him, “Fuck. Are you really an overachiever?”
“Let’s get this over with,” Jiang Cheng checked the time. “I’m hungry, let’s hurry it up so I
can go eat.”
“It’s done.” Wang Xu sat down on a three-legged stool nearby that looked so tattered it
could well be a prop in a haunted house. “There’s no problem between us anymore.”
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly, “Then I’m leaving.”
“Wait a little longer,” Wang Xu called out. “Monkey’s probably still around, they got the
numbers, if you go out now you’ll run into them.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak.
“Really, there’s three that you saw just now. You left Monkey with a face covered with
blood, when you go back out there it’s definitely not just gonna be the three of them
anymore, I’ll……get someone to come help.” Wang Xu pulled out his phone.
Jiang Cheng remembered what the tall skinny guy said earlier. He furrowed his brows and
asked, “Who are you calling?”
“Da-Fei.” Said Wang Xu.
“The fuck? Gu Fei?” Immediately, Jiang Cheng felt his face drop all over the ground in little
pieces.
Footnotes
[1] Wang Jianlin: once the richest man in China >
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5589
TL word count: 4229
TL time: 4:25:23
Edit time: 0:45:14
Curse words: 6x fucks, 2x shits, 2x asses
Chapter 30
Gu Fei’s breathing paused for a moment
“I meant…” Jiang Cheng’s “ah” seemed to throw Gu Fei off, and he didn’t know how to
continue. “Do you want to make some pocket change?”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng looked at him, pocket change? For some reason that still sounded
wrong.
“Just … take some photos and stuff…” Gu Fei explained.
Jiang Cheng knew that Gu Fei couldn’t possibly introduce him to anything weird, but at this
moment right after a vigorous ballgame, his brain was having some trouble catching up.
It took him a while to find his way out of the thought spiral of this is a trap of bad intentions,
but he finally managed to blurt out, “I’m not an improper person.”
“How is this an intelligence of an overachiever?” Gu Fei couldn’t help himself,
“Did you go to a special-ed school?”
“Ooh!” Jiang Cheng eventually recovered. “Take photos? What kind of photos?”
“Nudes,” Gu Fei gestured grumpily. He lit a cigarette and kept walking. “We’ll talk about it
when you’re awake.”
“I’m awake now… ” Jiang Cheng glanced at the cigarette in his mouth and paused. He knew
Gu Fei often smoked in the washroom between classes, but didn’t think that he would light
one up like this in broad daylight, in the middle of the school field.
“Want one?” Gu Fei offered.
“No.” Jiang Cheng refused decisively. Even though he and Pan Zhi also used to hide in the
washroom to smoke, but generally speaking they were not improper people.
“What photos?” Wang Xu, who was walking ahead, suddenly turned his head.
“Did someone take photos of us… ah of course they did, we were awesome today! Let’s
check the forum tonight, there must be all sorts of poses… but hey it’s probably all of the
two of you… “
“I’ll get someone to come take photos of you exclusively for the next match.”
Gu Fei said.
“For real?” Wang Xu started to laugh. “Come on, don’t tease me …”
“Gu Fei—” A voice called from behind them.
“Oooh,” Wang Xu raised his eyes. “Your highness the class leader.”
Jiang Cheng turned his head and saw Yi Jing running over with a small bag in her hand.
“You called me?” Gu Fei also turned around.
“This… ” Yi Jing handed the bag to Jiang Cheng. “I just got these from the infirmary, rubbing
alcohol and stuff. You fell during the game right? You should take a look at it later.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng was a little surprised. He did feel some burning on his elbow, but they all
wore long-sleeve shirts under their jerseys today. His sleeve separated his arm from the
ground when he fell, so it shouldn’t be too serious.
He took the bag. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” Yi Jing smiled.
“Why did you call Gu Fei’s name to give something to Jiang Cheng?” Wang Xu had a
meaningful smile on his face.
“I couldn’t remember Jiang Cheng’s name for a second.” Yi Jing brushed at her hair, a little
embarrassed, and walked off.
Wang Xu tsk-tsk’ed at her back. ”Only remembers Gu Fei’s name?”
“She just didn’t remember Jiang Cheng’s name.” Gu Fei said.
Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu were indeed generous, the game probably far exceeded their
expectations. They even called up a few cabs to transport the bunch of them to the AYCE
barbecue restaurant.
“Xu-zong,” Gu Fei stopped Lao-Xu at the entrance. “This is too much, let’s just go to a
normal restaurant. It’s just a gathering, doesn’t have to be anything special.” [1]
“What gathering?” Lao-Lu said from the side. “We’re celebrating! Gu Fei, you go on in, don’t
bother with this. Your Xu-zong and I can still afford this much.”
“Good lad,” Lao-Xu grabbed Gu Fei’s arm, a touched expression on his face.
“Good lad! You know to be considerate for your teacher! I knew you…”
“… Can still be saved.” Gu Fei finished his sentence and turned to head into the restaurant.
Jiang Cheng followed them in, trying to hold back his laughter.
The restaurant had a private room that likely didn’t get much use normally, but was just
right for the bunch of them.
“Go get some food first,” Lao-Xu propped himself up on the table as if in class.
“You all can fully satisfy your hungers and cravings today. You can even get some alcohol,
but I’ll have the last word on how much you drink.”
Everyone squeezed out again in a bunch to grab food.
Jiang Cheng took off his coat, and was just about to take a closer look at his elbow when his
phone sounded.
He pulled it out and peered at the message, it was a notification for the auto-payment of
this month’s cell phone bill: a hundred yuan. He normally wouldn’t think much of this
hundred yuan, but looking at the notification now he suddenly felt a little pain in his heart.
Should he switch to a cheaper plan? But then the data wouldn’t be enough, and Li Baoguo
didn’t have WiFi at his place… Install an Ethernet cable then? But that would also be
spending money.
He frowned. There was still money on his card, but this state of having no income made him
a little uneasy. Li Baoguo only provided him with a bedroom and nothing else. Right now he
had to buy groceries once a week to keep in the fridge, so he can cook food for himself from
day to day.
He let out a sigh and walked out to get some food.
Gu Fei was in front of him, holding a plate in his hand and staring at the meat in the row of
freezers.
Jiang Cheng walked over to stand by him. He also picked up a plate and grabbed a pair of
tongs: pork belly, fat beef, fat lamb, all piled up on the plates in just a few movements. Then
he stacked his plate on top of Gu Fei’s, picked up a new one, and continued: pork belly, fat
beef…
“How do you keep your figure?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“I go running when it gets warmer out,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not as if I eat like this all the
time.”
“Oh.” Was Gu Fei’s response.
“What you said… about the photos,” Jiang Cheng looked around, and didn’t see any
classmates. “What was that about?”
“It’s Xin-jie,” Gu Fei hesitated for a long time holding his tongs, then picked up a few
shrimps to pile onto the plate. “She has a shop that sells men’s wear. She’s looking for a
model to take some photos.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng thought about it. “Don’t these shops usually have their own models?”
“Just one regular one, the others are all temporary hires. The regular one is busy.” Gu Fei
said. “There’s new stock that’s come in these last couple of days, but no one to take photos
of. She asked me to help her look for the right person.”
“Is that so… ” Jiang Cheng hesitated. “I’m completely inexperienced, is that alright?”
“No problem, you have a face and a figure, not to mention you’re very photogenic,” Gu Fei
said. “Liu Fan helped out with the photos before too. If he can do it, it’s definitely not a
problem for you.”
“What are the clothes like?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’ll show you in a bit.” Gu Fei pointed his chin at the food counter. “If you don’t mind, grab
some vegetables too, I can’t stand it to be all meat.”
“Ok.” Jiang Cheng took a small basket and filled it with leafy greens.
When they returned to the room, everyone else was already back from getting food. The
room was steaming up from the heat.
As soon as they entered, Lao-Xu stood up with a glass of wine. “Come on heroes, sit down, I
have something to say.”
When Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei sat down, Lao-Xu raised his toast: “Everyone worked very
hard today. I had you guys from grade 10, some from grade 11…
Our Class-8, we don’t even rank in daily exercise contests, today we finally hold our heads
up high! It wasn’t easy! I believe with your current ability, getting into the finals is not a
problem! Add oil! Come now, let’s drink!”
Everybody picked up their glasses and cheered in a cacophony of clangs.
They barely took a sip when Lao-Xu began again, “We also have to thank classmates Gu Fei
and Jiang Cheng today for their efforts… ”
“Lao-Xu, Lao-Xu,” Lao-Lu called out. “That’s enough, let them eat first, they’re all hungry.
You’ll make yourself cry in a bit with all these touchy feelies.”
“Drink!” Wang Xu tilted his head back and emptied the glass.
Jiang Cheng looked at the glasses, they all contained beer. Only Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu’s glasses
had liquor.
He joined with a couple of gulps.
“It’s the girls’ competition tomorrow,” Wang Xu said. “I wonder how that’ll go.”
“No chance. Don’t our girls always go in just to lose the match, to get it over with? The ball
goes flying once they start to dribble, and no one likes to play basketball anyways.” Said
Guo Xu.
There was a chorus of laments all around for the girls team, then everyone went back to
discussing the upcoming matches.
“Look,” Gu Fei handed his phone to Jiang Cheng after some searching. “It’s mostly in this
style, pretty niche.”
Jiang Cheng swiped through the phone. There were a few photos of Liu Fan that looked
pretty good. The ones after that were all of a different person, likely Ding Zhuxin’s regular
model. He could see the difference when comparing them side by side.
“Steampunk?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Other styles too, all kinds of retro nostalgia.” Gu Fei said. “So how about it?
The payment can be by piece or by day, based on professional model’s rate.
She’s in a rush to shoot, so it might even be more than usual.”
Jiang Cheng hardly hesitated, it was money after all. He nodded, “Alright.”
“Then I’ll let her know. We don’t have matches in the next couple of days, so we can go
shoot in the afternoon and evening.” Gu Fei said.
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng went through the photos again. “Does anyone actually buy these
clothes? They’ll get gawked at for sure if they go out like this, might even get beaten up if
they’re especially smug about it… “
Gu Fei laughed, “This is your worry?”
“Yes, I’m nice like that.” Jiang Cheng said.
The management at Fourth High was quite lax. Since there were games in the afternoon,
those who wanted to watch didn’t even go to class. Everyone crowded onto the field. Those
that didn’t want to watch the games, nobody minded when they left.
However, Jiang Cheng still gave Lao-Xu a call to excuse his absence. The excuse being him
needing to go to the hospital to check out his injury from the day before. Lao-Xu approved
the leave and exclaimed that good students really do live up to their name.
In reality, Jiang Cheng never asked for leave in the past when skipping class.
Only Lao-Xu is the mother-hen type of head teacher who liked to spread his wings and
cluck at them all day. He would feel bad if he didn’t say anything.
“The place is a little far, but it’s a bus ride away,” Gu Fei took Jiang Cheng to the
station. “It’s at her studio aka warehouse aka bedroom that also has a small photography
set.”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He was a little nervous. He wouldn’t even be nervous if told to take someone else’s tests for
money, but modelling for photos… This kind of thing was a little too much out of his
comfort zone, he had never even considered it before.
He noticed when they got on the bus that Gu Fei was not carrying his schoolbag, but a
heavy looking backpack.
“What do you have in there?”
“Camera and lenses.” Gu Fei went to sit down in the last row.
“You’re… taking the photos?” Jiang Cheng froze.
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei pulled on Jiang Cheng’s sleeve and dragged him down to the seat next to
him before a man was able to squeeze over.
“You’re taking the photos?” Jiang Cheng asked again.
“Yeah yeah,” Gu Fei gave him a look. “I’m taking the photos. Is it that strange?
It’s not like you haven’t been photographed by me before.”
“That’s not what I meant, I just thought she would have a photographer.” Jiang Cheng said.
To be honest, it wasn’t that surprising knowing Gu Fei is the photographer. He had seen Gu
Fei’s photos. Gu Fei also shared them often in his Friend Circle.
They looked very professional.
“Ding Zhuxin has her own photographer, but she asks me when it gets busy,” Gu Fei said.
“I’ve always been taking photos for people.”
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Fei.
The bus started moving and Jiang Cheng didn’t speak again.
The heated bus rolled forward slowly, next to him were sounds of laughter and talking
voices. The people in the bus stayed in place, while the scenery outside the window
constantly changed.
This was the time when one would feel weighed down with an intense desire for sleep,
especially so soon after lunch. Eyelids would start to close just from looking at the warm
sunlight.
Gu Fei also stayed quiet. Jiang Cheng looked over at him and saw that he had his
arms folded and his eyes closed.
Sleepy.
He could’ve held it off too, but seeing that Gu Fei was already asleep, Jiang Cheng suddenly
could not keep his eyes open any longer. He pulled up the hood of his coat, lowered his
head, and closed his eyes as well.
Though, groggy as he was, it was still impossible to fall asleep just like that. He was in a
daze the whole time, all around him were muddled sounds and shadows that constantly
flitted by.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know how long he stayed like that, until he felt a weight on his shoulder.
He pulled off his hood, and found Gu Fei’s head leaned against him. When did that happen?
Gu Fei’s lashes were long, but not as thick as Gu Miao’s.
Jiang Cheng didn’t think he had any ideas about Gu Fei, especially with Ding Zhuxin
possibly being Gu Fei’s girlfriend… But in this moment he still felt an inexplicable itch in his
heart.
This itch felt like down feathers that had been fluffed in the sunlight, spreading gradually
from his shoulder to the rest of his body.
He closed his eyes again.
The feeling of loneliness, he had always known the taste of it.
From the day he realized that men were more appealing to him than women, and that he
could only keep this secret in strict confidence to himself. This feeling of loneliness would
appear from time to time. Pan Zhi knew his secret, but couldn’t relieve him of the pressure
that came with it.
When he had a family, parents and a brother, classmates and friends, though this loneliness
still existed, he did not feel it as profoundly. It was only after coming here that it all
overlapped and pressed together bit by bit.
He didn’t need kindreds, didn’t need people of the same kind who would casually huddle
together to keep warm.
Though the attraction was an objective one.
Gu Fei, and Gu Fei’s unconscious position at this moment, gave him the illusion of the
‘warmth of two people’.
He couldn’t make out exactly what this sentiment was.
“We’re here,” Gu Fei raised his head when the bus announced the stop. “It’s the
next one.”
He paused for another two seconds looking at Jiang Cheng’s shoulder, then said at last,
“Sorry, got too sleepy.”
“It’s fine,” Jiang Cheng stretched his shoulders. “You’re too tired from acting all cool
yesterday.”
Gu Fei laughed and stood up. “Let’s go.”
Jiang Cheng followed him. He only dozed off for a while, but now his legs felt weak just
walking… probably from overexertion yesterday. He hadn’t had this much exercise since
winter started.
The feeling of whole body weakness only subsided after they got off the bus and he felt the
wind on him.
Ding Zhuxin’s studio aka warehouse aka bedroom that was also a set was located on a very
hipster street. The kind with all sorts of graffiti on the street, a variety of manhole cover
paintings, phone booth paintings, and matching electric box paintings. The kind of street
that was lined on both sides with boutiques, decorated in ways that discouraged anyone
who wasn’t experienced enough with pretentiousness, lest they showed their own fear
upon entering.
The street was neither long nor grand, but Jiang Cheng was still surprised that there would
be a place like this in such a backwards and shitty little city.
Gu Fei brought him into a building that was not unlike a small office building. It looked
fairly old on the outside, though judging by the sign plates on the wall, the names of the
businesses in here were striving hard in a direction of incomprehension.
Jiang Cheng scanned the names of the businesses while waiting for the elevator, but wasn’t
able to make out any of them. The ones with roman alphabet, he couldn’t tell what country
they belonged to, though the Chinese characters also didn’t appear to have the typical
arrangement at the first glance.
“What is this place? Their ego must be reaching so high up to the sky that it can’t even be
held back with cable wires.” He couldn’t help but blurt out in the elevator, when it was just
the two of them.
“This area’s called the ‘90’s Collect’,” Gu Fei leaned against the side and laughed. “It was
meant to be a place where young people gather, the really trendy and fashionable type, but
went a bit off base. No one but posers come here now, though the rent is cheap.”
Ding Zhuxin was waiting in the studio and smiled as soon as they entered, “I knew you
would call him over.”
“Reeally,” Gu Fei threw his backpack on the floor. “We’re all acquainted here, so I won’t
make introductions.”
“Try some of this,” Ding Zhuxin brought over a pot of fruit tea and poured a cup for Jiang
Cheng. “I made it myself and added a bunch of random stuff, it tastes pretty good.”
“Thanks.” Jiang Cheng accepted the cup and looked around at the studio.
It was very messy, with fabric and posters everywhere, along with some large unopened
packages that probably contained clothes. He could tell through this chaotic mess that the
base was still in the currently popular cold industrial style, with concrete walls, concrete
lighting, exposed red bricks, and intersecting pipes.
“Let’s get going.” Gu Fei laid down on the sofa. “Show him the clothes first.”
“Come,” Ding Zhuxin took Jiang Cheng to a row of hangers and pointed to the clothes
hanging on the rack. “The style this time is ‘back to the basics’, all knit…”
“Knitted?” Gu Fei interrupted her. “You wanted me find a ‘bad boy’ type for this?”
“Knit material,” Ding Zhuxin leaned on the rack. “But the design is bad-boy style, it can be a
little difficult for the model…”
Ding Zhuxin looked Jiang Cheng up and down, “…But he can handle it.”
“Whatever you say.” Gu Fei sat up, opened his bag, and began to prepare the camera.
“Let’s try for 30 sets today,” Ding Zhuxin said. “How’s that?”
“… Ok…” Jiang Cheng looked at the clothes on the rack.
Hanging there in a row like that, other than the so-called knit material he couldn’t make out
much of anything, including the design Ding Zhuxin
mentioned. Only that there were a lot of long garments. Not to mention he never before
wore anything that he always associated with elderly men and middle-aged long-haired
artists.
“Get changed,” Gu Fei strode over and said. “The undergarments are all matched, you just
need to change into them.”
“You– ” Jiang Cheng turned around and, before he finished speaking, Gu Fei raised the
camera and clicked the shutter towards him, clickety-clackety, “…
little shit.”
“Go change,” Gu Fei pointed to a room to the side. “We’ll be shooting in there.
She will tell you the kind of sentiment she wants for the poses. I promise to make you
look… very handsome.”
“Ok,” Jiang Cheng answered and looked at the clothes on the rack. “Any one of these?”
“Any one.” Gu Fei said.
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng answered again, took off his coat and threw it on the chair to the
side, but got embarrassed when he was about to take more off.
It was one thing that Gu Fei was standing on the side with his camera up, but Ding Zhuxin
was also standing there holding a mug and her elbow, staring at him while sipping tea.
It wouldn’t be a big deal if it was just a jacket he was changing into, but looking at this pile
of set after set, he basically had to strip down to his underwear for all of them.
Gu Fei turned to look at Ding Zhuxin and gave her a little wave.
Ding Zhuxin smiled and turned into the room on the side, “Come in after you’re done
changing. You have a good base, so some simple makeup will do, we’ll just have Da-Fei fix
the photos later.”
“I have to wear makeup?” Jiang Cheng asked, taking off his shirt.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei pointed the camera at him and looked through the lens at Jiang Cheng’s well-
proportioned torso.
It was indeed an athlete’s body. Very well toned.
“Can you not point that thing at me?” Jiang Cheng clutched his belt and looked at the
camera.
“From now until tonight,” Gu Fei was still holding the camera. “This thing will be pointed at
you the whole time.”
Jiang Cheng took his pants off begrudgingly, and said while changing into new clothes, “I’m
telling you, it’s only for the sake of money that I’m not smacking you.”
Gu Fei laughed. Jiang Cheng’s legs were quite straight, and were toned like his upper body.
He looked through the lens at Jiang Cheng who had already changed into the top, “You’re
actually pretty suited for this style.”
“No way,” Jiang Cheng looked down suspiciously. “I’ve been alive for almost 18
years, and have never worn anything like this before.”
Gu Fei didn’t speak, but took a few steps back slowly with the camera.
Ding Zhuxin’s eye for people was always spot-on. As soon as Jiang Cheng changed into
these clothes, something about his whole person changed. He had always thought that
regardless of gender, anyone who put on a long knitted coat could pick up a bowl and go
begging on the street.
But when Jiang Cheng put the robe on, turned around and looked his way, Gu Fei’s
breathing paused for a moment.
This air about him, it was not something he normally saw in the people around him.
Footnote:
[1] zong = boss ↩

Some Stats
Raw character count: 5654
TL word count: ~3834
TL time: 5:51:12
Edit: ~0:38:00
Curse words: 2x shits
First posted: April 4, 2020
Chapter 31
Visual animals are superficial like that.
Jiang Cheng considered it a feat that he would pick such an inexplicable outfit without even
thinking.
Though if you ignore the coat, the outfit itself wasn’t half bad: slim pants and a loose black
t-shirt. Even though it’s knitted, it’s at least the kind that won’t attract stares when worn
outside.
But as soon as he put on the coat, Jiang Cheng froze and looked back at Gu Fei.
“Hey are you sure I didn’t grab the wrong clothes?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei was still looking at him from behind the camera. “What’s wrong?”
“I mean, don’t you think this looks like a knit version of the Matrix coat? No no, more like a
missionary if I wrap a woven rope around my waist?” Jiang Cheng pulled on the clothes and
said quietly. “Is there a mirror? I’m starting to feel like a mage too…”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, only laughed and pointed at the back wall.
The robe was very long, reaching all the way down to the calf. The material was relatively
thin and soft, giving it a slouchy look when worn. It was the infamous lazy casual style.
Though if it was worn by a shorter and skinnier person, they’d be caught and taken back to
Qing Shan (青山) for sure.
“This one requires the right face, body, height, and poise.” Ding Zhuxin leaned against the
door. “You wear this better than Da-Fei. He would just look like a delinquent wearing it.”
“Oh he doesn’t need this to look like a delinquent.” Jiang Cheng stood in front of the mirror
and took a look. It’s actually… okay. Even though he would never buy this for himself, he
wasn’t picking clothes for himself right now.
“Wonder who the designer is, I can only offer them a smiley face.”
“It’s me.” Ding Zhuxin said.
“… Huh?”
Jiang Cheng froze, then saw Ding Zhuxin’s expression of ‘I know what you are thinking’
written across her face. The familiar feeling of embarrassment suddenly arose, shooting
right out of the ground. He still didn’t regain the
feelings in his legs to walk properly by the time he followed her into the room.
Ding Zhuxin smeared makeup on his face while Gu Fei turned on all the photography
lighting.
“Don’t be nervous, just do some casual poses.” Ding Zhuxin gave Jiang Cheng’s face a couple
more sweeps with a brush. “Done.”
Jiang Cheng stood on the spot as indicated. The set was actually pretty cool, but he didn’t
know what to do after he got in place.
“Let’s do a few steps back and forth.” Gu Fei trained the camera on him. “From left to right
then from right to left.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He turned around and walked to the side. As soon as he started moving, the camera in Gu
Fei’s hands clicked, and he couldn’t help but turn his head.
“Already? I think I was walking weird.”
“Keep walking and don’t worry about me.”
Gu Fei clicked the shutter again.
Jiang Cheng took a breath and walked from left to right. There were only a few square
meters of set, so it didn’t take many steps to reach the end. He pivoted again and walked
back from right to left.
“Walk with your head lowered.” Gu Fei said between clicks. “Go a little faster and take a big
strides.”
Jiang Cheng lowered his head slightly and walked across again.
Gu Fei stared at him through the lens and took a series of continuous shots.
Jiang Cheng’s figure was fixed in the frame: head lowered, legs making long strides forward,
the corner of his clothing fluttering lightly behind him…
dynamic and striking.
“Put the hood on,” Ding Zhuxin said. “The hood also needs to be a distinguished design.”
“Ok.” Jiang Cheng put on the coat’s hood and walked forward while fixing it in place. “Now I
feel like the grim reaper’s here…”
“Jiang Cheng.” Gu Fei called out to him.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng turned.
Gu Fei clicked the shutter.
Still that forward striding pose. The raised hand and the edge of the hood obscured half of
his face, only visible were the straight nose and the eyes half hidden in the shadows.
“That was great.” Gu Fei said.
“Forward facing.” Ding Zhuxin said after a sip of tea.
“No need to smile or make any expressions.” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng. “No need for any
movements either.”
It would be difficult for the average person to hold this kind of straight stance with arms at
the side, with no expressions or movements, and not look stupid doing it. Gu Fei didn’t
know why he was asking this of Jiang Cheng, who was not just an amateur, but someone
who didn’t have anything to do with
modelling.
“Don’t I look like an idiot?” Jiang Cheng sighed and did as he said.
“Nah.” Gu Fei answered simply and clicked the shutter.
Jiang Cheng must have been vain growing up, Gu Fei thought, that he was able to handle a
inane stance like this and not look like an idiot.
He wasn’t all tensed up as if standing at attention, nor was he forcing himself to relax.
His centre of gravity was shifted onto the right leg, shoulders set naturally… this was an
important point. Those who didn’t know how to stand properly either had their shoulders
overly pulled backwards or hunched forward.
This kid definitely practices his stance in front of a mirror, to stand so upright but at ease… He
looks both relaxed and leisurely with his long arms and long legs.
“Tilt your chin up a bit,” Ding Zhuxin said. “And a little more smugness.”
“Smug… how?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Like when you first walked into Class-8,” Gu Fei said. “Like that.”
“I was annoyed.” Jiang Cheng recalled the experience of standing up there like a dumbass
being inspected by the whole class, and immediately felt some of that annoyance come
back.
Gu Fei clicked the shutter.
He put down the camera after a few more clicks, “You should consider doing this for a living
if you ever run out of options.”
“What’s that supposed to mean, why does he have to be out of options to consider doing
this?” Ding Zhuxin laughed and said.
“He’s an overachiever,” Gu Fei said. “Unlike you and your band of ex-
dropouts.”
“Move aside you.” Ding Zhuxin clapped her hands and thumped him once on the arm. “Jiang
Cheng, go change into another one, the one piece.”
“Which one?” Jiang Cheng took off the coat and asked as he walked out.
“That one piece, the long pullover.” Ding Zhuxin said.
Jiang Cheng walked out, but Gu Fei stayed back to look through the photos he just took shot
by shot.
If he must pick out something about Jiang Cheng that particularly appealed to him, aside
from the whole overachiever, woodwind playing, and the
slingshotness of it all, it was more this perpetual presence of effortless poise regardless of
the situation.
Some might call it delinquency, annoyance, or even contempt, but the
confidence that radiated from his bones was very compelling. It was an air that came from
knowing that he’s the best.
Compared to everything else, this intuitive and straightforward attraction was the most
powerful. It did not require one to uncover or to perceive it. One needed only to watch.
Watching was enough.
Visual animals are superficial like that.
Gu Fei sighed softly, all he could do was watch.
He couldn’t remember how long it’s been, that he didn’t have the mood to spare a single
glance at the people who came and went around him, the ones who left and the ones who
stayed.
Say no to early romance.
He didn’t have the mood for it, but he also didn’t dare. All that he protected couldn’t
withstand any disruption.
“Excuse me,” Jiang Cheng came in holding a linen-coloured garment. “Is it this one?”
“Yep.” Ding Zhuxin nodded.
“I’m just wondering, how do you wear this?” Jiang Cheng held the piece out by the
shoulders and shook it. “And what do I wear on the inside?”
“Underwear.” Ding Zhuxin said.
Jiang Cheng gave the clothing another shake, his face filled up with question marks of all
sizes.
Gu Fei turned his head and hid his face behind the camera, trying his best to hold back
laughter. He could almost hear the cry in Jiang Cheng’s heart.
It was a very thinly knitted pullover with a large neckline, with a hem that looked like it
might reach down to Jiang Cheng’s knees. Gu Fei had seen this design before, but he always
thought Ding Zhuxin made it with herself in mind.
He was surprised that it was men’s wear.
“Go change,” Ding Zhuxin said. “It’ll probably look good on you.”
“There’s a hole in the centre?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t let it go.
“That’s right,” Ding Zhuxin said. “You got abs? If not I can draw it on for you.”
Jiang Cheng’s facial expression was incomprehensible.
“Does he have abs?” Ding Zhuxin turned to ask Gu Fei.
“Huh?” Gu Fei turned back around, he didn’t have time to put away the smile on his face. “I
think so.”
“Go on then, I thought you were self-conscious because you didn’t have abs.”
Ding Zhuxin said to Jiang Cheng.
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng nodded and walked out as if he made an important decision, then poked
his head back in. “Xin-jie, I’m just asking, do people actually buy these?”
“Of course,” Ding Zhuxin sipped on her tea. “All my designs sell pretty well.”
“That’s awesome, what kind of people buys them?” Jiang Cheng said in a small voice.
“Crazy people, probably.” Said Ding Zhuxin.
Stripped down to only his underwear, with the clothing like a broken fish net pulled over
him, Jiang Cheng felt no different than if he was naked. He quickly walked over to the
mirror to take a look.
Mother of—
Jiang Cheng was of the firm belief that if this piece sells, it could only be because his own
figure was too fucking good.
He gritted his teeth and walked back in.
Gu Fei had his head down and was fiddling with his camera, but whistled as soon as he
looked up and saw Jiang Cheng.
“You shut up.” Jiang Cheng pointed at him.
“Good thing the underwear is black,” Ding Zhuxin looked over him and said with
satisfaction. “I was going to find another one for you if it wasn’t… Let’s get started.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng walked to the set.
They had replaced part of the set and it looked much more refreshing than before.
“Shoes off, barefeet.” Ding Zhuxin said.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t find the energy to resist in these clothes. He took off his shoes and
socks without a word and stood barefoot in the centre.
“This outfit doesn’t require a lot of movement.” Ding Zhuxin said. “The piece is called
‘mute’. Try to get a feel for it.”
Muteness.
That’s the only thing related to the word that Jiang Cheng could think of at this moment.
And as for the feel.
He felt a little cold. After all, there were holes all over the clothes. Never mind that Ding
Zhuxin could tell his underwear was black, she probably already saw what brand it was.
But he still had to try. Ding Zhuxin was paying him for these photos, she was his employer.
He’s gotta try to find this so-called feel. Not to mention, Gu Fei was still waiting with the
camera pointed at him.
Muteness.
Okay, not muteness. Mute.
No sound.
Very still.
Out of nowhere he remembered a Russian song he used to love.
“Тихо， тихо， тихо， тихотактаетвночи……”
The song made one feel hushed.
He often listened to it on his headphones after a fight with his family.
Eyes closed, listening to lyrics he didn’t understand, he could hear the voices in his heart.
Wow, his thoughts wandered really fucking far, he went looking for this feeling in Siberia…
In the frame, Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and placed his right hand gently on the left side of
his chest.
Gu Fei clicked the shutter.
Jiang Cheng in this moment felt very far away. His whole being surrounded by a dense
feeling of distance.
Aimlessness and wilfulness spelled out in the silent composure..
Gu Fei didn’t move for a long time after taking the shot, simply held the camera and stared
at Jiang Cheng’s face through the lens. Until Ding Zhuxin gently cleared her throat.
Only then did Jiang Cheng open his eyes as if suddenly awoken. His fingers caught on the
collar on its way down and pulled lightly on the material. The collar pulled away and
bounced back.
A series of shutter sounds came from the camera in Gu Fei’s hand.
The somewhat lost look in Jiang Cheng’s eyes, his slightly opened lips, the pulled collar,
fingertips traced across the body…
“This is great,” Ding Zhuxin said. “Very sensual but very sensitive too.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. He looked down at the camera in his hands for the longest time,
then finally took a breath and let it out slowly as if sighing.
“I’m gonna…” Gu Fei put down the camera. “Go to the bathroom.”
Perched on the toilet lid, Gu Fei held a lit cigarette in his mouth, watching the smoke drift
towards the window.
Life… had always been full of the unexpected.
For example, Jiang Cheng accidentally finding Gu Miao, Jiang Cheng
accidentally kissing the ground outside the door to his store, then unexpectedly becoming
his deskmate…
These accidents were unexpected but not too surprising. But what surprised Gu Fei the
most was that he, who always had everything well under control, would have a
physiological reaction when taking photos.
This kind of thing was really unexpected.
Really unexpected.
Even as withdrawn as he usually was, he still had to hide in the bathroom to calm down.
Following this train of thought, he couldn’t help but think if it was Jiang Cheng in his
position… he would probably finish it off in the toilet…
When Gu Fei came out of the bathroom with a cigarette in his mouth, Jiang Cheng was
standing in front of the rack of clothes having a fight to the death with another garment.
It was a tenacious battle, he tore at the garment, but the garment had him by the throat.
Upon hearing the sound of the door behind him, he raised his arm to peek through the gap
in the clothing. Seeing Gu Fei, he didn’t even have the energy to be embarrassed.
He managed to say in a strained voice, “Fucking, come help me.”
“… What’s going on here?” Gu Fei quickly stubbed the cigarette and walked over. He
reached out a few times with his hands but didn’t know what to pull on to free him.
“Ok no,” Jiang Cheng still had his arms raised, half of his face peeking out from between the
arm and the collar, expression angry and helpless. “This thing is not fucking meant to be
worn by humans. This neckline, had to be made for toddlers!”
“Hold on,” Gu Fei circled him. “Let me see.”
“If you had come out any later, I would’ve ripped this thing apart. I’ll pay for the damages
too.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I think… ” Gu Fei picked up the material on his left side and looked at it. “Did you get into
the sleeves?”
“… When you say it like that,” Jiang Cheng froze on the spot. “It suddenly makes a lot of
sense.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything and neither did he.
Two seconds later, he knew that they were about to start another round of the giggles.
By the time Ding Zhuxin came out the two of them were laughing like mad.
Several times Gu Fei attempted to help Jiang Cheng pull the clothes off but without success,
because his hands were weak from laughter.
Whereas Jiang Cheng giggled until he felt like the sleeves would strangle him to death, but
still couldn’t stop.
“I’m sorry,” Ding Zhuxin pulled out her phone and snapped a picture. “I need to get this for
my Friend Circle.”
“What?” Gu Fei asked, leaning against the rack giggling.
“My part-time photographer and my part-time model,” Ding Zhuxin said. “Went crazy.”
“We’ll be ready soon, he’s gone into the sleeve.” Gu Fei finally collected himself. He pulled a
little on the clothing and Jiang Cheng backed away, trying hard to make his arms and head
become one, and they eventually got the thing off.
“Ayyy!” He squatted down. “I’m exhausted.”
“Hurry up. Big sis will buy you guys takeout for dinner.” Ding Zhuxin turned and went back
in.
When they started, Jiang Cheng didn’t think much of 30 sets of outfits. After all, he himself
sometimes had to fuss and try on a couple different outfits before heading out.
But he realized today how annoying it was to put clothes on and take them off.
Endless dressing and undressing, standing before the lights trying to figure out all kinds of
feelings for the style. He couldn’t get over the soreness in his legs from the basketball game.
Every time he changed he wanted to rip the clothes right off.
The thing was that Ding Zhuxin’s clothes were all matching sets, not 30 separate pieces. It
wasn’t enough to just switch the pants a few times. Each change had to be from head to toe.
When it became dark outside, Ding Zhuxin offered to eat first, but Jiang Cheng refused. He
felt that if he stopped to rest and have a meal, he wouldn’t want to continue even with the
threat of death. He couldn’t muster up the energy even for extra money.
So none of them ate. They churned until past nine o’clock, before finally finishing up the
day’s work.
“You must be hungry.” Ding Zhuxin transferred the day’s pay to Jiang Cheng.
“Let’s go eat something downstairs, what do you want?”
“I… won’t be eating.” Jiang Cheng felt his whole body relax in the comfort of his own clothes
after changing back, then the sleepiness kicked in. “I’m heading back, I’m dying for sleep.”
“Aren’t you hungry?” Ding Zhuxin asked. “Just have something to eat, what if you get
hungry at night?”
“Thanks, Xin-jie,” Jiang Cheng yawned. “I’m so sleepy that I’m don’t even feel hunger
anymore, probably won’t even know if I go hungry tonight.”
Ding Zhuxin laughed. “Alright then, will you still have the energy to come tomorrow?”
“I’ll be fine after I wake up.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Take a cab back then,” Ding Zhuxin said. “I’ll reimburse you the transportation fee.”
“No need,” Jiang Cheng quickly replied. “There’s really no need. It’s not that much, I can do
it.”
Ding Zhuxin was about to say something more, but Gu Fei interrupted her.
“Give me the money, I’ll take a taxi back with him.”
“You’re not eating either?” Ding Zhuxin looked at him, a little taken aback.
“Mm,” Gu Fei pulled out a cigarette and lit it. “My mom made food today and left some for
me. I gotta to go back and finish it or she’ll cry again.”
“Alright then.” Ding Zhuxin nodded.
Jiang Cheng went to the side of the road to flag down a cab, while Gu Fei and Ding Zhuxin
stood there quietly.
“Da-Fei.” Ding Zhuxin opened her mouth when she saw a taxi approaching.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“This is my first time seeing you laugh so openly like that.” Ding Zhuxin was looking at Jiang
Cheng’s back. “I watched you grow up. Today was my first time seeing it.”
“What do you mean watched me grow up?” Gu Fei gave a little laugh, evading
Ding Zhuxin’s words. “You’re only a few years older than me and you sound like my mom. I
watched you grow up too.”
“Go on, get in the car.” Ding Zhuxin said. “I’m busy tomorrow so I won’t be here. I’ll have the
clothes ready to be photographed. My assistant will come over to do the makeup, and you
can help with the rest.”
“Sure thing.” Gu Fei threw away his cigarette butt and got into the car.
Jiang Cheng fell asleep as soon as he settled into the cab, he felt himself dozing off like a pig.
It took several shoves from Gu Fei before he finally realized it wasn’t the motion of the car
and opened his eyes.
“We’re here?” Jiang Cheng rubbed his face and opened the car door to get out. “I almost
started dreaming.”
“Ummm…” Gu Fei pulled at his arm.
Jiang Cheng was just about to ask what’s going on, when he heard the racket coming from
up ahead. Shouts of men and screams of women, and the sound of a woman crying.
When his eyes finally tracked the source of the noise his whole being sank into a state of
endless exasperation. In this instant, the combination of the afternoon and evening’s
exhaustion was close to blowing the lid off his head.
Li Baoguo, Li Hui, and Li Qian. His own father, brother, and sister. He recognized them at a
glance. There was also a woman with a limp who he hadn’t seen before. He didn’t know
who it was.
This woman was currently dragging her limping leg and wrestling with Li Baoguo, crying
and hurling abuse. Though she seemed to be speaking in a dialect, her accent was too thick
to be understood.
Li Baoguo was completely different from his cowardly self of the other day, when he was on
the ground holding his head and letting others kick and beat on him. He was now fighting
this woman with an enthusiasm that couldn’t be curbed by either Li Hui or Li Qian no
matter how they tried to pull him back.
“You bet that I can beat you to death!” Li Baoguo’s speech was for once clear and full of life.
“You obviously haven’t seen enough of me! See if I will let you come out of this alive today!”
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt out of breath and slammed himself back into the car.
Gu Fei was about to follow him out of the car but got pushed back inside. Jiang Cheng closed
the door.
“Huh? Not getting off?” The driver asked.
“Let’s take you back first.” Jiang Cheng said quietly to Gu Fei, his throat felt tight.
“Sure,” Gu Fei didn’t say any more. “Shifu, please turn into Beixiao Street.”
“Ok.” The driver turned the car around and drove to the next street.
They passed Gu Fei’s store and continued on for another stretch of road. Gu Fei had the
driver stop the car in front of a row of residential buildings.
“You going anywhere else?” The driver asked.
“Just here.” Gu Fei handed over the money and pushed on Jiang Cheng. “Get out.”
Jiang Cheng got out of the car. His brain felt a little numb. He looked at the building in front
of him. “Your place?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei said, and walked toward the entrance. “Come watch me do photos.”
“What photos?” Jiang Cheng hesitated then followed behind him.
“Your photos, don’t you wanna see? Supes haught.” Gu Fei said.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5687
TL word count: ~3821
TL time: 7:17:17
Edit: ~0:35:00
Curse words: 4x fucks, 1x ass
First posted: April 6, 2020
Chapter 32
“You know if I am.” Jiang Cheng watched him. “Right now it’s me asking you.”
The building where Gu Fei lived was newer than Li Baoguo’s. Even though it was also right
by the street with no exterior fence or management, and was likely also public housing, it
looked much easier on the eyes.
It didn’t reek of the inner city, and the corridor walls were still white, with a distinct lack of
cobwebs.
But it was also similar in that it too was a low rise without elevators. You gotta climb the
stairs all the way up. By the time they got to the fifth floor Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but ask,
“What floor do you live on?”
“Seventh, the top floor.” Gu Fei turned back and gave him a look, a subtle smile played at
the corner of his mouth. “What, can you not go on anymore? Do you need me to carry you?”
“Nevermind, you’re not much better. Took three whole minutes just to go pee,”
Jiang Cheng said. “Your kidneys must be deficient.”
Gu Fei looked at him wordlessly for a few moments, then turned and continued up the
stairs.
There were four units on the seventh floor, Gu Fei’s place was the furthest one in. Jiang
Cheng gathered his thoughts as Gu Fei opened the door. Gu Fei’s mom’s temper tantrum the
other day was still fresh in his mind.
The first thing he saw as he passed through the door was Gu Fei’s mom standing there in
the living room talking on the phone, a cigarette in one hand. Upon seeing the two of them
enter, she shot a somewhat shocked look over Gu Fei’s shoulder toward Jiang Cheng’s face.
“Hello auntie.” Jiang Cheng said quickly.
“Put it out.” Gu Fei said.
“Why so late?” Gu Fei’s mom put out the cigarette, hung up the phone, and looked them up
and down. After a while her eyes landed on Jiang Cheng’s face once more. “Was that you at
the store the other day?”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded and wondered if he should take off his shoes. “I’m Jiang Cheng.”
Gu Fei got a pair of slippers from the cabinet and threw them at Jiang Cheng’s
feet, then turned to face her. “Is there still food?”
“Yeah, I put aside a bunch, enough for the two of you.” Gu Fei’s mom
responded.
“Have a seat.” Gu Fei said then walked to a door beside the living room and opened up a slit
to peer inside.
“He’s checking on Er-Miao.” Gu Fei’s mom explained. “When it comes to our Er-Miao… her
older brother worries more than a father.”
Jiang Cheng just smiled and kept quiet.
“Not asleep yet?” Gu Fei leaned against the door frame and said into the slit.
“Cheng-ge is here, do you wanna come and say hi to him?”
A few seconds later the sound of slippers shuffling against the floor could be heard from the
other room, followed by the sight of a Gu Miao in pajamas running out the door.
“Good evening.” Jiang Cheng smiled and said.
Gu Miao’s face was blank, but she seemed to be in a hurry to run to his side and sit down on
the sofa next to him.
“You’re not asleep yet? It’s almost 10 o’clock.” Jiang Cheng looked at her and tidied the
mess of hair on her head. “You’re gonna get dark circles around your eyes tomorrow.”
Gu Miao rubbed her eyes and smiled.
The little girl’s hair was much longer now. Even though it still stuck out wildly in all
directions, but compared to the shaved boyish look from before, this was a marked
improvement.
The siblings both took after their mom, especially Gu Miao. Jiang Cheng thought. When she
grows up and with a little more polish, she’d be a right beauty for sure.
“Are you two eating now?” Gu Fei and his mom walked together to the kitchen.
“I’ll heat it up for you.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered. “Got any rice?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei’s mom said as she turned to take another look at Jiang Cheng.
“Is that kid Li Yan’s boyfriend?”
She wasn’t being particularly loud, but Jiang Cheng still heard it, and proceeded to raise his
head in utter shock.
Niania?! The wind’s too strong, I couldn’t hear properly, come again?
“…No,” Gu Fei said. “What’s going on in your head anyway.”
“But he has makeup on?” Gu Fei’s mom said.
“What does wearing makeup have to do with Li Yan, it’s not like Li Yan wears makeup…
Ding Zhuxin asked him to take some photos for her today, he didn’t get a chance to take the
makeup off. Oh, right,” Gu Fei poked his head out from the kitchen and yelled. “Jiang Cheng,
why don’t you go wash your face with my mom’s makeup remover.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng stood up.
Gu Fei’s mom took him to the bathroom and handed him the makeup remover.
“Here, use this. It gets the stuff off pretty well. You can use the face cleanser at the top
there, it’s Da-Fei’s.”
“Oh… thanks auntie.” Jiang Cheng stared at the makeup remover.
“Cotton pads are in that pink box,” Gu Fei’s mom looked at him. “You know how to use it?”
Jiang Cheng wanted very much to say yes, that way she could soon stop staring at him and
walk away. But if he said “I do” then he might once again become
“Li Yan’s boyfriend” in her eyes, even though he didn’t know what exactly Li Yan had to do
with makeup… At last he answered honestly, “No I don’t.”
“Er-Miao!” Gu Fei yelled from the kitchen. “Go help your Cheng-ge remove his makeup!”
Gu Miao quickly rushed in. After Gu Fei’s mom left, she stood on her tip toes and took down
the pink box that contained the cotton pads, took out two of them, and poured out some
makeup remover. She waved her hands and gestured for Jiang Cheng to squat down.
“Now what?” Jiang Cheng squatted.
Gu Miao looked at him and shut her eyes hard, then opened them and stared at him.
“Close my eyes right? Alright.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
Gu Miao started to wipe at his face with the cotton pad.
Outside in the kitchen Gu Fei and his mom didn’t continue their conversation from earlier.
But the phrase “Li Yan’s boyfriend” still resounded in Jiang Cheng’s ears. The
way Gu Fei’s mom said it, it was as casual as if she had been talking about Li Yan’s
girlfriend.
Li Yan… IS? And it sounded like it’s common knowledge??
If that was the case then Gu Fei, who hung out with Li Yan every day, must be very
understanding of this. Then… FUCK. Jiang Cheng all of a sudden opened his eyes.
Gu Miao was still holding the cotton pad. She frowned and shook her head.
He quickly shut them again.
If Gu Fei had people like that around him, had been familiar with this…… then the other day
when he kissed Gu Fei like that, there was now another possible explanation for his
actions!
Maybe Gu Fei wouldn’t simply interpret it as drunken madness like people normally would.
FUCK ME.
If that was the case, then this was now very awkward.
Gu Miao left after she finished removing his makeup. He picked up Gu Fei’s face cleanser
and looked at it, ‘Refreshing and not tight!’…… bullshit. He had used this brand before, it
still left your skin tight. There was no way for it to be refreshing without making the skin
tight.
His face already felt tight immediately after washing, but by the time he saw Gu Fei his face
felt so tight he could hardly keep his eyes open.
“You got some lotion or cream or something?” Jiang Cheng asked. “My face is gonna crack.”
Before Gu Fei even opened his mouth to respond, Gu Miao flew to her room and brought
him a bottle of moisturizer for kids.
“Ooooh,” Jiang Cheng accepted it. “You’re rather vain aren’t you, how do you even have
this?”
“Li Yan bought it for her. She pushes it on people all the time, but can’t be bothered to use it
on herself.” Gu Fei said.
“Do you know Li Yan?” Gu Fei’s mom asked, looking pointedly at Jiang Cheng.
“…Not well.” Jiang Cheng answered while rubbing his face, a little exasperated.
“They’ve only met a couple times, and Li Yan doesn’t even have a boyfriend.”
Gu Fei didn’t know what else to say. “You should go to sleep… Er-Miao, you go to bed too.”
Gu Miao was very good about going back to sleep in her room. Gu Fei’s mom took out her
phone again and started dialing, and only went back to her room and closed the door after
stealing more glances at Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei’s mother’s cooking was surprisingly good. It was still delicious even though it had
been left out and reheated, especially the ribs. Jiang Cheng ate five pieces in a row, and
stopped only when he realized and got embarrassed.
“You can have all of it.” Gu Fei said. “I was hungry for too long that I’m past it now.”
“I’m also…” Jiang Cheng hesitated, but then picked up another piece.
“My mom’s cooking is pretty good huh.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. Then thought about it and sighed. He looked at the dishes in
front of him. “I think it’s been a long time, since I had a home-cooked meal.”
Gu Fei was quiet.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything more, just kept his head down and ate.
Ever since he came here, he pretty much ate take-out exclusively, that or something similar
on the streets. Recently, to save money, he was cooking for himself, but usually just plain
noodle soups.
But now all of a sudden he got to taste a rather delicious ‘home-cooked meal’, Jiang Cheng
felt his heart clench unexpectedly. He was trying hard to not be so emotional, but he
couldn’t contain himself, he even felt his nose start to burn.
Fortunately Gu Fei picked this time to gather up the dishes to take to the kitchen, this gave
Jiang Cheng a chance to wipe his eyes. He took several deep breaths and finally managed to
calm himself down.
He didn’t even fight with Gu Fei to wash the dishes after. He didn’t want to move.
“You can take my bed if you’re sleepy.” Gu Fei opened a door to another bedroom. “I’ll sleep
on the couch.”
“That’s not necessary.” Jiang Cheng stood up and followed him into the room. “I can sleep
on the couch, I can fall asleep anywhere…… This room of yours, not bad.”
Their living room was clearly in the style of ten or twenty years earlier, and
hadn’t been maintained or updated. Though it was better than Li Baoguo’s place which
would’ve been met with disdain even fifty years ago, still it was the look of a very plain and
not well-to-do home.
Gu Fei’s bedroom was a surprise.
The room wasn’t big, and had no special treatment other than a coat of white paint. But he
could see that each piece of furniture was chosen with careful consideration.
A bed, bookcase, desk, chair, rug, a recliner, and a hammock by the window.
There were a lot of stuff, but it didn’t feel messy. There was a sense of warmth and comfort.
“Tea?” Gu Fei picked up a small kettle on the desk and put some tea leaves in.
“Or water?”
“Water.” Jiang Cheng sat down on the recliner. “I can’t sleep if I drink tea.”
Gu Fei put a wedge of lemon in the mug and poured him some warm water.
The hot lemon water, the soft couch, a warm and cozy room that he hadn’t experienced in
such a long time. Jiang Cheng leaned back against the recliner with the water in hand, and
didn’t feel like saying anything.
“My mom’s dense like that, she doesn’t think before she speaks.” Gu Fei sat down in front of
the computer and inserted the memory card from the camera.
“Don’t take her words to heart.”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng responded, paused for a moment and couldn’t help but ask. “Li Yan…
“
“Li Yan really doesn’t have a boyfriend.” Gu Fei said, then looked at him and smiled.
“Although Li Yan really does… like men.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng held the mug in his hands and allowed the rising steam to conceal his
face. “Does everyone know… about him?”
“Friends know. I’m not sure where my mom got it from, though she won’t go out and
spread it either.” Gu Fei said while transferring the photos to his computer.
“This kinda thing, nobody wants everyone to know, right?”
“Yeah…” Jiang Cheng sighed in agreement.
Not even a second later, the realization suddenly dawned on him. He bolted wide awake
and quickly cleared his throat in an attempt to cover the sigh.
Gu Fei gave him a look but didn’t say anything.
There was no way Jiang Cheng could keep himself from overanalysing Gu Fei’s look. The
kind of awkward tension that had long ceased to exist between the two of them
encompassed him again.
All he could do was stand up and stroll back and forth around the room with his mug of
water.
But it wasn’t a big room, and so his stroll was limited to about three steps in either
direction. He felt he was just flopping around blindly, this was even more awkward than
just sitting still.
At last, he stopped in front of the bookcase.
“Mind if I look at your shelf?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“…I don’t even know how to answer that.” Gu Fei turned to look at him.
“What’s wrong with looking at it, why would you even have to ask?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng chuckled softly. “Just a habit.”
“Your old… upbringing seems a little too strict.” Gu Fei said.
“Perhaps… The whole family was very strict. Rules, courtesies, manners.” Jiang Cheng
looked over the books on the shelves. “I must’ve been dense, should’ve known from the
start that I didn’t belong in their family. A family of four, and I was the black sheep…”
“You’re pretty good.” Gu Fei watched the progress bar of his photo transfer.
“Here maybe, I’m pretty good.” Jiang Cheng remembered what he saw earlier with Li
Baoguo’s family and that woman with a limp. Yeah… in a place filled with that kind of life
and lifestyle, only then can someone like himself be considered ‘good’.
“Some things don’t need to be compared to be seen.” Gu Fei smiled, poured himself some
tea and took a sip. “Whether a person is really ‘good’, one only need to look at the person. It
doesn’t matter where he is, or who’s around him.”
“… Why, you…” Jiang Cheng stared at him. “You suddenly don’t seem like the type to turn in
a blank test paper.”
“Bullshit. When did I ever turn in blank papers? I always made sure to fill them up first.” Gu
Fei said.
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help laughing.
Gu Fei picked up the camera and pointed it at him.
“You’ve been shooting the whole day, not tired of it yet?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Not if it’s of you.” Gu Fei said. “You look good… when you smile.”
Jiang Cheng’s smile froze on his face. Gu Fei held the camera and cursed himself in his head.
Dumbass.
The first sentence was already out of his mouth before he realized how inappropriate it
was, especially so fresh after Li Yan’s sexual orientation was
‘exposed’. Words like these was bordering on flirting.
But to cover it up he added on another sentence, one that he regretted before he even
finished. One more inappropriate than the next, but he had no choice but to finish what he
said, or it would seem even more conspicuous.
So by the time he closed his mouth, both he and Jiang Cheng were frozen in place.
He hid his face with the camera, unsure of what to say to ease the tension in the air.
For somebody who never felt any kind of embarrassment, second hand or otherwise, and
who rarely bothered to care what others thought of him, the fact that he would find himself
in this thorny situation alone was enough to render him speechless.
“After this shoot, Ding Zhuxin will probably ask you to do some other ones.” Gu Fei
continued. He was still holding the camera, staring at Jiang Cheng’s face through the lens. “If
you think the rate is appropriate, you can work with her long-term. She’s always
unsatisfied with her models, but she was pretty happy with you today.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng looked to the left, to the right, then at the camera. “Erm…I’m just
wondering, just that, uhh… If uhhh…Xin-jie is your…you know, you and her…uh, she’s
your…”
“Girlfriend?” Gu Fei interrupted him. “She’s not, I think I said before. She’s my childhood
friend, I call her big sister.”
“Oh!” Jiang Cheng answered in a loud voice, in an effort to free himself from the awkward
tension.
“All this effort.” Gu Fei couldn’t help but let out a breath of relief on his behalf.
“I thought you were going to ask about me and Li Yan.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng looked at him stunned. “You and Li Yan? You’re…??”
“No!” Gu Fei set the camera down. “Ayy… Li Yan and I are just friends, do we look like a
couple to you?”
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng leaned on the bookcase. He seemed to have a hard time
adjusting to this topic of conversation. “I guess not? He looks more likely to be with Liu
Fan.”
Gu Fei leaned on the chair and laughed for a long time. “Liu Fan would get mad if he heard
that.”
“…Really.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look and smiled without saying any more.
‘Not A Good Bird’ along with Li Yan and Gu Fei, they seemed like a close bunch. They hung
out together all the time, and even had their own little clubhouse in the Steel Works.
But according to Gu Fei… even close as these guys were, still there was someone who
couldn’t fully accept it.
Yes… Pan Zhi was right.
Tolerance and acceptance only existed in 2-D media. Real life was still ruthless.
But what about Gu Fei?
Jiang Cheng leaned his head back slightly against the glass door of the bookcase and
watched as Gu Fei played with his camera.
His attitude was actually clear as day. He wasn’t disgusted, he accepted it.
But was there anything more?
The kiss he landed on Gu Fei’s face the other day, Gu Fei didn’t have any reaction to it. Pan
Zhi would at least be shocked, then proceed to make fun of him.
Though Gu Fei was someone who rarely displayed his emotions externally, that kind of
calm and composure still seemed a little unusual between two people who were not close
enough to be on a drunken rampage together.
Now that he thought about it, his reaction the next day was also far too calm.
Too calm.
Jiang Cheng took a sip of the lemon water.
Gu Fei might be a slacker student, but he was a smart slacker.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a sense of helplessness as if he had already been seen through.
Gu Fei might know everything. He was having some trouble processing this new
information. So much so that he couldn’t even calmly continue their
conversation.
The photos were done transferring. Gu Fei created a new folder, marked the date, and
started to process the images.
His cursor swept over thumbnails. He didn’t like to process photos in order, he preferred to
pick and choose.
The cursor finally stopped at the one of Jiang Cheng when his fingers got caught on the
collar.
He leaned back slightly when he opened up the image. Compared to the glimpse through
the lens on set, the frozen moment that suddenly popped before his eyes in sharp definition
was much more striking.
His elbow on the armrest and his fingers supported the corner of his head, Gu Fei whistled
softly.
“And what about you?” Jiang Cheng suddenly asked.
Reflexively Gu Fei thought his whistle would be met by a “you shut up”, but by the time he
realized what Jiang Cheng said, he didn’t even dare to turn and face him.
“Hmm?” He zoomed out of the image so it filled the screen and adjusted the white balance.
“What… about me?”
“Are you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
To be honest, Jiang Cheng got embarrassed so easily that Gu Fei never imagined in a million
years that he would suddenly be this blunt. His tone of voice didn’t allow for any evasion.
“Are you?” Gu Fei turned to face him.
“You know if I am.” Jiang Cheng watched him. “Right now it’s me asking you.”
Gu Fei didn’t want to answer this question.
He actually didn’t ponder too much about whether Jiang Cheng was. Whether he was or
wasn’t didn’t have any effect on Gu Fei. Even if he did have any ideas about the matter, he
would keep it to himself.
But what Jiang Cheng wanted to know, he was afraid to answer.
If neither knew about the other, or at least feigned ignorance, it would be easier for them to
get along in their relationship. But if all of a sudden everything was out in the open, all of
the attraction and attention suddenly had a defined intent, now that was a little panic-
inducing.
At least, he was like that. He never intended to do anything. But once things became
transparent, his every word, every look, could all be interpreted to seem as though he
intended on doing something.
“Nevermind.” Jiang Cheng picked up the mug and sat down in the recliner. He leaned his
head back and let out a drawn out breath. “You don’t have to say it, I understand.”
Gu Fei only looked at him.
“Da-Fei,” Jiang Cheng tilted his head back but maintained eye contact. “I really don’t mean
anything by it, I only wanted to tell you that, if you know… please keep it a secret. I… don’t
want others to know.”
“Mm.” Gu Fei nodded. If he recalled correctly, this was the first time Jiang Cheng didn’t call
him Gu Fei.
“Just like how you don’t want others to know either.” Jiang Cheng took a sip of water.
“Was that a threat?” Gu Fei laughed.
“Yep.” Jiang Cheng chuckled too and nodded. “I’ve got leverage on you.”
“I will keep it a secret.” Gu Fei said.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5642
TL word count: 3778
TL time: 5:06:31
Edit: 1:35:08
Curse words: 2x fucks, 2x shits, 1x ass
Chapter 33
“You sleep on the inside of the bed.” Gu Fei said without raising his head.
After reaching the verbal agreement, neither of them spoke again for a while.
As to Jiang Cheng’s question, Gu Fei neither confirmed nor denied. Even after Jiang Cheng
came to the ‘conclusion’, he still did not confirm or deny it.
His attitude was a little vague, but it was enough for Jiang Cheng. His question was
originally just a daring probe, meant as an assault launched to protect his own secret.
There were so many people in this world who wanted to keep themselves hidden, and so
many things they needed to hide.
Gu Fei cracked open the window and lit up a cigarette, getting ready to continue editing.
After two puffs, Jiang Cheng reached over with his hand, “Give me one.”
“You do smoke regularly right?” Gu Fei put the pack of cigarettes in his hand.
“How come you keep asking me for them, what do you do when I’m not here?”
“I’m ran out.” Jiang Cheng lit one. “If you’re not here I just won’t smoke.”
Gu Fei opened up the window a bit more.
“It’s cold.” Jiang Cheng shrunk back into the couch.
“Go smoke in the kitchen with the vent on then.” Gu Fei clicked the mouse and zoomed in
on Jiang Cheng’s face on the screen.
For photos of clothes, he usually didn’t bother to edit the models’ faces, at best giving it
some quick touch-ups at the end. Most photos he would crop the face out entirely if he
thought it wasn’t shot well.
Jiang Cheng’s face however, was genuinely very good. Enough for him to set the clothing
details aside and started working on the face first.
The recliner was right by the desk. From his seat there Jiang Cheng was basically face to
face with Gu Fei and couldn’t see the screen. So he didn’t need to worry about the
embarrassment that would ensue if Jiang Cheng saw him editing clothing photos but going
for the model’s face first.
“Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng reached over to tap some ash into the ashtray on the desk.
“Mm,” Gu Fei nudged the ashtray toward his hands. “Using my full name again?”
“That was an appeal earlier, I had to feign intimacy.” Jiang Cheng held the cigarette in his
mouth and smiled. “I have a question for you.”
“Shoot.” Gu Fei stared at the screen. Frankly. there wasn’t much to be done to this face of
Jiang Cheng’s. He had a good face shape, and good skin too.
Jiang Cheng glanced over at the bookcase, “The sheet music I saw last time, that was you,
right?”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei paused, and looked toward the bookcase as well.
“A bunch of books on music composition, and all sorts of music theory books.
You’d be far too insincere,” Jiang Cheng said. “If you insist you didn’t write it.”
Gu Fei started to laugh and after a while leaned back on his chair, “Yes, I wrote it.”
“It’s rather unexpected.” Jiang Cheng spun the mug in his hands. “Sounded pretty good
though. An illiterate who can write and compose music…”
“I’m not illiterate.” Gu Fei corrected him.
“Major slacker student can write music too.” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Got any finished
works?”
“No.” Gu Fei answered plainly.
There were actually quite a few works, all saved in his computer, though he never listened
to them. It wasn’t wrong to say he didn’t have any. The only one he heard occasionally was
the one song sung by Ding Zhuxin.
When it came to these things, he wouldn’t have cared if it was anyone else. If they wanted
to listen then so be it. But he wasn’t very willing to show off in front of Jiang Cheng.
If only because Jiang Cheng was able to hum the tune after just one look at the sheet music.
He didn’t want to show fear.
“Be a man about it,” Jiang Cheng was probably bored. He said with excitement, the cigarette
still in his mouth. “I’ll keep it a secret.”
“Some bullshit secret.” Gu Fei laughed. He hesitated for a bit but still opened the music
player, searched for the song and clicked play.
When the guitar chords sounded, Jiang Cheng leaned back into the couch. He didn’t know
how to play guitar, but had always liked the sound of it. Though
everything he liked, whether it was guitar, the tin whistle, or the recorder, his mom always
showed disdain for them, they weren’t grand enough for her.
The piano harmony followed.
He felt nothing.
He had heard and played too much piano. He hadn’t wanted to touch a piano for even a
second since he passed level 8 back in middle school.
This lack of motivation and ambition must’ve made his mom… made Shen
Yiqing very disappointed. After that, whenever relatives and friends came over and wanted
to hear him play the piano, Shen Yiqing would turn them down with eyes brimming with
disappointment.
Let her be disappointed then. He didn’t want to play anyway.
The prelude was very good, the mood it was trying to convey was clear. It was full to the
brim with wandering uncertainty.
He couldn’t help but glance at Gu Fei. The impression Gu Fei gave people… he didn’t seem
like the type to have that state of mind.
A low female vocal started to hum. Jiang Cheng recognized the voice right away.
“Ding Zhuxin?” He looked at Gu Fei with surprise.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered, continuing to edit, eyes fixed on the screen.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but poke his head over to take a look, and saw his own bare chest
and half a face, along with a pulled open collar.
“Fuck.” He sat back down immediately. It was too unsettling, this feeling of watching
someone else edit photos of himself. He had been looking at himself in the mirror for more
than ten years, but this felt as if he was creeping on a stranger.
“This one is especially good.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He lowered his head and took a sip of lemon water amidst the
sound of Ding Zhuxin’s lazy and husky vocals.
“I take a step into the air, I’m about to fly
Upwards is wandering uncertainty, I head down and heard you say this is an empty world
You say one two three, shattering what’s gone by, withering
The way back, blown apart by wind, do you see me sing out… … you say one
two three
Turn around, listen to the wiped out panic……”
The melody was wandering and so were the lyrics. But when Jiang Cheng heard
“do you see me sing out” he raised his head and stole a glance at Gu Fei.
In this moment, it was the word “see” that let him get a grasp on the sense of
‘muteness’ that Ding Zhuxin was asking for.
A silent kind of repression.
“Who wrote the lyrics?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Guess.” Gu Fei folded one leg up on the chair and rested his chin on the knee.
The mouse click-clacked in his hand. “You get candy if you guess right.”
“It’s you, isn’t it?” Jiang Cheng said. “The music and lyrics are all you?”
Gu Fei grabbed the coat thrown to the side, pulled out a handful of candy from the pocket,
and placed it on the desk in front of him.
“Do you play in a band with Ding Zhuxin?” Jiang Cheng put a piece of milk candy in his
mouth. He was a little shocked.
He hadn’t fully contemplated the lyrics, but even so could perceive the delicate sensibility
within. It was hard to connect this kind of insight with Gu Fei.
He stared at Gu Fei.
Underneath the calm exterior of this person, what is the heart like?
“No, she used to bring me along is all.” Gu Fei said.
“Interesting,” Jiang Cheng said. “Though you really don’t seem like the type to play around
with this stuff. I wouldn’t be surprised if you played guitar.
Generally speaking most bad boys know a few chords, even if for the sake of showing
off……”
“I don’t know how to play guitar.” Gu Fei said.
“Whoa, a bad boy who doesn’t know how to play guitar.” Jiang Cheng said.
“That’s a handicap on the path to chicks.”
Gu Fei looked at him without a word.
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng raised the mug at him.
“Are you in a bad mood?” Gu Fei asked.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng took a sip of water.
“You’re being very chatty.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng was quiet for a moment, then set the mug on the desk, “The woman who was
fighting with Li Baoguo just now, do you recognize her?”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei answered.
“Is she Li Baoguo’s ex-wife?” Jiang Cheng asked. “The one he beat off?”
“She did run off after he beat her, but she’s not his ex.” Gu Fei lit another cigarette. “She’s
his current wife. They’re not divorced.”
“… Ah,” Jiang Cheng was stunned for a moment, he leaned back on the couch and closed his
eyes. “Fuck. What a fucking mess.”
“She hasn’t been back in a long time, we don’t see her more than once every couple of
years.” Gu Fei said.
This was probably Gu Fei’s way of comforting him: This woman doesn’t usually show up, not
even once every couple of years.
But Jiang Cheng felt that no reassurance can help his mood at this moment. No matter how
many years passed between her appearances, even if it was a lifetime, she was still his
biological mother.
As inexplicable as Li Baoguo, but indisputable.
He wanted very much to give Shen Yiqing a call. To ask her what the hell she was thinking
at the time, to adopt a child from a family like this.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei called out to him. “Come here, I want to show you
something.”
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng stood up and walked over to his side.
“When you’re shooting tomorrow,” Gu Fei pointed at the screen. “Pay attention to your
arm, bring it in a little…”
“The fuck.” Jiang Cheng just now saw clearly what he looked like in that well-ventilated
outfit and could hardly stand it. He pointed at the photo, “You dare to make a living editing
photos at this speed?”
Gu Fei smiled, “No, I’m very fast. It’s all mindless flow state work…”
“You call this flow state? You’ve been flowing all this time and still on this one, where is the
water flowing to?” Jiang Cheng could not comprehend. “Is this photo a dam reservoir?”
“I did a bunch already. I’m just using this one as an example for you.” Gu Fei said.
“Why do you have to use this one? Do I not have arms in the other photos?”
Jiang Cheng sighed.
Gu Fei laughed for a long time and eventually let out a sigh as well, “This one really is great.
I figure boss Ding will use this one as the feature, maybe even gift you the outfit.”
“Oh fuck off.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Can you remember what I said just now?” Gu Fei asked.
“Got it,” Jiang Cheng pulled up a chair behind him and sat down. “Arms in.”
“Then I’ll continue.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng watched the cursor flit back and forth clicking on the various menu settings
beside the photo, the picture changing between light and dark, enlarged one second and
shrunken in the next. Though after all the changes he couldn’t even tell what was different
without a side by side comparison, only that Gu Fei really was doing ‘mindless flow state
work’.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t bear watching photos of his own poses and expressions being
manipulated in Gu Fei’s hands. There was a constant worry that somehow his eye booger
or nose hair would be captured in all of their high definition glory…
He got up and went back to the recliner, pulling a notebook from his backpack.
“Not gonna watch anymore?” Gu Fei asked, hands still working nonstop.
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng said. “Do you have another desk?”
“For homework?” Gu Fei turned to look at him.
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “We have a test in a few days, there’s still some reading to do.”
Gu Fei was still looking at him, but now his hands stopped too. He paused for a long time,
then asked, “You have to study?”
“Bullshit.” Jiang Cheng stared back at him in utter confusion. “There’s a test, of course I
have to study.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei dropped the mouse and stood up. He pushed the monitor and keyboard to one
side, unplugged the speakers and stacked it on the computer under the desk, this cleared
out the space of half a desk.
“Don’t you normally have a desk or something to write homework on?” Jiang Cheng put his
textbook and notes on the desk.
“I copy it in the store if I have time, if I don’t then I won’t write it.” Gu Fei answered.
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng recalled that Gu Fei is a slacker slacker slacker student.
Homework was not a particularly unpleasant thing to Jiang Cheng. He could always
complete it regardless, though he always took it seriously every time.
He didn’t like to do homework much in elementary school, but his family was very strict
and the consequences of not doing homework was dire. So he eventually developed the
habit of writing it quickly and diligently, working hard first so he can play hard later.
His entirely opposite younger brother on the other hand, never needed anyone to fuss over
him.
Of course, inherited nature was different. Genetics were genetics.
If he hadn’t been adopted, if he grew up by Li Baoguo’s side, then today he would be Li
Baoguo and Li Hui.
Jiang Cheng sighed quietly, collected his thoughts, and continued to write.
In the gaps between his scribbles he could see Gu Fei’s hand at the mouse. It looked good.
Gu Fei didn’t know how to play the guitar, but probably knew piano. Though Jiang Cheng
had no idea how good he was.
Jiang Cheng liked to watch the way fingers danced across keys on a piano. This was his only
joy while practicing piano in the past. The only thing that motivated him to play a song well
was so his fingers could look better while dancing over the keys.
When his homework was almost done, Gu Fei’s hand left the mouse. Jiang Cheng figured the
photos were done.
“Done yet?” Gu Fei asked.
“Just a little more,” Jiang Cheng said as he continued writing. “Do you want to copy?”
“Are you copying for me?” Gu Fei asked again.
“Can you value your own face once in a while?” Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
“In that case I won’t.” Gu Fei stretched. “I’m sleepy, you keep writing, I’ll go take a shower
first.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Even though homework was very much a downer in terms of mood, his mind still
wandered in rather shameless directions after Gu Fei walked out of the room.
It wasn’t directed at Gu Fei specifically, but simply because he said “take a shower”… After
all, Jiang Cheng had watched his share of nsfw videos. In the atmosphere that followed their
exchange of secrets, a lot of damage could be done by those three words.
Even more unbearable was, after he finally calmed himself down with the homework, Gu
Fei finished showering and walked into the room in pyjamas, and suddenly he was wide
awake again.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fucking balls.
“Do you need to go?” Gu Fei pulled open a drawer and took out a cardboard box. “I have old
pyjamas and new underwear…”
“Ok.” Jiang Cheng rose swiftly, grabbed the box and turned to leave.
“There’s three in there.” Gu Fei said behind him.
Jiang Cheng opened the box with light speed, took a pair of underwear out and threw the
box back at him, then walked out of the room.
If this wasn’t Gu Fei’s home, if his mom and little sister weren’t in their respective rooms,
he would seriously consider taking care of business right there in the bathroom. He hadn’t
engaged in this activity much since he got here, considering the presence of Li Baoguo who
could push open his door at any given moment, and the cockroaches that would often
frequent the washroom…
In this tangle of thoughts he finished showering, then realized that Gu Fei didn’t give him a
towel. He hesitated, then used his clothes that were already half wet from the shower water
and hastily wiped himself dry.
It was only after he put on his underwear, that he realized in his hurry earlier, he had
forgotten to take the pyjamas.
“Fuck me.” Jiang Cheng picked up the clothes he changed out of, already wet, now even
more so after he dried himself with them.
After some mental gymnastics he made a decision, clenched his teeth and opened the
bathroom door. He was just going back to the room in his underwear after a shower, what
was the big deal? What was there to feel weird about?
Even if he was, and Gu Fei was, so what? It wasn’t as if they had to do it just because they
both were.
But before he had the chance to walk out with chest puffed, he noticed the neatly folded
pyjamas on the chair outside the bathroom door. The way Gu Fei’s so habitually used to
taking care of others, he’s virtually an angel…
He grabbed the clothes and quickly put them on, and finally let out a breath of relief.
When he pushed open the door to Gu Fei’s room, the computer was already turned off and
Gu Fei was sitting cross-legged on the bed playing with his phone.
“I…” Jiang Cheng awkwardly walked toward the recliner.
“You sleep on the inside of the bed.” Gu Fei said without raising his head.
“Don’t sleep on the couch.”
“Why not?” Jiang Cheng was a little confused.
“Gu Miao comes to sleep on this couch sometimes when she sleepwalks.” Gu Fei said. “If
you take her spot it might scare her.”
“She sleepwalks?” Jiang Cheng was surprised.
“Not often. But you’re here today and she’s excited, so I’m a little worried.” Gu Fei put down
the phone and looked at him.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng wanted to say I’ll go sleep in the living room, but thought that might
seem too deliberate, so he nodded. “You sleep on the inside.”
‘Hmm?” Gu Fei was momentarily confused.
“Your bed,” Jiang Cheng pointed at the bed. This bed of Gu Fei’s was framed and enclosed all
around, like traditional Chinese beds of the past. The design was very modern and
attractive, but it still had a very strong sense of privacy.
“I’ll sleep on the outside.”
“Sure.” Gu Fei moved to the side by the wall, and switched the pillows and comforters
around.
“How come you bought a bed like this?” Jiang Cheng sat on the edge. “For a sense of safety?”
“To block Gu Miao.” Gu Fei gestured to the foot of the bed. “She sometimes enters without
knocking, if I was doing something in bed I don’t even have time to tidy up. But if I lock the
door, she’ll get mad when she can’t get in.”
“……Ah.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help turning to look at him.
Gu Fei was looking at him too with a solemn expression on his face.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng started to laugh. Even though the topic was a little awkward, he still
found it hilarious for some reason.
“That’s how tiring it is to have a little sister.” Gu Fei laughed too. “I must’ve done something
to owe her in my past life.”
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng leaned against the headboard and pulled the comforter over himself.
“It’s only because you’re a good older brother.”
“Is that so.” Gu Fei put his head down and continued to play with his phone.
“Mhm, even though you’re always playing that idiotic game…” Jiang Cheng looked down on
Gu Fei’s phone screen, noticed that he was actually not playing the idiotic Ai Xiao Chu
today, and figured he was probably out of hearts. “I used to have a younger brother too.”
“A brother?” Gu Fei turned, shocked.
“Mhm. Their biological son, two years younger than me.” Jiang Cheng used the pillow as a
back cushion. “I get annoyed whenever I see him, he feels the same towards me. We haven’t
spoken to each other in a long time even before I came here…”
“Different personalities I guess?” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah, I have a different personality than the rest of the family.” Jiang Cheng said.
They were quiet after that, neither of them said anything else.
But this time the silence in the room didn’t make Jiang Cheng feel awkward. He spaced out
for a bit then turned on his phone for mindless chatter with Pan Zhi.
– gramps, do you remember Huang Hui from Class-117?
– you finally can’t hold it in anymore?
– not at all. I just want to say she fcking got with that dogshit Liang Zhiyong, right now i
want to cry but no tears would come
– they just started right? you still have a chance, hurry up and stick your foot in
– I think so too, still considering which one of them I can seduce more easily Jiang Cheng
chuckled at his phone for the longest time, Gu Fei turned and gave him a look.
“My bro,” Jiang Cheng said while laughing. “He got pre-dumped.”
“The one who went to the gymnasium with you during winter break?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng nodded, then chuckled again. “That kid.”
It was quiet again after the laughter stopped and the two of them continued to play with
their phones. Jiang Cheng had thought at the start that the two of them sitting on the bed
together would be awkward as hell, but it was actually the most comfortable “before bed
routine” he had in a long while.
A few minutes later he heard soft laughter from Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng turned to look, and Gu Fei handed his phone over, “Have you looked at our
forum lately?”
“Didn’t get a chance to.” Jiang Cheng took the phone. “Are they talking about the game?
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded while continuing to laugh.
Jiang Cheng took a look at the screen, the forum at Fourth High was bustling.
Each post had lots of views and replies. He scanned the headlines.
> DA-FEI MY IDOL HE’S SUFFOCATING HOT UWUUUAHHHHHHHHH
> Who is! This! Cute guy! DETAILS PLEASE!
> Who said Class-8 are weak chickens come out I promise to beat them up!!!
> HANDSOME BOYS TAKING PANTS OFF, multi-image, data users beware
> Just asking but is anyone here to discuss strategies…
Jiang Cheng laughed. Reading the headlines, he felt the people of Fourth High appeared
much more lovable than usual. “Do you reply to the posts?”
“Of course.” Gu Fei said.
“What’s your username?” Jiang Cheng asked as he scrolled down.
“freestyle_handsome.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng choked, then turned and coughed for a long time before turning back. “The
fuck?”
“It’s a secret.” Gu Fei said. “Nobody knows it’s me.”
“Secret indeed. You can blame Good Little Bunny on Gu Miao,” Jiang Cheng
tsked at him. “But if anyone found out about this username, your cold aloof persona’s
gonna be bust.”
Gu Fei laughed soundlessly.
> It’s not my inner fujoshi talking, but uknowwho and uknowwho really are kinda…… enter
if you get me
Jiang Cheng’s finger twitched when he reached this post. He could tell from a glance that
the thumbnails under the headline were of Gu Fei and him.
…… This forum is a little too scary.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5960
TL word count: 3984
TL time: 6:02:01
Edit: 2:24:48
Curse words: 17 fucks, 2 shits
First posted: April 26, 2020
Chapter 34
The two of them were suddenly face to face.
His old school also had a forum, but it was comparatively empty. It was a key high school
after all, one where the teachers were a mine detector away from scanning every single
student who came through the gates. Cell phones were at constant risk of being confiscated,
so nobody really bothered with these things.
At most there were small scale gossips in WeChat groups.
Jiang Cheng had never experienced this spectacle of wide open discussion on the school
forum.
That ‘fujoshi’ thread was posted on the day of their match. It hadn’t even been a day since
then, but the view count and number of replies were already impressive.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a long while, but did not end up opening the thread.
It was common for girls to jump on the hype with these things, but he wouldn’t have paid it
any mind if it was Wang Jiuri [1] they shipped him with. But seeing himself and Gu Fei put
together like that made him uncomfortable.
At last he opened the ‘Da-Fei my idol’ thread.
There were lots of photos of Gu Fei taken from different angles during the game.
The girl must’ve circled the court countless times to get these pictures. There was even a
shot from below of Gu Fei jumping up to the basket, god only knew how she managed to do
that.
The first few replies were all photos, along with the OP’s out of control screaming along
with lines of exclamation marks. After that were replies with more of the same screaming.
It was only until he got to the 30th comment that there was finally a voice of dissent.
> hardly a big deal, there’s lots like this out there
This reply inspired a flood of comments that lasted eight whole pages, all of it hurling abuse
at the commenter.
Jiang Cheng checked out the screen name and couldn’t help but blurt out, “What the…
fuck?”
freestyle_handsome.
“You must really be bored.” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei.
“Who would go on this thing unless they’re bored.” Gu Fei took the phone back, and
chuckled when he read it. “See, overachievers like you can’t even be bothered to look at
these.”
“I… go online too,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s just the forum at my old school was like a ghost
town, nobody uses it.”
“What’s your screen name?” Gu Fei tilted his head.
Jiang Cheng had a moment of hesitation, “Some Cheng.”
“Huh?” Gu Fei didn’t understand.
“Main account is ‘some_cheng’, side account is ‘soandso_cheng’.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What the hell kinda name is that, and you dare to laugh at me?” Gu Fei said. “I had to add
an alias for your WeChat handle since it was in English. Why don’t you consolidate your
styles and just make them all ‘jiangxx’.”
“I’m just too lazy to think of a name.” Jiang Cheng said. “What’s your alias for me?”
“Cheng-ge…” Gu Fei gave him a look.
“I think Good Little Bunny is the one that needs an alias.” Jiang Cheng grinned.
They were quiet again after that. Jiang Cheng took out his own phone and continued to blab
with Pan Zhi. He considered taking another look in the Fourth High forum again, but Gu Fei
was still beside him, so he dropped the idea from his mind.
Pan Zhi was rather envious of the bustling Fourth High forum, and expressed an interest in
joining in order to chat up girls. Jiang Cheng laughed for a few minutes then checked the
time and saw that it was almost midnight, so he got ready to sleep.
He looked towards Gu Fei and found that he was already asleep, lying with his face to the
wall and half of his head submerged under the cover.
Jiang Cheng looked to the head of the bed and saw there was a light switch. He turned the
lights off and the room plunged into darkness. A few seconds later he was able to see the
faint light spilling in through the curtains again.
He laid down on the pillow and rolled onto his right side. Jiang Cheng was used to sleeping
on his right side, but as soon as he turned he saw Gu Fei lying with his back to him.
So he flipped over again to face the left side and closed his eyes.
He suddenly remembered a survey he had once read about the sleeping positions of
couples. There were side by side, face to face, and the most popular one was where both lay
facing the same side, it was called ‘spooning’…
Fuck. He just figured out what that meant.
Gu Fei was a quiet sleeper. His breaths were even and had a hypnotic effect.
Jiang Cheng followed along with his breathing and before long also drifted to sleep.
Though whether it was due to the unfamiliar bed or because there was someone sleeping
beside him, he couldn’t get into a deep slumber. He had never before shared a bed with
another person.
He was having dazed dreams while knowing he was dreaming the whole time, and could
still feel Gu Fei shifting beside him.
What’s more, the dreams were not a continuous sequence, the scenes kept changing.
At last, he dreamed that he and Gu Fei were standing naked in the middle of a basketball
court, being surrounded and photographed by a bunch of people with paper bags over their
heads. There were sounds of insults and jeers.
This is a dream.
And rather absurd too. He wondered why he would dream of this kind of thing.
This isn’t real. He reminded himself.
But this dream wasn’t like ones he had before that could be sped up, rewound, or skipped
at will. It pushed forward slowly frame by frame.
His perspective changed often from his own point of view facing the jeering onlookers, to
the perspective of an outsider rotating like a camera that rapidly orbited the two people
standing on the court.
He turned to look at Gu Fei with a mixture of horror and panic.
Gu Fei was saying something to him without any expression, but he couldn’t hear a single
word.
Do you see me sing out?
Listen, to the wiped out panic.
Gu Fei heard the sound of the door. He opened his eyes and realized it was
almost light out, soft warm light filtered in through the curtains. Gu Miao padded in on her
bare feet, eyes directed straight forward. She sat down on the recliner, adjusted the
cushions, and lay down.
He sighed and sat up quietly.
Gu Miao used to share this bedroom with him. Gu Fei made her sleep on her own since she
started elementary, but Gu Miao still came back here every time she sleepwalked. She even
remembered Gu Fei’s words: “big brother is a boy, you can’t just sleep on the same bed as a
boy now”, and would always head straight to the couch to sleep.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng’s face. Jiang Cheng seemed to be sleeping soundly, but his
breathing was a little uneven, probably dreaming.
He put one hand on the bed to support himself and had a leg bent at Jiang Cheng’s side,
then reached his other leg across Jiang Cheng’s body to the other side. This guy took up
quite a bit of space when sleeping. To avoid stepping on him, Gu Fei almost pulled a
hamstring with this single step.
Next he straightened his torso and got ready to push the rest of himself across.
But when he was in the middle of passing over Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng suddenly frowned
and rolled over. The two of them were suddenly face to face.
Gu Fei felt Jiang Cheng wasn’t in a very deep sleep, judging by his furrowed brows and
uneven breathing… so he hastily propped himself up more wanting to get across quickly.
Just as he was about to push off with the leg that was on the inner side in order to jump
straight off the bed, Jiang Cheng opened his eyes.
Gu Fei wanted to speak, but at the same time was afraid of waking up Gu Miao, who just
laid down. Who knew if her sleepwalking state had ended or not. So all he could do was
stare at Jiang Cheng in silence, waiting for him to fully regain consciousness.
Jiang Cheng’s freshly opened eyes grew from slits to big European style eyes.
He stared at Gu Fei for many seconds then said in a hoarse voice that was equal parts
confused, shocked, and horrified, “What, the FUCk…”
It wasn’t a quiet sound. Gu Fei started, then quickly covered Jiang Cheng’s mouth with one
hand.
Jiang Cheng’s glaring eyes opened even wider, then immediately started to struggle as if he
had just been stabbed, flailing his arms and knees all over the place. Gu Fei didn’t dare
move the hand covering his mouth, but his position at the moment left him wide open for
attack, he was also afraid Jiang Cheng would suddenly knee him in the crotch…
He managed to grab one of Jiang Cheng’s hands after a lot of effort, then sat directly on
Jiang Cheng’s belly and said in a hushed voice, “Gu Miao!”
Jiang Cheng paused, stared at him for a long time, then suddenly shifted his gaze toward the
couch.
Gu Fei let go of his mouth. “She just came in, not sure if she’s back asleep or not. I was going
to check on her.”
“…Mm.” Jiang Cheng responded, lying still.
Gu Fei got off the bed and walked over to crouch in front of the recliner, watched for a
moment, then got a blanket from the closet and covered Gu Miao with it.
Jiang Cheng sat up as well and stared at Gu Fei. All notions of sleep had dissipated, he was
as alert as if he chugged two bottles of mint oil.
Just now he opened his eyes to Gu Fei hovering above his body. For somebody who always
slept alone, that was a little too energizing.
In that moment he had trouble distinguishing between dream and reality, the horrifying
scene in his dream overlapped with Gu Fei’s position. It wasn’t until he saw Gu Miao lying
on the couch, did he come back to his senses.
And realized that at some point he became drenched in sweat.
Cold sweat.
The scene in the dream was unbearable enough, but he suddenly wondered if Gu Miao had
woken up and saw that easily misconstrued position…
Jiang Cheng blinked hard.
He suddenly realized why he didn’t open that thread.
He was scared.
It was the first time he had a profound understanding of his own fear.
Even just a sleepwalking little girl on the couch was able to so merge with his dreamland so
authentically.
“This is why I wanted you to sleep on the inside.” Gu Fei said in a quiet voice after he tucked
Gu Miao in. “If you’re on the outside, I have to climb over you to get off the bed at night.”
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng asked also in a quiet voice.
“Just past 6 o’clock.” Gu Fei checked the little alarm clock on the bedside table.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng sat unmoved with the comforter clutched in his arms.
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei climbed onto the bed from behind him, got under the covers, then
sat back up again. He reached out his hand and felt Jiang Cheng’s pyjamas. “Do you…”
Jiang Cheng landed a backhanded slap on his arm.
“…Have a fever?” Gu Fei withdrew his hand and finished the sentence.
“No.” Jiang Cheng tugged at his shirt, a little embarrassed. “I’m just…”
“Did I scare you just now?” Gu Fei laid down and let out a soft sigh. “In all my years, you are
the most easily startled overachiever, I’ve ever seen.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him and gestured with his hands.
“The way you were just now, I must be an overachiever with an extremely composed
psyche that you didn’t scare me to death.”
“Sorry about that.” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything but continued to sit. A few minutes later he sneezed, then
grudgingly lay down and covered himself with the comforter.
This time he really couldn’t fall asleep. Jiang Cheng’s eyes were open but didn’t know where
to look.
He figured his mental endurance capacity must really be not that great. He couldn’t help
brooding over any arbitrary matter for a long time and having it affect his whole mood,
often putting immense pressure upon himself.
He understood it, but it was still out of his control.
At times he would be very envious of Pan Zhi. His heart was large enough to contain three
and half universes. Whether it was the consequence of a failed test or getting pre-broken
up with, a good night’s sleep, some words of complaint and roars of “motherfucker” later,
nothing is insurmountable to him.
As for himself… Perhaps it was the influence from the atmosphere at his old home, it was
impossible for him to let things go.
It didn’t take very long between 6 AM and the wakeup time. Jiang Cheng couldn’t get back
to sleep, so he just closed his eyes and rested. And in the meantime grappled with whether
to give in to the mess of obsessive thoughts or not.
Gu Fei was fast asleep next to him. Probably sleeping very well despite the fact that he had
been woken up.
Wide awake, he listened to Gu Fei’s breathing, how it gradually slowed down, then after
some time gradually regaining momentum, followed by a shift in his position, which
probably meant that he had woken up. Jiang Cheng felt Gu Fei reach for his phone to look at
the time.
He couldn’t sleep when he was supposed to, but now that he knew he had to get up, Jiang
Cheng suddenly was so sleepy he didn’t want to open his eyes.
Gu Fei shifted. Just as he was hesitating between opening his eyes now or waiting until Gu
Fei climbed over him to get up, he felt Gu Fei’s finger gently touch his head.
Jiang Cheng suppressed the urge to jump straight up and land a square kick on him,
clenched his teeth and didn’t move.
“It doesn’t feel feverish?” Gu Fei mumbled and sat up.
Fever?
Jiang Cheng was puzzled, then remembered that Gu Fei asked him earlier if he had a fever.
He was persistent in keeping his eyes closed, but all of a sudden felt a burning twinge in his
nose.
It might be a good idea to cut this nose off entirely, burning and twitching like a girl’s
whenever it pleased.
Jiang Cheng seldom received such attention and care, even in his old home, back when he
was their “real son”, if he felt at all unwell, he had to speak up about it.
Speaking up would get him very good care. But if not, as long as he didn’t faint on the spot,
nobody in the family would even notice that he was sick.
It was even more laughable since coming here. If he really came down with a fever right
about now, he wasn’t even sure who he could tell, Li Baoguo?
Even if he did, what then?
After mulling over it all he would do was give Lao-Xu a call to excuse his absence then sleep
for a day or so in that little room that had no sense of belonging…
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei had stood up at some point, and gave his leg a gentle kick.
“It’s time to get up.”
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng answered and opened his eyes.
Gu Fei had on a jacket outside his pyjamas and was about to climb down from
the foot of the bed.
Jiang Cheng felt he really wasn’t doing it on purpose, but couldn’t help but notice at a glance
that a certain part of Gu Fei’s loose pants had been propped up.
He honestly didn’t know how to react anymore, so he sighed and said in passing,
“You never wait for your little dude to calm down first before getting up?”
“…I have to pee.” Gu Fei said.
“Not even concerned about spraying all over the place.” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand why
he continued down this topic as if he wasn’t fully awake when he didn’t fall asleep in the
first place.
“Would you spray everywhere? Let me teach you then…” Gu Fei dragged his slippers and
said as he headed out. “Stand further away, then keep walking forward as you pee.”
“Fuck you!” Jiang Cheng shut his mouth.
Lunatic.
He got up after Gu Fei left. Gu Miao was still sleeping on the recliner with her face against
the back cushions, probably almost awake as well. He got off the bed, picked up yesterday’s
pants and looked over them. He wanted to change before Gu Miao woke up.
He only realized after he picked them up that because he was in such a hurry yesterday, he
forgot to shake out his clothes. The wet clothes were bundled together, all of his clothes
were still wet.
Even though it was still technically wearable, and would probably dry on his body in about
half an hour… but it was a little gross.
He was still stressing about it when Gu Fei entered the room while brushing his teeth, and
handed over a brand new toothbrush. Jiang Cheng accepted the toothbrush, “Thanks.”
Gu Fei opened the closet door while still brushing, and pointed.
“No,” Jiang Cheng took one look at Gu Fei’s row of clothes and shook his head right away.
“No, I’m not wearing yours.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei looked at him in confusion.
“You’re freestyle handsome, the whole school has their eyes on you. I suspect they even
know what your underwear look like.” Jiang Cheng said. “Last time i wore your clothes,
even Lao-Xu recognized it. I am super impressed.”
Gu Fei started to laugh, and kept laughing as he walked out toothbrush in mouth.
Jiang Cheng decided to wear his own clothes regardless of the grossness.
Gu Fei still had the bathroom, so he could only change in the bedroom. He turned to look at
Gu Miao, who didn’t stir at all. He swiftly took his pyjama bottoms off and yanked his jeans
over his legs.
He was rather vain, and liked to buy form-fitting jeans, though in this case the pant leg
became difficult to pull up while wet. When he was halfway done, Gu Miao turned over,
then before he had a chance to react, she suddenly sat up.
FUCK ME.
Gu Miao’s very clean and efficient wake-up routine had him so shook that he almost
tripped. He held onto his pants and shot out of the room before Gu Miao could turn her
head.
…And finished zipping up as he ran into the bathroom.
Gu Fei was washing his face. He turned and peered at him, “In a rush?”
“Rush your ass,” Jiang Cheng fastened his belt. “I was in the middle of changing when Gu
Miao suddenly got up… How does she not have a buffer period when she wakes up!”
“It’s always been this way.” Gu Fei grinned. “She sits up first, spaces out for five minutes,
then wakes up.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng let out a breath of relief.
After washing up Gu Fei carried Gu Miao back to her own room, put a set of clothes on her
bed, then came back out and closed the door.
He normally didn’t get up this early. Usually Gu Miao got up by herself and went out for
breakfast, and only then would he get up. Gu Miao didn’t have school to go to now, but still
abided strictly by the schedule. That couldn’t change.
However, today he had over an overachiever who was rarely late, so he couldn’t very well
sleep until class had already started.
When Jiang Cheng came out after washing up, he asked, “What do you want for breakfast?
I’ll have Gu Miao buy some in a bit.”
“There’s no need.” Jiang Cheng said. “I… don’t feel like eating, I’ll head off to school first.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei paused, then nodded. “Oh, alright.”
Jiang Cheng quickly gathered his stuff, then after a brief chat with a freshly woken up Gu
Miao, walked out of Gu Fei’s home.
After running down seven flights of stairs and having the wind completely pierce through
his not yet fully dried clothes, only then did he come back to his senses.
He felt maybe it wasn’t… very nice to leave in such a rush after having such an emotional
rollercoaster of a morning.
When Gu Fei heard that he wasn’t going to have breakfast and wanted to leave first, the
expression on his face was clearly a little surprised.
Disregarding the fact that Gu Fei took him in the night before and gave him a very good
meal, and the fact that Gu Fei cared whether he had a fever, and not to mention Gu Miao’s
face full of anticipation. Just the fact alone that he ran out like this, it was lacking the most
basic courtesy.
Leaning against a wall on the road that shielded him from the wind, he took out his phone
and dialed Gu Fei’s number.
“Forgot something?” Gu Fei answered the phone.
“Why don’t you bring Gu Miao down, there’s still time.” Jiang Cheng checked the time on his
phone. “Let’s go have some meat pie at Jiuri’s place?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei agreed right away and didn’t ask why he suddenly changed his mind.
When he saw Gu Fei come out of the corridor with Gu Miao, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a hint
of regret. He shouldn’t have told Gu Fei about himself.
He didn’t know when he could become as calm as Gu Fei. Without intentional cozying up or
keeping his distance, no thorns that were ready to come out at a second’s notice.
“We’re heading over now, should be there soon.” Gu Fei was calling Wang Xu.
“No need to prepare anything special, we’re just having a simple breakfast.”
“Are there buses going that way?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Walking to school from where they were was one thing, but if they were going to Wang Xu’s
place, it was a bit too far of a walk.
“We’ll take the car.” Gu Fei said.
“What car?” Jiang Cheng was astonished. “The little cornbread roll?”
“Mm.” Gu Fei nodded. “What, you look down on the little steamed roll?”
“I’m not,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Fine, the little roll it is.”
Gu Miao must really like the little roll. As soon as Gu Fei brought the car around, she ran
over, skateboard in hand, and deftly climbed into the backseat.
“You two will have to squish.” Gu Fei said. “Er Miao, set your skateboard to the side.”
Jiang Cheng remembered this time to put down the driver’s seat first, then got in and
squished beside Gu Miao in the backseat.
Gu Miao smiled at him and seemed very happy.
After the doors closed on the little roll, Jiang Cheng felt much warmer. He tugged on his
clothes and covered it carefully, hoping they’ll be dry by the time they get there.
“The set of clothes I gave you to wear last time,” Gu Fei said as he drove. “I thought about it,
it’s probably because I wore them when I read my self-admonition letter during a Monday
morning assembly last semester.”
“That’s definitely not the reason.” Jiang Cheng said. “If it was Zhou Jing up there, not to
mention reading an admonition letter, even if he read an entire pornographic novel out
loud, still nobody would remember what he wore.”
Gu Fei laughed out loud, “Thanks for the compliment.”
“How did I compliment you?” Jiang Cheng looked at the back of his head. “I think maybe you
should change your name from freestyle handsome, freestyle shameless is more like it.”
“Sure, I’ll make a side account.” Gu Fei nodded.
“What were you admonishing yourself about?” Jiang Cheng asked after some thought.
“I’m always climbing the perimeter fence to get into the school when I’m late. I broke a
branch on that tree by the fence when I stepped on it.” Gu Fei said. “Just for that.”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh. “Can’t you change trees once in a while?”
“That one’s the closest.” Gu Fei said. “Since I broke the branch, there’s a lot less people
coming over the fence now. The fence around our school is too high, you can’t get in
without climbing a tree.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, only leaned against the car window in a fit of giggles,
without even knowing what he was laughing about.
Actually, this was kinda nice.
When Jiang Cheng wasn’t overthinking, Gu Fei was the only person who could let him
completely relax.
Footnote:
[1] Jiuri = 九日, which is the left and right components of the character 旭(Xu) of Wang Xu. ‘Jiu’
means nine, and ‘ri’ can mean day or fuck (verb). Jiuri is either nine days or nine fucks,
depending on the… context (/ω＼). Therefore Jiuri is a friendly/teasing way of referring to
Wang Xu. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5981
TL word count: 4173
TL time: 9:01:40
Edit: 1:51:46
Curse words: 8x fucks, 1x ass
I’m still new to translating, and it’s a learning process every time. This one took me an
especially long time to do for some reason _(:3∠)_
Chapter 35
This guy’s dead meat.
Wang Xu’s family meat pie restaurant always had lots of customers from the very start of
the day. To get a couple of their meat pies for breakfast first thing in the morning was an
enjoyment in and of itself. So when there weren’t any seats left by the time they got there,
they went to sit in the room where Wang Xu’s family ate their meals.
“We haven’t any donkey meat fillings, gotta wait till noon for that to be done.”
Wang Xu brought out two baskets filled with meat pies and placed it on the table, then went
back and got another giant bowl of lamb soup. “Did you two leave together this morning?”
Jiang Cheng got a little flustered at Wang Xu’s words, so he took a big bite out of the pie and
said nothing.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei answered.
“How come you got up so early today?” Wang Xu pushed a small basket in front of Gu Miao.
“I thought you make a habit of being late… Miao-miao, there’s no donkey filling today, let’s
try a different flavour.”
“What meow meow?” Gu Fei said. “Don’t be gross.”
“Is it gross?” Wang Xu sat down, and said as he ate. “She’s just a baby girl who was
supposed to be cute and pretty. But all because of you she’s brought up like a wild little boy.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen her wear a dress.”
“She has to skateboard.” Gu Fei said. “How would a dress work with that? She wouldn’t
wear it even if I told her to.”
“Ai……” Wang Xu sighed. After a couple more bites he took out his phone and swiped a few
times, the phone made a clicking sound.
Jiang Cheng looked up and found that the guy was pointing the camera at him.
“What are you up to?”
“Just taking a photo. If our restaurant does a revamp in the future, we can post it as an ad.”
Wang Xu laughed and said, putting the phone back in his pocket.
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Delete it.”
“I’ve taken photos of a bunch of people, nobody’s asked me to delete them.”
Wang Xu said, unwavering. “I’m not deleting it. At most I just won’t post it.”
Jiang Cheng put his head down and focused on the pie, not wanting to further indulge him.
Leaving the restaurant after breakfast, Gu Miao stood on her skateboard and stared at Gu
Fei. Gu Fei bent down to look her in the eyes, “Remember when I said you can only skate in
specific locations?”
Gu Miao nodded.
“Go ahead then. Big bro is busy today, so won’t be home for dinner.” Gu Fei said. “I’ll
probably get home around the same time as yesterday.”
Gu Miao nodded again, then turned to face Jiang Cheng.
“Cheng-ge won’t be coming over today, yesterday was a special circumstance.”
Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao continued to look at Jiang Cheng.
So Jiang Cheng could only bend down and look at her as well, “I’ll come seek you out to play
next time?”
There was no reaction from Gu Miao.
“You have to tell her the exact time.” Gu Fei said beside him. “If you just say next time, she
won’t get it.”
“Then…” Jiang Cheng hesitated and considered for a while. “Then tomorrow?
Tomorrow after the match, have your brother bring you out to eat with our team, how’s
that? We can sit next to each other.”
Gu Miao finally nodded, stepped onto her skateboard, and kicked off in the general
direction of home.
“Can we squeeze?” Wang Xu walked out carrying his backpack, but
immediately became excited at the sight of Gu Fei’s little bun of a car. “Jiang Cheng, you and
I squeeze in the back yeah?”
“…Is there even space for you to squeeze?” Jiang Cheng was reluctant. The ‘car’
had very limited space, it was a tight squeeze even with Gu Miao.
“For sure!” Wang Xu said.
Jiang Cheng saw on his face the unwavering insistence on experiencing a ride in that car,
and had to give in. He tried his best to cram himself to one side. When Wang Xu stuffed
himself in, he felt the vehicle sink a little.
With the addition of Gu Fei, he feared the bottom of the car would scrape the ground as it
moved.
“Would it just come apart halfway there?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Nah.” Gu Fei turned the car around and drove them toward the school. “I use it to haul
heavy inventory for the store sometimes, the two of you combined doesn’t even compare.”
“Did you add your own weight to that as well?” Jiang Cheng said. With three grown-ass
boys crammed into one little bun of a car, even pedestrians were trying to peer inside.
“It’s warmer this way.” Wang Xu said.
“Bullshit. It’s not even that cold anymore, it’s called the Spring Basketball Tournament.”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh yeah, practice this afternoon?” Wang Xu asked.
“Jiang Cheng and I are busy today.” Gu Fei said. “I asked Li Yan and the guys to come help
you practice.”
“Where are you guys going?” Wang Xu immediately followed up.
Gu Fei didn’t bother answering him, so Wang Xu turned to look at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng stared out the window and pretended not to notice.
“Fuck.” Wang Xu fixed his clothes unhappily. “Keeping secrets now. Children.”

Jiang Cheng realized that Gu Fei really had no regard for other people’s looks.
Setting aside the fact that they were riding in a little bun designed for elderly grocery runs,
forget that they had three grown bodies crammed into it, but he actually drove the car all
the way into the parking shed by the main gates of the school, as if no one else existed to
him.
And then got out of the car while surrounded by a crowd of Fourth High students.
“All eyes on you.” Wang Xu said as he climbed out, equally unconcerned judging by his tone.
Or, perhaps not unconcerned, but happy. His goal was to be the big boss after all, being the
center of attention was a necessary part of it.
But for people like Jiang Cheng who didn’t like to be surrounded by onlookers, whose
temper rises just from being watched with all these eyes, it was only after
he got out that he regretted not having his mask on.
Immediately, he heard a girl say quietly from a few meters away, “Is that Jiang Cheng?”
“Yeahhhh!” Another girl answered.
He didn’t stick around to hear what else came after that. The inquisitive tone with just a
hint of excitement attached made him uneasy. He couldn’t help but recall that “fujoshi” post
on the school forum, it made him uncomfortable all over.
“Though I do think, you two are right to skip practice.” Wang Xu was saying as he walked
towards the front gate. “These last couple of days Class-2 has been studying video
recordings of our games, even asking people about Jiang Cheng’s ability. We really should
try to keep on the down low. If we win tomorrow, we’ll be facing Class-8 after the exams.”
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Wang Xu continued with enthusiasm, “I think our strategy…”
“Cheng-cheng? Cheng-cheng??” A woman’s voice came from behind them.
“Jiang Cheng?”
Jiang Cheng paused, then turned around.
“You must be Jiang Cheng,” There was a woman standing there, looking at him with an
intense expression. “Right? I picked you out right away, you look just like…”
Immediately, Jiang Cheng recognized her. This woman who looked a little dirty and dressed
like a country bumpkin was the same one who fought with Li Baoguo in front of their
building yesterday.
His birth mom.
“You…” Completely caught off guard in this moment, Jiang Cheng couldn’t think of anything
to say. He could only stare at her, frozen in place.
“Who is that?” Wang Xu asked beside him.
“Class hasn’t started yet right?” The woman limped over and grabbed his hand roughly.
“I’m”
She had a very strong grip. Out of sheer surprise and reflex, Jiang Cheng yanked his hand
away and shook her off, “Don’t…”
Don’t touch me.
Jiang Cheng had to clench his teeth hard to keep himself from saying the last two words out
loud.
“The bell didn’t ring,” The woman suddenly teared up. “Class hasn’t start yet right?”
There were lots of passersby looking over at this point. Jiang Cheng’s brain was a tangled
mess, he had no idea how to face this woman. He froze for a few seconds then handed his
backpack to Gu Fei, “Take this in… for me.”
“Ok.” Gu Fei took his backpack.
“Let’s go talk over there.” Jiang Cheng pointed with his chin to the opposite side of the
street.
“Oh sure, sure thing.” The woman nodded eagerly, eyes still glued to his face.
“Hey what’s going on? Should we…” Likely just as befuddled by the scene unfolding in front
of him, Wang Xu immediately wanted to come with.
Gu Fei reached out a hand and pulled him away, “What’s it gotta do with you, let’s go.”

Jiang Cheng crossed the street, his mind totally blank. He stopped and turned around once
he got to a corner with less people about.
“It’s mom,” The woman pointed at herself, a finger jabbing repeatedly at her own chest.
“I’m your mom… Li Baoguo never mentioned me right? I’m sure he didn’t, I’m sure of it.
That fucktard with shits for brains would never tell you…”
Jiang Cheng only stared, speechless. This somewhat pitiful looking woman and the vulgar
words coming out of her mouth made him momentarily unsure of how to react.
“It wasn’t my idea to send you away all those years ago, he never discussed it with me…”
The woman didn’t give him a chance to speak anyway, just kept on talking. She started
crying halfway through, and used her sleeve to wipe away the tears. “I even thought of a
name for you, your brother is called Li Hui, you can be Li Ming or Li Guang [1]… but he sent
you away just like that. I fought with him, and he beat me… that fucking prick…”
“I…” Jiang Cheng couldn’t say what exactly he was feeling, but knew he just wanted to block
her voice out.
He was using his superpower to its fullest extent here. In the past he would let his mind
wander whenever he didn’t want to listen to Shen Yiqing’s lectures, that way whether or
not he heard the words at the time, he would forget it later.
But compared to this “birth mom” in front of him…

“Come home with me!” The woman suddenly grabbed his arm and shook it
roughly, bringing him back to reality. “Come live with mom!”
“Don’t,” Jiang Cheng jerked his arm away and took two steps back, but wasn’t able to hold
back the two words that followed. “Touch me!”
“…Are you repulsed by me?” The woman leveled her eyes at him. “Is it because I don’t have
money? Do I embarrass you? Do you think your father has money?!
He’s just waiting to spend yours!”
“I’m not,” Jiang Cheng said with some effort. “I have to go to class now, I…”
“The family that adopted you was pretty well-off huh?” The woman wasn’t crying anymore,
her eyes scanned him up and down, it wasn’t clear if the look on her face was scorn or
sorrow. “Look at you, all dressed up like a rich young master.”
“I have to get to class now.” Jiang Cheng drew a sharp breath and turned toward the school
gates.
“HEARTLESS!” The woman suddenly leapt at him and pounded him hard on
the back twice, screaming, “You have no heart! The home is not like a home!
My own son doesn’t even recognize me! I have such a hard life”
“Are you out of your mind?!” Jiang Cheng finally couldn’t take it anymore and bellowed. He
raised a hand up to block hers. “If you have beef with Li Baoguo go have it out with him! I’m
not fucking recognizing either of you!”
After the outburst he immediately turned and started walking away, then after a couple
steps turned it into a full on run as if someone was chasing after him with a knife.
The gate was already closed but he didn’t stop. He sprinted forward along the perimeter
fence, and at last stopped and leaned against a tree on the side of the road.
He didn’t know whether the woman still followed, there was no way she could keep up
anyway. But he didn’t have the courage to look back.
He spaced out for a while, then took out his phone and sent a message to Gu Fei:
– Which part of the fence did you climb over?
The perimeter fence around Fourth High really was high. There were quite a few shops
built against the fence as well, making it impossible to get over. But at this
moment he desperately needed to get into the school. Desperately.
Gu Fei’s answer came very quickly:
– Can’t climb over the old way anymore. North of the back gates by the concession stand,
there’s a pile of bricks along the inside of the fence, come over that way.
Jiang Cheng found the concession stand. It had a dumpster that was right by the perimeter,
which offered him footholds for climbing. Once on top of the wall he was able to see the pile
of bricks that littered the ground on the other side.
If he didn’t calculate his jump down properly he might just be able to break his ankle along
the way.
“Go ahead and jump.” The owner of the concession stand was watching him on the ground
with his arms crossed. He called out in a loud voice. “There’s no teachers around right now,
give it another few minutes and they’ll be coming by.”
“Shit!” Jiang Cheng was so startled by his voice that he almost fell down the fence.
He scanned his surroundings and made sure there weren’t anyone around, then jumped
down.
Not too bad. He stumbled a little on some of the bricks, but didn’t step directly into one of
the brick holes.
When he entered the classroom Lao-Xu was standing at the podium [2], before him the
students sat at their desks and munched on breakfast. He looked like an official overseeing
the status of welfare meals.
“You’re late?” Lao-Xu was very surprised to see him.
“Had to pee.” Jiang Cheng said.
When he got to his seat, Gu Fei gave him a look but didn’t say anything.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng said quietly.
He wanted very much to say something, to curse, to bitch, to find somewhere and just let
out some screams. Wanted very much to curl up in a ball and have a good cry.
But he could only sit there and stare, and do nothing.
Just holding it in.
The suppressed rage boiled in his body, until he could almost smell the burning.
This fury that didn’t have an outlet but that also couldn’t be held down was giving him
burning pains all over.
He wanted to tell Gu Fei, but was also aware that anything Gu Fei said at this point would
cause him to suddenly come apart.
Good thing Gu Fei was an emotionally intelligent slacker. He kept his head down and played
that idiotic stupid dumb Ai Xiao Chu [3] without a word, without a single glance at him.

But life was ruthless at times. There was always someone doing the most inappropriate
thing at the most inappropriate time. These people were simply poor unfortunate souls.
“CHENG-CHENG!” A sharp contorted voice came from outside the classroom door, “Cheng-
cheng”
Jiang Cheng jerked his head around, and saw a guy from the Class-5 basketball team
laughing while passing with a mocking expression.
This guy’s dead meat.
That was Gu Fei’s first thought upon hearing this dumbass’s voice.
Jiang Cheng shot straight up out of his seat, his knee knocking into Gu Fei’s back as he
jumped over from behind his chair, leaving Gu Fei coughing while turning to look outside.
Jiang Cheng was very fast. By the time everyone else in class got up to look, he had already
rushed outside, grabbed the dumbass’s collar and landed a fist on his nose.
It was a rather heavy punch. Gu Fei recalled that when they last fought, Jiang Cheng was
very aware of his own strength, but with this punch he almost didn’t hold back at all.
“Fuck!” Wang Xu was the first to jump up, he braced his hands on the desk and leapt over it
in one smooth motion, then did the same with the next desk.
It was rather miraculous how this guy’s athleticism could suddenly shoot up by three
whole levels, all for the sake of FOMO.

By the time Jiang Cheng’s second punch met with the dumbass’s face, the whole class had
stood up and gathered around the back door, trying to squeeze outside.
“What’s wrong, what’s wrong?!” Lao-Xu shouted as he also tried to get out, but was very
quickly jostled to the back by the students swarming forward. “What’s going on?? Go stop
them! Stop them now! Wang Xu, go stop them!”
“How the hell do I do that?!” Came Wang Xu’s voice from the corridor.
Gu Fei got up and dragged a chair to the back of the crowd, then stood on it and looked out.
The dumbass classmate was already on the ground, Jiang Cheng had one hand on his throat
and the other hand was still swinging hard. If the crowd of onlookers weren’t so loud they
definitely would’ve heard the sounds of fist connecting with face.
This dumbass was from Class-5. He wasn’t the big boss of Class-5, but definitely a
contender, not unlike Wang Xu. With him getting held down and beaten up this way, it
easily drew the attention of other Class-5 students, who quickly made their way over.
“FUCK!” Somebody cried out and immediately rushed over.
“Who do you think you’re fucking?!” Wang Xu cried out as well. He pushed up his sleeves
and shot forward. “Wanna fuck me? COME ON!”
And just like that a brawl between two classes erupted suddenly without much preamble.
They skipped over the trash talk and warm-up, and went straight into a fully staffed riot.
The corridor crammed with students, the noise from onlookers and 12th graders cheering
them on was thunderous. The few teachers on this floor couldn’t even find their way out of
the crowds, much less attempt to keep order.
Gu Fei jumped down from the chair and squeezed his way through the mass of bodies to
Jiang Cheng’s side, all the while dodging punches.
The guy on the ground now had a bloodied face, though perhaps the beat down was so
vicious that it finally sparked his fighting spirit, he actually started to swing back.
“Jiang Cheng,” Gu Fei called out but Jiang Cheng didn’t seem to hear him. He frowned.
“Cheng-ge! That’s enough!”
He was just about to go and pull Jiang Cheng up, when a fist shot up from the guy on the
ground. Its target was Jiang Cheng’s face, but swiped the side of Gu Fei’s face instead.
Gu Fei grabbed Jiang Cheng’s arms and yanked him backwards, the momentum
making Jiang Cheng stumble and fall back on the ground, but he didn’t forget to land
another slap on the other guy’s face.
Now that Jiang Cheng was sitting down, he finally regained a sliver of sense out of the
jumbled fury from before.
The guy on the ground gave him a hard stare and looked ready to get up and jump him.
Gu Fei jabbed a finger at him, the tip of his finger almost meeting with his eyeball, “You
move one more inch and I’ll put you in the hospital.”
His voice was icy cold, the guy immediately froze in place as if somebody suddenly stepped
on his brakes.
Jiang Cheng had never heard Gu Fei use this tone of voice before, it was enough to chill him
back into mental clarity. He slowly got up from the ground.
The group brawl around them was still going strong, he stood in the middle of the mass of
bodies and suddenly felt a little dazed.

“Gu Fei, Gu Fei!” Finally and with a lot of effort, Lao-Xu managed to make himself visible in
the midst of the chaos. “Gu Fei! Stop the fight! Stop the fight!
Separate them!”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He walked over and picked up the back collar of someone from Class-
5 and started dragging him backward. The guy turned and swung at him, but he caught the
fist and shoved him to the side.
After that, he grabbed Wang Xu’s collar in the same manner, then dragged him off and
pushed him away.
“I’ll fuck your…” Wang Xu saw that it was Gu Fei and shut his mouth without finishing the
sentence.
“Tell your people to go back to class.” Gu Fei turned to look at him and said in a low voice.
“Enough!” Wang Xu yelled. “Everybody stop! All of you from Class-8, get back inside!”
Gu Fei grabbed another Class-5 student and shoved him away.
Eventually the students on the corridor slowly separated, the tangled physical back-and-
forth was replaced by verbal abuse.
“Get back to class!” Lao-Lu’s voice suddenly sounded out of nowhere. He was
teaching the first period that day, so he must’ve been there for a while, though nobody was
able to hear his shouts before. “Did you all sleep too well last night?! Feel like acting out
huh?! Come on! I’ll satisfy whoever raises his hand, come down to the field and we’ll have a
go at it! You!”
He pointed at the guy with the bloodied face, courtesy of Jiang Cheng, “I’m talking about
you, look at your face! You think the blooms look pretty? Is that a morning glory or a
sunflower? What are you staring at me for, do you need me to carry you to the bathroom to
wash your face?!”
Everyone walked slowly back to the classroom to the sound of Lao-Lu’s voice.
With so much excitement this early in the morning, many people didn’t feel properly sated.
Chatter and shouts filled the room, those who were unsatisfied were still yelling out insults.
Jiang Cheng settled into his seat, but still felt a little disoriented.
Gu Fei sat down beside him and rummaged around in his backpack. He pulled out a few
band-aids and threw them on the desk.
“What?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Hands.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng looked down at his own hands, which had at some point acquired several
scrapes. He didn’t even feel it, there was no feeling of pain even now.
He peeled open the band-aids and stuck them on.
“Hey Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng…” Zhou Jing turned around with excitement on his face.
Jiang Cheng gave him a stare and he turned back into his seat without even finishing the
sentence.
“Jiang Cheng.” Lao-Xu entered the classroom with a frown. “Come out here with me for a
second.”
Jiang Cheng stood up and followed Lao-Xu out of the room.
“What’s up with you?” Lao-Xu asked as he led him down the stairs. “What was that all
about?”
Jiang Cheng stayed quiet.
“Is it because of the game?” Lao-Xu turned to look at him and continued. “That doesn’t
sound right either. If it’s about the game, it would’ve been Wang Xu leading the charge.”
Jiang Cheng still didn’t say a thing.
Lao-Xu led them all the way to the edge of the field before he stopped and sighed, “Jiang
Cheng, you’re gonna have to report to the Guidance Office for what happened today. You
can at least tell me what it’s about, so I can speak on your behalf to the head of Guidance.
This kind of thing gets you demerit points you know!”
Who cares about demerit points.
He still carried his past demerit points to this day.
Demerits weren’t scary, the scary thing was he didn’t how to begin to explain himself.
I hit him because he was mimicking the way that woman talked.
I beat him up because he was mimicking her?
How come?
Simply because that woman is my biological mother?
It shouldn’t be that hard to explain with some common sense, but it was very difficult for
him.
Jiang Cheng looked at Lao-Xu and said after a long pause, “Whatever.”
Footnote:
[1] Both are variants on ‘light’, while Hui (辉) means brilliance or glow. ↩
[2] In China the school day starts with a Self-Study class, supervised by the Head Teacher
(Lao-Xu) of that class. Sometimes there’s a Self-Study class in the evening as well. The first
period comes after the morning Self-Study class. ↩
[3] Ai Xiao Chu = a Chinese variant of Candy Crush ↩
Also, little bun.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5824
TL word count: 4105
TL time: 6:14:47
Edit: 1:50:00
Curse words: 11x fucks, 6x ass
TL Notes:
Oh Cheng-ge, when will you get that temper of yours under control?
17/06/20: I just realized that despite not getting a ‘light’ themed name, Cheng-ge managed to
shine brightly all on his own (☆▽☆)y
Chapter 36
He was dead meat.
Jiang Cheng thought Lao-Xu was rather responsible as far as teachers went, but he really
didn’t feel like saying anything, not to mention he had no idea what to even say. Even if he
did try to explain himself, the one who started the fight because of someone else’s words
was him. To expound on why exactly he did what he did, there was too much he needed to
tell all at once, and too much he didn’t want to face.
In comparison, he’d much rather just take the punishment, if only to make it all go away.
Though he did feel a little bad for Lao-Xu, who genuinely cared about his students.
Lao-Xu took up the span of half a class period trying to convince him, appealing to Jiang
Cheng’s reason and dialling into his emotions. At one point he thought Lao-Xu was on the
verge of tears, but he still didn’t manage to get anything out of him, and so had no choice
but to let Jiang Cheng back to class.
When Jiang Cheng arrived at the bottom of the stairs, the dumbass from Class-5
happened to also pass by after getting treated at the infirmary.
His injuries didn’t look too serious, consisting mostly scrapes and bruises. The worst of it…
was the swelling.
Jiang Cheng had been punching him with his right fist the whole time, so the dumbass now
had a left eye that was pretty much swollen to a slit. The left side of his face was also
swollen, giving him an overall lopsided look.
When he caught sight of Jiang Cheng, he looked ready to shoot flames out of his remaining
one and one-fifth eyes.
Jiang Cheng halted in his steps and stood at a distance of three meters away from the
stairwell.
“What’s the matter?” The dumbass spat on the ground. “Weren’t you pretty fierce just a
moment ago?! What, now you’re scared?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
The dumbass gave him another two and two-fifths eyes worth of glares, and went up the
stairs all the while cursing up a storm. Jiang Cheng listened as his voice gradually
disappeared, then continued forward slowly up the steps.
It appeared that Lao-Lu didn’t bother with having a regular class today. When
Jiang Cheng entered the classroom, he was standing at the podium in the midst of an angry
tirade, the volume of his voice was making the ceiling tremor and rain down bits of plaster.
“Oh here comes the hero!” As soon as he saw Jiang Cheng, Lao-Lu immediately aimed the
pointer at him. “I’ve got a proposal for you Jiang Cheng!”
Jiang Cheng turned to face him.
“You should write an essay, the topic of which will be to discuss ‘how one leaps over two
rows of desks to rush into the hallway and somehow manages to avoid getting injured in a
brawl’!” Lao-Lu exploded. “After it’s done I’ll even print it out for you to hang in the
classroom!”
“… Ah.” Jiang Cheng answered helplessly and returned to his seat.
“Not that I want to bother but,” Lao-Lu waved his pointer around and pointed it from right
to left. “Every one of you! Only when napping in class do you seem a little more like an
actual human being! When your eyes are open you’re just mounds of shit! Why can’t I see
you do a single thing all day that doesn’t suck?!
Your parents work themselves to death just to send little shits like you to fool around in
school…”
“Did you go to the Guidance Office?” Gu Fei kept his head down and asked as he played on
his phone.
“Not yet.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Then I guess they’ll bag us all after class.” Gu Fei said.
Gu Fei must have had some experience in this department. A few minutes before class
ended for the morning, the head of the Guidance Office, Lao-Xu, and the head teacher of
Class-5 all barricaded themselves at the end of the hallway.
Without exemption, everyone who participated in the brawl got taken to the Guidance
Office.
The Guidance director started off with a fresh storm of condemnations, then asked each of
them to state their motive for fighting. None of them could come up with an answer. They
had all joined because the others did.
At last, the Guidance director’s sights locked on Jiang Cheng and the dumbass.
“He said you hit him first.” The Guidance Director watched Jiang Cheng.
“Why?”
“Right, of course there had to be a reason,” Lao-Xu said right away. “You know, Jiang
Cheng’s marks would be top-ten of his grade even in a key high school…”
“Mr. Xu, we know he’s an overachiever,” The Guidance director interrupted Lao-Xu. “Let me
finish my questions.”
Lao-Xu shut his mouth.
But still Jiang Cheng did not answer.
Just as the Guidance director was about to lose his temper, Wang Xu raised his hand, “I
know.”
“Go ahead,” The Guidance director gave him a look. “Never seen you this well behaved in
class. So you do know how to raise your hand.”
“He was calling him names at our door.” Wang Xu said. “Something like
‘Cheng-cheng, Cheng-cheng I’m gonna fuck your mom’. Obviously anyone
would get mad at that, he was talking in a weird mocking voice too…”
“What did you say?!” The dumbass immediately leapt up and yelled. “When did I call him
names!”
“During our morning self-study period,” Wang Xu glared at him. “Why else would an
overachiever like him beat you up? He was clearly provoked.”
“Fucking bullshit!” This enraged the dumbass, he was so furious that his left eye opened.
“I…”
“Listen to him, Director!” Wang Xu was in his element. “Listen to him! He’s cursing even
now! He was even louder this morning, we all heard it, otherwise we wouldn’t have gone
out and joined in! We’re a mediocre bunch, but we pride ourselves on group honour!”
“That’s right, we all heard it!” The students from Class-8 all chanted their agreements.
“That’s some bullshit!” The dumbass grew red in the face and turned to his own classmates.
“Did you guys hear it?”
“Nope! He never called any names!” The students from Class-5 also stuck together.
“Of course you didn’t hear,” Gu Fei stood at the back of the crowd, leaning against a desk.
“You guys were a whole classroom away. He said it while standing next to Jiang Cheng.”
“Gu Fei!” The dumbass jabbed a finger at Gu Fei and struggled to get another word out.
“Though they definitely heard you screaming after.” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
“Enough.” The Guidance director leveled a glare at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei pulled out his phone and started playing with it.
The facts of the matter were clear. The dumbass made some snide comments and got
beaten up, which started a brawl between the two classes. As much as the dumbass tried to
protest, the director had no problem with this version of events.
At schools such as the Fourth High, if a fight broke out among the students, no side was
innocent.
What came next was a debate between the two head teachers regarding the issue of who
had the bigger blame, with each trying to push it onto the other class. Just as during his
lectures, Lao-Xu’s mild mannerism didn’t afford him any advantage during the argument,
but it was hard to out-talk a chatterbox who would blabber on and on once he got started.
The other head teacher was a woman, who attempted several times to interject without
success, and finally waved her hand and said, “Fine, I yield. Given Mr. Xu’s way with words,
teaching really is a waste of your talent.”
“Forgive me.” Lao-Xu nodded graciously.
“Alright alright, you can stop arguing now.” The Guidance director was also visibly fatigued.
The final verdict was that everyone who participated in the fight had to write a self-
admonition of no less than 800 characters, and clean the two bathrooms in the school for
one week. The two students who headed the fight, Jiang Cheng and the dumbass, had to
read their self-admonitions aloud to the whole school at the next Monday morning
assembly, as well as take one warning demerit point.
As soon as they heard about the demerit point, both Lao-Xu and the head teacher of Class-5
became upset all over again.
“Director, I don’t think this matter is so severe as to necessitate a demerit point as
punishment.” Said the Class-5 head teacher. “Not to mention going by the level of injuries
our class had…”
“THAT’S RIGHT!” Lao-Xu exclaimed loudly.
Jiang Cheng got the sudden sense that Lao-Lu had temporarily taken over Mr.
Xu’s body.
But Lao-Xu turned back to his old self immediately. “They are but teenagers, it’s normal for
them to be a little impulsive at times. We as educators and guiding lights, cannot simply
apply clear-cut punishments to them, what good will a demerit point do? It’s nothing more
than a mark on their record, this method of interaction serves only to decrease us
educator’s workloads! I for one disapprove of this method, I think we should use our love
and care, our patience and…”
“Mr. Xu, Mr. Xu! Lao-Xu!” The Guidance director reached out an ‘er-kang’ [1]
hand with a pained expression on his face, at this rate his other hand should probably be
clutching at his heart. “I get it, I understand your good intentions…”
“We as educational workers, when faced with all these kids, definitely feel the struggle to
keep up at times, but this is the career we chose…” Lao-Xu didn’t show any sign of slowing
down. “Who among us didn’t have impulses at this age? Listen, we were classmates, right?
When YOU were in high school…”
“Xu Qicai!” The Guidance director yelled out. “I said I understand!”
Jiang Cheng had been in a pretty dismal mood up until this point, but for some reason he
suddenly felt much better. Lao-Xu’s words were amusing, but he was still moved. To meet a
teacher like Lao-Xu once in his lifetime was fortunate for him. Even though due to his low
emotional intelligence, Lao-Xu never did find a way to properly communicate with his
students…
But Jiang Cheng really did feel like laughing in that moment, and he wasn’t the only one. He
heard the sound of unsuccessfully repressed laughter from Wang Xu’s direction.
“Fine.” The Director took two huge gulps of water. “No demerit points for now, but we’ll
continue to observe. If there’s any sort of rule violation for the rest of this semester, the
demerit points will be stacked, it won’t simply be a warning, this time it’ll go directly into
your records.”
“Excuse me,” Gu Fei said from the back. “Why do I have to write a self-admonishment?”
“Were you not in the fight?!” The director slammed his glass down on the desk hard.
Jiang Cheng got the feeling that he had been pushed to the edge.
“I wasn’t,” Gu Fei said. “I was there to stop them.”
“Yes, I asked him to.” Lao-Xu nodded and said.
“You hit me!” The dumbass yelled out, virtually stomping his feet.
“Did anyone see it?” Gu Fei narrowed his eyes and scanned the faces in the crowd. “Did
anyone witness me hit you?”
The dumbass was so furious that his hands were shaking, but couldn’t squeeze out a single
word.
“What are you doing here if you weren’t in the fight?!” The director shouted at Gu Fei.
“You guys brought me here.” Gu Fei said.
“You… write a letter of self-admonition.” The Guidance director said. “Write about how you
were late to school this week and I caught you coming over the wall again! And read it out
loud on stage with the rest of them!”
Coming out of the Guidance Office, everyone from both classes seemed to be keeping quiet.
Lao-Xu walked them all the way out the school gates to the parking shed where he clearly
wanted to leave them with some words of wisdom, only he didn’t get a chance to open his
mouth.
That was because once in the parking shed, the whole bunch of them crouched down and
sank into fits of unstoppable hysterical laughter.
By the time he was buckled up in the little bun, Jiang Cheng was still suffering from the
giggles. He cracked open the window and let the fresh air hit his face to clear his mind.
“So we’re driving this to Ding Zhuxin’s?” He asked after a while.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “See, how convenient.”
“Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask, usually it’s the elderly who drives these cars, but you’re a
grown ass person. Doesn’t the transportation police give a damn?”
Jiang Cheng asked.
“Give a damn about what, you think this place is the same as where you used to live?” Gu
Fei said. “If they really did stop me I’ll just say I’m delivering this to my grandpa. Big
whoop.”
“Does your grandpa drive?” Jiang Cheng chuckled and asked.
“No idea, he’s been dead for a long time.” Gu Fei said.
“Ah…” At that, Jiang Cheng was a little stuck, so he stayed quiet.
“He killed himself,” Gu Fei stopped at a red light, and said in an indifferent voice while
leaning back. “By drinking pesticide.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng was taken aback.
“Because he had a scumbag son.” Gu Fei was quiet for a while after that. The light turned
green and they started moving again, half a block later he finally continued. “There are tons
of fucked up things and fucked up people in this world, you’ve just never encountered them
before now.”
Jiang Cheng stared at the back of Gu Fei’s head without a word.
“Don’t think about it too much.” Gu Fei said. “It’s easier if you just watch from
the sidelines.”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng answered and closed his eyes.
Ding Zhuxin wasn’t in her studio today, there was only a young woman buried in the midst
of a huge pile of clothes, busy trying to organize it.
“Xin-jie’s assistant, Xiao-Lu.” Gu Fei introduced them. “This is Jiang Cheng, our model
today.”
“Wow, you’re cute… Oh, I’m Lucia. It’s hard for him to pronounce so he simplified it.” Lucia
smiled and pointed at the two rows of clothes on the rack.
“These are for today, they’ve been put together already. I’ll do your makeup in a bit.”
While Lucia put makeup on Jiang Cheng’s face, he stole a few glances out of the corner of his
eyes at the clothes for today. He felt they were not dissimilar to the ones from yesterday,
more of either the mage style or the beggar’s style. Though it wasn’t all knitted materials
this time, most of them actually looked like burlap… so it seemed even more authentic to
the beggar style.
Though Jiang Cheng would much rather wear these. At least it wasn’t open on all sides.
“All done, honestly you don’t even need very much.” Lucia backed up a couple steps and
gave him a once-over. “A face like this must be really photogenic, you’ve got a really clear
profile.”
“Boy are you chatty today.” Gu Fei poked his head out. “Hurry up and change already, it’s so
tiring to have to shoot till nightfall every day.”
“Alright.” Lucia clapped her hands together. “It’s all up to you now, I have to go down to the
stockroom. If anybody calls here please answer it and tell them to ring my cell.”
“No problem.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng waited till Lucia left before he walked to the rack to take a closer look,
intending to choose a set he liked.
“You’ve got to wear them all anyway,” Gu Fei leaned against the door frame.
“It’s just a matter of now or later.”
“… I know.” Jiang Cheng ended up picking a random one.
As Gu Fei turned back to the other room, he studied the outfit he picked out.
There were many layers to it; not bad, it would be warm.
Although he wondered why Ding Zhuxin’s designs all looked so unisex, or
rather, they all looked like women’s wear.
This particular set included a pair of slouchy linen pants, but the top also happened to be a
loose shift. After putting the whole thing on, Jiang Cheng felt maybe he needed a strand of
rosaries to complete the look.
“Hmm.” Gu Fei watched as he walked in and raised an eyebrow. “Not bad.”
“Don’t make me insult your aesthetic.” Jiang Cheng planted himself in front of a bunch of
lights. After a whole day of shooting the day before, he now felt relatively at ease on the set.
At the very least he no longer felt the awkwardness of not knowing where to place his
hands.
“Just walk around for a bit. OK, now turn around. Look back.” Gu Fei pointed the camera at
him. “You can choose to smile or not.”
Jiang Cheng did a few laps in front of the camera, “How’s this?”
“Great.” Gu Fei said. “Now let’s do a front facing close-up of your face, then you can change
into the next one.”
“Why do you need a front facing close-up?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You have a slight cut on your lip… did you not notice?” Gu Fei asked.
“I did notice.” Jiang Cheng said. “What does that have to do with the close-up?”
“It’s got a pretty good vibe.” Gu Fei pressed down on the shutter. “Alright, you can change
now.”
“No wait,” Jiang Cheng didn’t move. “What for?”
“For my own collection.” Gu Fei said. “Not like I haven’t taken your photo before.”
“… Alright.” Jiang Cheng walked out. His whole morning had been a chaotic mess, he didn’t
have the spare energy to ponder over this.
He grabbed another outfit off the rack. He didn’t pay too much attention to the top half, as
long as the bottom half was still a pair of pants. He pulled the pants on first.
He was a little speechless as he put them on; the hem cut off at an awkward point between
his ankles and his knees.
He had a pretty good grasp of Ding Zhuxin’s style at this point, and for all the ones he didn’t
understand he simply paired them with bare feet…
… But this top.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng came in holding a bundle of burlap material, topless, and wearing a
pair of cropped pants. “You two grew up together, care to explain to me what this is
supposed to be?”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei put the camera down and took a few glances at Jiang Cheng, scanning him
up and down. Jiang Cheng did have a pretty good figure,
especially that scar on his flank…
Jiang Cheng shook out the bundle he was holding, “Is this just raw material? Did she forget
to make it into a shirt?”
Gu Fei looked at the large rectangular piece of burlap in front of him and started to laugh, “I
got it. Hand it over.”
Jiang Cheng threw the fabric to him. He caught it and gathered it up gently until it formed a
long narrow piece, then set it on Jiang Cheng’s shoulders and wrapped it around a couple
times.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was amazed. “It’s a scarf?”
“… No, but you can think of it as one.” Gu Fei tugged on the fabric here and there, making
small adjustments to make it look as though it was just casually thrown on.
“If somebody actually buys this then I’ll eat the whole thing.” Jiang Cheng said.
“This isn’t necessarily for sale, it’s mostly to show off the design concept.” Gu Fei took a few
steps back. “Good, very sexy.”
“I feel like once I start moving it’ll just fall off.” Jiang Cheng held his arm stiffly in place in
support of the fabric on his shoulder. “I can’t move.”
“Just run across to the other side, don’t worry about it falling.” Gu Fei raised his camera.
Jiang Cheng shifted his body over to the set like a robot. Though his movements were
funny, his smoothly toned back was still rather pleasing on the eyes. Gu Fei pressed the
shutter.
Click.
“What’s your problem?” Jiang Cheng tilted his head slightly, he couldn’t turn his whole head
around for fear the excessive motion would cause the ‘scarf’ to fall off. “Is this also for your
private collection?”
“Correct. It’s not like your face is in it.” Gu Fei said.
“Why are you acting like Wang Xu.” Jiang Cheng finally got into position.
“When I take your picture, you’d only look better.” Gu Fei said. “When he takes your
picture, it’s all dependent on your face.”
“… Hurry up and shoot! It’s falling!” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what else to say.
“Run.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng darted across the set, his upper body stiff.
“Was that OK?” He turned his head to look at Gu Fei, the fabric had already successfully
slipped to the floor.
Gu Fei held the camera and looked at him without a word.
“OK, I know,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Was it a bit…”
“You ran like a chicken [2].” Gu Fei said.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng was a little vexed. “What the hell did you say?”
“Have you ever seen a chicken run?” Gu Fei said. “Its head doesn’t move.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him, then a few seconds later squatted down and cackled at the floor,
“Fuck, I’m not shooting in this outfit anymore.”
“You’re getting paid by the piece,” Gu Fei also laughed and said. “Come on, be a
professional.”
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to stand up again, “Fine, I’ll try my best to not run like a
chicken this time.”
Gu Fei picked up the fabric and started wrapping it around him once more.
Perhaps it was because he was topless, but when Gu Fei leaned in close, Jiang Cheng could
feel Gu Fei’s breath directly on his shoulder… the sensation made his heart race.
The feeling of breaths on the face or ears wouldn’t have solicited this warm and ambiguous
feeling from him. But this time of year especially, the shoulders were a rarely exposed spot,
so mentally speaking it was akin to a private body part.
He felt a little uneasy, but clenched his jaw and refrained from moving or speaking. He
could sense Gu Fei was being very careful when adjusting the fabric and avoided any
contact with his skin.
He didn’t want to seem too fussy or sensitive in Gu Fei’s eyes.
“Alright,” Gu Fei took one last look. “From here, run to that side. I should just be able to
capture the scar as well.”
“What’s with this hobby of photographing scars.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Like a little monk…” Gu Fei raised the camera again, “Who had endured all of life’s
hardships.”
Jiang Cheng was just about to say something, but Gu Fei suddenly yelled out,
“Go!”
Without thinking Jiang Cheng dashed across to the other side. Since he didn’t want to have
to go a third time, this time he ran without much care. He didn’t even pause when he
sensed the fabric slipping off his shoulders mid-run. He raced to the other side in just a few
long strides.
When he turned around he saw the fabric had fallen down in the center of the set.
Gu Fei stared at his viewfinder, “Amazing.”
Of the shots he snapped while Jiang Cheng was in motion, there was one in which Jiang
Cheng was suspended in mid-air, his legs stretched out in stride, the
‘scarf’ on his body was also in a suspended state between staying on and falling off. It was
very dynamic.
“I can change now?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Let’s do another still shot.” Gu Fei thought for a second, then pointed at the armchair
toward the back of the room. “Sit there, and wrap the fabric however you want, just once
around is fine, you can throw the extra length behind the backrest.”
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng sat down.
“Put your arms on the armrests, relax your body, the lazier the better.” Gu Fei looked at him
through the lens. “Put one leg over the other.”
“I don’t usually cross my legs.” Jiang Cheng folded his legs together. “Like this?”
“Not like that, it’s too girly.” Gu Fei said. “Rest your ankle on the other leg.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng stacked his legs together as instructed and leaned back into the sofa, his
head tilted against the cushion, “Is this OK?”
Gu Fei held the camera and didn’t move for a long while after he pressed the shutter.
“You done?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Done.” Gu Fei put down the camera. “Can I fix this one up and post it to my
Friend Circle?” [3]
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng was surprised. He knew Gu Fei posted photos often; there were some of
Gu Miao, of scenery, and quite a few photos of people too, some he recognized and some he
didn’t.
“This one and the others from this set.” Gu Fei glanced at him. “May I?”
“Uh… Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then asked after a beat. “Do you often make money by
doing photoshoots for people?”
“Not ‘often’.” Gu Fei said. “I’ve always been.”
“Oh…” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a wave of unspeakable emotion wash over him. This gig
was the first time in his life that he made any money. He didn’t even go last year when Pan
Zhi wanted to drag him to hand out flyers and
‘experience life’ together. “You’re pretty impressive.”
“Nope.” Gu Fei said simply. “My family has a lot of use for money, just relying on the store is
far from enough. Gu Miao needs medicine too.”
“Does your mom… not work?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“She’s too busy, gotta go on dates.” Gu Fei laughed to himself. “She hasn’t been to work
since my dad died.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. This was the first time he heard Gu Fei mention his father’s
death. So he really was dead.
Then… how did he die?
He recalled Li Baoguo’s words, though he didn’t believe them. But… he couldn’t ask about it
either, if only Gu Fei was willing to tell him one day of his own volition, just like how he felt
about his own problems.
It was time to change into the next ensemble. Jiang Cheng walked out and quickly came
back in a new outfit.
Gu Fei took one look and had to repress the sudden urge to laugh. He truly didn’t know
what Ding Zhuxin was thinking this time.
“Deranged caveman?” Jiang Cheng spun in a circle helplessly, then pulled out an object from
behind his waist and waved it in the air. “She even provided a slingshot? I’m just saying,
this has to be a dupe, I bet the shots go wide every time.”
“Really,” This outfit was such that even Jiang Cheng’s figure and face wasn’t enough to
salvage it. Gu Fei couldn’t hold it anymore, he put down the camera, and managed to say
between fits of laughter. “Then use yours.”
As soon as the words left his mouth, he and Jiang Cheng both went silent at the same time.
The room became so quiet that even the sound of a bubble in the watercooler was like a
thunderstrike.
Gu Fei got a feeling.
He was dead meat.
Footnotes:
[1] er-kang hand = meme of this character reaching out his hand dramatically to stop
something happening ↩
[2] Chicken = slang for hooker ↩
[3] Friend Circle = the ‘timeline’ of WeChat ↩
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 6362
* TL word count: 4574
* TL time: 5:06:22
* Edit: 1:56:54
* Curse words: 6x fucks, 15x ass, 5x shits
TL Notes
The secret’s out!
Chapter 37
These weren’t just regular buttons.
“Oh yessss! Thank you, thank you.”
“The contestant Jiang Cheng decided to once again raise the stakes! He decided once again to
raise the stakes! Wowww——”
“Instructor X, do you think that was a lapse in judgement or were his techniques not quite
there?”
“I think he still has room to improve…”
……
It remained quiet in the room, but at this moment in Gu Fei’s head, all he could hear was
Jiang Cheng’s voice, all sorts of dual roleplaying, a variety of mannerisms, the routine he
threw his whole self into.
As proficient as Gu Fei was in dealing with awkward scenarios, he felt that this was the
ultimate dead end for him. He could sense a near-fatal beating in his not so distant future.
Nobody knew that Jiang Cheng had a slingshot. The only time he showed off his slingshot
must have been by the lakeshore the other day. The. Empty. Lakeshore.
He couldn’t even make up an excuse to deny it.
.
Jiang Cheng still hadn’t said anything, he just stood there and watched him with a blank
face. His face had remained expressionless since after the initial moment of shock wore off.
Gu Fei couldn’t even figure out Jiang Cheng’s exact mood at that moment.
“Um…” He had to say something. “The other day I…”
Jiang Cheng remained still, as if waiting for Gu Fei to continue.
“I was just passing by.” Gu Fei said.
“There isn’t a way through.” Jiang Cheng said. “I walked around the whole thing.”
“Ok, I was there for a reason,” Gu Fei finally found the words to go about it.
“But then I saw you there playing with your slingshot. We weren’t very close at the time, so
I left without telling you.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him and tossed the slingshot up and down in his hand.
When it dropped back into his left hand after a couple of twirls in the air, Gu Fei saw his
right hand reach out to grab something from the nearby table.
Crap!
Gu Fei knew there were lots of accessories for the outfits on that table, along with some…
buttons.
Jiang Cheng had just grabbed a handful of buttons.
Gu Fei turned to run toward the back of the set.
These weren’t just regular buttons. Ding Zhuxin liked to use all sorts of authentic materials
in her designs. These buttons were made of round wooden beads, making them absolutely
perfect companions for slingshots.
.
“This is what you meant by ‘watching from the sidelines’?” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei heard a ‘whoosh’ followed by a surge of pain on his thigh. He had been hit by a
wooden bead.
He turned his head and saw that Jiang Cheng was still in the same spot, with the slingshot
pulled back a second time, aimed right at him.
“You…” He didn’t get a chance to finish, Jiang Cheng let go of the band. He yelped out loud.
“Ahh!”
This time the button got him in the abdomen.
Though to be fair, Jiang Cheng was holding back. If he had used the same power as when he
shot holes in the ice the other day, there would be no sound coming from Gu Fei anymore.
“Didn’t you say this slingshot is a dupe and isn’t accurate?!” Gu Fei leapt over the armchair
and used the back to block his lower body.
“That depends on who’s using it.” Jiang Cheng aimed another button at him. “I can aim true
with just two fingers and an elastic.”
“Don’t…” Gu Fei didn’t get to finish his sentence. Jiang Cheng released the sling again and
the button hit Gu Fei on his arm. This one was especially painful, he rubbed at his arm hard.
“Shit!”
“When you said ‘watch from the sidelines’,” Jiang Cheng once more pulled back the band
and looked at him between the bifurcation of the branches. “Is this what you mean?”
“It’s just a figure of speech,” Gu Fei had been hit three times in a row and finally couldn’t
take anymore. He raised his voice. “Will you listen to reason!”
“What reason?” Jiang Cheng shouted, his hands were shaking visibly. “What possible
reason?! It’s easy for you to ‘wander lonely as a cloud’ and simply watch from the sidelines,
so what need do YOU have for reason?! There IS no reason to speak of in this world! Was
there reason to me getting adopted? Was there reason to speak of when I got sent to this
godforsaken place right after being told I wasn’t their real son? What possible fucking
reason is there?”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei climbed back out from behind the armchair. “I really didn’t mean to……”
Before he was able to finish, Jiang Cheng’s fourth shot landed square on his chest.
“AGH!” Gu Fei sprung up in the air, and as he scrambled back fell directly into the armchair
behind him, then gave up on trying to get up altogether.
He yelled back at Jiang Cheng, “Come come come come come now, contestant Jiang Cheng,
the genius marksman! Come on! Don’t stop until you’re satisfied!
If these aren’t enough there are more buttons outside! Not just wooden beads, there are
ones made of fucking stone, and iron and copper, how about you skip straight to the iron
ones?!”
.
“You saw the whole thing,” Jiang Cheng glared at him for a while longer, then let his hands
drop and tossed the slingshot and buttons to the ground. “Right?
You saw everything.”
“I saw everything.” Gu Fei answered.
“From beginning to end?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“From you shooting holes in the ice, to instructor X, to the crying,” Gu Fei said.
“I finished watching the whole thing, then left when you started to cry.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied, then leaned back against the wall.
Saw the whole thing: an entertaining dual role performance with a bonus reel of a dude
curled up in a ball bawling his eyes out.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure how exactly he felt at the moment.
From shock to awkwardness, then feeling embarrassed that he made a fool of himself, and
the humiliation at having his secrets seen, then arriving finally at anger.
Now all those feelings had disappeared, and the only thing left was hurt.
With his back against the wall, he slowly sank down to a crouch and wrapped his arms
around his head.
It was this same position.
Not just when crying, ever since he was little, he always got into this position whenever he
was hurt, depressed, or plain unhappy. It was a position that allowed him to curl himself up
into a ball and take up as little space as possible, to avoid being seen by anyone else.
It made him feel safe.
The logic was the same as an ostrich sticking its head in the sand. He didn’t really think this
would hide him from others’ view, he just no longer wished to see anything or anyone else.
See no evil, hear no evil. That was enough.
.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei had walked to his side at some point and called out to him.
“Cheng-your-great-uncle,” Jiang Cheng buried himself in his knees and elbows and said in a
muffled voice. “Are you fucking younger than me?”
“By one month.” Gu Fei said.
“You fucker.” Jiang Cheng was so stunned by this reveal he even pulled his head out. “You
know my birthday?”
“That time you passed out from a fever, I checked your ID.” Gu Fei said. “It makes sense to
at least see who the person is before bringing him into my place.”
“Next time don’t bother.” Jiang Cheng buried his head into his knees again.
“Want one?” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng looked out from the gaps between his arms, Gu Fei was holding a pack of
cigarettes. He shut his eyes and opened them again, then a few seconds later reached out a
hand to take a cigarette from the pack.
“You gotta keep the smoking a secret.” Gu Fei also lit up a cigarette and handed him the
lighter. “This studio forbids smoking, it’s all flammable material in
here.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, just lit the cigarette then turned to peer at the security
camera in the corner.
“It’s fine, she doesn’t usually check the footage.” Gu Fei said.
.
“Did you laugh?” Jiang Cheng asked, his voice was hoarse, as if he had been a victim of some
major wrongdoing. He cleared his throat irritably. “When you were spying on me.”
“In my head I did.” Gu Fei said. “It was funny. Would you believe me if I said no?”
“Mm,” Jiang Cheng sighed softly. “I fool around like this on my own all the time. It’s the
same thing when I used to play the tin flute: Next up please welcome the performance of
the esteemed tin flute player Jiang Cheng.”
Gu Fei started laughing. He laughed so hard that he scattered ash everywhere, so he
reached back to grab an empty container and tapped the cigarette against it.
“Haven’t you ever played around like that?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Nope,” Gu Fei shook his head. “But I bet a lot of people share the same hobby.
There was a post in the Fourth High forum once, where the OP said that unless they make
up and star in a full-length feature film in their head every night before bed, they wouldn’t
be able to sleep. And under it were a bunch of replies from people saying they have the
same compulsion.”
“Huh…” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“But in a way it’s a good thing, now that you know I saw you.” Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up.
“I finally have a chance to tell you, contestant Jiang Cheng, you are the most impressive
slingshotter I’ve ever seen.”
“… Thanks,” Jiang Cheng picked up the slingshot he tossed to the side earlier.
“Though this is probably just a prop that wasn’t meant to be used.”
“Wasn’t it pretty spot-on when you were shooting me?” Gu Fei said.
“It wasn’t spot-on, just able to hit.” Jiang Cheng said. “When it hit you in the thigh I was
actually aiming for your ass.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei turned to look at him. “Why?”
“There’s more cushioning,” Jiang Cheng said. “Less chance of injury.”
“I find that you’re actually… pretty self-aware. You don’t bottle up your anger, but won’t go
overboard either.” Gu Fei said as he tapped the cigarette against the container.
“Us overachievers tend to be conscientious in all matters,” Jiang Cheng said.
“For example, we would never fling anyone against a tree.”
“Shit.” Gu Fei started laughing again.
.
Jiang Cheng stared for a while at the cigarette in his hand, “What were you doing out there
that day? It was cold as fuck, and there wasn’t a way through.”
“That day was…” Gu Fei stopped, then continued after a long pause. “It was the anniversary
of my father’s death, I had to go burn some money.” [1]
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng was shook.
“That was where he drowned.” Gu Fei tapped his finger rhythmically against the empty
container.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng’s brain was still out of service, but he finally managed to get out. “I
thought the lake wasn’t that deep.”
“It’s not, he had been drinking that day. If he hadn’t,” Gu Fei’s finger paused against the
container. “It probably would’ve been me who drowned.”
Jiang Cheng raised his head and stared at Gu Fei in shock.
.
He hadn’t believed it when Li Baoguo said that Gu Fei murdered his father.
When Gu Fei said his dad drowned, Jiang Cheng’s only reaction was one of “ah so it was an
accident”. But hearing these words come out of Gu Fei’s mouth, he was so stunned that he
almost couldn’t trust his own ears.
“My dad was kind of an asshole,” Gu Fei said in a calm voice. “I’ve always wished he would
just die and get it over with. I wouldn’t have that thought even if my dad was Li Baoguo.”
Jiang Cheng stayed silent, his head was a scrambled mess.
“Though he’s not as much of a gambler as Li Baoguo, he’s much better when it comes to
using his fists.” Gu Fei laughed quietly to himself. “My mom was fooled by his handsome
face at first, that’s why she married him. Then came the beatings. He would beat us when
he was drunk, and when he wasn’t drunk. I’ve always thought his only way of expressing
himself was through his fists.”
“I heard Li Baoguo say…” Jiang Cheng remembered Li Baoguo’s words. “He beat Gu Miao
too.”
“Mm.” Gu Fei bit his lips. He had been fairly calm up until then, but only when Gu Miao was
brought up did his expression change. “Gu Miao had always been a little different than the
other kids, ever since she was born. Maybe it’s because of his drinking, who knows. Of
course he would never think that. He just thought of her as a giant nuisance, a kid who
couldn’t speak fluently, and had trouble learning things.”
“So he beat her?” As he listened Jiang Cheng felt his temper rise up again.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei turned his face away. “He flung her against a wall. Gu Miao pretty much
stopped talking after that.”
“Fucking hell!” Jiang Cheng blurted out. At that moment, he had the sudden urge to dig up
Gu Fei’s dad’s grave and whip his corpse.
Gu Fei had finished his story. They sat and stared at the makeshift ashtray together in
silence.
.
After a long while, Gu Fei said quietly, “The way I fling people against trees, I probably got it
from him…”
“Nonsense.” Jiang Cheng cut him off immediately.
“That tone,” Gu Fei started laughing. “You sound just like Lao-Xu.”
“Who should I sound like then, Lao-Lu? I don’t have the strength to yell anymore.” Jiang
Cheng leaned back against the wall and sighed. “This is a fucked up place.”
“Your adopted parents sheltered you pretty well, actually.” Gu Fei said. “Even though you’re
like one of those bang snaps [2], but still you’re really… clean.”
“I guess.” Jiang Cheng said quietly. He thought for a bit, then asked tentatively.
“Why did Li Baoguo say that you… never mind.”
“That I killed my dad?” Gu Fei said.
“Uh,” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt it was an inappropriate question to ask at this moment.
“Don’t worry about it, I didn’t believe him, I’m just… never mind, pretend I didn’t say
anything. Don’t mind me.”
“Not forthright at all.” Gu Fei wagged a finger at him. “It’s nothing really, just rumours,
there’s all kinds. We have lots of those around here, I’ll tell you the stories one day.”
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
.
“Somebody saw us when my dad dragged me to the lake,” Gu Fei said. “When they got there
my dad was in the lake, not moving, and I was standing on the shore. It must’ve looked just
like a murder crime scene. The perpetrator was obviously ruthless, he didn’t even cry.”
“That’s… you were probably in shock.” Jiang Cheng frowned. He was a little afraid to
imagine the scene at the time, how old had Gu Fei been?
“I don’t know, maybe.” Gu Fei lit another cigarette. “It might scare you if I told you.”
“Then scare me.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I couldn’t save him. I didn’t know how to swim and I was freezing.” Gu Fei’s voice got
lower. “But I wanted him to die too. I stood there and watched as he stopped moving little
by little, I watched as he sank down, just… watched.”
Jiang Cheng suddenly found it difficult to breathe. He tried twice to draw in a deep breath
but failed, as if something had wrapped itself around his lungs.
“It’s horrific isn’t it.” Gu Fei’s voice was very low with the faintest tremor. “I was terrified. I
save him, and he might still want to kill me, I’m scared that he’ll kill Er-Miao, or my mom… I
don’t save him, then I just stand there and watch him die, little by little… Every year on the
anniversary of his death I feel like I shed a layer of myself, like I’m never going to get past
this…”
Gu Fei was still holding the cigarette in his hand but it was shaking so hard even the smoke
rising from the ember tip looked as if it was struggling.
.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng never thought Gu Fei would have a backstory like this, and was
already at a complete loss for words, but seeing Gu Fei in such a state that was totally
unlike his usual cool and unflappable self, he felt his hands also start to shake. He didn’t
know what to do. “Gu Fei…”
Gu Fei turned to face him.
He wasn’t crying.
Thank goodness. Jiang Cheng let out a breath of relief. Even though he figured Gu Fei wasn’t
like him, getting a twinge or tickle in his nose out of nowhere like a delicate lady, he was
still a little worried.
Now with Gu Fei’s eyes on him, he was even more at a loss. Jiang Cheng raised
his hand up in the air and hesitated for the longest time, then finally put his arm around Gu
Fei, and rested his hand on the other shoulder, “Cheng-ge hug.”
Gu Fei didn’t struggle, only lowered his head and braced his forehead on his knees. Clearly
most people weren’t like himself, reacting to a simple touch from others as if he’d been
stabbed.
“To be honest… Never mind, I don’t even know what I’m saying.” Jiang Cheng had never
comforted anyone before. On one hand if someone wasn’t very close to him, he wouldn’t
think to comfort them. Meanwhile his best friend Pan Zhi never really needed much in the
way of comforting, his heart was so big he could eat shit and just sleep it off. All he could do
was lightly pat Gu Fei’s back over and over, and then give it a few rubs for good measure.
“It’s alright, it all passed… It’s normal for you to feel scared, but this is all past now.”
Gu Fei kept his head down without moving.
“I mean,” Jiang Cheng gathered Gu Fei toward himself and gave his arm a good rubbing too.
“Now you’re someone who’s weathered some big shit, right? My mom used to… my
adopted mom, she always said that in your life, any
experience you have is valuable, no matter good or bad…”
Gu Fei’s head was still down.
Jiang Cheng was racking his brain trying to think of the appropriate thing to say, all the
while stressing over the mismatch between his overachiever status and his utter lack of
knowledge in the ways of comforting people.
He had run out of words to say and could only continue to smooth the
nonexistent ruffled feathers all over Gu Fei’s back and arm. Just as Jiang Cheng was about to
resort to making up something ridiculous like “rub-a-dub-dub no fear little cub” in order to
comfort him, Gu Fei finally moved his head and turned his face away.
.
“You…” Jiang Cheng hurried to look at his face, but was stunned after a single glance, the
corners of Gu Fei’s mouth was turned up in laughter. He jerked his arm back in one swift
motion and yelled out. “You’re laughing?? Where’s your fucking humanity?!”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei laughed even harder. “This is my first time on the receiving end of such an
amateur consolation effort, I couldn’t help it. See, I was pretty upset but…”
“Fuck off!” Jiang Cheng roared and sprang up from the ground. “How much do you wanna
bet I can beat you until you’re upset again?”
“Nonono don’t…” Gu Fei stood up as well and quickly kicked the slingshot to
one side.
“Hold on, I was really worried about you, do you realize I was so stressed I was ready to
smooth out your feathers!” Jiang Cheng had no words for how he felt.
“Meanwhile you’re perfectly happy to play me for a fool, should I give you a round of
applause…”
“Thank you.” Gu Fei said.
“You’re welcome,” Jiang Cheng replied automatically, and when he came around to it was
too tired to bother. “… your great uncle.”
“I’m serious.” Gu Fei raised a hand and poked Jiang Cheng’s shoulder gently with a finger.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, just glanced at his own shoulder with a strange look in his
eyes.
“Thank you,” Gu Fei walked over and gave him a hug. “Really.”
.
This was different from the celebratory hug on the court the other day. This time Gu Fei
wrapped his arms tightly around him, and Jiang Cheng’s muscle reflex was so late that it
might as well not bother at all.
“Also,” Gu Fei said gently while holding him. “When I say ‘watch from the sidelines’, please
try to comprehend it with your genius overachiever mind, and not misinterpret it in bad
faith.”
“I’m absolutely not misinterpreting it in bad faith.” Jiang Cheng said. He could smell the
faint scent of tobacco on Gu Fei, and had the sudden thought that this kind of hug was
strangely enjoyable. He couldn’t tell if it was the shameless kind of enjoyable, the
wholesome kind, or some other variety. In short, he didn’t have the urge to push Gu Fei
away. “When you saw me by the lake, you were thinking of yourself as a bystander,
watching from the sidelines as someone else cried, laughed, and split himself into eight
pieces.”
Gu Fei began to laugh again, “Alright fine, I ‘bystood’ for a bit. But I didn’t think anything of
it, and I wasn’t making fun of you either.”
“There we go,” Jiang Cheng said. “A little more honesty, and the whole world is brighter.”
Gu Fei patted him on the back and let go, “I honestly thought I would die by your hands
today.”
“Not likely.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Although now I’m a little worried, seems like I might
know too much…”
“Don’t worry about it.” Gu Fei held up his camera. “I have photos of you in underwear.”
“What?!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“I have. Photos. Of you in underwear.” Gu Fei waved his camera. “Face included, high res, no
pixelation.”
“You shameless little shit,” Jiang Cheng pointed at him. “I should never have tried to
comfort you. Do your classmates know of your perverted tendencies?”
“My deskmate does.” Gu Fei scoffed.
Jiang Cheng tried to keep a straight face, but gave in to the giggles a second later.
He didn’t much care whether Gu Fei really had photos of him in underwear. At the end of
the day it was just underwear, at least it wasn’t photos of him without underwear. In
comparison, what he was actually worried about…
“And your chicken run photos.” Gu Fei said.
“Delete it!” Jiang Cheng yelled.
Yes, compared to the underwear photos, he was way more concerned with the photo of him
running like a chicken. Now that, would be seriously embarrassing if seen by anyone else.
“Sure,” Gu Fei answered briskly. “If you write the Monday morning self-admonition for me.”
.
Jiang Cheng glared at him for a few seconds, then said at last, “You can’t even write a self-
admonition? Someone like you, you must’ve written quite a few of these growing up.”
“I really can’t, I used to ask Li Yan to write them for me, and Zhou Jing [3], pretty much
everyone I can think of.” Gu Fei said.
“Ayyy…” Jiang Cheng poured himself a glass of water and took a sip. “I’m honestly quite
impressed. Just getting by like you do, even when it comes to self-admonitions. What are
you gonna do about the university entrance exams?”
“You’re thinking too far ahead, that’s more than a year away.” Gu Fei said. “I haven’t
thought about the university entrance exams, I just want to get my high school diploma.”
“Why didn’t you go to a technical college or something for secondary school,”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Then at least you could have a skilled trade under your belt.”
“I already do,” Gu Fei waved his camera again, and smiled after some thought.
“When I was in middle school, I actually thought about applying to university one day. But
then I figured there was no point.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply. He knew that Gu Fei didn’t actually think that it was pointless.
Considering his home life, it was probably impossible for him to leave for school, and there
didn’t seem to be any respectable schools in the area worth applying to…
“You’ll probably get into some impressive university.” Gu Fei said. “Will the two years you
spend here at a garbage school like Fourth High negatively affect you?”
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng chugged the whole glass of water. “It’s all in the textbooks, doesn’t
matter who teaches it.”
Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up.
“Maybe it’s out of spite… but I want to prove it to my… my adopted mother,”
Jiang Cheng frowned, it wasn’t like she would ever know. “That I’m not someone who
would rot in place wherever I’m put down, I will go far away from here.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei stretched. “This shitty place, no one wants to stay here.”
Footnotes:
[1] Burning fake paper money is a tradition for the living to send currency to the dead so
they may live comfortably in the afterlife. ↩
[2] Bang snaps = a small novelty firework ↩
[3] Zhou Jing: the guy who sits in front of them in class, in case y’all forgot (:3∠)_ ↩
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 6166
* TL word count: 4229
* TL time: 10:05:17
* Edit: 1:20:43
* Curse words: 9x fucks, 2x ass, 6x shits
TL’s Notes
I loved doing this chapter, and I’m still learning all the time. I look back at translations I did a
few chapters ago and I cringe at the wording (￣ ￣|| ) . The author also leaves really cute
author’s notes all the time, I would do them as well if only I could figure out what she’s talking
about half the time.
Cheng-ge’s outburst was one of my favourite scenes while reading the novel, I felt for him so
much and hope I got the emotions across properly.
Anyways, hope you enjoy (∀)
Chapter 38
Paraspinal muscles, or commonly known as tenderloins.
It would appear that this ‘deranged caveman’ ensemble wasn’t the main focus of the line.
Gu Fei only snapped a couple more photos of it before sending Jiang Cheng off to change
again.
Left alone in the room, Gu Fei collected all of Jiang Cheng’s spent wooden ammo and put
them back on the table.
He was reminded of the pain on his arm, and rubbed it again. That one was particularly
painful, it would probably leave a pretty serious bruise. He sighed. It had been a while since
someone had hurt him to the point of leaving a mark on his body, but the first half of this
semester alone he had already been bitten once by Jiang Cheng, not to mention he had just
been hunted down with a slingshot.
Although… Gu Fei stretched, he was actually in a pretty good mood.
The only people around him who knew about his family background were Li Yan and Ding
Zhuxin. He didn’t like to talk about it because it made him uncomfortable. He was not used
to receiving words of comfort or sympathy from other people.
But now that he told Jiang Cheng, he suddenly felt a sense of relief.
Perhaps it was because he witnessed Jiang Cheng’s secret first, so it was only fair to trade.
Or maybe he just wanted to talk about it with someone.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t expressed any obvious sympathy, and his efforts at consolation had
been a mess, but it made Gu Fei feel comfortable.
He wasn’t teasing Jiang Cheng. He had felt pretty crappy, and it was Jiang Cheng’s so-called
words of consolation that made him break out in laughter.
.
“What’s this one supposed to be?” Jiang Cheng finished changing, and walked in.
“I feel like you ask this with every outfit.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Does Ding Zhuxin have her own brand? Is the brand called ‘WTF Is This’?”
Jiang Cheng spread his arms and showed off the garment. “What’s the vibe here?”
This outfit was still made of some kind of linen; the bottom was a pair of loose fitting pants.
Spread all over were countless vertical cuts in the fabric of various lengths, his leg could be
seen through the slits when he walked.
The top was a normal shift, but the long sleeves had been partially cut in the middle,
leaving the bottom halves of the sleeves on the forearm like long Victorian gloves.
“Looks pretty good.” Gu Fei lifted up his camera and looked through the viewfinder. “This
set gives off a kind of wilful feeling.”
“Alright then,” Jiang Cheng turned toward the set. “You tell me what this wilfulness is
supposed to look like.”
Once Jiang Cheng turned around, Gu Fei noticed that there were several long tears on the
back of the shirt as well, and when he moved Gu Fei could see the well-toned paraspinal
muscles underneath very clearly… he cleared his throat.
To turn around and have a reaction to someone’s back so soon after divulging his tragic
backstory… It must be Spring time, the adolescent hormones are acting up.
Gu Fei turned away, pretending to fiddle with the camera, and tugged on his pants. He was
wearing a pair of thick sweatpants that day, so it shouldn’t be a problem. He didn’t want to
have to keep going to the bathroom to ‘meditate’.
Paraspinal muscles, or commonly known as tenderloins. [1]
He raised the camera. If he thought about it that way, then suddenly any and all sense of
aesthetics was gone.
.
“Hold your arms up,” Gu Fei said after a couple still shots of Jiang Cheng standing with arms
by his sides. “Both of them… No not like you’re
surrendering, act like you’re blocking out the sun…”
“I never block the sun,” Jiang Cheng raised his right arm and held it in front of his forehead.
“Just say like I’m wiping sweat from my brows.”
“Mhm, lower the other arm a bit, so one is higher than the other. I only need to see your
eyes.” Gu Fei said. “OK, now don’t move, let me find a good angle.”
Jiang Cheng held still, “Do I need to look wilful or something?”
“The way you looked just now when hitting me with a slingshot is fine,” Gu Fei said as he
adjusted the distance. Jiang Cheng’s eyes had always had this air of conceit, and when
focused on like this, they were very imposing. Wilful… not exactly, but no doubt alluring. Gu
Fei cleared his throat again and bent a little at
the waist, then pressed the shutter. “Very good.”
“That’s it?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“A little lower, I wanna get a full body shot with only your mouth showing.” Gu Fei said.
”Mm.” Jiang Cheng kept his arms up.
Gu Fei backed up a few steps and clicked the shutter again, “And turn, with your face
forward, no movement necessary.”
Jiang Cheng did as instructed.
After that he went out to change again. Gu Fei tugged on his pants. Tenderloin tenderloin
tenderloin……
.
The number of outfits were on par with the ones from yesterday, but since Jiang Cheng was
more practiced at it, they were able to finish up earlier, even accounting for the time spent
in intermission for fighting and the exchange of secrets.
Gu Fei drove them to a nearby eatery in the little bun for a bowl of surprisingly good
noodles.
On the way back from dinner Gu Fei didn’t forget to remind him, “Remember to write the
admonition for me.”
“Hold on,” Jiang Cheng stared at the back of his head. “When did I agree to that?”
“It doesn’t need to be long, otherwise it’ll suck to have to read it out loud.” Gu Fei said. “I’m
guessing you don’t have prior experience of reading these out loud in front of the whole
school?”
“…No,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “And no experience of cleaning the bathroom for a whole week
either.”
“Just going through the motions is fine, the bathroom gets cleaned regularly anyway.” Gu
Fei said. “You know how to sweep the floor?”
“Are you under the impression that I’m a desolate young master thrown out by some large
prominent family?” Jiang Cheng was a little speechless. “My family… my adopted parent’s
household is just one of slightly better than average salary income family. Including me
there are only four people, do you think we have a maid or something?”
“Are you still in contact with them?” Gu Fei asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng knitted his brows into a knot. “We haven’t spoken since last time when
they sent all my stuff over. What is there to say anyways, should we talk about how terrible
life has been for me in this shitty place?”
.
“Has it been that terrible?” Gu Fei chuckled.
”To be honest… it’s alright. At first I felt like I couldn’t spend a single second here, one
second longer and I might start a fight with Li Baoguo, but what’s the use? I’ve adapted now
I think, there’s nobody to keep an eye on me now, it feels about the same as living on my
own.” Jiang Cheng stared out the car window.
“I’m also lucky to have gotten to know you.”
Gu Fei tilted his head.
“Err… gotten to know you all: you, Gu Miao, Jiuri…” Jiang Cheng rushed to explain. “Lao-Xu
is really nice too, and Lao-Lu…”
Gu Fei started to laugh, then said after a while, “I never thought I would get to know
someone like you one day, you’re unlike any of my other friends and classmates.”
“Is that so?” Jiang Cheng pondered. “Is it because I’m more handsome than you?”
“I was born and raised here,” Gu Fei lifted an arm and drew a circle in the air around them.
“I’ve never left this place before high school, not to mention travel.
All my relatives are here too, so I don’t even have the excuse to leave and visit family.”
“You never left the city before high school?” Jiang Cheng was a little taken aback. To be
honest, he wouldn’t be surprised if Wang Xu or Zhou Jing had never travelled before, but Gu
Fei didn’t seem like someone who had grown up trapped in a place like this.
“Mm, I skipped class a few times in high school to travel around.” Gu Fei said.
“Didn’t go far though, I didn’t have enough money and I couldn’t be gone for too long. It was
mainly to take photographs… Oh, and I went into a Starbucks once, but I didn’t know how
to order.”
Jiang Cheng burst out laughing, and said after a minute, “Hey, I’ve actually never been to
Starbucks either. So do you know how to order there now?”
“Yep.” Gu Fei laughed and turned his head around to look at Jiang Cheng. “I’ll teach you if
we get to go one day.”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng nodded solemnly.
They burst into laughter again. After a while, Jiang Cheng finally recovered and said, “Have
you ever thought about leaving this place?”
“Of course,” Gu Fei said. “How could I not.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied. The barely discernible note of sadness in Gu Fei’s tone made him
feel bad.
.
“I’ll see if there’s a chance of that eventually,” Gu Fei said. “When Gu Miao is older. She’s
very stubborn at the moment, and can’t really accept change. A lot of times I can’t figure out
what she’s thinking. You give her new clothes, a new hat, and she’s happy. But if you change
her duvet cover to a brand new one, she’ll get mad and cut it to shreds. You can’t touch her
skateboard at all, she’s this close to going to sleep with it in her bed. If the wheels are
broken you can only replace the wheels, if you buy her a new board she’ll smash it on the
ground until it’s in pieces… I have no idea what she can or cannot accept. Just look at how
long she’s known Li Yan and the guys, but she still doesn’t pay them much attention. But
you, she likes after only meeting once…”
“So that’s why, when I called you and said I have your sister here, you didn’t believe me at
all?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm, she wouldn’t be with a stranger.” Gu Fei smiled and said. “She actually has a set
route for her skateboard, she’s very stubborn about it. Even if she went to the train station,
there’s no way she’ll get lost, she knows how to get back from there… You have no idea how
much you sounded like a scammer at the time.”
“At the time I thought you were a lunatic.” Jiang Cheng smiled too, but he thought he could
also sense Gu Fei’s helplessness. “Can she be treated?”
“It’s hard to see any substantial changes,” Gu Fei said. “We can only take it slow. It might be
several years before there’s even a small improvement. Look at how good she is with the
skateboard, but she can’t figure out simple arithmetic involving two digit numbers, and
sometimes gets it wrong even when it’s under 10.”
“Ayyy…” Jiang Cheng pulled out a cigarette and lit it. “I like her, I don’t think she’s weird at
all, she’s got swag.”
“More so than me?” Gu Fei asked.
“Have some shame please, you’d compete with your own baby sister?” Jiang Cheng was
bemused. “Why are you like this.”
“Can’t I? I’ve always considered myself rather handsome.” Gu Fei said with a serious face.
“Yeah yeah, you’re freestyle handsome.” Jiang Cheng stuck his thumb out and waved it
beside Gu Fei’s face. “The handsomest.”
“Thank you.” Gu Fei said.
“No…” Jiang Cheng bit back the next word.
.
Li Baoguo’s place was still empty when he returned, but Jiang Cheng preferred it that way.
He didn’t want to be alone with Li Baoguo, it was still unpleasant even if it wasn’t awkward.
He remembered the woman from earlier today again, his birth mother. He didn’t even get
to ask what her name was, not that she gave him a chance to ask.
Jiang Cheng wondered if she would go looking for him at the school again, the very thought
of that scared him, he briefly considered climbing over the perimeter fence again the next
day.
Once he was back in his own room with the door closed, he sat down at the desk and
started working on the day’s homework.
There were relatively few homework assignments at the Fourth High, it didn’t take him
very long to finish. He sometimes thought it was somewhat illogical the way the homework
was assigned, a lot of the important points mentioned during class never showed up in the
homework.
He sent a message to Pan Zhi when he was done, asking him to take a photo of the list of
required texts they had for the semester. He was planning to buy the material as well.
– I’ll ship them to you directly. Gramps are you gonna get the highest test mark at Fourth
High this time?
– Shouldn’t be a problem
– No wonder you’re my gramps, I like this confidence!
What his score was, how he placed, Jiang Cheng wasn’t too particularly hung up on that
point. He was more concerned with whether he was able to do the work, and how much he
really understood; marks came after that. Of course, the higher it was the better. After all,
his reputation as the genius overachiever had already spread, there were already people
who teased him about it. A high test score would shut them up once and for all.
Jiang Cheng put his homework away and started to review.
He opened a textbook and said quietly to himself as he skimmed his notes,
“Overachiever Jiang Cheng is going to start his revision now, beginning with English. He’s
always been very good at planning out his revisions… By starting with his most proficient
subject, it’s easy to build up the positive mindset of ‘I got this’… OK now we will keep quiet
and see what exactly he’s got in his neural network…”
.
Jiang Cheng revised until past 1 am before going to bed, but he still felt rather invigorated
the next morning. Maybe it was the fact that he hadn’t been able to sit down and study
quietly like this in a long time, he felt as though he was finally back in his old rhythm.
He looked towards the general direction of Gu Fei’s home when he got to the main street.
No Gu Fei. Considering Gu Fei’s usual schedule, he must still be in bed at this time.
Jiang Cheng was relieved to see that his mother wasn’t waiting for him by the school gates,
but he figured he should find a chance to ask Li Baoguo about it.
He had to put an end to this problem, living in constant fear was a surefire way to
premature baldness.
Handsome as he was, he couldn’t risk that.
Gu Fei missed the first period. By the time he finally made his way into the classroom
through the backdoor, it was already ten minutes into math class, and Jiang Cheng was
writing the self-admonition letters while half listening to the lecture.
He glanced up for a second when Gu Fei sat down beside him. Suddenly, it felt like there
was a weird… intimacy between them.
Perhaps it was because they had been interacting with each other more than anybody else,
maybe it was because they knew more secrets about each other, or maybe it was their
echoed sentiments the day before that ‘getting to know you was an accident but a happy
one’…
/
“This afternoon’s game may be a little tricky,” Gu Fei said quietly. “I just saw
reinforcements outside for Class-7.”
“That’s really a thing?” Jiang Cheng was stunned. “Have they no shame?”
“It looks like there are two of them. I’ve faced them before, they play dirty, so be careful this
afternoon.” Gu Fei said. “Let’s get Jiuri and the guys out for another
practice session at lunch.”
“Mn, doesn’t the referee care?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not really, as long as the game is exciting.” Gu Fei said.
“Then we should…” Jiang Cheng was interrupted by the teacher before he was able to
finish.
“Jiang Cheng, you seem to be having a lot of fun chatting away, why don’t you come up here
and solve this.” The teacher glared at him, vexed.
/
The math teacher had a habit of calling people up to the board to solve problems, and so
most people tend to be a little more reserved during math class. After all, nobody wished to
stand up there with a piece of chalk for minutes on end like an idiot, then receive a scolding
for their troubles.
Jiang Cheng stood up and slowly walked toward the front of the classroom, reading through
the question as he went.
Gu Fei swept his eyes over Jiang Cheng’s side of the desk. There was only a sheet of
unfinished self-admonition on it, he hadn’t even opened his book.
Was it finally time to show off his overachiever abilities?
Jiang Cheng walked to the front, grabbed a piece of chalk and broke it in half on the podium,
then proceeded to stand there reading the question.
“What’s wrong, do you need to take a language class first? Can’t understand the question?”
The teacher said with his arms folded.
“Language class was last period.” Jiang Cheng said.
There were sounds of quiet laughter from the rest of the class.
Just as the teacher’s temper was about to flare, Jiang Cheng finally began writing on the
board.
From Gu Fei’s slacker point of view, he couldn’t even figure out what the question was
asking, let alone how to go about an answer. He watched as Jiang Cheng made rough notes
on the side while working through the problem, it didn’t take him very long before he was
done. He even took the time to wipe away his notes before turning to walk back to his seat.
Jiang Cheng’s handwriting in chalk was hideous, even more so than his fountain pen
writing, one could tell at a glance that it wasn’t the writing of a trueborn son.
However, he could tell by the expression on the teacher’s face that Jiang Cheng
answered perfectly.
“You really should work on your handwriting.” The teacher said.
“…… This is what it looks like after I already worked on it.” Jiang Cheng said.
The whole class erupted in laughter. The teacher was baffled for a moment, before he
recovered and knocked hard on the podium, “Quiet! Is everybody this eager to come up and
answer questions?”
“I thought you won’t be able to do it, since you were writing the admonition and not paying
attention.” Gu Fei bowed his head and pulled out his phone to play his idiotic Ai Xiao Chu.
“It wouldn’t be a problem even if I’ve been playing an idiotic game the whole time.” Jiang
Cheng said.
Gu Fei chuckled for a good while, “You’ve not no less shame than me.”
/
The plan was to head to the court right after class to warm up for the afternoon’s game, but
the Guidance director ambushed them at the door just as they were leaving.
They had to go clean the washrooms first.
Those whose transgressions were less severe were assigned to the staff washroom,
whereas serious offenders such as Jiang Cheng and the dumbass were designated to the
general student washroom, where even breathing is a mistake.
Jiang Cheng usually held his breath when coming to the washroom and quickly finished his
business, but he did finally get to experience the full extent of the washroom’s aromas on
that day.
They were all so casual in their washroom habits, not to mention unreasonably proud of
their ability to piss on target. Though inexplicably when it came to the school washroom,
there was always urine near and around the urinal.
Jiang Cheng grabbed a mop out of the cleaning supplies stall, and the dumbass immediately
snatched the only remaining mop. This left his poor lackey with rags as his only choice.
Jiang Cheng could not bear to look at his agonizing expression of pure martyrdom as he
reached for the rag.
/
Mopping the floor was a relatively easier task, at least they didn’t have to touch anything
with their hands, Jiang Cheng and the dumbass each took a side and started mopping.
Usually around this time, going by the dumbass’ temperament, they would be far into the
trashtalks, but even breathing was a cruel exercise at this moment.
There were a few other students in the washroom, and they all had a moment of shock
when they saw who it was mopping the floor and wiping the walls, but that very quickly
devolved into laughter.
“What are you laughing at!” The Guidance director stood at the door. “If you think this is
funny then go ahead and take their place! Or maybe start a fight right here right now, I’ll
find a mop for you.”
Jiang Cheng had mopped the floor at home, but it was always at a leisurely pace with
multiple phone breaks in between. This was the first time in his life that he concentrated
his entire being into speed mopping.
When he got to the innermost stall, the door to the stall opened.
He was just about to move the mop out of the way, but the person inside had put their foot
down on it.
Jiang Cheng straightened up and gave this person a once over.
Nope, don’t recognize.
/
“Ah, it’s the god of three-pointers, what a coincidence,” The guy looked at him with the
biggest fake grin. “I suppose you train your body by mopping bathrooms? I never would’ve
guessed.”
Jiang Cheng gave the mop a tug, but the guy leaned his weight onto it, and he wasn’t able to
just pull it out with ease. He shot a glance at the guy’s foot,
“Move your trotter.”
“So you think you’re pretty impressive huh?” The guy continued flashing his shit eating
grin.
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to continue a conversation in this environment, so he just held the
mop and watched him without a word.
“At Fourth High, it’s not your place,” The guy pointed at Jiang Cheng’s face.
“To represent yourself through basketball.”
Jiang Cheng always thought of himself as a little derp at times, though he was content to
revel in it and didn’t intend on changing. But today, staring at this guy who had just walked
out of the last stall of the washroom, he had a whole new
understanding, that someone can be this level of derp.
“I usually represent myself with words, not with a basketball.” Jiang Cheng said, and
endured for now the finger pointed at him.
“You think you’re so funny?” The dude was clearly irked by this, and jabbed a finger against
Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “Dumbass.”
This jab happened to land directly on Jiang Cheng’s ‘on’ switch.
He reached out and yanked hard on the mop handle, the mop got pulled out abruptly from
under the guy’s feet.
The guy pivoted backwards unexpectedly, stumbled a few steps, then steadied himself
against the wall to avoid falling into the squatter. Once he collected himself, he immediately
jumped out with an expression of rage on his face, “I’ll fucking…”
“Stop fucking this and fucking that.” Jiang Cheng extended the mop handle forward and
pushed the tip against the guy’s throat, forcing him to brake suddenly.
Spring is such a moist and humid time of the year, so why is everyone acting like they have an
explosive fuse on their head?
Jiang Cheng sighed in his mind and grabbed the guy’s collar with one swift motion. He kept
his voice low so the Guidance director standing right outside wouldn’t hear, “You’re from
Class-7 right? You wanna let the game speak for you? I’ll be waiting for you to come talk to
me this afternoon.”
When he released his grip, the other guy still wanted to make a move. Jiang Cheng
immediately called out at the door, “Director! I’m done mopping, can I go now?”
“Let me check!” The Guidance director came in.
The guy could only give him a dirty glare before he smoothed out his shirt and left.
/
Gu Fei and Wang Xu were waiting outside the washroom when Jiang Cheng walked out.
Wang Xu greeted Jiang Cheng as soon as he saw him, “Did you run into Hu Jian just now?”
“Hu Jian?” Jiang Cheng almost couldn’t help but remind Wang Xu that it’s Fujian [2], but
paused and realized that Hu Jian was the name of that guy.
“Mhm, what about it?”
“He looked pretty mad when he came out just now,” Wang Xu said. “We’re gonna have some
drama this afternoon.”
“Not a problem.” Jiang Cheng said. “All that drama can’t beat a win on the court.”
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Wang Xu gave him a thumbs up. “Let’s go, we’ll go
practice in secret at the vocational school next door. I already told my friend there to hold
the court for us.”
The bunch of them walked out of the gates together, chatting loudly.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei walked side by side behind everyone else, listening in synchronized
silence as Wang Xu talked excitedly about their battle strategy.
What’s so synchronized about silence? Jiang Cheng was a little weirded out by his own
thoughts.
/
“The one-on-one blocking isn’t gonna work this afternoon,” Wang Xu said.
“They have outside help, at least one extra person, maybe two…”
“That’s fine if we can’t each have a target, but make sure you keep your eyes on us.” Gu Fei
said. “Class-7’s skills aren’t comparable with Class-5, even if they have reinforcements,
they’re probably not going to work together that well.
After all, we’ve been training together all this time…”
“Exactly! Our teamwork is great now.” Wang Xu waved his hand around. “So what’s our
play this afternoon?”
“Put all your energy into assisting Cheng-ge and I to score.” Gu Fei said.
It suddenly got quiet, everybody turned in unison to look at Gu Fei.
Even Jiang Cheng was stunned.
“Me and…” Gu Fei cleared his throat, and pointed at Jiang Cheng. “Him.”
Footnotes:
[1] Not technically true, tenderloins are actually… somewhere else. Gu Fei could not
possibly have been staring at Cheng-ge’s ‘tenderloins’ that would’ve been highly
inappropriate…
But let’s forgive Gu Fei for thinking this, he’s not in his right mind :’D ↩
[2] Omg it’s a Fujian/Hujian joke hahahaha. Fujian is a province in the southern part of
China, the stereotype (which as someone from Fujian I can confirm) is people there tend to
have accents that make it hard to differentiate between their
‘f’ and ‘h’ consonants, especially ironic since there’s an ‘f’ in the province name.
So when people say they’re from Fujian, it sounds like “I’m from Hujian”. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6103
TL word count: 4490
TL time: 5:11:47
Edit: 2:02:15
Curse words: 3x fucks, 5x ass, 1x shit
TL’s Notes
!!! Today marks the start of the three day marathon as a countdown for Cheng-ge’s birthday
on July 12th, so you will see another chapter here at this time tomorrow and the day after!
(don’t get used to it)
Thanks for all the comments since last chap! Stay safe out there, love you <3
Chapter 39
Gu Fei walked over and without a word, reached out and lifted up Jiang Cheng’s jersey.
“Cheng-ge!” Wang Xu was very quick to react. “Uh huh! Got it! Pass to you and Cheng-ge!”
“Jiang Cheng.” Said Jiang Cheng. He wasn’t used to having a bunch of people around him
calling him big bro, even though he was already grandpa to Pan Zhi.
“Fine, Jiang Cheng it is, Jiang Cheng.” Wang Xu waved his hand
absentmindedly. “We’re all bros so don’t get hung up on the rules and regulations… We’ll
head to my place first to get something to eat, I asked my mom to get it all ready, then we’ll
go straight to the technical college court to practice.”
Jiang Cheng wanted to ask where the rules and regulations are, but couldn’t bring himself
to. After all the delicious meat pies he had at Wang Xu’s place, he had a vested interest in
preserving Wang Xu’s status as the tyrant of Class-8.
By the time the rowdy bunch got to the restaurant, Wang Xu’s mom had packed up all the
meat pies for them. Probably because it was the first time she ever got to witness Wang Xu
accomplish something like ‘lead a basketball team to victory’, she was very excited.
“Why don’t you all eat here, wouldn’t it be uncomfortable to eat these while walking against
the wind?” She said.
“It’s fine, we’re in a hurry,” Wang Xu said. “We’ve got a heavy burden and very little time.
You wouldn’t understand.”
“Thanks auntie.” Jiang Cheng took the pies from her.
“Aren’t you the sweetest, so polite every time.” Wang Xu’s mom smiled and said.
.
They didn’t stay for very long, after they picked up the pies, the bunch of them rolled on in
the direction of the technical college.
“Da-Fei,” Wang Xu handed a bag of meat pies to Gu Fei. “There’s beef and pork tenderloin,
which kind do you want?”
“…… Beef.” Gu Fei said.
“Tenderloin’s very good too, I thought you really liked it last time?” Wang Xu said.
“I just feel like eating beef today.” Gu Fei said.
“And Jiang Cheng?” Wang Xu shoved the bag in front of Jiang Cheng’s face.
“I’ll try the tenderloin.” Jiang Cheng followed Wang Xu’s advice and picked out one of the
pies with pork tenderloin filling.
Beside them, Gu Fei suddenly choked on something, he turned away and
coughed it out.
Jiang Cheng pulled out a water bottle from his backpack, “Want some water?”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei accepted the water and took a few big gulps.
“Hey, that water bottle looks nice,” Wang Xu said. “Sporty, very obviously made for athletes.
I’m just saying Jiang Cheng, you’re really good at putting on a show sometimes, no wonder
people got a problem with you.”
“…… If even a water bottle counts as putting on a show,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Aren’t your standards a little low?”
“Naw,” Guo Xu said beside him. “When there’s someone like you who
obviously doesn’t belong here, and who actually came from some big city, to a remote place
like ours you are the show.”
Everyone voiced their agreement.
Jiang Cheng was at a loss.
.
The court at the technical college wasn’t as nice as Fourth High’s, but everyone still
crouched diligently by the courtside in discussion of game strategy, then trained rigorously
according to their established plan.
It was worth mentioning that despite not paying any attention during actual class, these
guys from Class-8 made impressive strides in improving their basketball skills since
receiving the positive reinforcement of the previous win.
They had come a long way since the days of chasing the ball around the court, several of
them now embraced the importance of cooperation and guarding their teammates. Jiang
Cheng was so touched he felt like composing an English radio announcement to commend
them.
Due to the games, the first class of the afternoon was a mess as expected, with the teachers
not even bothering to rein them in. The Class-8 team practiced at the technical college until
halfway through the first period, then walked back to
school together.
There was already a crowd gathered around the court, this time the arrival of the usually
shunned Class-8 team immediately drew the attention of the crowd.
Jiang Cheng was surprised to discover that in a few short days, they had already amassed
quite a fanbase.
Before they even got to their resting area, Wang Xu zipped open his jacket with a flourish,
and in one smooth motion took it off and tossed it to one side, so that it landed right on top
of the Lu Xiaobin next to him.
“Hold it yourself.” Lu Xiaobin was about to chuck it back to him.
“Hold it for a sec!” Wang Xu turned to glower at him.
“…… We should really assign a dedicated photographer to you.” Lu Xiaobin said.
“All this whining, all this reluctance, just from asking you to help hold my jacket,” Wang Xu
chided. “Are you the captain or am I?”
Lu Xiaobin didn’t answer, only turned his face away and ignored him.
.
What came as a serious shock for Jiang Cheng was the sight of Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu in athletic
wear, waiting for them by the court.
“Tell me that’s not our external reinforcement?” Jiang Cheng had to ask.
“To be fair,” Gu Fei also found it amusing and chuckled. “Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu are both from
our class, if we switch them on, it wouldn’t even count as external.
Lao-Lu actually plays pretty well. There’s going to be an inter-school staff basketball
tournament soon, you should go watch.”
“Our principal must really love basketball.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
He spotted the principal just as the words left his mouth.
The principal’s surname was Liu, Jiang Cheng had never been face to face with him, so he
jumped when principal Liu suddenly appeared out of nowhere in front of him. He noticed a
pimple on the side of the principal’s nose, and wondered if it was caused by the excitement
of the games.
“Jiang Cheng,” Principal Liu smiled and clapped his hand on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “Not
bad, I watched you guys play, not bad at all! With your ability, you’ll have no problem
playing for our school team!”
“Principal Liu,” Before Jiang Cheng even got a word out, Wang Xu rushed to
say. “Don’t touch his shoulder.”
“I……” Jiang Cheng looked at Wang Xu, and had the feeling that this guy’s brain wasn’t just
missing a string, but an entire instrument.
“Alright alright, I won’t touch him.” Principal Liu didn’t seem very bothered, after he
commended Jiang Cheng he went on to pat Gu Fei on the shoulder.
“Your shoulder is OK, right?”
“Nope.” Gu Fei gave him a wry smile.
“You rascal,” The principal pointed at him and laughed. “The only times I don’t find you
annoying are when you’re playing ball, you and Jiang Cheng really are perfect partners. You
two have got to come out for our staff tournament next time!”
“Nope.” Gu Fei continued to smile.
Principal Liu pointed at him but wasn’t able to get a word out, so he turned around and
waved to someone behind him, “Reporter, come interview our dark horse pair!”
.
A very hipster looking boy with a face full of pimples and a girl who was so short she could
take stalker photos while standing right in front of the person immediately walked up to
them.
“Hello, we’re reporters for the school radio station,” The hipster boy first snapped a bunch
of photos of the two of them with his point-and-shoot, then took out a little notepad. “We’d
like to ask you some questions.”
For a crappy school with less tests even than other schools, they actually had a radio
station, and reporters??
“…… Hello.” Jiang Cheng was rather irritated at suddenly being photographed without so
much as a warning, especially with the guy getting all up in his face.
He had the urge to grab the camera to check how his image had been tarnished.
Gu Fei simply turned and walked away.
“Classmate Gu Fei,” The waifish girl chased after him anxiously. “Classmate Gu Fei! I have a
couple of questions for you……”
“Classmate Jiang Cheng,” The hipster boy immediately blocked off Jiang Cheng’s path to the
Class-8 resting area. “Will you answer a couple of questions for me please.”
Jiang Cheng wanted to ask whether all their questions had been prepared in
couplets.
“The result of your last game was rather unexpected,” The hipster boy looked at him. “I just
want to ask……”
“Wang Xu!” At once, Jiang Cheng spotted Wang Xu, who had been looking this way
expectedly. “Captain!””
“Ayy! Yes, what’s up?” Wang Xu made his way over with lightning speed.
“This is a reporter for the school radio station,” Jiang Cheng introduced them. “I think his
questions are better answered by the team captain, our captain really is the team’s soul…”
“What question?” Wang Xu immediately fixed his eyes on the reporter. “I can answer.”
Jiang Cheng hurried to retreat, the hipster boy wanted to stop him but was blocked by
Wang Xu, “Ask away, but my time is limited, so you should pick the important ones.”
.
The members of the Class-7 team had already arrived. Jiang Cheng sat on the bench and
tried hard not to look at all the phones and cameras directed at him and Gu Fei, trying
instead to direct his attention to the Class-7 team.
“Looking for Hu Jian?” Gu Fei asked as he changed out of his street shoes.
“Is that their reinforcement?” Jiang Cheng raised his chin at a guy on the other side with a
wild boar pattern engraved into his buzz cut.
“Mmn,” Gu Fei also looked up. “There’s only one so far, I wonder if there will be more later.”
“Dirty player?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Very dirty.” Gu Fei said. “Not A Good Bird and I lose more than half of our games with
them.”
Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei in astonishment, because frankly under normal circumstances,
Not A Good Bird with the addition of Li Yan and Gu Fei, the six of them could probably beat
the crap out of most other teams.
“They will have certain people foul on purpose,” Gu Fei said. “Their team has a lot of
reserves, if things aren’t going their way they’ll switch the alternates on just to foul, as long
as they can disrupt us enough that we can’t score.”
“No worries.” Jiang Cheng took off his jacket. “As long as they don’t bring
knives into it, we’ll pick them off as they come.”
“You cover me,” Gu Fei said. “Jiuri and the guys are pretty good now at working together,
we don’t even have to go above our usual level to win this one.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Perfect partners?
Jiang Cheng quite liked this label.
“Give us a smile.” Gu Fei turned.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then turned around with him and saw Yi Jing with a
camera pointed at them. And so he smiled.
“Add oil!” Yi Jing clenched her fist and gestured at them encouragingly. [1]
.
By now the games all ran one at a time, for everyone’s viewing pleasure the two matches of
each day were scheduled separately. Therefore, the spaces around the court were
completely taken up by the players and the crowd of onlookers.
Since there were no bleachers, everyone gathered right up against the boundary lines.
Being watched so closely by the audience was no doubt nerve-racking, but it was also
exhilarating at the same time.
Jiang Cheng had never played a game while being so tightly surrounded before, he felt an
strange excitement. If only Pan Zhi was here, he thought. If they had Pan Zhi on the team,
they’d take the crown for sure.
The referee blew the whistle.
Players from both teams filed into the court, then the captain of each team gathered in the
centre for the jump ball.
On Class-8’s side it was Wang Xu, Jiang Cheng didn’t want to waste their main force on the
jump. Compared to Wang Xu’s stealing ability, Gu Fei was much better suited for the job.
“Jiuri,” Gu Fei followed behind Wang Xu. “It’s all up to you now.”
Wang Xu didn’t turn around, only pounded his chest a couple of times.
.
Wild Boar Head hadn’t come on yet, at the moment they were facing Class-7’s regular
formation.
Jiang Cheng exchanged a look with Gu Fei across the court and got into the ready position.
The whistle blew again, and the ball was tossed up in the air. There was a moment of quiet
among the crowd of onlookers, and in this brief interval they all heard an angry roar from
Wang Xu, as he slammed his palm hard on the ball.
He even managed to rather competently swat the ball in Gu Fei’s direction.
Gu Fei reached out and instantly palmed the pall, but when he turned around, all of the
Class-7 team had rushed back to their defense, leaving Hu Jian by his side as a screen.
Gu Fei took a step forward with the ball, and Hu Jian immediately took one step alongside
him. Gu Fei passed the ball away with his backhand.
By the time Jiang Cheng received the pass, Gu Fei had already darted out in front of him,
Jiang Cheng followed closely behind, then threw the ball to Guo Xu. Guo Xu dared not carry
it for too long, and a few strides later bounced it back to Gu Fei, who was by now rapidly
approaching the 3-point line.
They had good momentum.
Jiang Cheng gave these people a mental thumbs up. Just half a month ago, they never would
have been able to carry out this level of coordination.
Class-7’s circle of defense was closing in tight, and quickly too. But frankly compared to
Class-5 it was nothing. After all, Class-5 was a strong team second only to the reigning
champion Class-2. It must have been rather demoralizing to be eliminated by them so
unexpectedly.
Gu Fei took a step forward on the 3-point line and raised the ball up.
Jiang Cheng ran up and called out in a low voice, “Here.”
With a flip of his wrist Gu Fei passed the ball over. Jiang Cheng jumped up to receive it, and
before the other team realized what was going on he immediately followed it up with a 3-
point jump shot.
It was a rather nerve-racking shot for Jiang Cheng. This was the first shot of the game, it
had to go in.
Good thing that as a long time overachiever, he possessed the excellent mental composure
necessary for showing off…
The ball went in.
A wave of cheer erupted from the Class-8 resting area and spread out to the entire court.
/
The ball was now in Class-7’s court. Gu Fei jogged ahead of Jiang Cheng with his hand by his
side and palm backwards.
Jiang Cheng ran forward and slapped his hand lightly.
Just as Gu Fei was about to take his hand back, Wang Xu ran up as well and gave his hand a
loud slap, “Good job!!”
“Ayy!” Gu Fei jumped in surprise.
“Watch the defense!” Jiang Cheng called out.
Class-7’s team was 3 points down immediately after opening, this seemed to awaken their
fighting spirit, Hu Jian got the ball and led the way with a fierce offensive wave.
Since they had the agreement of “letting the game speak for them” earlier, Jiang Cheng
immediately ran up and got in Hu Jian’s way.
He didn’t have any prior knowledge of Hu Jian’s skills, but the guy’s pompous trash talk was
fresh on his mind. However, in Jiang Cheng’s eyes, save for Gu Fei and Li Yan, there was no
one else in this place who could carry a ball past him.
Hu Jian was agile enough, with lots of false movements too. Jiang Cheng stood in place and
watched as he continued to feint left and right, forward and back, and almost wanted to
remind him to stop wasting his energy.
Just as Jiang Cheng thought the referee was about to blow the whistle to put a stop to the
swaying, Hu Jian suddenly swerved to the left and charged forward with the ball.
Jiang Cheng sighed and took one big stride forward and pushed on the ball, it immediately
changed directions and bounced out. Wang Xu received the pass on the side, then turned
and carried the ball towards the other basket.
Class-7’s team seemed to be caught off-guard by this sudden development, even their
defense was half a beat behind. Wang Xu continued to drive forward in a flurry of motion,
around him were sounds from the spectators. He made his way to the basket, and did a
perfect layup even while a defense of the other team jumped up to block the shot.
“Great shot!” Wang Xu roared out with his fists clenched and eyes widened after scoring the
2 points. “Great shot!”
/
Class-7’s skills really were much worse compared to Class-5, at the end of the first period
they were already behind by 6 points.
“Check it,” Wang Xu said between gulps of water during intermission, he shot a look across
the court. “The Class-2 team is currently checking us out, their number one opponent.”
“Everyone from Class-5 went on to cheer for Class-7.” Lu Xiaobin said.
“We don’t need to change anything when we go back in,” Jiang Cheng looked over there.
“Just play the way you did just now, we just need to keep it up.”
“They’re making substitutions.” Gu Fei said.
They looked across the court and sure enough, Class-7 had switched on two of their
alternates: one was a big guy with a shiny face, and the other was Wild Boar Head.
“Try to avoid direct contact with them,” Jiang Cheng said. “And pass. As soon as someone
gets close, you pass the ball right away.”
According to Gu Fei, Wild Boar Head was here to score, that means the shiny face guy must
be the dedicated fouler. Class-7 did have a lot of alternates, it was hard for Class-8 to even
put together 3-5 alternates, but the number of benchwarmers they got sitting on Class-7’s
side were enough to form a soccer team.
/
The ball was in Class-7’s court, they passed it straight to Wild Boar Head.
The Boar Head took the ball and descended like a tank on the other basket, with incredible
speed but sturdy gait. Jiang Cheng cut in to block in front him, but after briefly braking and
readjusting his direction, he knocked Jiang Cheng’s arm to the side and ran through him
without any extra movements.
Just as Jiang Cheng was about to chase him down again, Shiny Face was already coming for
him in a head on collision.
Jiang Cheng wanted to change direction to dodge him and continue forward, but Shiny
Face’s shoulder already made contact against his right shoulder, crashing into him hard,
and not so discreetly.
Jiang Cheng was almost knocked to the side by the impact, he first felt numbness on his
shoulder, which quickly evolved into straight up pain. He frowned.
Typically for games like these, the referee wouldn’t blow the whistle on loose ball fouls
unless the offending player literally held on to the opponent’s arm and
won’t let go, in most cases the referee didn’t even notice.
After Jiang Cheng was knocked out of the way the Wild Boar Head arrived under their
basket, Gu Fei was held back by two of their opponents and wasn’t able to stop it. Wild Boar
Head did a successful layup.
There was a wave of cheers from the Class-7 crowd, some of them had picked up the
benches and thumped them against the ground.
/
“Be more daring!” Lao-Lu’s loud voice suddenly appeared out of nowhere, accompanied by
ice cream truck music no less.
Jiang Cheng glanced over and saw that Lao-Lu was holding a megaphone, but for some
reason hadn’t bothered to turn off the default music, so it kept playing in the background as
though it was his personal soundtrack.
Lao-Lu continued to yell into the megaphone with one hand braced on his hip,
“Be a little bolder! If they slam you, make sure to slam back! Dare to…”
“Teacher Lu, teacher Lu!” The principal also held up a megaphone on the referee stand. “If
you disrupt the game again it’ll count as a technical foul against Class-8!”
Lao-Xu snatched the megaphone out of Lao-Lu’s hands and handed it to a student behind
him.
“Imma go slam people now,” Gu Fei said as he ran past Jiang Cheng. “You shake off Zhang
Wei and score.”
“You mean Shiny Face?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei threw a glance in the direction of Shiny Face, “……Yes.”
“It’s not necessary, to be honest.” Jiang Cheng said.
“You just focus on scoring.” Gu Fei replied.
/
Jiang Cheng didn’t even need to ask to know that Gu Fei’s body-slam target is Wild Boar
Head. At the moment, the dude and Shiny Face had each taken up the roles of scoring and
disruption, respectively, and working together like a well oiled machine.
That fact somewhat irked him. The real pair of perfect partners is right here, where do you
people get off flashing your partnership？
However, he wasn’t a big fan of deliberate fouls, though he couldn’t get into it with Gu Fei at
the moment. He had no choice but to keep playing.
Jiang Cheng kept guard at the center line, Class-7 went on the offensive right away after
getting the ball, and continued to pass to Boar Head. Gu Fei didn’t get a chance to body-
check him, and had no way of aiding the defense since he was once again locked down by
two of their opponents.
Jiang Cheng had no time to think, he directly inserted himself in their midst of the two
people and forced his way through between them. After Gu Fei got out of the bind, he
swung around and together they positioned themselves in front of the Wild Boar Head.
The way they set up the screen, in his mind Jiang Cheng gave themselves a round of
applause with cheers and screams. By the time they both steadied themselves, Wild Boar
Head was still one step away. It wouldn’t count as a blocking foul.
Absolutely perfect.
However, Wild Boar Head was no amateur, he didn’t crash directly into them, but rather
when faced with two opponents of similar stature to himself, he confidently chose to shoot.
Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng jumped up at the same time to swat the ball.
The ball flew off to the side and landed in Lu Xiaobin’s hands.
That was a rather fine lid they put on the hotpot, Jiang Cheng again did some mental self-
congratulation. Especially the way they worked together so synchronously, he very much
enjoyed playing like this.
But the screams from the girls at the courtside made him uneasy again, he felt a little
sheepish as though he had been caught in the middle of an affair.
Honestly, he wondered when he had become so useless.
/
Once Lu Xiaobin got the ball he quickly worked with the others to launch an attack. Jiang
Cheng and Gu Fei were practically glued to Wild Boar Head’s side, attached to him like
shadows, and prevented him from cutting over and stealing the ball.
On their end, Lu Xiaobin and Wang Xu continued to pass the ball around, messing up the
rhythm of Class-7’s defense. Then Wang Xu got the ball and with yet another spirited roar,
scored them two more points.
There were only a few more minutes left until the end of the first half when
Class-7 asked for another time-out.
“Damn,” Gu Fei clapped his hands together. “Did Jiuri snap?”
“He is the team captain after all,” Jiang Cheng said. “Can’t let you guys have all the glory.”
“We need to get through the first half, the score right now is still pretty hard for them to
catch up.” Gu Fei said. “It’s not easy for me to body-check him at this point either, he knows
me too well.”
“We can win regardless,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, his gaze travelled along Gu Fei’s neck,
down to his collarbone, his shoulder, and all the way to his bicep, where he paused. “Is that
from getting slammed?”
Gu Fei looked down at his arm, “That, is a result of a slingshot plus wooden bead, I got
another one on my abs, wanna see?”
“I mean,” Jiang Cheng was a little at a loss for words. “Aren’t you a little too delicate… It’s
not like I used much force…”
“This is flesh,” Gu Fei patted his own arm. “Not a tree trunk.”
“……Sorry.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“It’s fine,” Gu Fei accepted the water Yi Jing handed him. “Consider it my ticket payment to
your show.”
“Fuck you.” Jiang Cheng clenched his teeth and said.
The first half wasn’t that difficult, Class-7’s ability did not improve much with the added
force of one Wild Boar Head. And now twenty minutes later, Jiang Cheng could tell that Hu
Jian was nothing but an overly-confident derpacious youth, with skills that are on par with
Wang Xu. If he was really gonna let his basketball skills speak for him, then at most he was
a stutterer.
As soon as the second half began, however, the entire Class-7 team acted as though they’ve
been collectively injected with steroids. They had probably decided to go all in, with the
intention of reducing the score difference even if they didn’t win.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t too worried about the others, the alternates they switched on for the
sole purpose of fouling didn’t dare to just casually commit an offensive foul, lest they
reward their opponent with a free throw. The only problem was Wild Boar Head.
This guy had the skills as well as the lack of shame.
Lu Xiaobin got the ball, and as he closed in on the other side’s basket he tossed
the ball to Jiang Cheng.
It was actually not the greatest timing. Gu Fei didn’t have time to cover him, but Wild Boar
Head had already rushed over.
Jiang Cheng lowered his center of gravity and shifted the ball from his right hand to the left,
shielding it with his body. Wild Boar Head closed in, planted himself on his right side, and
continued to press in, inconspicuously digging into Jiang Cheng’s side with his elbow.
Jiang Cheng was extremely irritated, but in situations like these, as long as the referee
didn’t blow the whistle, he had no choice but to keep calm and carry on.
Fortunately, Gu Fei quickly caught up to them and opened himself up to receive.
Jiang Cheng caught sight of Gu Fei’s shoes in his peripheral vision, and with a turn of his
wrist he passed the ball over.
At the same time, Wild Boar Head jumped forward without warning and reached out a right
hand as if to block the pass, but Jiang Cheng realized almost immediately that it wasn’t his
intention.
Just as Wild Boar Head reached out with his right hand, his left elbow made contact with
Jiang Cheng’s stomach with the full force of his forward momentum.
“Fuck!” Jiang Cheng squeezed out a curse in between gritted teeth.
After the strike, the unbearably intense nauseating pain that arose from his stomach made
him completely blank out for a moment, and he almost kneeled down.
His brain was a scrambled mess from the pain, a chorus of voices in his head loudly sang out
—— My wounded heart is in such agony! Why is it always me who gets hurt? Ahhhhh it’s
fucking always me! [2]
The referee blew the whistle, “Blocking foul!” [3]
Wild Boar Head laughed lightheartedly and held up his hands.
Most of the crowd didn’t see what exactly transpired and assumed it was a normal
collision, only the members of the Class-2 team booed and gave him a thumbs down.
“Fucking hell!” Wang Xu was right behind Jiang Cheng, he rushed over and propped him up.
“How’re you doing? Is it serious?”
“I’m fine.” Jiang Cheng took a while to finally get enough air into his lungs for an answer.
Gu Fei walked over and without a word, reached out and lifted up Jiang Cheng’s jersey.
Even though he had grown used to Gu Fei’s touch, but with such a big
movement as this, he still had to hold back a reflexive slap.
“You really do play dirty.” Gu Fei turned and fixed his eyes on Wild Boar Head.
“What,” Boar Head smirked. “Going for a flop? I’m not as dirty as you.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, his face darkened as he walked straight towards Wild Boar
Head.
“Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng scrambled to grab Gu Fei’s arm.
Gu Fei turned around and frowned, annoyance apparent on his face, “What?!”
Jiang Cheng lowered his voice, “Basketball is basketball, the game is the game, and if they
want to be shameless that’s up to them. But if we’re gonna win this, we have to win fair and
square, and make sure to leave them speechless.”
“Cheng-ge’s right!” Wang Xu agreed in a similarly repressed voice, his face solemn and
tragic.
Gu Fei stared at Jiang Cheng for a long while, then finally said, “Got it.”
Footnotes:
[1] I… probably don’t have to explain “add oil”, but the general sentiment is
“Do your best!” ↩
[2] Hahahahaha this exact line here, Cheng-ge is an old soul. ↩
[3] It should be a flagrant foul, but the referee didn’t see what happened so judged it as a
blocking foul, which results in a milder consequence. ↩
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 6689
* TL word count: 4912
* TL time: 7:07:03
* Edit: 2:32:41
* Curse words: 4x fucks
TL’s Notes
Day 2/3 of Cheng-ge birthday countdown! Tomorrow is chapter 40, and Cheng-ge’s bday ヾ(^
^ゞ
I… I really don’t know basketball, I had to look up so many terms. Pls forgive me if I got
something wrong orz. If anybody’s interested, here’s a glossary of basketball terms:
If you are able, please show support for the author by purchasing the book!
Chapter 40
I think you two should get an award for the most compatible deskmates.
Going solely by the scores, there wasn’t much suspense to expect from the second half of
the game. As long as Class-8 didn’t stand still and wait for Class-7 to make their shots, they
would surely win.
Wang Xu and the other guys also came to the same conclusion, every one of them were on
fire, they charged forward as if their tails had been lit. They bounced several feet up in the
air every time they did a layup or vied for a rebound, as though they had a firecracker on
their feet… They even went so far as to bring each of their alternate up so they can have a
turn at playing.
The crowd for Class-8 also deeply committed themselves to cheering for their team. It was
a rare chance for them to cheer their own team on in a competition, Lao-Lu didn’t even
need a megaphone to have his roaring voice stand out in a cacophony of screams and
cheers.
Class-7 would not admit defeat.
Indeed, there was no such thing as admitting defeat when competing on the court, no one
wanted to give up until the very last second.
Though the method with which Class-7 expressed this reluctance annoyed Jiang Cheng to
no end.
There were all sorts of collisions, obstructions, all manners of little discreet fouls; within a
few minutes of the last quarter their whole team had accumulated enough fouls to warrant
a penalty shot.
Their aim at that point wasn’t to bring up the score, that was no longer feasible.
Their goal now was probably to disrupt Class-8 from scoring as much as possible, and vent
their own dissatisfaction at the same time.
.
“Can’t put up with this anymore.” Lu Xiaobin had always been a man of few words, but
during the break he wiped the sweat from his forehead and said,
“Even my inner thigh got hit, they almost got my balls. I’m not ready to be infertile just yet.”
“But when we win, it has to be a clean one.” Wang Xu had been knocked in the side of the
head when he was going for a rebound, but he insisted on what Jiang Cheng said. “They can
do whatever they want, but we’re not going to. Otherwise even if we win they’ll say it was a
dirty game.”
“Then we’ll just have to bear with it a while longer.” Guo Xu sighed. “It’s a sure win for us
anyway, there’s less than ten minutes on the clock, they don’t have any more chances to
play tricks.”
“Is this Wild Boar Head’s fourth foul?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei replied, staring at the other team with an irate expression.
“Go tempt him into another one.” Jiang Cheng said. “Remember, you’re
instigating a foul from him, you’re not committing a flagrant foul.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei’s face remained a picture of displeasure.
“In a second, I’ll tell you guys what to do in these situations.” Jiang Cheng raised his arms
into a stretch, and held his arms in the air until the people from Class-7 looked over, then
stuck out his thumbs and pointed them down.
Hu Jian pointed at him right away and cursed something out loud.
Jiang Cheng raised his arms up over his head again, and gathered his hands together into a
heart, he even tilted his body to the side, just for him.
There were sounds of laughter all around him.
“Fuck!” Hu Jian was louder this time, he was about to stomp over to them, but was held
back by his teammates.
.
“That’s all you do?” Wang Xu was a little befuddled. “Let’s all do it together?”
“… I was talking about when we get back on the court in a bit.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know
what to say to him, he put his arms down. “Right now I’m just doing some stretching, as
well as giving thanks to all the people cheering us on.”
“Oh!” Wang Xu had a sudden revelation. He nudged the other teammates beside him, then
turned and raised his arms to make a heart shape to their classmates behind them. “Come
on, let’s thank our cheerleaders!”
These guys either let the excitement of the game go to their head, or perhaps they’d already
approved of Wang Xu’s class tyrant position, but only a short pause later they all raised
their arms up in unison, and gestured heart shapes to their classmates.
All of a sudden Class-8’s crowd erupted in shouts and cheers, which drew applause from
everyone else too.
“Da-Fei.” Wang Xu looked towards Gu Fei, who had been watching the show from the side
with his arms folded.
“No.” Gu Fei rejected him plainly.
“Da-Fei! Where’s your sense of collective honour!” Wang Xu glared at him.
“Come on!”
“Moron.” Gu Fei continued to dismiss him.
“Gu Fei ——” The girls from their class started chanting. “Gu Fei! Gu Fei!”
“Even Jiang Cheng Cheng-ge made a heart!” Wang Xu continued to badger him.
“I have to do it just because Jiang Cheng-cheng did it?” Gu Fei didn’t know what to do with
him.
Wtf is this Jiang Cheng-cheng?! On the side, Jiang Cheng almost choked on his water.
The referee blew the whistle, the last few minutes of the game was about to start.
The girls were still chanting, but their voices were tinged with disappointment.
Jiang Cheng figured Gu Fei was probably not going to give him this one, so he headed onto
the court. Suddenly, there was a barrage of wild screaming from all around him, even the
girls on the other side bounced up in their seats and shouted.
He turned around, just in time to see Gu Fei with his arms over his head in a heart shape.
……Fuck. Everyone’s gone mad.
.
Class-7 was almost 20 points behind at this point, there were only a few minutes left on the
clock, and there was no way they could make a comeback. Therefore once the game
resumed, their strategy was to not give a crap about the points, but rather to lock down
each one of Class-8’s players.
As soon as someone in Class-8’s team got the ball, that person would be hounded by at least
two of Class-7’s players, this was spearheaded by Wild Boar Head and Hu Jian. Even if they
weren’t doing anything sketchy, they only needed to pester the person so much that they
couldn’t even pass the ball away, and 24 seconds would pass by just like that.
The only thing Jiang Cheng was impressed by from Class-7 was their stamina.
Under these circumstances, their offence relied entirely on Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei working
together, moving quickly and taking advantage of any gaps in the other side’s defence to get
the ball out.
Many times when passing to Gu Fei, Jiang Cheng couldn’t even wait for a good timing, all he
could do was toss the ball away. One time he almost bounced the ball onto Gu Fei’s head.
.
Gu Fei got the ball and had just crossed the centerline, when Wild Boar Head was already in
front of him.
Even from more than a few steps away, Jiang Cheng could see the fury shooting out of the
Wild Boar Head’s eyes, it was comparable to the head of a candle.
This was a good opportunity, with Gu Fei’s skills it wouldn’t be a problem enticing Wild
Boar Head into a foul, especially since the guy was now playing with the intention of
fouling.
“Pass!” Jiang Cheng shook off the hounds at his back and ran to the left side in front of Gu
Fei.
Gu Fei glanced at him, and with two hands on the ball he reached forward, then changed
directions in an instant just as Wild Boar Head went to swat it out of his hands.
Wild Boar Head’s palm connected with Gu Fei’s wrist with a sharp slap.
The ball flew out of Gu Fei’s hands.
Immediately, the referee’s whistle sounded, “Personal foul! That’s five!”
Jeers, cheers, and applause rose up all around them.
.
Wild Boar Head was disqualified from the game. Wang Xu gave every one of his teammates
a high five, his face brimming with excitement, as if he personally disqualified the guy, he
was in the highest of spirits.
Although Wild Boar Head’s disqualification did not temper the flames of Class-7’s
brazenness. By the time they made their substitution, there was less than four minutes left
on the clock.
Headed by Hu Jian, their aimless rampage continued.
Frankly, Class-7’s energy of persisting to the last second and not giving up might have been
a little admirable. Some other team would have treated the last quarter like a walk in the
park, if the score difference was too much.
Too bad Class-7’s energy was spent in the wrong place.
So many times when Hu Jian jumped at Jiang Cheng, he wanted to slap him straight. He felt
a pang of regret at not beating him up with the handle of the mop earlier today.
.
An opportunity presented itself in the last minute of the game, Hu Jian had gotten the ball
and carried it to the basket. The players from Class-7 still had more energy than Class-8,
likely because they had more alternates, and so got to rest for longer.
At this point, Hu Jian was still able to make sudden advances, but on Class-8’s side they
were already slower than when they first started, this allowed Hu Jian to cut straight in and
descend on their basket.
He jumped and made the shot.
Based on Hu Jian’s starting off point, Jiang Cheng calculated his time in the air, and put all
his energy into this single jump. Hu Jian’s jump was nothing to write home about, it
couldn’t even compare to the towering mass type players such as Lu Xiaobin. Jiang Cheng
jumped much higher than him.
The ball left Hu Jian’s hand and flew up toward the hoop.
Jiang Cheng extended his hand in the air and spiked down hard on the ball.
It was a clean hit, he didn’t touch a single thing aside from the ball.
However, he had put all his strength behind this spike as if it was a volleyball, the ball
headed straight down and smashed into the face of Hu Jian, who had just landed back on
the ground and didn’t even have a chance to regain his balance.
Hu Jian pitched sharply backwards and fell down on his butt.
.
“Foul!” Hu Jian yelled out after a moment of shock. “He hit me!”
The referee gave him a look but didn’t say anything.
“Foul on your mother’s ass!” Wang Xu rushed over and stole away the ball that had fallen to
the ground, with a turn he passed it to Guo Xu on the midline.
“Sorry about that.” Jiang Cheng went over and patted him on the shoulder, then jogged
away.
“Fuck!” Hu Jian continued to rave. “Fuck!”
Very soon Jiang Cheng heard his voice again coming up from behind, he turned
to give him a look, and discovered this dude got a nosebleed out of the ordeal, and was
currently glaring at him with a mouthful of smeared blood.
Gu Fei just scored a layup, and there was almost no time left on the clock. The crowd over
at Class-8’s side were all yelling and stomping as they clapped their hands in the air.
Class-7 wanted to make a substitution, but was rebuked by Hu Jian, “Substitute your ass!
I’m not dead yet!”
.
Hu Jian finished playing the last 30 seconds with his nose bleeding all over the court, when
the last whistle sounded, he bounced the ball hard on the ground, it bounced once and
hurtled toward Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng’s attention was elsewhere. By the time he realized there was a ball headed his
way it was too late to dodge it. He was just thinking to himself that perhaps his constitution
was made for getting hurt, when a hand suddenly reached over and blocked it. It was Gu
Fei, who at the last second swatted away the ball that was about to smash into his face.
“Motherfuck,” Wang Xu’s temper erupted. He pointed at Hu Jian. “What’s your deal, you’re
no good at basketball but seem rather professional at being shameless!”
“What’s it got to do with you? Did you really think you’re the boss?” Hu Jian pointed back at
him, around him several of the Class-7 players had swarmed up as well. The pairs of eyes
all seem to spit fire, like a little bonfire party.
“I’m not the boss,” Wang Xu said. “Our boss is Gu Fei. What, are you looking for him?”
The guys from Class-7 didn’t speak, only directed their collective glares toward Gu Fei.
Gu Fei turned and walked away without even bothering to look in that direction.
.
Everyone from Class-8 was so overwhelmed with excitement they didn’t even notice the
conflict brewing on the court. They all swarmed up and surrounded their players in a ring
of chatters and cheers that instantly drowned out whatever else the Class-7 players had to
say.
“Good game!” Lao-Xu was stuck in the middle of the throng but was trying hard to get
closer. “Good game! That’s the spirit with which you’re supposed to play!
You guys finally learned to control yourselves! Good job! I’m so touched…”
“GOOD ON JIANG CHENG FOR THAT SPIKE!” The sound of Lao-Lu’s yelling crushed Lao-
Xu’s voice to a pulp, and left Jiang Cheng’s ears ringing.
“THE SKILLS! And without any emotion attached at all!”
“Teacher… You have to teach their class too, how will you face them
tomorrow.” Guo Xu said. “You’re so biased.”
“They can learn from that Class-4 I used to lead, and do a mass protest against my
teaching!” Lao-Lu said. “I love winning fairly and openly like this! You got to be like that in
your fights too! See, only last year…”
“Teacher Lu! Lao-Lu! Don’t go on and on about fighting!” Lao-Xu interrupted him and
looked at the rest of the team. “I am honoured by all of you!
Honoured!”
.
It took Jiang Cheng a lot of effort to finally break free from the throngs of people, he tugged
his collar away from his body and waved it.
“I’m spent,” Gu Fei squeezed out as well. “You gotta hand it to them for their stamina.”
“They have more alternates.” Jiang Cheng glanced back at the excited crowd behind him.
“What’s that Lao-Lu said about last year?”
“The fight between him and the twelve graders last year,” Gu Fei said. “It was brilliant. After
that he got kicked to teach our grade instead.”
“……Now that’s a personality.” Jiang Cheng exclaimed.
“Just for the next few days, why don’t you wait for me before coming to school.”
Gu Fei said.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng gave him a look, then glanced in the direction of the Class-7 players.
Everyone there had dragged their chairs away already with dejected expressions, leaving
only a few guys from their basketball team standing there and looking this way.
“You don’t need to bother with Hu Jian and the guys, just a couple of students can’t stir up
much,” Gu Fei said. “Jiang Bin is the real trouble.”
“Who’s Jiang Bin?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Wild Boar Head,” Gu Fei said. “He’s Monkey’s younger cousin.”
“Monkey?” Jiang Cheng paused and racked his brain before remembering who Monkey was,
he was speechless. “Are all your thugs around here in a family business? Even Monkey has
a connection to this?”
“Bullshit, it’s not like you hand out anywhere else. It’s just the area around here that
belongs to Monkey and his gang.” Gu Fei said.
“But isn’t Monkey scared of you?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly.
“Nah, they’re just unwilling to easily provoke me,” Gu Fei raised his arms and stretched.
“Not scared.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng continued to ask.
“I don’t hold back.” Gu Fei gave him a look.
Jiang Cheng looked back at him without a word.
.
“Come on let’s go let’s go!” Wang Xu rushed over to their side. “Go wash your face, we’re
gonna watch Class-2’s game in a bit. Then tonight we’ll go out for dinner, Yi Jing said we can
use the class funds.”
“Feasting on the official funds?” Jiang Cheng said.
“This is normal expenditure! How is it feasting on the official funds, we earned honour for
our class!” Wang Xu straightened his spine all the way. “The whole class agreed on this,
they even delegated special eating companions!”
“……You’re making it sound even more problematic.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh.
“I mean, some of the girls want to come out and eat with us,” Wang Xu said quietly, and
stole a look in the girls direction. “I figured it’ll be livelier this way, so I agreed.”
“That’s jobbery.” Gu Fei said.
“Shit,” Wang Xu was suddenly a little embarrassed, but then stuck to his guns after some
thought. “You two can get in on the benefits too!”
“Get lost.” Gu Fei replied.
.
Class-2’s game was just as unsuspenseful as theirs, their opponent was weak, not to
mention they didn’t have the dirty reinforcements as Class-7 did. They were held down by
Class-2 the entire game.。
“We can’t beat them.” Jiang Cheng stood beneath the hoop and watched the Class-2 players
on the court.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“Their talents are too evenly spread, and all tall too.” Jiang Cheng covered his mouth with
his hand, to prevent Wang Xu from hearing and losing faith. “They must play together all
the time, look at that teamwork.”
“Their class is taught by principal Liu, they play pickups whenever there’s free time.” Gu Fei
said quietly. “And it’s true that all the skilled players are gathered there.”
“So what’s the play?” Wang Xu was recording the game on his phone. “I got some footage,
by the time we face them it’ll be after exams, we have some time to study their weak spots.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Their team doesn’t have anyone bigger than our Lu Xiaobin,” Wang Xu said.
“Or a pair more in sync than you two, maybe…”
“Don’t get your own voice in the recording too,” Gu Fei interrupted him. “It’ll be annoying
when we watch the footage back.”
“Damn, you’re getting full of yourself.” Wang Xu narrowed his eyes and shot him a look.
“But it’s understandable, I am too.”
.
After watching Class-2’s game, Jiang Cheng only had two thoughts: the first was they can’t
beat them, the second was the wonder at their very strong cheering squad.
Just as they were about to leave, Class-2’s team captain came over to them.
“His name is He Zhou.” Gu Fei leaned over and said into Jiang Cheng’s ear.
“Don’t just use a random nickname.”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng responded.
Wang Xu immediately walked up when he saw He Zhou make his way over, but He Zhou
only nodded, walked past him, and stopped in front of Gu Fei.
“We’ll be facing you guys in the next game.” He said.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei gave a little laugh. “Are you gonna go easy on us?”
“Never,” He Zhou laughed too. “You guys don’t have to either… I’ve waited all this time to
finally play a proper game with you.”
Gu Fei didn’t reply.
He Zhou turned to face Jiang Cheng, “Your name is Jiang Cheng?”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Jiang Cheng.”
“I’m He Zhou,” He Zhou was smiling, but there was a hint of provocation in his eyes. “Don’t
hold back on us, king of 3-pointers.”
Wang Xu stared at He Zhou’s retreating figure, feeling a little irked, “That kid’s a tiger with a
smiling face.”
“Take some notes on intimidation from him,” Gu Fei said. “Captain.”
“Shit, let’s go eat, come on!” Wang Xu waved his hand, then paused and turned back to look
at Jiang Cheng. “You got the nickname of ‘3-pointer king’ now?
Mighty impressive huh, as a captain I’m not even as famous as you are huh?”
“You are.” Jiang Cheng gave him a thumbs up.
“Bullcrap. Tell me, if you’re the 3-pointer king, then what am I?” Wang Xu pointed at
himself.
“The 3-pointer king’s captain.” Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng opened their mouths at the same
time.
Wang Xu stared at them and said after a while, “I think you two should get an award for the
most compatible deskmates.”
.
As they walked out of the school, Jiang Cheng spotted Gu Miao right away. She was sitting
on the railing of the parking shed, with her skateboard standing up against it. She dangled
one of her feet while the other one rested atop the skateboard.
Jiang Cheng waved at her.
Gu Miao kicked the board to the ground and jumped down from the railing directly onto
the skateboard, and rolled over on the momentum.
“Cool.” Jiang Cheng told her.
“That was awesome, queen Miao-miao!” Wang Xu clapped.
The bunch of them praised her to the heavens, but Gu Miao didn’t respond to any of them,
only circled them on her skateboard with a blank look on her face.
She was indeed cool, Jiang Cheng watched Gu Miao, who seemed to be one with the
skateboard. But on the other hand, when he remembered that this coolness of Gu Miao
partly stemmed from problems with her psychology or physiology, he also felt sad at the
same time.
“You,” Gu Fei leaned in close and whispered to him. “Hurry up and get on my bike.”
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng scanned his surroundings, but didn’t see any Monkey or
Monkey adjacent people show up, that they need to go on the run.
“I don’t want to carry a girl.” Gu Fei said.
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng understood, and nodded.
.
Next, he witnessed Gu Fei dash into the parking shed to grab his bike, then peddled on
ahead of everyone else, without regard for even his little sister.
“Gu Miao, catch up!” Jiang Cheng shouted and ran after Gu Fei’s bike.
He didn’t know why Gu Fei was so scared of the girls in their class, but at the speed he was
going, it was almost impossible for Jiang Cheng to hop on.
“Fuck! Why don’t you just fly?!” Jiang Cheng had to resort to grabbing his shirt, and only
hopped on when he slowed down a little.
“I’ll only fly after you get on.” Gu Fei said.
As Jiang Cheng steadied himself on the backseat, he saw a shadow zoom by on their side,
and glide ahead of them.
It seems that Gu Miao took off flying first, with this speed… Jiang Cheng suddenly thought
perhaps having his weight on the back of Gu Fei’s bike was really hindering him from
taking off.
Almost half a kilometer later, Jiang Cheng heard his phone ring. He pulled it out and saw
that it was Wang Xu.
“Yeah?” He answered.
“If I didn’t know any better I would think you two were rushing to get to the bathroom for
your explosive diarrhea!” Wang Xu’s voice sounded like he was yelling while peddling his
bike. “You’re rushing to go off but do you even know where we’re going to eat?!”
“……Where are we eating?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“City center! That hotpot place in the square! Da-Fei knows,” Wang Xu said.
“There’s clearly nothing good around here! The only good place around here is Wang Er’s
Meat Pie!”
“Alright alright, got it.” Jiang Cheng started to laugh. He hung up the phone and
patted Gu Fei’s back. “Hey, Mr. Pilot sir.”
“Where to?” Gu Fei asked as he turned, then whistled to stop Gu Miao, who was charging on
up ahead.
“The hotpot place on the square, apparently.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Must be our captain Wang’s choice, he loves that place.” Gu Fei made a turn at the next
intersection.
.
Gu Miao caught up to them and reached out a hand as if to grab the bottom of Jiang Cheng’s
butt.
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng jumped in surprise, then immediately sat up straight and grabbed onto
the back of Gu Fei’s waist to steady himself. “What are you doing?”
Gu Miao held on to the frame of the backseat, glanced at him with a totally calm expression,
then moved her eyes to look forward at the road.
“Your brother is gonna be tired to death carrying two people.” Jiang Cheng chuckled and
said.
“She doesn’t weigh anything like this.” Gu Fei said.
“I’ll switch with you in a bit when you’re tired.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ve always thought you didn’t know how to ride a bike.” Gu Fei turned his head.
“……I just don’t have a bike,” Jiang Cheng said, then sighed after a second.
“And I can’t be bothered to go buy one.”
“Amazing, too lazy to buy a bike, but not too lazy to walk every day.” Gu Fei said. “I’ll take
you some day, there’s one near the yarn store from last time.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Neither of them spoke, Jiang Cheng watched Gu Fei’s back as Gu Miao glided beside them. It
was a good feeling, there was residual excitement and fatigue from the game, but also a
temporary peace as if isolated from the rest of the world around them.
Though Jiang Cheng kept getting the sense that something was wrong with his posture, it
took a long time for him to suddenly realize that his hands were still resting on the small of
Gu Fei’s back.

This discovery gave him a big shock, but he stopped himself from letting go as if he was
actually shocked. He didn’t want to seem so fussy, so easily triggered.
However, after he had this revelation, the once feelingless palm kept feeling as though it
could sense the warmth of Gu Fei’s body through his shirt.
I must be cursed. Jiang Cheng shut his eyes and sighed.
Footnotes:
???
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 6013
* TL word count: 4323
* TL time: 5:48:37
* Edit: 1:11:55
* Curse words: 6x fucks, 2x ass, 3x shit
TL’s Notes
Last basketball chapter (for a while) and 3/3 of the Cheng-ge birthday marathon! I can finally
close that wikipedia tab ヾ(＾-＾)ノ
Anyways, head on over to the # 撒野 tag on twitter for some celebratory art! (ps.
I’m @StrawberryMuMa)
We will now be back to our regular (un)scheduled programming. Excuse me as I go sleep for a
million years.

First posted: July 11, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 41
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then pressed his thumb and forefinger together with Gu Fei’s.
In the first year of high school, before they were all sorted into different streams, Gu Fei
was still in Class-1. There was a moron in his class who was chatting with his new girlfriend
in the last row during a self-study period, there was probably some mutual elbow contact
as well. Then after the self-study period, the dude went to the washroom.
According to rumours, the guy was so full of pent up thirst that he came just from the elbow
touches… and he went to the washroom to dispose of his underwear.
Their whole class laughed about it for more than a semester.
Gu Fei also found it very amusing at the time, but now he figured they were not so different
after all…
He lowered his eyes and peered at his left side, Jiang Cheng’s left hand had stayed on his
waist. At first, Jiang Cheng was startled by Gu Miao, so he grabbed Gu Fei for balance. Then,
perhaps because Gu Miao kept holding on to the backseat, he didn’t have anywhere else to
put his hand, so he just left it there, on Gu Fei’s waist.
To be honest, Gu Fei would ordinarily be immune to this sort of contact that he would not
even notice unless he was looking directly at it. He had carried plenty of people on the
backseat of his bicycle and his motorcycle, male and female alike; this sort of contact was
nothing if not typical.
But the person at this moment was Jiang Cheng.
When he saw Jiang Cheng these days, he would instinctively think of the body he saw half
hidden under the bizarrely tattered Ding Zhuxin designs.
His legs, his waist, his back, even the scar on his side and the cut on his lip.
In conclusion, Jiang Cheng’s hand on his waist at this moment, was like a grenade.
When and if it exploded, he too might lose a pair of underwear to it.
After pedaling for a while, he caught sight of the rest of their team ahead… and the girls
sitting on their back seats.
Gu Fei extended his right arm with his palm facing backwards, then squeezed the brakes.
As soon as they slowed down, Gu Miao’s face crashed right into the palm of his hand. She
kept her face braced against his hand and used the force of it to decelerate on her
skateboard.
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng asked from the back.
“You carry me.” Gu Fei put a foot on the ground to steady them and turned to look back at
him.
“Tired already?” Jiang Cheng got off the bike. “This stamina of yours is quite worrying, one
ball game and you don’t even have the energy to pedal a bike.”
“Why did I not realize before just how much you talk?” Gu Fei got off too and shoved the
bike into his hands.
“I’ve never coordinated with Er-Miao before,” Jiang Cheng swung himself onto the seat.
“Will she be OK?”
“If you crash, she’ll get out of the way,” Gu Fei sat astride the backseat. “Let’s go.”
“It’s so much work to take off from a complete stop, can’t you wait till I’m……”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Nope. My stamina that can’t even withstand pedaling after a ballgame will not allow me to
run.” Gu Fei said as he pulled out his phone to play with it.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng cursed quietly, but had no other choice but to try hard and pedal from a
stop.
Gu Miao first rode on her skateboard a couple steps away, then after a while came back
over and grabbed hold of the backseat again.
Jiang Cheng rode hard for a stretch and caught up with Wang Xu and the rest of them.
“They’re here,” Guo Xu glanced back at them. “You guys ran off pretty fast.”
“Got hungry.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Jiang Cheng.” He heard a girl’s voice call out to the left of him…
He turned, and the phone in her hand ‘clacked’. He sighed, “Don’t you know to turn the
sound off when sneaking a photo?”
“I’m not sneaking though.” The girl covered her mouth a little sheepishly and giggled to
herself..
The group of them chatted away on their bikes as they went. It was not a short distance to
the city center, but they took up an entire lane noisily, and if a motorcycle or scooter
needed to get by, they simply squeezed into a smaller cluster and giggled like idiots.
It was truly an age where one could burst into laughter even after eating shit, Jiang Cheng
thought as he watched the people around him.
These people, if it was before, would have been subjects of ridicule between himself and
Pan Zhi. They were a little country, and to top it off were not just a little derpy. But now,
here he was riding along with them, squished together on the road.
He did not join in on their mindless giggle fits, though there were already countless
examples of that with Gu Fei.
Gu Fei had stayed quiet, being his usual anti-social self, and kept his head down playing on
his phone.
When the girls wanted to sneak photos of him, Gu Fei simply put his forehead right up
against Jiang Cheng’s back.
“Stop with the photos, just tell me which one of these two you’d like pictures of,” Wang Xu
had Yi Jing on his bike. His voice was booming and he looked full of energy. “I’ve got it all, I
even have a photo of Jiang Cheng eating a meat pie.”
“Your great uncle.” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“Send it to me, I wanna see!” Immediately, one of the girls piped up.
“Can’t share it so easily, I won’t beat Jiang Cheng in a fight.” Wang Xu said.
“I’ll only sell it, 20 bucks a picture.”
“You’re willing to endure a beating for just 20 bucks…” Lu Xiaobin said.
Everyone burst into laughter at that.
“You shut up!” Wang Xu glared at him. “Do you even math? If ten people buy it, that’s 200
bucks!”
“That’s true…” Lu Xiaobing was stunned. “That’s quite a lot then, if everyone bought one….
You’d be making bank.”
“The brains on you lot…” Guo Xu sighed. “One photo might be sold once at most. If you sell
to one person, they can just make copies, why would they keep buying from you…”
“Go away!” Wang Xu shouted. “You’re the only one with the brains OK?”
“That’s not a bad business idea,” Gu Fei said quietly from the back. “I have here different
shots of face included, high res, no pixelation……”
“Can you have a smidgen of ethics as a professional photographer?” Jiang Cheng turned
around and said in a low voice.
“Sure, that’s why I haven’t sold it,” Gu Fei said. “I’m waiting for a high enough offer…”
“You wanna bet I’ll fling you off the bike?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Nope.” Gu Fei answered.
Jiang Cheng opened his mouth, then closed it again. No sounds came out.
“I can’t get past this level,” Gu Fei held up the phone next to his face. “Pass it for me when
we get there?”
“……Damn it.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say. “You’re still trying to one-up Li Yan?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei went back to playing. “He’s already three levels ahead.”
“I’ll get all three levels for you in a bit,” Jiang Cheng said. “Just a stupid game and you treat it
like some great endeaver, as if we’re waiting for you to save the world.”
Gu Fei started chuckling behind him, “Yeah you’re right, in that case I’ll get rid of the shit-
talkers first.”
Since Wang Xu only called before they left to reserve the room, all the bigger rooms were
already gone. Including the team and the girls, their group consisted of maybe 20 or so
people. At last, the server pieced three tables together into a room for them.
“Try to squeeze,” The server said. “Young people, right, the closer the merrier.”
“No problem! We’ll squish!” Wang Xu nodded and pushed them into the room one by one.
Jiang Cheng dragged Gu Miao into the innermost seat by the wall; he promised Gu Miao he
would sit beside her. Gu Fei squished in right after them, and sat himself down next to Jiang
Cheng.
“You don’t wanna sit beside Gu Miao?” Jiang Cheng looked around him: to his left was Gu
Fei, and to his right was Gu Miao.
“It’s too late to switch,” Gu Fei stood up to change seats, but when he saw that everyone had
already squeezed in, he sat back down immediately and lowered
his voice. “If I keep switching I’m gonna end up with girls on either side of me.”
“Wait,” Jiang Cheng found it amusing. “What exactly is your problem?”
“No problem,” Gu Fei said. Yi Jing had just sat down on his left, he quietly inched the chair
even closer to Jiang Cheng, and said quietly with his head turned, “I’m just not used to it.”
“A boss type such as you……” Jiang Cheng poured a cup of tea and set it down in front of Gu
Miao. “Gu Miao, have some water first, and take your jacket off, look how your face is
flushed from the heat.”
The room was small, their group all huddled around a long table as if holding some kind of
meeting; it was noisy and hot.
Gu Miao took a sip of water, then flung her hat off onto the table and threw her jacket on
the ground. Her mess of hair stuck out in all directions.
“Put it up on the hanger there.” Gu Fei said and pointed at the clothing rack in the corner,
he also took off his own jacket and handed it to her. “Hang big brother’s up for me too.”
Gu Miao took the clothes and the hat and went to hang them up, still sporting what looked
like a bird’s nest on her head.
“Fix your hair a little,” Jiang Cheng said. “You are a little lady after all, you gotta pay
attention to your image.”
Gu Miao gave him a look, and with some indignation, combed her fingers through her hair
at random, then stopped and stared at his jacket.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng immediately took off his jacket and handed it to her. “Hang it up for
Cheng-ge too, thanks.”
Gu Miao brought his jacket over to the hanger with the most solemn expression, and since
she was not tall enough to reach the higher hooks, she stacked his jacket on top of Gu Fei’s
on the same hook. Then she sat back down and curled up in her seat, sipping slowly away
at the tea.
Jiang Cheng pushed his chair back so it leaned against the wall, and with his arms folded,
watched this roomful of rowdy people. They were very hyper and very noisy. The door to
their room was open, but the server must have had enough and came to close it after just a
few minutes.
However, it was also quite nice. It had been a long time since he gathered with a bunch of
people like this. Everyone in his previous school was a studyholic, with strict parents too.
Most people went straight home after school ended.
Someone like him who skipped class at will and even stayed out all night, it was
difficult to even have a companion every single time…
The lively scene in front of him finally allowed him to feel the warmth and comfort
associated with Springtime.
”What are we eating, what are we eating!” Wang Xu opened the menu and got busy. “I
ordered three pots with soup bases, all 2-in-1s, is that enough?”
“Enough enough!” Somebody shouted in reply. “The pot isn’t important, what’s important is
the meat! The ingredients!”
“You can have as much of those as you want,” Yi Jing laughed and patted her backpack. “I
brought the class funds, Xu-zong said he’ll make up for any that’s not covered by it.”
“Lao-Xu ah… he certainly does come around sometimes.” Wang Xu said. “He just nags too
much, even more so than my mom, and would move himself with his own speech before
anything else…… Lamb! Veal! Pork belly! Come on!
Anything else you’d like to eat just say it, I’ll put it down!”
“The heat in here is making me drowsy.” Gu Fei also leaned back with his chair.
Since the group of them came straight from the game, once they took off their jackets they
only had short sleeves underneath. When Gu Fei leaned closer, their arms brushed together
ever so slightly.
In a season that was not quite yet suited for short sleeves, this sudden skin on skin contact
awakened a strange feeling in Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei must have felt the same, as Jiang Cheng felt him immediately shifting a little toward
Yi Jing, but not two seconds later scooched right back over.
Jiang Cheng found the whole thing kind of funny, and giggled at the tea cup in front of him.
“Shit,” Gu Fei also started laughing, and proceeded to relax his posture and lean against
him, putting his leg against Jiang Cheng’s as well. “You keep laughing and I’ll shut you up for
good.”
“One elastic band and I can get you right back……” Jiang Cheng glanced at their legs resting
side by side under the table as he laughed, and suddenly realized that his tolerance of
physical touches when it came to Gu Fei was almost at the same level as his grandson Pan
Zhi.
Not to mention this feeling was entirely different than with Pan Zhi.
…… But of course it’s not the same; Pan Zhi was his bro, a secret-sharing shit-talking bro.
Whereas Gu Fei, Gu Fei was someone like him, who also possessed all the qualities that
inherently attracted and enticed him.
He had never thought to seek out others like him, and furthermore never considered the
idea of huddling for warmth. But he had to admit the way they were right now, in this very
moment, among the excitement of a big group and the atmosphere that was just a little too
toasty, in the minute details unnoticed by anyone else, in these tiny ambiguous tensions
that existed only in this moment unbeknownst to others, he found comfort in the quiet
enjoyment.
“Da-Fei, what are you drinking? Something white [1]? ” Wang Xu waved the menu at the
two of them.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“What about Jiang Cheng?” Wang Xu turned to Jiang Cheng. “We haven’t drank together
before, what are you drinking?”
“… Whatever.” Jiang Cheng was going to say he wasn’t planning on drinking, though looking
at this roomful of people all in such high spirits, it wasn’t enough that they just won a game,
but there were several girls present too. If he didn’t drink today, they would tease him to
death.
“Really now….” Wang Xu said. “Whatever? Listen to this, living up to your title of 3-pointer
king.”
“And you complain about Lao-Xu being naggy.” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye.
“You watch your tone when speaking to the team captain,” Wang Xu pointed at him. “That
time in the beginning of the semester, I only let you off easy on account of Da-Fei.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Server——” Wang Xu opened the door and hollered into the hallway. “Hurry up with the
food! And a thing of Niu’er [2]! And some freshly squeezed juice
——”
He turned to look at Gu Miao, “Queen Miao-miao, you drink fruit juice? There’s orange and
corn [3]. ”
Gu Miao didn’t even look up, only cradled the teacup in both hands and shook her head.
“What does she want to drink then?” Wang Xu turned to Gu Fei.
“Beer.” Gu Fei said.
“…… Fuck me.” Wang Xu was stunned, but he turned around anyway. “And a pint of beer for
our queen here!”
“Aiyoo stop yelling please!” The server stood in the doorway. “I’m right here and yet you’re
still yelling…”
“This big bro is in a good mood today——” Wang Xu continued to shout.
“Hurry, bring the meat and alcohol first!”
“Got it, meat! Alcohol!” The server laid the bowls and chopsticks down for them and jogged
out of the room.
Yi Jing stood up and got a camera out of her backpack, then waved it at the girl on the other
side of Wang Xu, “Juan-er, let’s take a group photo. You take one from that side, then I’ll
take one from this side.”
“Alright,” The girl caught the camera and said as she backed up. “Everyone squeeze in,
otherwise I can’t fit you all.”
The roomful of people immediately converged on Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng.
“Squeeze together, squeeze!” Wang Xu squeezed next to Yi Jing and leaned over with one
hand on the wall.
Yi Jing laughed and tried to get out of his way by shifting closer to Gu Fei’s side.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, but he very quickly scooched toward Jiang Cheng.
”Shit,” Jiang Cheng had just pulled Gu Miao over, and right away got crushed into Gu Fei by
the people pressing in from his right. “You all need to lose weight!”
”Hurry.” Gu Fei said to the girl with the camera.
“Smile!” The girl instructed them. “Class-8 number one!”
“Class-8 NUMBER ONE!” The group roared in unison.
The girl pressed the shutter. They were about to disperse when she gestured a little
frantically, “Hold on, I didn’t take it yet…”
“Get the server!” Wang Xu pointed at the door. “Ask the server to take the photo for us!”
The server was startled at the sight of them squeezed into a cluster, “Why does it feel like
there weren’t so many of you just a minute ago…”
“Hurry and take the photo!” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but rush.
There was a gap between his and Gu Fei’s chair, the result of which was they both were in
very awkward and twisted positions. He had no choice but to brace his hand against Gu
Fei’s leg, there was no way they could hold this for very
long.
“Make a heart sign! Make a heart!” Wang Xu suddenly said.
“I’ll make you a double-yolk egg!” Jiang Cheng was going mad. “I only have one hand!”
“I also have only one hand, no can do.” Gu Fei said.
“You can each use one hand, that’s perfect, come on!” Wang Xu hurried them.
“Let’s everyone use one hand, and make a heart with the person beside you, use both hands
if you have no one beside you! We made a big heart today during our game, let’s do a small
one this time with your hands. Yi Jing… here, we can make one together!”
“Ay…” Yi Jing could only laugh and go along. She pressed her thumb and forefinger against
Wang Xu’s, and together they formed a heart shape.
“Queen Miao-miao, you can use both hands, do you know how to make a
heart?” Wang Xu was practically working himself to death.
Gu Miao just held on to her teacup and leaned against Jiang Cheng, as if she didn’t hear him
talk.
“She doesn’t.” Gu Fei answered for her, then stuck out his left hand in front of Jiang Cheng’s
face.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then pressed his thumb and forefinger together with Gu Fei’s.
”Is everyone ready?” The server asked. “I still have to go bring the orders out.”
“Ready ready!” Everyone shouted.
“One, two…” The server held up the camera.
“Class-8 is the BEST——” Wang Xu yelled.
“Class-8 is the best——” Yelled everyone together in a chaotic chorus.
After the photo, Jiang Cheng tugged on his clothes that had been wrinkled from being
squished. There was even sweat on his back.
Gu Fei rubbed his leg where Jiang Cheng’s hand had been.
Jiang Cheng gave him a look, “Aw, aren’t you delicate.”
Gu Fei rubbed at his leg again, but failed to hold in his laughter, “Aw, aren’t you cheeky.”
“Aw, heard you want to shut me up for good?” Jiang Cheng continued.
“Aw, heard you plan to get me back with one elastic band?” Gu Fei said.
Then they both burst into giggles but hid their laughter under the table.
“Come, come now!” Wang Xu’s loud voice interrupted their idiotic giggle session. “The
alcohol’s here, distribute! Pour it out for everyone! Girls, pour your own fruit juice… Miao-
miao, your beer!”
Wang Xu set a pint of beer down in front of Gu Miao. She stood up without a word, picked
up the glass with both hands and took a big gulp.
“What the…” Wang Xu was taken aback. “Is she just thirsty?”
“Is it OK for a kid to drink like this?” Yi Jing asked in a quiet voice from the side.
“She’ll stop on her own after about a glass.” Gu Fei said.
“… What a cool little gal.” Yi Jing said thoughtfully.
“Come on!” After everyone filled their glasses with alcohol, Wang Xu raised his glass in the
air. “I’ll say a few words first! Thank you to everyone for your collective efforts, it’s the
reason we have our win today!”
“Ahhh——” They all banged their glasses on the table.
“Thank you to your highness the class leader for cheering us on, and for getting us the class
funds for the meal.” Wang Xu said. “Thank you Da-Fei, for joining our team this time and
bringing your damn impressive skills! Thank you Jiang Cheng! Even though you just
transferred here this semester, but if we didn’t have you to guide us in the competition, we
never would have won so easily…”
“Hurry and drink.” Gu Fei tapped his glass.
“Ganbei!” Wang Xu knocked his glass against the table, then tilted his head back and
emptied the glass in one gulp.
Following his suit, several other boys also emptied their glasses.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. The glasses weren’t very big, but they weren’t shot-sized
either. “You guys all just slam it down like this?”
“You don’t need to.” Gu Fei downed a glass too. “Only Wang Xu and the others who can
drink are like this, you southerners…”
“… I’m not a southerner.” Jiang Cheng said.
“South of here,” Gu Fei drew a line with his hand. “Are all…”
“Jiang Cheng!” Wang Xu stared at him, bottle in hand. “You’re the one who said you’ll drink
whatever, how come you still haven’t moved?”
The whole table looked over at them, so Jiang Cheng had no choice but to raise his glass at
Wang Xu and said under his breath, “Here’s to you with your ridgeless brain…”
He also downed the entire glass in one gulp.
Now that they had some alcohol in them, the already excited guys got even more excited,
their voices practically boomed. The server opened the door and peered in, “Oohh, sorry, I
thought you guys are fighting in here……”
“Eat!” Wang Xu beckoned with his chopsticks.
Eating shuan meat [4] with a bunch of excited people was not a pretty sight. The plates of
meat were dumped directly into the pot, then seven or eight pairs of chopsticks reached in
and stirred up a frenzy, and before long it was all gone.
Yi Jing got a small plate of meat and placed it in front of Gu Miao, “Little sister, eat up.”
Gu Miao had her head down and focused entirely on eating, but did not forget to stand up
and give her a bow.
Jiang Cheng filled a bowl of soup, and before he got to put it down, Gu Miao reached out her
hand, so he set it down in front of her and took her empty bowl to fill another for himself.
Just as he sat down to eat, Gu Fei shoved his bowl at him too, “If you would be so kind.”
“Do it yourself.” Jiang Cheng paid him no attention.
“I’ll help you.” Yi Jing said.
“No need.” Gu Fei quickly picked up his bowl and stood up, then frantically filled a bowl of
soup for himself.
After he sat down, he saw that Jiang Cheng was leaning back in his chair, laughing
uncontrollably at something under the table.
“Had too much to drink huh.” Gu Fei gave him a look.
“Ah yes, that must be it.” Jiang Cheng took a deep breath and tried to hold in his laughter.
Though, that glass of alcohol really was strong. If they were to compare the sheer
savageness of their drinking habits, he would no doubt lose to this group of
people here. Over on Wang Xu’s side they were busy drinking up a storm.
Without Lao-Xu here to supervise this time, it was as if drinking was their way of proving
themselves to be grown men, each of them downing their cups in flourishes.
Jiang Cheng did not have that skill. Having only downed one glass, he already felt a lively
burn in his stomach, combined with the heating in the room, he felt as though he could fall
asleep right there.
“Hey.” Gu Fei nudged him with his arm.
“Hmm?” He turned his head to look at Gu Fei while leaning against the wall.
Gu Fei pressed a piece of candy into his palm, “Mint candy, it’ll make you feel better.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him, but his mind had gone temporarily blank… Since when did his
alcohol tolerance become so pathetic?
He took Gu Fei’s hand in his own, and along with the candy, clutched it in a death grip.
Footnotes:
[1] White alcohol = baijiu [白酒] aka hard liquor commonly made from sorghum
↩
[2] Niu’er is short for Niulanshan Erguotou. Niulanshan is a cheap brand of Erguotou,
which is a baijiu/hard liquor made from sorghum grain, much like vodka but Chinese. ↩
[3] For those unfamiliar with corn juice, it’s cooked corn, blended with water, sugar, and
milk. It’s very common as a non-alcoholic beverage in restaurants and it’s delicious I swear!
↩
[4] Shuan meat: hotpot dish of thinly sliced meat and vegetables boiled in water and served
with dipping sauces ↩
Some Stats
* Raw character count: 6088
* TL word count: 4274
* TL time: 7:39:52
* Edit: 1:07:13
* Curse words: 2x fucks, 6x shit
TL’s Notes
Only checked for formatting, sp and grammar, will do a more thorough edit later orz
Edited! I just realized all the footnotes in this chap are food-related (ﾟ￢ﾟ)
Chapter 42
“No way, you’ve never had a girl… boy… boyfriend or girlfriend or
something?”
Jiang Cheng had a rather strong grip, especially in his current slightly-out-of-control state
of mind, influenced by the alcohol and the lively atmosphere. The bones in Gu Fei’s hand
were in pain from being crushed together, and the mint candy in his palm pressed into his
flesh like a pebble.
Gu Fei glanced at Yi Jing out of the corner of his eyes, she had been pulled into a
conversation by Wang Xu. The roomful of people were busy eating, drinking, and chattering
away. Nobody noticed that in this corner Jiang Cheng was about to crush his hand into
pieces.
“What is it?” Gu Fei asked in a low voice.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, just backed his head against the wall and stared at him,
hand still clutching his.
Gu Fei maintained eye contact with him for a while, then turned away and stared in a daze
at the table of food in front of him.
He was not left-handed, he needed his right hand to eat, but Jiang Cheng didn’t seem at all
willing to relinquish his grip anytime soon. All he could do was stare at the food in silence.
To be honest, he could tell that Jiang Cheng did lose control at the start, but he must have
recovered just three or four seconds later.
Therefore the justification for his continued death grip in this moment was one part
awkwardness, one part panic, and one part the reluctance to suddenly let go for fear of
appearing too deliberate. For someone like Jiang Cheng, who was sensitive and tended to
overthink even on a regular day, when presented with a situation like this one, the gears in
his brain were probably spinning so hard they were ground down to dust.
Gu Fei picked up the soup bowl with his left hand and took a sip. Wang Xu had ordered this
lamb tripe soup specially, it tasted pretty good.
“The soup isn’t too bad.” Gu Fei turned and said to Jiang Cheng.
“Ah…” Jiang Cheng said in reply, his grip loosened a little.
“Wanna try some?” Gu Fei said, and tapped his thumb gently on the back of Jiang Cheng’s
hand.
“Lamb tripe?” Jiang Cheng asked, and finally let go.
“Yes.” Gu Fei took back his hand, paused for a moment, then placed the mint candy back
into Jiang Cheng’s palm.
“I actually don’t like lamb tripe soup,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. He didn’t grab Gu Fei’s hand
this time, only accepted the candy, and unwrapped it slowly under the table with his head
down. “I like lamb soup, lamb bone soup, femur soup, pork tripe soup……”
“You’re making me hungry.” Gu Fei picked up a piece of lamb tripe with his chopsticks and
put it in his mouth.
“Me too.” Jiang Cheng put the candy in his mouth, then two seconds later whipped his head
around. “This isn’t one of those damn flavour changing candies is it?”
“No, did you like that one? That was one of the joke snacks that Liu Fan’s friend brought
back from Japan; I still have a whole bag of it at my place.” Gu Fei laughed and said.
“Give me some, a couple pieces is enough.” Jiang Cheng nodded. Those candies were very
befitting of the way he and his moronic grandson Pan Zhi spent their time together.
“I’ll give it to you on Monday.” Gu Fei said. “Hey, we have to read our admonitions on
Monday.”
“…… It’s done.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
When having a meal with a big group of people, especially half-grown young men like
these, everyone usually got full in the first 20 minutes, because they all fought and
competed for the food, as if they had been locked in a vegetable garden for a decade and
hadn’t ever seen meat before.
And once they were full, that was when the bragging and drinking really started.
Jiang Cheng didn’t join in on the idle conversations, only sat there and listened.
It was similar to gatherings with his classmates in the past, which also included these over-
elaborate tales of adventures and misadventures, but they were not half as riveting as the
stuff these Class-8 guys came up with. As he listened, Jiang Cheng kept having the urge to
laugh, though the few girls present seemed genuinely enthralled, and very cooperative with
their reactions.
“Jiang Cheng!” Wang Xu had at some point finished telling one of his grand stories; he stood
up suddenly and extended his glass at Jiang Cheng. “Let’s go!
“Huhh?” Jiang Cheng was puzzled.
“I’m toasting you,” Wang Xu had had quite a bit to drink, and his face glowed with red light.
“Here’s to our secret weapon!”
“It stopped being a secret a long time ago……” Jiang Cheng watched Wang Xu’s face, which
clearly expressed the sentiment that ‘if you didn’t drink I would pour it down your throat’,
and stood up with his own glass in hand.
“We’re all on the same team, so let’s do away with the formalities, huh?”
“You’re not nearly as smooth a drinker as you are a ball player!” Wang Xu pointed at him.
Jiang Cheng had nothing to say to that, so he clinked Wang Xu’s glass with his own, tipped
his head back, and emptied the alcohol down his throat.
“Now that’s a straight shooter!” Wang Xu shouted cheerfully, and downed his own cup.
“Love you!”
“…… No need for love.” Resigned, Jiang Cheng sat back down.
“No no, it’s necessary!” Wang Xu waved his cup with a flourish. “Know that you’ve got Xu-ge
to protect you in the future……”
“Sit down.” Gu Fei pushed away Wang Xu’s arm that had been hovering above his head, and
wiped his face of the alcohol scented spittle that had landed there.
“Da-Fei!” Wang Xu was like a man who had just discovered the new world, he shouted as he
poured more alcohol into his cup. “We should……”
Gu Fei didn’t wait for him to finish talking or drinking. He stood up, grabbed his own glass,
and downed it in one motion, then grabbed Wang Xu’s arm. “Sit yourself down, and eat
something.”
“Oh!” Wang Xu looked at him, face dazed with excitement.
“Don’t let him drink any more,” Gu Fei turned and looked at Yi Jing, who had been trying to
get out of their way. “How are we gonna get him home if he passes out?”
Yi Jing smiled in resignation, “It’s not like he’ll listen to me.”
“He will.” Gu Fei said.
“Yes listen!” Wang Xu nodded his head right away. “I will listen!”
Gu Fei stopped paying him attention, and squeezed out from behind Jiang Cheng.
“Where are you going?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Gonna splash some water on my face,” Gu Fei said. “And get some fruit for Er-Miao on the
way.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Miao, who was fast asleep on the chair next to him.
“She’d been asleep for a while now……”
“She gets sleepy when it’s her bedtime.” Gu Fei put on his jacket, and with some difficulty,
made his way past the group of people.
The merriment continued inside the room, with laughter and yelling and eating.
The alcohol bottles were almost empty, and Yi Jing stopped the guys from asking for more.
Jiang Cheng still leaned against the wall in the same posture, watching these flushed-face
laughing people with his arms folded. The atmosphere in the room hadn’t changed, but
watching Gu Fei’s back as he opened the door and walked out, he suddenly felt a little
colder.
It was probably because they had been squished together before this, with arms next to
each other and legs touching…… Oh, he grabbed his hand too.
He thought the way he was today was nothing short of extraordinary. Even when recalling
the way he held onto Gu Fei’s hand just now, it surprisingly didn’t make him want to crash
headfirst into the awkwardness. Strangely, he even felt a little gleeful at having gotten away
with it.
What the hell was he proud of? Not sure. The inner workings of a youth’s mind was
mysterious like that, and just as shameless!
Probably, it was due to the alcohol. He wasn’t exactly a lightweight, but was simply not
used to the hardcore way these people went at it.
Every time, when he had a lot to drink all at once, he would get a delightful feeling as if he
was stepping on clouds and took the wrong medicine. The last time this happened he
kissed the guy on the cheek, and this time he wouldn’t let go of his hand. It was a picture of
someone using his own drunkenness to be shameless.
But this time, his embarrassment and shock at his own behaviour did not last very long. For
instance, when he recalled it now…… he only wanted to laugh.
How scary, the way a person’s skin could grow so thick and sturdy so easily.
Gu Fei had been gone a long time. Jiang Cheng stood up reluctantly, he needed to use the
bathroom. He wanted to go for a while now, but he thought it might be a little unseemly if
right after Gu Fei went to wash his face, he followed him to the bathroom as well.
But now, not being able to hold it any longer, he stood up and squeezed his way
out of the room.
“Jiang Cheng!” Guo Xu roared in his ears just as he got to the door. “Where’re you going?!”
Jiang Cheng was already a little dizzy, this sudden outburst of sound startled him so much
that he almost smashed his head into the door. He turned around and saw Guo Xu with his
bright red nose and sparkles of excitement in his eyes.
“Just to the washroom.” He patted Guo Xu’s arm and walked out the door.
“Well hurry up! We haven’t had a drink together yet!” Guo Xu poked his head out the door
and yelled.
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng waved his hand.
It would appear that these ‘northerners’ weren’t such tanks after all; the drinking had made
them loopy. They already ran out of alcohol, what the hell were they gonna drink?
He didn’t run into Gu Fei in the washroom, so he was probably getting fruit for Gu Miao.
When Jiang Cheng was washing his hands at the sink, his phone rang. He was surprised to
see Shen Yiqing’s number on the display.
After staring at the caller ID for a long time, he ultimately decided to answer.
“Xiao-Cheng?” Shen Yiqing’s voice came from the other end.
Though he was resistant—and the feeling had faded a lot with time—but when he heard
this voice again, Jiang Cheng still thought perhaps he would never be able to completely
erase the familiar feeling brought to him by this voice that was always full of coolness and
control.
“Uh huh.” He answered.
“Are you home?” Shen Yiqing asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng turned off the tap and lit a cigarette as he walked out; he stopped at a
window in the corridor. “Having dinner outside.”
“Are you smoking?” Shen Yiqing continued to ask.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng leaned against the wall and looked outside, suddenly feeling very
carefree.
Shen Yiqing didn’t speak for a while, then continued in a stony voice, “You certainly do stay
true to yourself, regardless of where you are.”
“Mmn, not that I’m keeping it up on purpose, but that’s just the kind of person I am, right?”
Jiang Cheng frowned. “You called just to ask about this?”
“Li Baoguo gave me a call and said he needed some money,” Shen Yiqing said.
“For tuition and food and such……”
“He called you?” Jiang Cheng was shook.
He never in a million years thought Li Baoguo would call Shen Yiqing to ask for money. The
intense mortification that suddenly overcame him made him struggle for breath.
“I was thinking, these types of expenses are usually the parents’ responsibility, so I didn’t
agree.” Shen Yiqing said. “There’s still money on the card I gave you, right?”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng said through gritted teeth.
“That money is for you. Even though we’re not a family anymore, the sentiment is still
there,” Shen Yiqing said. “I hope you hold on to that money.”
“Got it.” Jiang Cheng took a hard drag on the cigarette.
“That’s all I wanted to say. I’ll hang up then.” Shen Yiqing said.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes, the smoke that rose up made his eyes sting.
“But I still want to remind you,” Shen Yiqing suddenly added. “I hope in this new
environment, you can see your own faults more clearly; don’t keep thinking that you never
got over your rebellious period. Marks don’t actually prove anything, your own character
and temper is what ultimately decides how your path……”
“Don’t you fucking lecture me,” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes, his voice was hoarse. “I’ve
heard enough of that. The fact is, your lectures have no effect on someone like me. I’m not
my little brother, I’m not on the same frequency as you! It’s always been this way!
Everything you say sounds like berating to me, and everything I say sounds like thorns to
you! I’m home now, isn’t that enough?!”
That last sentence came out as a roar.
After that, he hung up the call and stared at the wall for a long time, then stuffed the phone
back in his pocket. He turned and leaned against the wall with his eyes closed, and took
several deep breaths before he was able to calm down and open his eyes…
… And saw Gu Fei standing two steps away from him holding a large platter of
fruit.
He stared at Gu Fei, not sure of what to say.
“Want some?” Gu Fei offered him the plate. “I just got it from the server.”
Jiang Cheng grabbed a slice of watermelon, “You’ll get brain damage from eating off-season
fruits.”
“Yet you’re eating it anyway?” Gu Fei put the platter on a side table nearby and also picked
up a slice.
“I’m too smart,” Jiang Cheng said. “Gotta eat some of these to get closer to the average, I’m
striving to be on the same level as my real dad Li Baoguo.”
“Li Baoguo’s not that dumb, he’s pretty good at counting cards.” Gu Fei laughed.
“Pretty good at asking for money too.” Jiang Cheng said, then felt dejected all over again. He
felt the outburst he had just unleashed on Shen Yiqing become hollow and baseless due to
Li Baoguo’s request for money. He took a bite out of the watermelon forcefully. “Fuck.”
“You always eat watermelons with the peel?” Gu Fei looked at him in shock.
“Shut up!” Jiang Cheng spat out the chewed up watermelon peel into the garbage. “That’s
how us city folks do it.”
“Understood.” Gu Fei chuckled and kept eating.
Jiang Cheng was a little disheartened at the moment. He felt that his emotions really were
erratic; it was quite easily influenced. The bit of good mood accumulated through a relaxed
and jovial evening had gone down the drain, all because of one phone call.
He didn’t even feel like going back to their dining room right now, since all those people
who had made him feel happy just moments before, could now become the source of his
irritation.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else, but didn’t seem to be in a hurry to get back either. The two
of them simply stood by a little table in the hallway, working their way through the fruit
platter.
Watermelon, orange, cherry tomatoes…… With a stomach full of various meats, this was the
perfect antidote to the greasy food.
It was not until they finished the entire platter of fruits, that he looked up and exchanged a
look with Gu Fei.
“Ah… we ate all of Queen Miao-miao’s fruits.” Jiang Cheng wiped his mouth.
“Mhm, I’ll go get her another plate in a minute.” Gu Fei said.
“Did you happen to overhear another epic secret just now?” Jiang Cheng looked at him, the
feverish feeling in his body caused by the alcohol and the indoor heat was slowly being
balanced out by the coolness of the fruits.
“Doesn’t really count as some huge secret,” Gu Fei said. “I already knew that your adoption
was reversed…… Was that… your adopted mom just now?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng nodded, he slowly traced musical notes in the empty platter with his
finger. “Li Baoguo asked her for money.”
Gu Fei arched his eyebrows in surprise, but didn’t say anything.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng wiped away the musical notes. “You must’ve had times when you’re
really troubled, right? How did you deal with it? The way you’re so nonchalant and carefree
all the time, it doesn’t seem like an act.”
“Alcohol and a good night’s sleep.” Gu Fei said.
“Really,” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows. “Does it work?”
“Nope.” Gu Fei said.
“You playing with me?” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“How else could I manage? It’s no big deal once you’re used to it.” Gu Fei said.
“There are way too many things to worry about, I can’t afford to be so bothered with every
little thing.”
The two of them were still standing in the corridor, staring at the empty platter together,
and it didn’t seem like either of them planned on moving any time soon.
After a while, Jiang Cheng heard the sound of a skateboard against floor tiles.
“Mm?” Gu Fei turned around.
“Gu Miao?” Jiang Cheng looked up to see Gu Miao rolling out of the room holding their
jackets and backpacks.
“Hey! Miao-miao, slow down, your brother……” Wang Xu ran out the room in a panic, and
chased after her, jacket in hand. He let out a breath of relief when he saw Gu Fei and Jiang
Cheng standing in the hallway. “Shit! I thought you two eloped together! Come on let’s go,
let’s go!”
“We’re done?” Gu Fei asked.
“What? No,” Wang Xu said as he put on his jacket. “We’re moving places! Let’s go sing!”
“I’m not going.” Jiang Cheng quickly said in a low voice.
Gu Fei glanced back at him, then turned and nodded at Wang Xu, “Sure, let’s go.”
Everyone had come out from the room now, it was loud and bustling again.
Coming out of the restaurant, they all immediately headed across the street.
Judging by the familiar way Wang Xu was leading the way, he probably picked this spot as
well.
Jiang Cheng walked at the very back. When everyone had crossed over, he noticed Gu Fei
still standing on the side of the road with Gu Miao.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Didn’t you say you weren’t going?” Gu Fei said.
“…… I did say I’m not going,” Jiang Cheng was surprised. “But you can go if you want, no
need to keep me company.”
“Nah, I gotta get Er-Miao home for bed anyway.” Gu Fei ruffled Gu Miao’s hair.
“If you weren’t here, I wouldn’t even come for dinner today.”
“Why not?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“There’s no point,” Gu Fei stretched and pushed his bike toward a taxi parked on the side.
“Let’s go, Cheng-ge.”
Gu Miao was already sleepy, so Gu Fei didn’t let her skate back on her board.
He stuffed the bicycle in the trunk, and they took the taxi back.
“Are you…” Jiang Cheng hesitated for almost the whole way, until he saw the street sign at
the intersection, did he manage to ask, “Are you gonna head straight home?”
“Where do you want to go?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’m not sure,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his forehead. “I just don’t want to go back to Li Baoguo’s
place.”
“Mnn.” Gu Fei answered.
When the taxi stopped in front of Gu Fei’s shop, Jiang Cheng saw that the lights were still on
inside. He got out of the car, and saw Gu Fei’s mom inside. All this time, and it was the first
time he saw her in the shop past 9 pm.
“Wait for me here.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng watched as he took Gu Miao into the shop, handed her to his mom, then
circled the shelves a few times. When he came back out he was holding a large plastic bag
filled with various items.
“What are these?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Snacks; peanuts and jerky and stuff.” Gu Fei answered as he turned and walked ahead.
“Where are we going?” Jiang Cheng caught up and walked side by side with him.
“The Steel Works.” Gu Fei glanced at him. “I thought you didn’t want to go back?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, only gave him a thumbs up.
It appeared that someone had dropped by their room in the Steel Works recently, and
cleaned it up pretty well too. Even the sheet that covered the legless sofa was changed for a
fresh one.
“Li Yan sure is nice and domestic,” Gu Fei tossed the bag of stuff onto the table and started
to make a fire in the firepit in the centre of the room. “Pretty much everything in this room
was sorted by him.”
“He doesn’t look domestic at all.” Jiang Cheng collapsed on the couch and let out a long
breath; for some reason, he already felt much better. “What did you bring to eat? Let me
see.”
Gu Fei set the bag next to him.
Other than all sorts of flavoured peanuts, there was also a bunch of beef jerky, some
chicken breasts and fish filet, even sausages and instant noodles; these things filled up the
whole bag. Jiang Cheng chuckled, “This setup is enough for us to drink until morning.”
“You’re down for more drinking?” Gu Fei turned around.
“Don’t be prejudiced against us southerners,” Jiang Cheng opened a bag of salted peanuts
and put one in his mouth, chewing on it slowly. “We southerners are just slow drinkers,
especially a fashionable southern city-dweller like me, we’re even slower drinkers……”
Gu Fei started to laugh, “I’ll check if there’s still alcohol here.”
“If not, just go back and get some from the shop.” Jiang Cheng pulled out a cigarette and lit
it.
“Yes, boss.” Gu Fei picked up the cardboard boxes by the wall, and after going through
them, brought out two bottles of baijiu. “Hongxing erguotou [1], these guys changed their
tastes recently.”
“Either way it’s erguotou, country boy.” Jiang Cheng said with the cigarette still in his
mouth, and stretched out his legs.
“Should I pour it out for you too?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m not in the mood to move.”
“You better engrave this moment into your memory, Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei kicked the side table
to Jiang Cheng’s side, poured out the alcohol, and set it in front of him. Then he got some
disposable plates and dumped all the snacks out. “Other than Er-Miao, I’ve never taken care
of someone like this.”
“Weren’t you pretty accommodating when we ate barbeque here last time?”
Jiang Cheng grinned.
“Then start the memory from last time.” Gu Fei sat down beside him.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng picked up the cup and took a sip. “Really?”
“Really.” Gu Fei picked up a hunk of beef jerky and tore at it slowly.
“No way, you’ve never had a girl… boy… boyfriend or girlfriend or
something?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“None.” Gu Fei said.
“…… Oh.” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
He held a moment of silence in his mind for their conversation, which had suffered a
premature death due to his impromptu and inherently awkward question.
Footnotes:
[1] Hongxing (红星): one of the most common brands of erguotou, but since this is northern
China, the guys were probably used to drinking Niulanshan (mentioned in last chapter) ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5753
TL word count: 3943
TL time: 3:52:12
Edit: 0:55:56
Curse words: 2x fucks, 1x shit
TL’s Notes
SQUEEEE~ THE HAND, here’s a sketch I made to accompany the meal ( ᴗ) Nothing else to say
except it’s a more funny/bantery chapter in typical Wuzhe fashion, I just hope that I got the
tone across properly orz
2020/08/04: updated for some grammar and tone edits
Chapter 43
“Was it the sofa or me?”
“Then…” Gu Fei put a piece of jerky in his mouth, and slowly chewed while leaning against
the other side of the couch.
Jiang Cheng stared at the beef jerky in his hand, as if he could see the pit he personally dug
for himself. He needn’t even guess what Gu Fei wanted to ask, it was a reaction any normal
person would have.
“What about you?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng sighed in his heart.
He didn’t want to lie, but he didn’t know how to begin with something like this.
He didn’t even know how to explain, so as to not come off like a player who gets around
with members of both sex.
Gu Fei just continued to sip from his cup after he asked the question; he didn’t keep
hounding him.
This considerate attitude of his made Jiang Cheng a little pissed, as if he actually had
something reprehensible to hide.
“I used to…” He hesitated for a moment. “Have a… um… girlfriend……
Though it didn’t even count really, mmn, she was from my class…”
“A girl?” Gu Fei turned to look at him in surprise.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng lit another cigarette. The charcoal fire in the room had started to
flourish; the waves of warm heat poured toward them, warming the alcohol in his body to
just the right level of comfort. It gave him the sudden illusion that nothing he said would
really matter. “She sat in front of me in class.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei was still staring at him. “I thought you… didn’t like girls.”
“I can’t explain it,” Jiang Cheng leaned back with his head against the sofa cushion. “For me,
I’ve never had a boyfriend, so I don’t know what that’s like, I’ve just……”
Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, and stared at the ceiling very slowly spinning before his
eyes, “Always… to guys…… But when she pursued me it didn’t exactly feel wrong to me
either. I ended up being annoyed by her not because she’s a girl, but because she’s just
annoying.”
“Everybody annoys you,” Gu Fei chuckled. “When I first saw you I thought you could start a
fight with someone in any second.”
“I’ve just got a quick temper, but I try my best to keep it under control most of the time. If I
fail to control it then I guess it sucks to be whoever the fuck has to deal with it.” Jiang Cheng
laughed along with him. “But with her it really wasn’t because I…… you know. It’s just some
girls when they start to fuss it gets pretty ridiculous, you give them a pair of wings and they
can fly it all the way up to Mars.”
“I can’t relate,” Listening to his experience, Gu Fei laughed for a good long while. “I’ve
always been reluctant to get close to girls.”
“I can tell. You were afraid that Yi Jing was gonna ride on your bike today, weren’t you?”
Jiang Cheng cocked his head. “Ai yoo, gunning for it like that, you’re not even worried about
the awkwardness if she sees through it.”
“That’s at least better than giving her a chance to confess, then rejecting her.” Gu Fei said.
“True,” Jiang Cheng gave him a thumbs up. “Good man.”
Gu Fei pushed away his hand which still held a lit cigarette that almost made contact with
his own face, “You and your girl… friend, you broke up already?”
“Mmn, broke up before I came here. Honestly in total we were only together for a few
days.” Jiang Cheng stubbed out his cigarette, grabbed Gu Fei’s jacket from the side and
started rummaging around in the pockets. “I don’t think she misses me very much either.
She reached out a couple times, then stopped, probably moved on to someone new.
Anyway, for so-called romantic relationships between high schoolers, even being in
different grades is enough to be considered long-distance, it wouldn’t have lasted.”
“Looking for the mint candy?” Gu Fei asked. “It’s in that pocket.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng switched to the other side and plucked out two pieces of candy. He
unwrapped one and put it in his mouth, letting it melt slowly while the minty cool flavour
cleared a messy path from his throat to his nose, to his brain, which then promptly
disappeared. “Actually, you say you don’t like to get close to girls, but it’s not entirely
accurate. Aren’t you pretty close with Ding Zhuxin?”
“Mmn, I guess she’s the exception.” Gu Fei opened a bag of peanuts, took one between his
fingers and slowly rubbed the skin off. “She used to live downstairs from us, I would go play
at her home all the time. Every time my dad gets violent, I just go hide at her place.”
Jiang Cheng let out a quiet sigh.
“I guess her home was my…… safe harbour when I was little.” Gu Fei threw the
peanut in his mouth. “I’ve always been scared of my dad. One bellow from him was enough
to keep me up all night, and even if I fell asleep it’d be a night of nightmares.”
“How much older is she?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Five years,” Gu Fei said. “She wasn’t that old back then either, but she was very good at
consoling people, and had a mind of her own. I just felt like she was someone I could lean
on.”
“Ah, the boss’s boss.” Jiang Cheng exclaimed.
Gu Fei laughed, “I was a little shit when I was younger, don’t have a lot of friends either, but
I could talk to her. It used to be that any problems I came across, I could talk it through with
her first.”
“Really,” Jiang Cheng was somewhat surprised, it seemed that Gu Fei wasn’t as naturally
composed as he appeared. “She really does give off… a formidable aura.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
“And now……” Jiang Cheng looked at him, and thought of the message Ding Zhuxin sent the
other day.
“We don’t talk much these days.” Gu Fei said. “The connections between people will change
eventually. There’s no relationship that will stay the same indefinitely.”
Given Ding Zhuxin’s attitude, Jiang Cheng could pretty much deduce the meaning of Gu Fei’s
words. A prodigal overachiever’s brain worked even faster after a couple of drinks, and not
to mention had less inhibitions when speaking.
“She likes you, doesn’t she?” He asked.
Gu Fei arched his brows, “Is it so obvious or are you just overly sensitive?”
“My intellect is probably higher than yours by at least a hundred units of Wang Jiuri.” Jiang
Cheng pointed to his own head.
“A head full of Wang Jiuri,” Gu Fei laughed and picked up another peanut.
“Seems kind of inappropriate, when his head is full of Yi Jing……”
“Fuck off!” The finger pointed at his own head swiftly changed directions to point at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei stopped talking, just laughed. Jiang Cheng sighed and took a sip of baijiu, relishing as
it burned all the way down to his stomach, and laughed along with him.
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his forehead. “She knows about you, right?”
“Mhm. Confession, rejection, plus coming out. All done in one sitting.” Gu Fei said.
“Real fucking brutal.” Jiang Cheng looked at him and said.
“That’s why I said, it’s better to keep the distance from the start, beats rejection.”
Gu Fei said.
“…Yeah,” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes. “It’s exhausting to even think about.”
“Why, you used to have a girlfriend.” Gu Fei said.
“Nah, that’s different.” Jiang Cheng shook his head. But the whole room started spinning as
soon as he moved his head, so he stopped immediately. “I don’t dislike girls. If they’re
attractive I’m more than happy to look. But I don’t feel the… impulse, you know. I don’t
have improper thoughts toward pretty girls, that’s not right at all.”
Gu Fei laughed so hard he almost spilled the alcohol in his cup, “But you have improper
thoughts about handsome guys?”
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng felt at the moment, that alcohol has been drunk, and the conversation is
where it was, so going along with the tipsy feeling, his emotional rollercoaster of a night
made him much bolder than usual, feeling like he was ready to let it all go and just vent.
“Don’t you?”
Gu Fei coughed twice, but didn’t answer.
“Would you deny it?” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes and looked at him. “Way to be
disingenuous.”
Gu Fei took a drink of alcohol in an effort to provide some buffer for his emotions, but as he
swallowed, the burn seemed to undo his inhibitions even more. Hence this thing known as
alcohol, it could not only undo a thousand worries, but could also undo a thousand robes.
Jiang Cheng’s tolerance wasn’t bad, which was why he still hadn’t passed out even now.
Only, he had drunk himself into a different persona.
“Man up.” Jiang Cheng turned his body and curled one leg up on the sofa, and braced his
arm against the back cushion.
That phrase again. Gu Fei sighed, “I do, yes.”
“There we go,” Jiang Cheng started to laugh, but then probably felt dizzy, so he rested his
head on his arm. “It’s so normal.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
It was all normal, but if Jiang Cheng knew he had been ‘normal’ toward him a few times
already, who knew what his reaction would be.
“I…” Jiang Cheng laughed for a while then stopped, his voice was low. “I might have had too
much to drink tonight.”
“It’s not like you’re doing it every day,” Gu Fei slid down against the sofa, his head resting
atop the cushion. “Once in a while is nothing, I……”
Before he finished the sentence, he felt Jiang Cheng’s slightly cold fingertip touch just below
his earlobe. He was dazed for a second, then when he recovered, his first instinct wasn’t
surprise, but the thought that Jiang Cheng’s fingers were cold even after a whole night of
drinking.
The tiny tinge of coolness slowly traced from beside his ear down to his neck, and only
when it arrived at his collarbone, did he abruptly jerk his head around to stare at Jiang
Cheng.
“And toward me as well?” Jiang Cheng cocked his head and asked.
Gu Fei suddenly had the urge to get a bowl of cold water from the bathroom and throw the
whole thing on Jiang Cheng’s face. The idea that Jiang Cheng, who had always been evasive
around these kinds of topics, would suddenly ask a question like this… they must’ve had
counterfeit alcohol.
Gu Fei immediately glanced at the bottle of liquor on the table. A 56% erguotou, even
during promotions a whole case of twelve bottles would come to just over a hundred yuan.
Li Yan had no reason to fall for cheap knockoffs just to get a good deal……
Jiang Cheng’s finger flicked against his cheek, “I asked you a question.”
“No.” Gu Fei replied.
He admitted that this whole sequence of actions and words from Jiang Cheng had about the
same effect on him as dumping a whole bottle of liquor straight into his veins, his impulses
at this moment was enough to drive through a steel board… but his habitual restraint led
him to put in this last little bit of effort.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng said in a low pitch. “Do you have a problem or are you just a fucking
coward?”
To that, Gu Fei was rendered momentarily speechless.
“The other day at the photoshoot,” Jiang Cheng suddenly stood up, still braced against the
back cushion with one leg kneeling on the seat, and looked down on him from above. “Don’t
tell me you got hard from looking at the sofa?”
FUCK! ME!
Gu Fei felt booms of thunder roll through his brain.
He never in a million years thought that Jiang Cheng would notice that kind of detail, not to
mention bring it up so bluntly like this.
It was way out of line with Jiang Cheng’s usual persona.
“I have great eyesight,” Jiang Cheng’s finger flicked him again, this time on the tip of his
nose. “I don’t wear glasses.”
As utterly shocked as Gu Fei was at this moment, he couldn’t help but laugh at this, “I have a
very mild prescription.”
“Don’t change the subject,” Jiang Cheng stared at him. Gu Fei could see that his eyes weren’t
completely in focus, but the danger in them was still evident at a glance. “Was it the sofa or
me?”
“You.” Gu Fei answered.
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak, only turned and spat out the candy in his mouth.
Gu Fei wanted to comment how it was rather impressive to keep a candy in your mouth for
such a long time, but he didn’t get a chance to.
Jiang Cheng suddenly leaned down and planted a kiss on his lips.
Gu Fei had no such experience, but judging by the way Jiang Cheng usually carried himself,
ready at a moment’s notice to slash people with his hand out of sheer reflex should anyone
dared to touch him, he was probably just as inexperienced in the matter.
Though with things like this……
When Jiang Cheng’s mint-flavoured tongue reached in from between his teeth, Gu Fei
grabbed his collar and pulled him down even closer.
Jiang Cheng’s hand slipped on the backrest, so he went along and put the hand around Gu
Fei, and yanked on his shirt, then reached his hand in and made a hard grab at Gu Fei’s
waist.
At that moment, Jiang Cheng felt as though the thing known as the brain had ceased to
exist. He had no feelings and no thoughts, even vague notions such as
‘fuck that felt great’ had dissipated into thin air.
As if all organs in his body had all disappeared, he was left without even a sense of touch
Only his lips and tongue, and that source of all evil in his lower body, seemed to have
escaped from consciousness and control, and deployed to their
full potential all on their own.
Gu Fei’s reaction was fierce. Jiang Cheng’s brain waves which were all scattered in the
surrounding warmth wanted several times to bite down hard, as if only by fighting back,
could he release the desire that was building up within him, that was growing hotter and
more unbearable by the second.
Occasionally when his hearing returned he could hear panting, his, and Gu Fei’s.
He couldn’t distinguish which was higher or lower, or if one of them was heavier or lower.
Occasionally when his sense of touch returned he could feel Gu Fei’s taut and smooth skin
against his palm, and the electric currents when Gu Fei’s hand caressed his own skin
The two of them fell into the sofa. Jiang Cheng’s hand reached into Gu Fei’s pants, and at the
same time Gu Fei yanked open his waistband. Only then, did the various parts of his body
start to come back to life once more.
An intense, never-before-experienced tremor, made a path up from his lower abdomen
through his heart, and flooded him in a single moment.
The fire was still going strong, they could see the flames dancing in the pit.
Jiang Cheng sat on the floor with his back to the sofa.
His head was still fuzzy, he felt tired and jelly-like all over. Because of the alcohol, but also
because after extreme elation… it was as if his whole body had been emptied out.
He didn’t know how he ended up sitting on the floor, but by the time he regained his senses
he was already sitting there. Gu Fei was sitting back on the sofa, both of them quiet.
His butt could sense the cold seeping through from the ground, but he didn’t feel like
moving. He stared at the crumpled up tissue and the cup Gu Fei had thrown on the floor,
along with the spilled but not yet evaporated alcohol.
A short while later, Gu Fei tossed a cushion to his side, “It’s cold on the floor.”
He dazed for another long time, then finally reached over, grabbed the cushion, and sat on
it.
“Want a cigarette?” Gu Fei asked.
“An after-the-fact cigarette?” Jiang Cheng turned and gave him a look.
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t reply, only offered the pack to him. He pulled one out and lit it,
then continued to space out.
“If you don’t want to go back,” Gu Fei said. “You can sleep here, this sofa expands to a bed.”
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei patted all around him but didn’t find his phone, “I don’t know where my phone
went.”
Jiang Cheng looked around and didn’t see his own phone either.
Both their phones were on the sofa, but had now disappeared together…… His face
suddenly felt very flushed. It was only a mutual handjob, but they made such an earth-
shattering ruckus. He felt that if the sofa wasn’t already without legs, then perhaps today
was the day it would lose them…….
But come to think of it, how did the legs break off in the first place?
A series of inappropriate images flashed across Jiang Cheng’s mind.
Shameless!
Gu Fei found their phones under the bunched up sheet on the sofa.
Jiang Cheng took a look at the screen, it wasn’t yet midnight.
It wasn’t early, but not very late either. He was too lazy to go all the way back now, but to
spend a night here, seemed like it would be a long one.
Gu Fei didn’t seem to have the same internal struggles. He sat down next to the fire pit, and
tossed a few yams he found in a nearby box onto the charcoal.
“You’re hungry?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei got a stick and poked the fire until the yams were buried in the charcoal.
“You want some?”
“Will it cook through like this?” Jiang Cheng was a little worried.
“Here’s where you city folks are ignorant,” Gu Fei said. “We country people always eat the
charcoal with the yams.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, “Fuck off.”
After the exhilaration his body felt empty, and so he was cold. Jiang Cheng kicked a small
stool to the side of the pit, so he could sit down and warm up by the fire.
When his peripheral vision swept across the bunched up tissue on the floor, he suddenly
felt an intense wave of embarrassment. As if someone could walk in at any moment and see
at a glance what the hell these tissue papers were used for.
He quickly walked over and picked up all the crumpled up tissues, disregarding any
ownership issues. Then having circled the room and discovering no garbage can, and not
wanting to continue holding on to the handful of stuff, he ended up throwing them all in the
fire.
The crumples instantly turned into golden balls of flame, and a black smoke rose up from
the fire.
“The fuck?” Gu Fei was bewildered. “What did you just throw in there?”
“The paper…. from before.” Jiang Cheng said.
“The used ones?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked back at him. “No shit, why would I throw in unused ones.”
“There’s food down there, and you throw that stuff in……” Gu Fei sighed.
“Nevermind, they all died in the fire anyway.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say in response. “I never would have thought that
you were so particular.”
“I’m not particular, I was too lazy to even clean that up.” Gu Fei said. “I’m just randomly
lamenting.”
Jiang Cheng no longer wanted to continue this particular conversation, so he sat down
beside Gu Fei and stared at the fire, spaced out.
The effects of the alcohol hadn’t yet worn off, but the tipsy feeling had slowly spread out
until it turned into general weakness. Jiang Cheng was tired just sitting there. He shifted the
stool back until he could lean against the wall, and extended his legs out.
There was no awkwardness at the moment, only a vague sense of aimlessness.
Neither of them spoke until the yams were finished roasting, but it didn’t seem to be from
embarrassment.
Gu Fei wrapped a paper plate around them and handed one to him.
The outer layer was burnt to a crisp, but once peeled open, the aroma overwhelmed his
nose.
“It smells pretty good.” He said.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei got one for himself. “When I was little, I liked to hide somewhere with
nobody else around, dig a pit, light a fire, and roast yams to eat.”
“Sounds like you were pretty lonely when you were little.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded. “But not anymore since Er-Miao came along, so
annoying.”
Jiang Cheng laughed.
After finishing the yam, when he finally got some warmth in his belly, Jiang Cheng started
to get sleepy. He could hardly keep his eyes open.
“You should sleep. There’s a comforter here, Li Yan brought it before, I don’t think it’s been
used.” Gu Fei threw some more coal into the fire, then got up and pulled a bag out of the
crumbling closet. “I… I’m gonna go in a bit.”
“……Go back at this time?” Jiang Cheng was surprised.
Gu Fei looked at him, then looked into the bag, “There’s only one comforter in here.”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied.
After spacing out some more he couldn’t stand it any longer, so he dragged the sofa out
until it flattened into a bed, then lay on it. He instantly felt much more at ease, so he pulled
the cover over himself.
Gu Fei still sat there, unmoving. Jiang Cheng’s eyelids were struggling to stay open. He
didn’t bother asking again, and simply closed his eyes.
Just as he was about to fall asleep completely, he felt the sofa shift under him.
Gu Fei had sat down.
“You’re not going back?” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes.
“You’re not asleep yet?” Gu Fei turned to meet his eyes.
“Not yet,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I don’t wanna move again either.” Gu Fei grabbed a cushion to put under his head, and lay
down. “Shall we squeeze?”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng gave him some space under the comforter.
He was pretty tired, but after Gu Fei laid down beside him, he couldn’t fall asleep anymore.
He was so tired that tears were streaming down his face, but still sleep would not come.
Guess it’s gonna be a sleepless night.
“Are you awake?” Gu Fei asked beside him.
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng said. “Can’t sleep.”
“Are you only able to sleep in your own bed?” Gu Fei asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Where’s your phone?”
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei turned.
“I’ll just get through those stupid levels for you,” Jiang Cheng said. “Usually these dumb
pointless games will have me asleep in no time.”
“Damnit.” Gu Fei laughed and handed the phone to him.
Jiang Cheng liked to call this thing dumb, but the higher levels were actually pretty hard.
The fact that Gu Fei got this far was a feat in and of itself.
He couldn’t just get past any level that he chose to either, luck was still an important factor.
On days like today, after the drinking, after the drunken shenanigans, after all the luck
probably having been ejaculated from his body, the idiotic Aixiaochu had turned into
annoying Aixiaochu.
Gu Fei had accumulated more than 20 hearts, but he only managed to get past one level
after using up half of the hearts.
“Ayy…” He sighed quietly. “Luck isn’t on my side today, all this time and only one level.”
There was no sound from Gu Fei.
He glanced beside him, and found that Gu Fei had already fallen asleep.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng was a little mad as he threw the phone to one side and pulled up his
cover. Level up your great uncle.
They didn’t turn the light off. Even though the shitty lamp wasn’t very bright, it was more
than enough to see Gu Fei’s face very clearly.
He stared at Gu Fei’s profile, watched as the image of Gu Fei’s profile slowly multiplied in
his eyes, then slowly turning into a blur, and eventually fading into darkness.
Footnotes:
????
Some Stats
Raw character count:
TL word count: 4061
TL time:
Edit: 0:21:33
Curse words: 10x fucks, 4x shits
TL’s Notes
No thoughts only screaming ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ok one thought: the version of this chapter currently on jjwxc has a couple of sentences
ommitted, but I included the original here, because I love you and I love them <3 (you should
still buy the chapter there though)
Chapter 44
“To all my teachers and classmates, I am Jiang Cheng of Year-2 Class-8……”
It was a night of deep slumber. Before he fell asleep, Jiang Cheng thought perhaps he would
have some dreams, but he ended up sleeping straight through to the next morning, and
getting woken up by the cold.
It had started to get light outside, it was probably already 7 or 8 AM. The fire had already
died out in the room, and the wind spilled through the gaps in the window. The first thing
Jiang Cheng did when he opened his eyes was a series of sneezes.
He then reached out his hand to feel around beside him, and found nothing.
He turned his head, and discovered that Gu Fei was no longer beside him.
But before he had a chance to fully indulge in his surprise that Gu Fei would get up so early
on a weekend morning, he couldn’t help but space out for a few minutes over what
transpired the night before.
Jiang Cheng sat up and ran his hand through his hair a few times.
The alcohol had worn off by now.
And so had the madness.
Though the feeling of awkwardness had not yet set in.
At the moment he was only wrapped up in a faint sense of panic.
Jiang Cheng what the hell did you do?!
Not to mention, whatever was done was done, but the person you did it with had run off
without a trace first thing in the morning…… Fuck me! Who the fuck does that!
Jiang Cheng hopped off the sofa and circled the room a couple of times, just to confirm that
Gu Fei’s clothes, backpack, and stuff were all gone. The spineless piece of shit had fled
without a trace just like that?
Was that necessary?!
Even if it was a spur of the moment one night stand! Was it necessary to make a run for it
like that??
It was no longer just a matter of embarrassment, what Jiang Cheng felt at this
moment was serious fucking blow to his ego.
“That dog-fucker!” He cursed quietly, then picked up his phone, sneezed two more times,
and called up Gu Fei’s number.
Not even two seconds later, he suddenly heard the sound of ringtone from just outside the
door.
There’s someone there?
Who’s there?!
Not A Good Bird?
Li Yan?
Or Ding Zhuxin?
Fuck me has the scene of the crime been properly cleaned up?
When he finally realized the ringtone at the door belonged to Gu Fei’s phone, his back was
drenched in cold sweat from the scare he gave himself.
The door was pushed open, and Gu Fei walked in carrying two steaming takeout
containers, “Was that you calling?”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Hurry up and eat, it’s rice noodles with beef.” Gu Fei set the containers on the table. “Li Yan
called just now and said he wants to come to the store, so I went to open up for him.”
“He’s at the store right now?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not yet, he’s gonna head over in a bit.” Gu Fei said.
“So you’re just leaving the door open like that? Nobody’s there?” Jiang Cheng asked again.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered. “No one will go in and steal stuff at this time of day, the thieves
had just laid down to rest after a long night of work.”
“…… Oh.” Jiang Cheng sat down.
Gu Fei pulled a tiny tube-shaped packet out of his pocket and tossed it in front of him.
“Wasabi?” Was Jiang Cheng’s first reaction.
“You like to eat wasabi with your beef noodles?” Gu Fei put his head down and
started eating.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the thing in his hand, it was an individually-packed tube of
mouthwash, “You guys stock this kind of thing in your store?”
“What about it, our store likes to keep up with the times.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng laughed for a long time, then went to wash up in the bathroom, and gargled
some mouthwash before sitting back down and digging into the noodles.
They ate in silence, though Jiang Cheng didn’t really feel like speaking at the moment
anyway. His previous speculations about Gu Fei left him a little embarrassed.
Besides, though he didn’t feel the awkwardness immediately after waking up, perhaps he
was too busy sneezing, and feeling shocked and angry….
… But right now, sitting down and eating piping hot noodles in silence, the uneasiness and
trepidation in him finally dared to rear its head.
“Are you going home?” Gu Fei wiped his mouth after he was done. “Li Yan sounded like he
wanted me for something, he might find his way over here if he doesn’t find me at the store.
I’ll have to head over now.”
“Hurry and go then,” Jiang Cheng said immediately when he heard that. He didn’t want to
be seen, by anyone, whether or not they could tell that something happened here. “I should
go too.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei collected the rest of the snacks into a bag and tossed it into a cardboard box
on the side, then put all the garbage in a plastic bag and carried it out.
Jiang Cheng followed him out the door, keeping quiet the whole way.
After getting some food in him, Jiang Cheng discovered that it was actually not that cold a
day. The wind hadn’t picked up, but for some reason, he kept wanting to shiver.
Gu Fei stopped when they got to the intersection outside of the Steel Works.
Jiang Cheng’s way home was to the left, and Gu Fei’s was to the right.
“So uh…” Gu Fei glanced at him. “You’re going home?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded and took a couple steps to the left, then turned around and
slowly walked backwards while facing him. “I uh… I’ll be going then.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered, but stood there without moving.
Jiang Cheng backed up a few more steps, then cleared his throat, even though he didn’t
know what else there was to say, so he waved at Gu Fei and turned to walk away normally.
As he sauntered up to Li Baoguo’s place, he could see in the distance Li Baoguo also walking
rapidly this way from across the street.
As soon as he saw the guy, he immediately remembered the phone call from Shen Yiqing
the day before, and felt a pit in his stomach that almost stoppered all the way up to his
throat. And so he paused his steps, wanting to wait until Li Baoguo was home and asleep
before going in.
But when Li Baoguo got closer, he noticed there were two women following behind him.
They wore identical clothing, like some sort of sales uniform.
“Da-shu [1], ” The younger woman jogged closely behind Li Baoguo. “Da-shu, we did make
the mistake of calling the wrong number, it was our fault, but you can’t just deny
everything like that!”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about! I never got any call!” Li Baoguo said in his usual
loud voice as he waved them off. “Stop following me around!”
The other woman was a little frantic, “Sir please, you look like you’ve got some years on
you too! How can you act so dishonourably?”
“Who’s dishonourable? Who’s dishonourable!” Li Baoguo turned to glare at her.
“For days you people have been accusing me of taking your stuff! And
slandering is so very honourable of you?”
“Da-shu, how did we slander you!” The young woman started shouting, with a hint of tears
in her voice. “We really did make a mistake and dialled your number accidentally, but why
did you have to claim that it was your purchase?
And even told us to ship it to you! Our driver still remembers that it was you who accepted
the delivery!”
“I don’t know about any driver!” Li Baoguo entered the building, and a loud
‘bang’ immediately followed as he walked inside his apartment and slammed the door.
“What’s wrong with this guy!” The young woman stood at the entrance to the corridor and
burst into tears.
Jiang Cheng stood in place, and watched for almost a whole minute before slowly walking
up to the two women. He felt almost like he had sandbags tied to his feet.
“Excuse me,” He looked at the slightly older woman. “Big sis, what’s… what happened?”
“Do you know that man?” The woman immediately asked, and pointed at the door to Li
Baoguo’s place. “Can you talk to him for us?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t admit that he knew Li Baoguo, but the woman still explained everything.
These two worked as sales for an alcohol and tobacco wholesaler. An old client of theirs
ordered some cigarettes and wine, but a new hire dialled the wrong number and ended up
calling Li Baoguo. Li Baoguo told them to deliver everything to the curbside, then walked
away without paying.
“Usually with our older clients they sometimes paid after receiving the products,” The older
woman said. “But that evening the client called to ask when the delivery would come, that’s
when we realized the mistake.”
“This is all my fault,” The younger woman said through her tears. “But he can’t just take
what’s not his and then outright deny it, those things are worth more than 2000 yuan, if he
doesn’t return it, then I’ll have to pay it back…”
Jiang Cheng felt a chill spreading throughout his whole body. He felt a bloating in his head
after turning away to sneeze a few times, and acute discomfort all over.
“Why don’t you leave your number with me,” He said. “I’ll contact you after I clear things up
with him.”
“You know him?” The older woman asked right away. “What’s your relation to him? Are
you his son?”
“……Yes.” Jiang Cheng nodded with much difficulty.
“Then you’ve got to help this girl out, you’re all young people. She had only been here for
two months, her monthly salary isn’t enough to cover this.” The woman said. “Her family’s
also not doing well, things are hard.”
“I’ll contact you guys after I ask him.” Jiang Cheng said.
The young woman continued to cry, and the older woman kept pleading with him. Jiang
Cheng didn’t know what else he could say, only repeated the one sentence.
When the two of them finally left, he opened the door and walked in wearily.
“What did you talk to them for?” Li Baoguo was standing in the living room.
When he saw Jiang Cheng walk in he immediately hollered in his loud voice, displeased.
“You shouldn’t bother with them at all!”
“Is it true you took those things?” Jiang Cheng threw his backpack onto the couch.
Li Baoguo was still on his tirade, “Whether or not I took them, this is……”
“I’M JUST ASKING IF YOU TOOK THEM OR NOT!” Jiang Cheng
interrupted his words with a bellow.
“I took them! So what! They’re the ones who called wanting to send the stuff to me!” Li
Baoguo also shouted with his eyes bulging. “What about it! What the hell does it have to do
with me! It’s their own mistake, so they have to shoulder the consequences!”
“Give it back to them.” Jiang Cheng stared back at him.
“Did you get water in your brain? This is free stuff, why should I give it back?
It’s not like I made the move to swindle them!” Li Baoguo looked at him as though he was
looking at an idiot. “I’m telling you, they checked the surveillance cameras, and went to the
local police station! The cops don’t even give a crap! Let them deal with it themselves!”
It would’ve been better if Li Baoguo hadn’t said this, but now that he did, Jiang Cheng felt as
if the rage could blow a hole right through the top of his head,
“You’re proud of yourself, aren’t you? Even the cops don’t want to provoke a shameless
prick like you! But you’re mighty pleased, yeah?”
“You better watch the shit you’re spewing out of your mouth!” Li Baoguo was just as
incensed, and pointed at him. “Understand who you’re talking to right now! You’re talking
to your old man!”
Jiang Cheng tried to suppress the rage he felt. After staring back at him for a few seconds,
he turned and walked into Li Baoguo’s room.
“What do you think you’re doing!” Li Baoguo immediately followed and tried to drag him
out by his arm.
Jiang Cheng turned and roughly flung away his hand, “I said! Don’t touch me!”
“So what if I touch you!” Li Baoguo bellowed. “I fucking ejaculated you out of me, even if
your old man beat you up right now it’s still not your place to talk shit!”
Jiang Cheng was so mad his hands were shaking. He ignored Li Baoguo and bent down to
look under the bed. It was piled full of crap, he didn’t see any cigarettes or wine, so he
walked over and opened the closet doors.
“If I don’t teach you a lesson today you wouldn’t know who’s really in charge of this family!”
Li Baoguo came from behind and shoved him, hard.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t expected it. The push slammed him directly into the closet door, he felt a
surge of pain on his nose.
Li Baoguo followed it with a punch to his face, “You really thought you’re some rich young
master!”
All his life, Jiang Cheng had been yelled at by his parents, had been physically punished by
standing and even kneeling, but this was the first time he had been struck by a ‘parental
figure’ like this.
It was a rather heavy punch from Li Boaguo. So much so that he felt it didn’t make sense for
Li Baoguo to be pinned to the ground and beat up by those guys that day, based on his fist
alone.
The room blurred in front of his eyes, and Li Baoguo had already begun his third strike; a
kick got him immediately in his abdomen.
This kick landed Jiang Cheng directly on his knees, he was in such pain that he couldn’t
make out a sound.
I’ll. Fuck. Your. Ancestors.
Just as Li Baoguo was about to land another kick to his shoulder, Jiang Cheng clenched his
jaw, grabbed a stool from the side, and slammed it into Li Baoguo’s calf.
Li Baoguo probably didn’t expect him to hit back; he cried out in one part pain and one part
anger.
Jiang Cheng stood back up, keeping one hand on his stomach. He grabbed the stool and
flung it again, this time against Li Baoguo’s arm. It made contact with a crack.
“Motherfucker.” Jiang Cheng clenched his jaw and glared at him.
Perhaps because after the two strikes, the Li Baoguo who was only a coward outside but
never had his authority challenged in his own home, felt like his ego was bruised, he lunged
forward to launch a series of attacks.
Jiang Cheng had no intention to continue the fight. Even if this man wasn’t his birth father,
he was still an old guy who coughed his lungs out for hours on end…… So when Li Baoguo
rushed at him again, he only raised a hand to shove him away.
But Li Baoguo was just getting into it, and likely wouldn’t stop until Jiang Cheng was beat
down and at his feet. At this moment, he looked nothing like the image of a sick old
coughing man.
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to continue pushing him away every time, moving from the
bedroom to the living room, until a last shove landed Li Baoguo on the main entrance door
to the living room.
“You wanna kill me, huh!” Li Baoguo bellowed. “Come on then! Kill me!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to speak, just stared at him without a word.
“Lao-Li! What’s going on?” A neighbour’s voice sounded from outside the door.
“My son wants to kill me!” Li Baoguo hollered, then opened the door behind his back, and
continued to shout at the neighbours standing outside. “Take a look everyone! My son
wants to kill me!”
“How can you…” Jiang Cheng’s tremendous shock had already surpassed his fury, even his
voice trembled. “Be so shameless?”
“I’m shameless?” Li Baoguo turned to look back at him. “I’m shameless? I have to provide
for you, feed you, clothe you, and pay for your education! All I did was take some freebies
delivered to my doorstep, and you call me shameless?”
Jiang Cheng felt as though he could hardly get a breath in, like he was going to keel over
right then and there.
“Your dad doesn’t have it easy either……” An older man said from outside the door.
“You shut the fuck up!” Jiang Cheng exploded.
These neighbours, with their expressions of gossip. It was clear from a glance that none of
them were actually sympathetic, or genuinely came to break up the fight. They were
gathered here for the sole purpose of watching Li Baoguo make a fool of himself.
“Yuoo!” A middle-aged woman yelled out. “How can the kid behave like this!”
“Like what!” Li Baoguo suddenly turned on her. “What’s wrong with my son!
What the hell is it to you that you’re blabbering on over there!”
“You’re a lunatic!” The woman glared at him, and stomped upstairs as she continued her
tirade. “A whole family of lunatics! The pharmaceutical companies are closing down
because they can’t even keep up with crazy people like you!”
Li Baoguo slammed the door shut.
He turned around and stared face to face with Jiang Cheng for a long time, then finally
opened his mouth, “I’m dying……”
“Don’t talk to me,” Jiang Cheng’s voice was hoarse. “I’m already dead.”
Li Baoguo opened the door again and walked out of the apartment.
“Where’s the stuff?” Jiang Cheng asked behind him.
“Sold it.” Li Baoguo said.
“And the money?” Jiang Cheng asked again.
“Spent it all.” Li Baoguo answered.
“Starting from this moment on,” Jiang Cheng said. “I am no longer your son.
Never was, and never will be.”
Li Baoguo stood unmoving outside the door.
“I’ll move out.” Jiang Cheng said. “You don’t have to provide for me, no need to feed me or
pay for my education.”
Li Baoguo turned to give him a look, scoffed, then left without a word.
Gu Fei sat behind the counter playing on his phone. Li Yan leaned against the front of the
cash register and watched as Li Baoguo wandered around the store shelves.
“This sale item, has it already expired?” He pointed to the tubs of yogurt drink inside the
refrigerated area.
“It’s close,” Gu Fei said. “They’ll expire in two or three days.”
Li Baoguo picked up a tub and placed it on the counter, “Cash me out.”
“I didn’t know Li-shu likes to drink yogurt?” Li Yan said.
“Why not, never had it before,” Li Baoguo said. “Might as well try.”
“Is it going on your tab?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’ve got money.” Li Baoguo pulled out a stack of bills.
“Got pretty good luck these days, huh Li-shu?” Gu Fei smiled and made change for him.
“Not bad, not bad.” Li Baoguo walked out carrying his yogurt drink.
Li Yan sat down beside Gu Fei and watched as Li Baoguo left, “That’s really Jiang Cheng’s
biological father?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei kept his eyes on his phone.
“Fuck. I guess the environment really does have a big impact on how you turn out.” Li Yan
raised his arms up in a stretch. “Look at Li Baoguo, and look at that family of his. I can’t
believe he has a son like Jiang Cheng.”
“How much longer are you gonna stay here?” Gu Fei didn’t continue the conversation, only
kept swiping on his phone. “I’m wasting my entire weekend here with you, what a pain.”
“I’ll go back whenever my mom gives up on trying to set me up on dates.” Li Yan said.
“Aiyoo,” Gu Fei tossed his phone on the counter. “Why don’t you just buy this store from me
then.”
Li Yan leaned against the chair and laughed, “What the hell kind of friend are you.”
“Are you still gonna be here tomorrow?” Gu Fei said. “If you’re gonna be here again, I’ll tell
my mom she doesn’t need to come by, just you alone is enough.
You can watch over Er-Miao at the same time too.”
“Mmn, no problem.” Li Yan said.
“And pick up some stock for me?” Gu Fei glanced at him. “That place where we got frozen
dumplings last time, you’ve been there before.”
“OK OK OK OK, just leave it all to me.” Li Yan sighed.
Li Yan wasn’t that old, not even 23 years of age. But since he never had a girlfriend, this
made his mom, who had wanted a grandson ever since he was 15, extremely anxious. She
didn’t even have time to bother with the fact that he wandered around all day without a
proper job. She was single-mindedly focused on getting him married.
Sometimes even Gu Fei felt tired for him.
This time was probably more intense than before. Li Yan opted to simply turn his phone off,
and had been hanging around his store for the past two days, just to avoid having to go
home.
Gu Fei had run out of hearts in his Aixiaochu game. Jiang Cheng promised to get through
three levels for him, but in the end only finished one. He had worked on the remaining two
for the past two days, but still couldn’t pass them.
He sighed, and exited out of the game, instead opening his Friend Circle and scrolled
through it mindlessly.
It was pretty meaningless. The girls only posted all sorts of heavily filtered selfies and
shopping purchases, whereas the guys only posted about games and showing off.
In the midst of all this, Jiang Cheng’s post was certainly a breath of fresh air.
Cheng-ge: I have so much money.
Gu Fei stared at the sentence and laughed for a good while, then gave it a ‘like’.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t contacted him in the last couple of days. Even though they never used to
talk very much on the weekend, but considering the adult content that happened a couple
days ago… Gu Fei was fine, but he was a little worried about Jiang Cheng’s state of mind.
Though judging by this post, there didn’t seem to be any problems.
Only when he saw Jiang Cheng again on Monday, he could still tell that Jiang Cheng’s
countenance wasn’t the best, but his mood seemed to be normal.
“Here.” Jiang Cheng handed him two folded up pages.
“The self-admonition?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “There shouldn’t be anything you can’t pronounce in there.”
Gu Fei gave a little laugh, “I’m a slacker, not illiterate.”
This was the day they all had to get up on stage and read their self-admonitions out loud.
Lao-Xu had collected them by the side of the podium before the assembly started. No one
from Class-5 was there yet, there were just the bunch of them gathered there like idiots
before even the flag ceremony had started, standing by to go on stage.
And so they stood there all the way until the ceremony was over, when the principal and
the teacher on duty had finished their speech, and it was their turn to go on. They almost
got the feeling that it was ‘finally their time to shine’.
“First one up is Gu Fei.” The principal said.
A wave of applause sounded below.
“What are you clapping for?” The teacher on duty said. “What’s worth clapping for? What’s
so great about reciting a self-admonition that you need to clap for it?
Everyone be quiet!”
Gu Fei opened up the self-admonition Jiang Cheng gave him, and stood in front of the
microphone.
“A self-admonition,” Gu Fei read out loud to Jiang Cheng’s shitty chicken-scratch. “To all my
teachers and classmates, I am Jiang Cheng of Year-2 Class-8……”
After a brief moment of silence, the entire school erupted in uncontrollable
laughter, with some screams among them. The principal and teacher on the side both
turned to him in shock.
“Fuck.” Gu Fei swung his head back to look at the row of people standing behind him.
Jiang Cheng was frantically going through his pockets. Then after what seemed like forever,
he finally pulled out another two sheets of folded up paper, and dashed up in two long
strides to hand it to him.
Gu Fei traded them for the pages in his hand, and said under his breath, “You really are
something else you know, how could you mix it up like this?”
“You’re really something else yourself,” Jiang Cheng also said in a lowered voice. “You don’t
even know your own name?”
Footnotes:
[1] Da-shu: uncle, a polite term for a man around your father’s age ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5798
TL word count: 4152
TL time: 3:46:57
Edit: 1:01:09
Curse words: 11x fucks, 4x shit
TL’s Notes
Heh, these idiots
Chapter 45
“From now on I’m just a fucking orphan.”
Holding this new version of the self-admonition letter that Jiang Cheng had just handed
him, Gu Fei unfolded it and made double sure that the name written on it was Gu Fei, and
not Wang Xu or some other random person. Only then did he start reading it out loud, “I am
Gu Fei of Year-2 Class-8. As a member of Fourth High, I did repel…… repeatedly go against
the…… something set in place…
rules set in place…… Tender… tardiness is…. a serious affect… offence, whereas driving
over the fences… climbing over the fences after being late is even noic… worse……”
Jiang Cheng had written large enough, but that didn’t take away from the sheer grotesquery
of his handwriting. It was quite hideous really. Gu Fei struggled along the text, as sounds of
suppressed laughter continued to emanate from the audience.
“In this key… moment, only half a semester away from year three of high school,” Gu Fei
stared at the page, unsure of what was so key about entering year three. “I will make sure
to change the error of my ways, abide by the rules of the school. I will not arrive late or
leave early, will not… will not climb fences and step on… branches……”
What the hell did branches have to do with anything!
He finally let out a breath of relief as he arrived at the last line, “Sincerely signed, Gu Fei.”
“Gu Fei, go stand there on the side. Next up,” The teacher on duty scanned the row of
students on the stage. “Jiang Cheng!”
Another round of applause sounded from below. The teacher was so furious her face
turned green, she pointed at the students below, “Who wants to come up here and recite
with him? I’ll give you this chance!”
Jiang Cheng stood in front of the microphone and pulled out his copy of the self-
admonition. He flipped it to the second page and glanced briefly at the writing, then folded
the pages back up and put it in his pocket.
“I am Jiang Cheng of Year-2 Class-8.” He looked out at the audience. “Last week, due to a
small squabble, I got into a fight with……”
Jiang Cheng stared at the audience in silence for two whole seconds, then turned to the row
of people behind him, “What’s that guy’s name again?”
He didn’t manage to keep his voice down for this question, but neither did the audience
with their bursts of laughter.
“The fuck?” Wang Xu was astonished, and quickly told him. “It’s Luo Yi!”
“I got into a fight with my fellow student, Luo Yi of Class-5.” Jiang Cheng turned back and
continued calmly. “This sort of behaviour seriously violated the rules of this school, and is
not conducive to the promotion of teamwork and unity among my fellow students and
classrooms. As the one who started the fight, I did not provide my classmate Luo Yi an
opportunity to apologize and explain, but instead created a conflict between the two
classrooms. This led to a very unfortunate outcome. In the past few days, I have conducted
an intensive reflection of my own impulsive behaviour. Violence is never the answer……”
Watching Jiang Cheng’s back, Gu Fei was thoroughly and profoundly impressed by this
overachiever who refused to pass over any opportunity to show off, even when reciting a
self-admonition. Not to mention throughout the letter, he not only admitted to his own
wrongdoings, but managed to push a majority of the blame of instigation onto Luo Yi.
Though while he was listening, Gu Fei finally realized why Jiang Cheng didn’t look so well
this morning. He seemed to have caught a cold; when he spoke his voice sounded stuffy.
“Fuck me,” Wang Xu mumbled quietly beside him. “What the hell is this guy trying to do,
damned if he’s not more of a showoff than I am. Even with something like this……”
“You can only admit defeat.” Guo Xu said with his head down. “Just this right here. Forget
about the writing, there’s no way I can even memorize the whole thing.”
“I will continue to seriously reflect on myself, work on amending my past mistakes,
promote unity among my classmates, and learn to control my
impulses……” And so Jiang Cheng finished reciting the entire self-admonition without so
much as a stutter. “Sincerely signed, Jiang Cheng.”
He gave a little bow, then turned and joined back in the rank of his gaping classmates.
Next up was Wang Xu. He took out a crumpled ball of paper from his pocket, opened it up,
and started reading from it with a booming exuberance, “My dear teachers and fellow
students, GOOD MORNING! On this WARM Spring day
where the flowers are BLOOMING, on this GLORIOUS day when Spring has
returned to the world! I’ve committed a grave sin……”
Gu Fei let out a big sigh, and was barely able to hold in his laughter. He quickly put his head
down.
“Without context, you’d probably think he’s committed some kind of Spring-related sin…..”
Jiang Cheng said quietly.
Their entire row immediately started shaking with laughter.
The principal cleared his throat behind them, and after much effort, they finally managed to
stop laughing out loud.
“I can’t believe you memorized your letter?” Gu Fei turned his head slightly and glanced at
Jiang Cheng.
“I didn’t,” Jiang Cheng answered in a low voice. “I didn’t think we would go so close
together. The two copies I wrote were almost exactly identical, what with admitting past
mistakes and all that. It would’ve been too obvious……”
“What the fuck,” Guo Xu was stunned. “So that was you winging it on the spot?”
“It’s called going off script.” Jiang Cheng corrected him.
“…… Oh.” Guo Xu’s face was still a picture of amazement.
After Class-8, it was Class-5’s turn to read their letters of admonition out loud.
Each of them stammered through it with great difficulty, tripping over every other word.
They took up so much time that by the time it was all done, the principal didn’t even want
to bother wrapping up, and ended up dismissing them directly.
When they got back to their classrooms, everyone gathered around Jiang Cheng to pay their
regards.
“Now you’ve really made a name for yourself,” Zhou Jing gave him a thumbs up. “Jiang
Cheng, you’re really……”
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng said as he turned away and sneezed.
“Did you catch a cold?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then pulled out a mask and put it on.
Perhaps it was the sudden realization that the cold might very well have been because they
spent that one night together under one comforter, in that room where the window was
open and the fire was out……
The conversation abruptly came to an awkward halt.
It was only after class started, that Gu Fei continued, “Didn’t I tell you to wait for me and
come to school together?”
“…… I forgot.” Jiang Cheng was slumped forward on the desk with his eyes half closed.
“Let’s leave together after school.” Gu Fei said.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng mumbled in reply.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything more. He saw that Jiang Cheng probably wasn’t feeling too well,
so he lowered his head down and continued playing with his phone.
When class ended, he set his phone down and glanced toward Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng had fallen asleep on the desk with his mask still on, looking like he was in deep
slumber too.
“Gu Fei,” Lao-Xu called out to him when he passed by their classroom after finishing up a
lecture next door. “Come here for a sec.”
Gu Fei gazed back at Lao-Xu and sat there unmoving.
“I have to talk to you about something,” Lao-Xu beckoned him. “Come here!”
Gu Fei put his phone away in resignation and slowly walked out of the classroom, following
behind Lao-Xu.
After walking down the stairs, Lao-Xu turned straight for the direction of the staff
washroom. Gu Fei stopped, “How about we talk first and then you can go to the
washroom?”
“Not into the washroom,” Lao-Xu said. “There’s less people over there.”
Looking at Lao-Xu’s expression of ‘this is a big secret’, Gu Fei had no choice but to follow
him and sat down on a stone bench outside the washroom.
“I want to ask you a few questions, but you have to keep it a secret.” Lao-Xu said.
“If it doesn’t have to do with me then you can save it; I don’t want to meddle in other
people’s business, and I don’t want to keep anyone’s secrets.” Gu Fei reached for his pocket
out of habit, but took one look at Lao-Xu and stopped.
“Ayy… go ahead and smoke, just don’t let the Guidance Director see you, otherwise I’ll have
to write a letter of admonition too.” Lao-Xu sighed, then continued speaking after the
cigarette was lit. “It’s true this doesn’t have to do with you, but it has to do with Jiang
Cheng. I’ve noticed that you two are pretty friendly with each other… so I want to talk this
over with you.”
Gu Fei kept his head down for a while, then finally asked, with the cigarette still in his
mouth, “What do you want to talk about?”
“Did you know that Jiang Cheng ran away from home?” Lao-Xu asked.
“Huh?” Gu Fei looked up in surprise.
“Ayy, you don’t know either?” Lao-Xu let out a heavy sigh. “His father came to me.”
“Ah, Li Baoguo?” Gu Fei said. “He came to the school?”
“No, he called.” Lao-Xu said. “He knew me from before. His eldest son Li Hui, he used to be
my student too.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei replied.
Ran away from home?
Lao-Xu said quietly, “Lao-Li didn’t say why Jiang Cheng ran away either, only said that there
was conflict, and that Jiang Cheng just wanted to rile him up……”
“You can’t trust what that man says.” Gu Fei said.
“That’s why I came to ask you. If I went to Jiang Cheng directly, judging by his
temperament, he’d never say.” Lao-Xu’s face was full of worry. “Such an exceptional kid like
him, if these things aren’t dealt with properly, it would surely affect his studies.”
“I don’t know, he didn’t mention it to me.” Gu Fei said, but Lao-Xu stared at him with an
expression of disbelief. He extinguished the cigarette. “I can’t help it if you don’t believe
me.”
“OK fine, ayy…” Lao-Xu shook his head. “Don’t go asking him about it either.
I’ll talk to Lao-Li again to find out what exactly happened. Tomorrow is the midterm exams,
we’ll deal with it after that.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything more, just stood up and headed back to class.
Jiang Cheng had been lethargic all morning. After getting some cold medicine from the
nursing station, he came back and went right to sleep on the desk, all the way until noon
when class ended.
Gu Fei had to give him several nudges to get him to wake up, “Hey, it’s time to go.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes and said with a stuffy voice. “I’m not going home for
lunch, you… go on by yourself.”
“Not gonna eat either?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’ve got no appetite, don’t feel like eating.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes again.
“Alrighty.” Gu Fei didn’t say anything else. He walked out of the classroom while still
playing with his phone.
As soon as he walked out of the front gates, he spotted the small cluster of people squatting
by the side of the streets across from him. There was a motorcycle beside them, and on it
sat Jiang Bin.
Gu Fei didn’t pay them any attention. He kept walking as he started composing a text
message to Jiang Cheng.
– Jiang Bin is here, don’t come out
Before he sent it, he went back and changed the ‘Jiang Bin’ to ‘wild boar head’.
Jiang Cheng already had trouble remembering people, and now that he was all groggy from
the cold, odds were he wouldn’t remember who the hell Jiang Bin was.
Jiang Cheng’s reply came surprisingly fast.
– Are they bothering you
– Nah
Jiang Cheng stopped replying. Gu Fei figured he likely fell asleep.
When Gu Fei got on his bicycle, Jiang Bin also started his motorcycle and parked it right in
front of him, blocking his way.
Wang Xu and the others were also fetching their bikes at the same time. When they saw
this, they immediately stopped what they were doing and collectively directed their stares
in this direction.
“Got a minute?” Jiang Bin asked.
“You want something?” Gu Fei rested one foot on the ground.
“It’s been a while since we played ball together,” Jiang Bin said. “How about a game some
time?”
“We’ll see,” Gu Fei said. “I have exams tomorrow.”
“Aiyoo,” Jiang Bin put on an expression of exaggerated amazement. “The famous Gu Fei has
to do exams?”
This was followed by a smattering of laughter.
“We’ll see after the exams.” Gu Fei didn’t pay any heed to the laughter.
“Fine,” Jiang Bin pointed at him. “I’ll give you that. After your exams I’ll come find you.”
Gu Fei made a sound of agreement.
“And bring that Jiang Cheng guy along too.” Jiang Bin said.
“That, I can’t guarantee.” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck,” Jiang Bin spat on the ground. “I said, bring him with you.”
“Don’t get cross with me,” Gu Fei gave him a look, and said steadily. “If you want to pick a
fight with me, get your cousin to come with you.”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Bin revved the engine on his motorcycle. “I’m not my cousin, I don’t have the
kind of rapport with you that he has……”
“Your cousin doesn’t have that kind of rapport with me either.” Gu Fei interrupted him. “If
you want to play ball, come find me after the exams. If you want to get Jiang Cheng, then call
up your cousin.”
After he said this, Gu Fei stepped on the pedal, and squeezed by from beside him.
Wang Xu and the others immediately caught up to him on their bikes, “What’s going on?
Are they here to bother you?”
“What’s it to you,” Gu Fei said. “If you’re itching for trouble, you can go up to him right
now.”
“Fuck you,” Wang Xu was offended. “This whole thing started because of our game! It’s a
matter for our whole team! This is our collective……”
“Find another use for your collective honour.” Gu Fei stepped hard on the pedal a couple of
times and darted forward on his bike. “Go home.”
When he got back to the store, Gu Miao was playing on her skateboard outside.
She didn’t so much as spare him a look as she blew past him like the wind.
Gu Fei noticed the little girl seemed to have grown taller. The height that had stagnated for
a whole year was finally starting to show some changes. Her head was now almost reaching
to his waist.
Li Yan was inside, and so was Liu Fan; Gu Fei guessed that Li Yan probably got bored and
dragged him along. The two of them were boiling some water in preparation to make
noodles.
Before he even opened his mouth, he suddenly heard the boom of Li Baoguo’s voice, “Ah
Da-Fei, you’re back from school?”
“Li-shu,” Gu Fei was a little surprised to see Li Baoguo standing there by the shelves. “Here
to do some shopping?”
“He’s come to ask you about Jiang Cheng,” Li Yan said from the side. “Said he ran away from
home.”
Gu Fei hardly knew what to say. He was looking for Jiang Cheng in such a way that even Li
Yan knew about it. If Jiang Cheng found out about how Li Baoguo was making such a big
fuss, he would probably never agree to go back.
“Did he go to school today?” Li Baoguo asked in his usual loud voice.
“I don’t know,” Gu Fei said. “I wasn’t at school today.”
“Don’t you help him hide from me!” Li Baoguo said in obvious displeasure. “I know you
bunch of delinquents all like to cover for one other!”
“I really didn’t go to school today.” Gu Fei said.
“That brat. Growing up in the city certainly gave him a big temper! It’s all from being
spoiled by those people! Can’t chide and can’t even touch!” Li Baoguo complained loudly. “If
he’s wrong, as his father am I not allowed to teach him a lesson! Only a few words and he
just ran off. Wouldn’t even acknowledge this father of his anymore! If it weren’t for his old
man! Where would he be!”
“When did he leave?” Gu Fei asked.
“On Saturday; probably ran off right after having it out with me!” Li Baoguo’s expression
was full of anger. “I came back after my card game, and he already took all his stuff and left!
Big balls on that kid! If it weren’t for your teacher Xu stopping me at your school, see if his
legs aren’t broken right this very second!”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else.
Li Baoguo stood in the middle of the store and had a full-on tantrum with curses and
yelling, before finally stomping out, still rambling on as he went.
“Fuck me,” Liu Fan sat down by the table. “That man really is unbelievable. If it was my dad
going around cursing me out like that, I would never go back home ever again.”
“Isn’t that what Li Hui is doing now, not going home.” Gu Fei sat down as well.
“Oh yeah, in a couple days after my exams, let’s go play some ball.”
“Basketball? At your school?” Li Yan asked. “You guys are pulling for external support too?”
“No,” Gu Fei said. “Jiang Bin’s asking.”
Liu Fan leaned back against the chair and started laughing. It was a long time before he was
finally able to stop, “That dickwad, where did he get the face to issue this challenge?”
“Why not,” Li Yan’s expression was a picture of nonchalance. “We hardly ever get a chance
to beat them on the court anyway, this time we’ll just take the loss so they can recover
some ego.”
“He specifically asked for Jiang Cheng to go too.” Gu Fei said.
Li Yan froze for a moment, “That sounds like more than just basketball then.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Are you planning to take this on for him?” Li Yan asked.
“What do you mean ‘take this on for him’,” Gu Fei said. “Jiang Bin counted me in there too.”
“Let’s all go together then.” Liu Fan stretched lazily. “It’s been a while anyway since I last
exercised……”
When Gu Fei arrived at school in the afternoon, class hadn’t started yet. Jiang Cheng still
wore a mask, and was hunched over the desk playing with his phone, looking half dead.
When he sat down, Jiang Cheng finally lifted his gaze in surprise, “I thought you weren’t
coming back.”
“There’s nowhere to go,” Gu Fei said, and looked him over again. “Should you go get an IV
drip or something for your cold?”
“No need,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not that serious. I’m just drowsy is all; I didn’t sleep very
well last night.”
“Ah.” Gu Fei didn’t know what else to say. He wanted to mention that Li Baoguo went
looking for him, but thought that it probably wasn’t the best time to mention it. And after a
long stretch of silence, he decided to extend the silence even further.
The afternoon’s self-study period had been cancelled and replaced; the teachers of various
different subjects used it as last minute battle grounds to highlight key concepts for the
upcoming exams.
Gu Fei already found regular lectures to be tedious, not to mention this endless highlighting
of key concepts. He put headphones in and listened to music as he started aimlessly
browsing around on his phone.
There was already a post in the forum regarding the debacle of the big name
switcheroo from this morning. It had been bumped to the top as the hottest trending post,
and had even been starred.
<Rational Diskhorse, has my OTP been made officially canon by their IRLs?>
Gu Fei tapped into it and skimmed through. The flurry of excited memes, hearts, keyboard
smashing, and all the people exploding on the spot accompanied by exclamation marks
made him laugh. He couldn’t tell who everyone was, but could guess that there were
members from the school reporters club. There were quite a few of them running around
with cameras during the game.
He even found an account that looked suspiciously like Wang Xu’s:
‘CaptainXu’. It was probably a newly registered side account. Looking at this name, he
probably looked through a Chinese to English dictionary quite diligently in order to find
this word……
Five seconds before the last bell, the math teacher barged into the classroom,
“I’ve got a mock test here…..”
A string of drawn out complaints resounded through the room. Most people simply ignored
what the teacher had to say and streamed out in a hurry.
“You coming?” Gu Fei asked Jiang Cheng.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng stood up and walked over to pick up a mock test from the math teacher
first.
“Such a model student.” Gu Fei went to pick one up as well.
“And what are you doing with this?” The math teacher looked at him.
“You’re just giving it out anyways.” Gu Fei folded the pages up and stuck it in the pocket of
his pants.
When Jiang Cheng got to the bottom of the stairs, he headed first to the sink to wash his
face, then switched on a new mask, “You… do you have time?”
“Why?” Gu Fei asked.
“That bike store you mentioned,” Jiang Cheng said. “Can you take me there? I can’t be
bothered to walk, I’ve been dying from congestion the whole day.”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Bin wasn’t waiting for them at the school gates, and neither was Monkey.
Though Gu Fei was fully conscious of the fact that Monkey would no doubt stick his nose
into this matter. Despite his less than chummy relationship with his cousin, when all was
said and done, Monkey was still the top dog around these
parts. He was different from the likes of Wang Xu, who was still struggling on the path of
the class-leader-wannabe. Monkey had a reputation to protect.
Not to mention, Monkey had barely tolerated him for a long time. Every time he claimed to
do him a favour, who knew just how much he was seething inside.
Even if it wasn’t for Jiang Bin, this was bound to blow up at some point.
Though if they really insisted on dragging Jiang Cheng into it, that was something he could
not accept. Jiang Cheng was different from all the rest of these people. Just from that off-
script incident alone, he wasn’t someone who should be stuck in this place. And even more
so, not someone who should be stuck here and be plagued with trouble.
“Hey, I forgot to ask you.” Jiang Cheng was sitting on the backseat of the bike.
“Is that place expensive? I can probably only afford something under 500
bucks.”
“Mr. City-man,” Gu Fei turned his head slightly. “The most expensive bike they have is
probably no more than 350 bucks.”
“…… Oh,” Was Jiang Cheng’s reply. Then after a moment he clucked his
tongue. “Wouldn’t it be extremely ugly then.”
Gu Fei squeezed the brake and kept one hand on the handle, while his whole upper body
twisted around in an effort to shoot a glare at Jiang Cheng.
“I’m… just saying.” Jiang Cheng said.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t actually too picky about his bike. He didn’t buy the most expensive 400
yuan model either, but ended up choosing one that was priced at 250 yuan. He even used
the excuse that 250 sounded terrible to haggle the price down to 220 yuan. [1]
Gu Fei figured it was likely that Jiang Cheng really didn’t plan on going back to Li Baoguo’s
place again. The way he was prudent with money now was a
noticeable change from before.
“How is it?” Gu Fei watched as he rode back and forth a few times on the sidewalk.
“Not bad.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Only thing is that it’s too ugly.”
“Hurry up and pay so we can go.” Gu Fei said in resignation.
After Jiang Cheng paid for the bike, the two of them pedaled back leisurely toward the
direction of home.
When they were almost at the intersection, Jiang Cheng turned to Gu Fei, as if he had just
made up his mind, “I’m not living with Li Baoguo anymore.”
“Why not?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’m not sure how to explain.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I’ll drop by your store in a bit to buy
some stuff.”
“Daily necessities?” Gu Fei watched him. “Where are you staying now?”
“It’s not too far.” Jiang Cheng said. “I heard about this place from the owner of that inn I
stayed at last time. It’s a side lane just a little further down from your street……”
“The towel factory dorms?” Gu Fei asked.
“Not sure, though the state of the building is pretty comparable to the one Li Baoguo lives
in. There’s one bedroom, and the rent is pretty cheap.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What do you plan to do from now on?” Gu Fei asked.
“I hadn’t thought about it.” Jiang Cheng turned and sneezed, then said sniffling.
“Either way I’m not going back there again. I’m nobody’s son. From now on I’m just a
fucking orphan.”
Gu Fei didn’t reply.
The two of them rode forward in silence for a while, then Gu Fei said, “Orphan boy, how
about I buy you dinner later.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng showed a little smile.
“Let’s go somewhere near the towel factory dorms.” Gu Fei said. “On the way there I’ll show
you the places where you can go to buy stuff.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
When Gu Fei turned to look at him, he tugged on his mask and hastily turned his face away.
Footnotes:
[1] Two hundred and fifty = erbaiwu = slang for someone who’s a dumbass ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6011
TL word count: 4374
TL time: 6:56:25
Edit: 1:49:33
Curse words: 7x fucks, 1x dickwad (•‿•)
TL’s Notes
Thanks to everyone who left comments (∇) , pls let me know if there’s any mistakes or typos
orz
Edit 2: done
Chapter 46
I want to be here! I want to be there! I want this place! I want that too!
Gu Fei rode on ahead of Jiang Cheng and kept a steady distance. Jiang Cheng sometimes felt
that Gu Fei’s high emotional intelligence, demonstrated through his well-honed perception
and reluctance to meddle in other people’s business, really irked him.
He pulled his mask up even further so that the edge of it could conveniently catch his fallen
tears.
The distance from there to Gu Fei’s store was tolerable. On bike it would take them under
20 minutes. That was enough. He followed behind Gu Fei and let his tears flow freely.
He actually didn’t know why he suddenly started crying.
He didn’t feel like he had the impulsive need to cry, nor was there any specific trigger for
his tears. Never again having a home, or parents; he had been contending with this mindset
for more than just a couple of days. From the day they told him he was adopted, he already
felt that he would never have a home again.
After coming here, this feeling only grew clearer as the days went on. So why would he
suddenly shed tears immediately after declaring himself to be an orphan?
I guess people really do get more sensitive when they’re sick.
His tears had stopped before they arrived; the ones already shed had also been mostly
dried by the wind. Only his eyes still felt a bit swollen.
They parked their bikes outside of Gu Fei’s store. Gu Fei turned back and glanced at him,
then said quietly as if startled by what he saw, “Aiyoo…”
“What.” Jiang Cheng leaned his bike against the wall.
“I……” Gu Fei hesitated. “Didn’t think you would cry like this.”
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like laughing. Even someone like Gu Fei, who was the master of
neutralizing awkwardness, could no longer keep up the pretense.
He rubbed his eyes, “Is it very red?”
“It’s pretty red.” Gu Fei said. “Why don’t you wait for me here, and I’ll bring out whatever
you need. Li Yan is still in there.”
“It’s fine,” Jiang Cheng rummaged around in his backpack and pulled out an eyeglass case.
He took out a pair of shades and put them on. “I have equipment.”
“You look……” Gu Fei stared.
“Really handsome, right?” Jiang Cheng checked out his own reflection in the window of the
community clinic next door. “Every time I pass by a display window, I would stumble over
how good I look.”
“Yes,” Gu Fei nodded. “You certainly are… very handsome.”
When the two of them walked into the store, Li Yan was struggling to navigate the aisles on
Gu Miao’s skateboard. Gu Miao stood in front of the cash register with her arms folded,
looking on with a distant expression.
When she saw them enter, Gu Miao ran to Jiang Cheng’s side and looked up with vested
interest at the sunglasses on his face.
“So this is how bored you are.” Gu Fei said.
“Just working out.” Li Yan glanced at Jiang Cheng. “Whoa, I thought it was someone coming
to collect protection tolls.” [1]
“Pay up then.” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s all in the drawer.” Li Yan pointed at the cash register.
“When are you going home?” Gu Fei asked Li Yan.
“Don’t you worry about me.” Li Yan continued to struggle forward on the skateboard. “I’m
having dinner with Liu Fan later, do you two wanna come?”
“Count me out.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m not going,” Gu Fei yanked Li Yan off the skateboard. “We have midterm exams
tomorrow.”
“What do midterm exams have to do with you?” Li Yan said. “The overachiever has to study,
but a king of blank test papers like you…..”
“I’ve never turned in a blank test.” Gu Fei corrected him.
“Oh, you always fill in all the blanks.” Li Yan nodded.
“That’s right.” Gu Fei nodded as well.
“Fine, if you don’t wanna come then don’t come.” Li Yan grabbed his jacket.
“I’ll be going then.”
Jiang Cheng took a couple of turns around the shelves and got some daily
necessities and food. Gu Miao stayed by his side the whole time, staring curiously at his
sunglasses.
Eventually, he had to take the sunglasses off. Though some time had passed so his eyes
shouldn’t be so red anymore. He put the shades on Gu Miao’s face.
Gu Miao gave the glasses a little nudge, expressionless as always.
“Very cool.” Jiang Cheng gave her a thumbs up. “You’ll definitely be way cooler than your
brother when you grow up, and way good looking too.”
Gu Miao didn’t reply, just turned and ran out holding her skateboard.
“Hey!” Gu Fei yelled after her. “Take the sunglasses off! You’re gonna drop and break them!”
Gu Miao didn’t pay him any attention. She rolled out with a flourish, still sporting the
shades on her face.
“It’s OK,” Jiang Cheng said. “If it breaks, it breaks. I’ve had them for a while.”
“If you’re willing to stoop to 200 yuan for a bike,” Gu Fei leaned against the counter and
looked at him. “How will you afford to replace these if they break.”
“If they break, shouldn’t you pay for it?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Oh, right,” Gu Fei considered it. “Yes.”
Jiang Cheng placed his items on the counter, “Cash me out.”
“This……” Gu Fei was a little hesitant.
“No.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei quirked a smile, then walked behind the counter and started to scan the items. He
put them all in a bag, “The total comes to 123.20 yuan, I’ll round it down for you to 120.00.”
“OK.” Jiang Cheng handed him the money.
Since there was no one left to watch the store, Gu Fei closed down and locked the doors
after telling Gu Miao to head home by herself.
“I’m disrupting the business, aren’t I?” Jiang Cheng felt a little guilty.
“There’s no customers around dinner time anyway. At most it’s only those who suddenly
realized they’re out of salt or oil while making dinner.” Gu Fei got on his bike and set out.
Jiang Cheng followed behind on his own bike.
“I’ll bring you the sunglasses tomorrow.” Gu Fei said.
“No need, Gu Miao seems to like it a lot.” Jiang Cheng said. “She can keep it to play with. Just
don’t let her wear it all the time, it’s not good for children’s eyesights if they constantly
wear that.”
Gu Fei only smiled.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t familiar with this area. After the landlord told him the address the other
day, he spent a long time before finding his way to the actual place. And when coming here
again today… he stared at the row of similarly broken down buildings, and could not
remember where his own rental apartment was.
“OK so,” He felt more than a little distressed. “I remember you just turn in at a certain
intersection, then there’s a few buildings that look about the same……”
“Which certain intersection?” Gu Fei asked him.
“I……” Jiang Cheng paused for a long while, then finally pulled out his phone.
“Let me ask the landlord again.”
The landlord on the other end was driven to laughter by his plight, then repeated the
address to him again, “Young man, mind that you don’t come home in the middle of the
night. I usually turn my phone off at night. If you get lost again, you’ll just have to spend the
night outside.”
Gu Fei knew the area well. He stepped on the pedals and continued forward.
“This way.”
“How come I don’t remember it being that far.” Jiang Cheng was a little disoriented.
“You can’t even remember people’s names.” Gu Fei said.
“It’s not that I can’t remember,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “It’s that I can’t be bothered to
remember. My brain is not a dumpster, I’ve gotta save it for useful things.”
“You’re right, remembering directions isn’t very useful.” Gu Fei nodded.
“You shut your mouth.” Jiang Cheng said.
When Gu Fei led him to his apartment building, he studied his surroundings very diligently,
“Alright, I’ve committed it to my memory.”
“Let’s go upstairs to put your stuff down, then we’ll head to dinner.” Gu Fei said.
“OK.” Jiang Cheng led him up the stairs. The landlord owned an apartment on
the second floor of this building. It was pretty rundown, but the inside wasn’t too bad. It
was almost fully furnished, and though everything was old, it was pretty clean. At the very
least it didn’t have the mice and roaches of Li Baoguo’s place.
“It doesn’t look too bad.” Gu Fei stood in the living room and glanced around.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng set the things down on the table. “I’ll set up an ethernet cable in a
couple days, then everything should be all set…… Oh right, do you know anywhere that
sells bed supplies?” [2]
“Bed supplies?” Gu Fei drew a blank.
For some reason, when Jiang Cheng spoke the words out loud, his mind
inexplicably went in the wrong direction. Judging by Gu Fei’s reaction, he wasn’t too far off
either.
The two of them exchanged a glance, then Gu Fei started laughing first, “Ah, bed supplies… I
understand.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak, but suddenly found he couldn’t contain his laughter anymore. He
stood by the window and laughed wildly until his jowls hurt.
“Ah fuck.” Gu Fei rubbed his face.
“Then let’s go after dinner? I can’t wait for an online order on these.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then we should go before dinner.” Gu Fei took out his phone to check the time.
“For sheets and such there’s a textile market where they sell ready-made goods.
They have comforters and pillows too, but they close around 7 or 8 pm.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Then……” Gu Fei pointed at the door. “Let’s go?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, instead he just stood there for a while longer, then stepped in
front of Gu Fei. He lifted his arms to wrap around Gu Fei’s shoulders and pulled him into a
tight embrace.
Gu Fei froze for a moment, then gave his back a couple of gentle pats, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng was still holding on tight. “Do you ever have times when you feel
really ungrounded, like you’re not standing on solid ground, and there’s nothing to even
hold onto.”
Gu Fei was quiet for a moment, then answered, “Yes.”
“I figured you probably have.” Jiang Cheng said. “I take a step into thin air, I’m
starting to fly, I look up and see uncertainty, I look down and hear you say this world is
empty……” [3]
When he got to the last line, Jiang Cheng sang it in a very low voice.
Gu Fei was shocked. Not only because Jiang Cheng was able to remember the melody and
lyrics to the song after only hearing it once, but also at his singing voice, which was low and
had a husky and sultry quality to it. It sounded really good.
He could empathize with the emptiness that Jiang Cheng was feeling at the moment. Even
though their past experiences were not the same, he could still identify with it, the kind of
panic that came from not being able to reach solid ground.
The two of them stood there quietly for a long time. He could hear Jiang Cheng’s very low,
suppressed, and almost imperceptible sobs next to his ear.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said softly, and gently patted Jiang Cheng’s lower back.
“Frankly, I’m not very good at comforting people either, the only person I’ve ever
comforted was Er-Miao….. I just want to say this, if you’re crying, it’ll feel more satisfying if
you let it out.”
There was a moment of silence from Jiang Cheng, then after a couple of coughs he suddenly
started crying out loud.
It was a reluctant sort of weeping, but also tinged with anger, resignation, and frustration.
Judging by the sound, he was giving it his all; from the beginning with simply vocalizing his
tears, and eventually grabbing hold of Gu Fei’s shoulder tightly and roaring as if he was
venting his release.
“Screw you,” Jiang Cheng said in a stuffy voice.
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered, still gently patting him. Then he turned his head and planted a
kiss on the very top of Jiang Cheng’s ear.
It was a gesture that surprised even himself, he couldn’t justify it. But Jiang Cheng didn’t
give him any time to ponder, as he turned and kissed Gu Fei directly on his lips.
The tip of his tongue, with the faintest salty taste from the tears, barged in as if looking for a
fight.
Gu Fei was caught off guard, and got knocked back a step by this somewhat feral stance.
Jiang Cheng then took advantage of this momentum and forcefully shoved him back even
more.
Gu Fei bumped into a wall behind him, and Jiang Cheng went in for another kiss.
This kiss was just as out of control as the one from the other day when Jiang Cheng was
drunk, except today he was sober. After all, there was no counterfeit alcohol involved. As a
result, everywhere his tongue went felt like a challenge to a duel.
I want to be here! I want to be there! I want this place! And I want that too!
I’m drawing a circle around this! Here, here, and there—it’s all mine!
Gu Fei wasn’t actually planning on doing anything, but after this round of crazed besieging
from Jiang Cheng, he was suddenly reminded of captain Wang Jiuri’s self-admonition letter.
On this warm Spring day where the flowers are blooming, on this glorious day when Spring
has returned to the world……
He grabbed Jiang Cheng’s arm and threw him onto the sofa next to them.
Jiang Cheng crashed hard into the sofa. Gu Fei bore down on him and lifted up Jiang Cheng’s
shirt, then rubbed the side of his body hard.
Jiang Cheng’s breathing faltered for a moment, then reached down and grabbed Gu Fei over
his pants.
“Fuck.” Gu Fei said in a lowered voice. “Why don’t you really lay into it, just fucking break
the thing why don’t you.”
Jiang Cheng chuckled a little at that, then reached out his hand decisively.
……………
After everything returned to quiet in the room, Gu Fei could hear the laughter and shouts of
the kids outside who had just finished dinner and came running out to play.
“Guess,” Jiang Cheng lay on the sofa with one foot on the ground. “How much longer will it
take before you squish me off the couch?”
“I’m not entirely on the couch myself.” Half of Gu Fei’s body was still pressed on top of Jiang
Cheng, while he kept one foot braced against the coffee table.
“Where I’m lying, I’d fall as soon as I lift my leg.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at his leg and couldn’t stop laughing.
Gu Fei didn’t laugh along. As he pushed himself up with one arm, he reached out and
touched the corner of Jiang Cheng’s eyes.
“I’m fine.” Jiang Cheng flicked his hand.
“If you want to buy bed… supplies, we’ll have to hurry.” Gu Fei kicked away the crumpled
tissues on the floor, and said as he rearranged his pants. “Any later and there’ll only be the
few stores that face the street still open, you won’t have any sort of selection to pick from.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng got up as well and went to wash his face in the bathroom.
He was a little worried when he came back out. “You should go and wash your face……”
“What,” Gu Fei asked as he walked toward the bathroom. “Are you worried your snot
rubbed off on my face?”
“I just don’t want you to ca……” Jiang Cheng had a sudden revelation in the middle of the
sentence. “No fucking way!”
“…… You didn’t.” Gu Fei went to the bathroom.
Jiang Cheng stood in the living room and sniffled. His nose was pretty clear now, so he
probably didn’t get any snot on Gu Fei’s face.
Though compared to the fact that he did such a shameless thing while fully conscious, he
was more speechless at the thought that he seemed to be more concerned with the snot
problem.
After confirming that there was in fact, no snot problem, the peculiar sense of
embarrassment finally came to the surface and hung in the air around him, and at the edge
of his consciousness.
When Gu Fei walked out of the bathroom with water droplets still clinging to his face, he
found himself almost unable to meet Gu Fei’s eyes. The way his own eyes shifted around, he
almost had the delusion that he somehow roofied Gu Fei.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei wiped his face. Then as if the awkwardness had spread to him, he grabbed
some tissue to dry his face and walked straight to the door.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng glanced at the tissues on the floor and wanted to tidy it up, but after
hesitating for a moment, felt embarrassed again. So he decided to ignore them for now and
followed Gu Fei out the door.
In this part of town, the new terrain he uncovered under Gu Fei’s guidance was not much
different from the area around Li Baoguo’s place. It was just as run down, though the
lighting situation was a marked improvement.
Under good lighting, this older area of town gave one the sense of having a rich storied
past.
Certainly, there were plenty of stories. Just Li Baoguo’s family alone, there were
many stories there. And Gu Fei… he turned to look at Gu Fei.
“It’s just up ahead.” Gu Fei said. “There’s a farmer’s market on the right side, the food there
is pretty cheap. If you want to cook for yourself, you can get groceries there.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Behind the textiles market up ahead, there’s also a clothing market, where they sell cheap
yet ugly clothes.” Gu Fei glanced back at him. “If you want to save money, you can go there.”
“…… Mhm.” Jiang Cheng laughed a little.
“And then there are the food places. After we buy your sheets and whatever else, I’ll take
you there.” Gu Fei said.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Most of the businesses in the textile market had already closed. Fortunately, all the ones
facing the street were still open. Jiang Cheng had no idea how to pick out these things, he
only knew to look at the colours.
“Let’s go with this set.” He put his hand on a four-piece set with wide stripes.
“Those ones tend to pill.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng pulled his hand back, and settled on another set. “Then this……”
“There’s no difference between these two, can’t you tell?” Gu Fei said.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng put his hand in his pocket. “Why don’t you pick out a couple for me, good
sir.”
Gu Fei grinned and rummaged around the products, then pulled out a set,
“This……”
“Too ugly.” Jiang Cheng immediately said. “Cheap, yet ugly.”
“Alright then, you can get the ones that pill.” Gu Fei started to laugh.
“Expensive, yet beautiful.”
At the end Jiang Cheng bought a set of each material. He couldn’t be bothered to look
around at the other stores, so he got his pillows and comforters at the same place.
“You’re getting just one pillow?” The female storekeeper asked.
“Ah, I’m the only one sleeping on it.” Jiang Cheng said.
“You can buy another to keep in the rotation. When you put one out to air in the sun you
can sleep on the other one.” The storekeeper said. “It’s closing time so I’ll give it to you
cheaper. Not to mention, even if there’s just one of you at the moment, doesn’t mean it’ll
always be just one of you.”
“I’m… in high school,” Jiang Cheng’s goal was still to save some money. “By the time there’s
two people, the pillow’s probably already decomposed.”
“This is a very high quality pillow!” The storekeeper held the pillow up to his face and gave
it a couple of slaps. “Check out this springiness! Not to mention, there’s lots of people who
move in together even in high school! I’ve seen quite a few myself, pairs of them coming
here to buy bedding from me.”
“I just… want one.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what else to say. Normally he would turn to Gu
Fei for help, but at the moment he was too embarrassed to even look in Gu Fei’s direction.
“His mom checks in on him all the time. He usually goes to the motel, so it’s really not
necessary to have two pillows in his room.” Gu Fei chimed in from behind him.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng swung his head around.
“Ohhhh—— is that so,” The storekeeper switched on an expression that said “no wonder”.
“Then I guess one is enough.”
Walking back to the street with the two bundles, they spent a long time just attaching
everything to the back of the bikes. They even went back to ask the storekeeper for ropes
to tie things down.
“We’re going to dinner like this?” Jiang Cheng stared at the things he bought.
“And carrying it into the restaurant?”
“I’m taking you to eat something simple,” Gu Fei got on his bike. “No need to unload the
bike.”
“…… Alright then.” Jiang Cheng also got on. “What are we eating?”
“Deep fried rice cakes,” Gu Fei said. “Very delicious.”
“You’re taking an orphan for rice cakes only?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“It’s on the same level of delicious as Wang Er Meat Pies,” Gu Fei said sincerely. “Really.”
After buying his bedding and on the way to the deep fried rice cakes, the awkwardness
Jiang Cheng had been feeling finally dissipated. As he sat down at the table in the rice cake
restaurant with Gu Fei, the repressed feeling that had made it so hard for him to breathe
over the last couple days suddenly
disappeared along with the awkwardness.
“We can see the bikes from here.” Gu Fei said after he sat down.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng checked out the restaurant, which was exceedingly small.
It was barely able to fit five tiny tables inside, but they were all low to the ground, so eating
at these tables was akin to crouching.
Including them, there were two occupied tables in here at the moment. A group of girls sat
at the other table, chatting up a storm.
Comparatively, with only him and Gu Fei sitting across from each other in silence, their
table appeared much quieter.
“I forgot to ask you,” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei. “Did Wild Boar Head bother you today?”
“Nah,” Gu Fei poured a cup of tea and set it down in front of him. “He was just making some
noise.”
Jiang Cheng took a sip of tea, “Who do you think you’re fooling?”
“I’m serious,” Gu Fei started to laugh. “Who dares to fool the genius overachiever. So smart,
even going off-script on an self-admonition letter.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, just stared at him.
Gu Fei took a sip of tea, but he was still staring. So Gu Fei extended the teacup forward and
clinked it against Jiang Cheng’s, then took another sip. Still Jiang Cheng stared.
“Ayy…” Gu Fei sighed. “It’s not a big deal, we’ll see what happens after exams.”
“He’s come to schedule a fight with you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Came to schedule a ballgame.” Gu Fei quirked a smile.
“What’s the difference between a ballgame and a fight for people like him?”
Jiang Cheng drank his tea, and after some pondering, was still kind of amazed.
“OK but, where does he get the face to come again? He played so dirty……
Damn if his face isn’t large enough to be folded up into a paper airplane.”
“Don’t worry about it, nothing’s happening at the moment. Just focus on the exams.” Gu Fei
said.
“Don’t tell me you’re worried about it affecting my exams?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“A little.” Gu Fei said.
“No need to worry,” Jiang Cheng said. “In a crappy little school like Fourth High, I can get
first place even while amnesic and running a fever. Do you want to copy me? I thought
Zhou Jing said you guys don’t switch up the seats during tests.”
“There’s no need, even a test score of zero wouldn’t stress me.” Gu Fei couldn’t stop
laughing, then finally said after a while, “Cheng-ge you’re really……”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng caught a whiff of the aroma of fried rice cakes, and turned to look
toward the kitchen.
“The most exceptional person I’ve ever met, in all my life.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng paused, then turned back around without a word.
“I’m serious.” Gu Fei said.
“You are the most un-thug-like thug I’ve ever met, in all my life.” Jiang Cheng said. “You’re a
toasty warm thug, and … rather good looking too.”
“Should I return the compliment?” Gu Fei asked.
“Not necessary,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m well aware of my own handsomeness.”
Footnotes:
[1] Protection tolls: local gangs extort regular payment from small business owners in
exchange for ‘protection’, usually from themselves, but sometimes from rival gangs ↩
[2] Original text says 床上用品 as in bedding, which… isn’t normally an
innuendo, but given the weird sexual tension between these two, it’s really easy for their
minds to veer off in a dirty direction…… ↩
[3] Lyrics from saye.mp3 for the unitiated ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6010
TL word count: 4195
TL time: 4:23:06
Edit: 1:29:40
Curse words: 5x fucks, 1x shit
TL’s Notes
Ahhhh Cheng-ge just needs to let it all out ~~
Chapter 47
【Overseen while walking past the office…… officesecretcam.avi】
The fried rice cakes really were delicious. Jiang Cheng figured Gu Fei would get full marks
when it came to finding delicious foods that would otherwise go unnoticed.
He had now cried, done the shameless deeds — even though he really shouldn’t dwell on it
too much — filled his stomach, and bought everything he needed.
When they walked out of the little rice cake shop, Jiang Cheng let out a loud burp and was
in a much better mood.
“Let’s head back.” Gu Fei glanced at the time on his phone. “Don’t you still need to study
some more?”
“Not study, but I do need to sleep.” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t tend to study in the two days
leading up to tests, mainly sleep. Regardless of whether it’s big exams or small tests.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei said. “Me too, whether it’s big exams or small tests, I mainly sleep in the year
leading up to it.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help himself, they burst into another bout of wild laughter.
He almost laughed the snot from his nose, so he hurriedly grabbed a tissue and pressed it
against his nostril, “Ah fuck.”
“Try to go to sleep early when you get back. With your cold, watch that you don’t get sleepy
in the middle of the exam tomorrow.”
“I won’t,” Jiang Cheng waved his hand. “I can write it with my eyes closed.”
“Don’t,” Gu Fei said. “That handwriting of yours, it’s illegible even with your eyes open, if
you close your eyes……”
“You shut the fuck up.” Jiang Cheng started giggling again.
The two of them slowly pedaled their bikes back to the rental apartment. Gu Fei didn’t go
up this time, only helped take the things off the bike and handed them to him, “You can call
me if you get lost again, I’ll tell you how to get back here.”
“…… I already know how to get back here.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Good night.” Gu Fei smiled and said.
“Good night.” Jiang Cheng walked the bike inside the stairwell and locked it to the railings,
then walked upstairs with all his purchases.
Even though it didn’t look that different from Li Baoguo’s place when he opened the door to
the empty apartment, the feeling is entirely different. He no longer had to trouble himself
with Li Baoguo’s mess, no longer had to pay back what he owed time after time, and no
longer had to listen to his coughing and loud roaring tirades of anger. Not to mention, he
didn’t have to worry about his door suddenly being opened.
Jiang Cheng heated up the water tank until it was almost blistering hot, then showered
himself from top to bottom. There was a hot water shower here, unlike at Li Baoguo’s
home, where he had to carry buckets of boiled water every
day…… He hadn’t even seen Li Baoguo shower, maybe he used the bathhouse.
The scalding hot water flowed from his face and neck down over his entire body.
He closed his eyes and braced against the wall, slowly relaxing his whole body.
But a short while later, he shut off the tap, quickly dried himself off, and walked out of the
bathroom.
Even though it wasn’t at all strange under these circumstances to think of Gu Fei and what
they did together, he still felt a little uncomfortable.
He often fantasized. About certain celebrities, certain graphic images he saw at random
somewhere, a scene in a certain adult video…… But having such a defined and physically
close subject of his fantasy, that was a first. No matter how he looked at it, he still felt a little
guilty.
After he got back to his bedroom and shut the door, he set up the new beddings and pillow
he had just bought. Since they were all new, he briefly considered maybe he should wash
them, but after hesitating by the bed for a long while, he ultimately decided to give up. As a
dude, he thought, he shouldn’t be overly fussy over these things.
He got on the bed, and after turning off the lights, stared into the darkness for a long time
without a thread of drowsiness.
This time it wasn’t due to Gu Fei, but because of the exams tomorrow.
The first half of this semester he had spent in almost a trance. Even though there was
nothing taught in class that he didn’t understand, and no homework he couldn’t do, but
now he was starting to get a little worried.
At the previous school, every time he relaxed, it would directly impact his grades. And now,
in an environment like the Fourth High, it was practically impossible to even find a peer
who seriously listened in class. Never mind that the tests would certainly be less difficult
than the ones he wrote before, but he was still a little worried about his potential grade.
He wasn’t going to touch a book before a test, but this time he sat back up, pulled out a
notebook from his backpack, and flipped it open.
The exam schedule at the Fourth High was different than what he knew before.
There would be two subjects in the morning, Language and Politics. He sighed.
To schedule the tests so close together like this, it wasn’t at all like the laid-back style of
Fourth High, the way they pushed back the final game of the basketball tournament to after
the exams…
He didn’t know when exactly he fell asleep. When he woke up in the morning, his
notebooks were on the floor, but he was bundled up nicely in the cover.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the time. The alarm hadn’t yet sounded, but it was about time to get
up. Turned out, his biological clock was fairly reliable in important instances.
The breakfast options near his rental flat were about the same as the ones by Li Baoguo’s
place. He ate a bowl of tofu pudding and two fried pancakes at a roadside stand, and
headed to school on his bike.
He paused when he got to the intersection, wondering whether it was necessary to call up
Gu Fei to go together. After a few seconds of hesitation, he got out his phone to call Gu Fei.
Just as he pulled up Gu Fei’s name in the contact list, he heard the sound of a whistle from
nearby. He turned, and was surprised to find that Gu Fei was right there, sitting on his bike
with one foot resting on the ground.
“Morning, overachiever.” Gu Fei waved at him.
“The fuck,” Jiang Cheng checked the time in shock. “When did you get here?”
“Only five minutes ago.” Gu Fei said. “I’m never late for tests.”
“What a miracle.” Jiang Cheng started to laugh, suddenly he was in a very good mood. For
some reason, whenever he saw Gu Fei’s smile, it felt very… intimate.
Perhaps it was because they did something together, even though neither of them would
bring it up, but nevertheless they were deskmates who shared a not so innocent experience
together……
“You’ve eaten?” Gu Fei asked.
“I just picked up something random.” Jiang Cheng said. “If you told me you were coming, I
would’ve waited for you to eat together.”
“It’s OK,” Gu Fei smiled and said. “I’ve eaten too. I just thought if you hadn’t, then I’ll wait for
you to eat.”
Everything was calm as can be on their way to school. They didn’t run into the pair of zoo
animals, probably because they already arranged the fight… no, arranged the ballgame, so
they wanted to maintain a semblance of civility.
When he entered the classroom, Jiang Cheng discovered that as idle as these people were
normally, they were still able to exhibit some stress come midterm time.
All the desks had already been pulled apart. Though the gap wasn’t that large, it still
seemed like they would be assigned a desk each.
Zhou Jing turned around as soon as he sat down, “Jiang Cheng, Jiang
Cheng……”
“If you want to look at my answers, just look on your own. If you dare to call my name like
this during the test I’ll report you for cheating immediately.” Jiang Cheng pointed a finger at
him.
“Ay! Fine fine fine……” Zhou Jing froze for a moment, then grinned so widely that his face
was practically a flower garden. “Now that’s a friend.”
“Jiang Cheng.” Someone called out to him from the left.
Jiang Cheng turned and was surprised to find Wang Xu sitting at the desk to the left of him,
“You’re sitting here?”
“This is where I sit during tests.” Wang Xu said solemnly. “Don’t block the answer sheet
with your arm, yeah?”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“And don’t flip it over once you’re done, got it?” Wang Xu continued.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng continued to answer.
“Don’t you worry about Da-Fei there, he never cheats during tests. Just focus on me,” Wang
Xu still had a solemn expression on his face. “I’m responsible for passing it on.”
“…… Got it.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then turned to look in Gu Fei’s direction. Gu Fei was
currently playing on his phone, but he turned and met Jiang Cheng’s gaze, then smiled
wordlessly.
The invigilator was a teacher from third year, a very dignified looking bespectacled middle-
aged woman. After she entered the classroom and set the test papers down, she glared at
them from left to right, then from right to left, and then backwards and forwards one more
time, before she finally cleared her throat and recited the examination rules to them.
Never before had Jiang Cheng heard such silence from the people around him.
He was almost unaccustomed to it.
After he got the test paper, Jiang Cheng first skimmed through the pages once, and found
that the difficulty level of Fourth High tests was certainly consistent with the general
Fourth High style. At least to him, this test was fairly easy.
He flipped to the composition question at the end and read through it.
Mr. Ji Xianlin once said, “Every person is striving for a perfect life. However, since the
beginning of time, whether within or outside of our borders, there has never existed a one
hundred percent perfect life. That’s why I say, imperfection is what life is about.” [1]
Based on your understanding, and relating it to reality, determine your own premise, form,
and title.
Jiang Cheng sighed quietly. This composition question was ridiculously easy, especially to
him at this moment. Nevermind 800 characters, even 8000
characters wasn’t out of the question.
He flipped the test over to the first page, and started to work through the questions with
his mind at ease.
It was still silent all around him. In a classroom that only ever heard low buzzing chatter
during class, he could now hear the sounds of pen scratching against paper. It was a most
peculiar sense of dissonance.
He glanced toward Gu Fei. Gu Fei hadn’t yet begun to write, but was instead staring at the
Reading Modern Texts page, seemingly enthralled by its content.
Jiang Cheng didn’t plan to check out how Wang Xu was doing to his left, because without
even turning his head, he could sense the intense heat of Wang Xu’s gaze, and in his
peripheral vision, the face that was turned eagerly toward him.
The two invigilators were fairly strict. They were stationed at the front and back of the
class, and constantly switched positions with each other. Judging by the frequency at which
Zhou Jing was twisting and fidgeting, Jiang Cheng guessed that he must be undergoing
major stress at this point.
Comparatively, Pan Zhi had always been very composed. He would always calmly fill out
some bullshit answers, then correct them one by one as Jiang Cheng finished writing……
Gu Fei finished reading the little Modern Texts piece, and was disappointed that it wasn’t a
story. The article was about the spirit of logic behind architecture……
It wasn’t much fun.
He flipped the test to the front, planning to ‘guesstimate’ some answers to a few familiar
questions first, and then start on the lottery. After that he would
randomly fill in some answers, then piece together some writing at the end.
The composition question didn’t place a limit on the format, and furthermore had no 800
characters quota for poetry. He decided to take advantage of this loophole, in an effort to
write as little as possible.
It was a perfectly good plan. When he started filling out the blanks on the answer sheet, he
figured his state of mind was not much different from the overachiever beside him.
Overachiever Jiang’s pen hadn’t stopped. He basically began writing out the answer as he
read through each question. When the question was longer, he didn’t pause for very long
either. If his overachiever image wasn’t too obvious during day to day classes, it was
certainly making an appearance now.
As Gu Fei finished his once-over with the familiar questions, and was just about to do a
counting rhyme for the remaining multiple choice, beside him, Jiang Cheng had just turned
the page.
As he started to randomly fill in some blanks, Jiang Cheng started on his essay.
Fuck.
Watching Jiang Cheng’s side profile, for a moment he felt that Jiang Cheng in this state was
so hot that both men and gods would hold him in contempt.
Though compared to the 800 words composition required of the overachiever, Gu Fei’s
loophole poem was much faster. He casually put together a few lines of vague sounding
sentences, and called it a day. He didn’t need to review a test paper filled out in this
manner. Even if a review was called for, it would be to roll the dice one more time, best two
out of three.
Usually, he would turn the paper in at this time, but today he didn’t budge. Jiang Cheng was
still writing his essay beside him. He wanted to see.
Jiang Cheng’s handwriting might be a work of grotesquery, but he wrote fast.
Just like the way he went off-script during the assembly, the lines of text appeared on the
page without hesitation one after the other.
Jiang Cheng had set his test paper and answer card by the corner of his desk. On the other
side, Wang Xu was fervently copying down the answers, but when it came to fill in the
blank questions he still had to crane his neck sometimes in an effort to see better. It looked
strenuous. Zhou Jing wasn’t having an easy time of it either. With handwriting like Jiang
Cheng’s, it was difficult to make out even right side up, but trying to read it upside down
was akin to deciphering the word of the gods.
Though it was still a much better situation than before; the students who got good grades
in their class usually sat near the front of the room. People like them who sat at the back
didn’t even have someone to copy from.
Half an hour before the end time, Jiang Cheng the overachiever who wrote like the wind,
finished his essay at last. Apparently he didn’t need to check his work either. He took a
glance all around, and looked as though he wanted to turn his answers in.
Beside him, Wang Xu suddenly became frantic. He said in a lowered voice,
“Don’t rush!”
Jiang Cheng let out a sigh, and started to space out at his desk.
After spending some time spacing out he turned around, and once his eyes made contact
with Gu Fei’s he mouthed a question, “You’re done?”
Gu Fei nodded.
Then lifted up his composition page so Jiang Cheng could see.
Jiang Cheng first froze, then turned and started laughing at his test paper.
It was a very suppressed laugh. He wanted to laugh out loud, but dared not make a sound.
He even had to press a tissue against his nose to prevent snot from coming out. Gu Fei
wasn’t planning on laughing, but simply seeing him like this, he couldn’t hold it in either.
Jiang Cheng ended up laughing so hard he had a coughing fit, which finally put a pause to
his hysteria
Gu Fei got up and handed in his test, then left the classroom and went downstairs. They had
another exam soon, he wanted to stretch a little before it started. It was hard for him to sit
still for even 40 minutes of class, so suffering through the duration of an exam was
especially painful.
Soon after, Jiang Cheng also made his way downstairs. He was a little surprised,
“You handed in your test?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “The teacher was standing right next to Wang Xu, and I figured
he was pretty much done copying everything, so I handed mine in…… Were those lyrics or
poetry that you were writing?”
“A poem.” Gu Fei said, and sauntered slowly toward the staff washroom.
“Fuck, you really are thickskinned huh,” Jiang Cheng walked with him and said quietly. “Do
you write poems every time the form isn’t specified?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei chuckled. “I’ve done it three times already. The first time around Lao-Xu and
the other teachers even held a discussion about how many points I should get for it.”
“That talent.” Jiang Cheng tutted at him. “What did you write, let me hear a few lines?”
“It’s so stunning that I’m embarrassed to say it out loud.” Gu Fei said.
When they arrived at the remote corner by the washroom, he pulled out a pack of
cigarettes and glanced at Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng shook his head, so he lit one up for
himself.
“The lyrics you wrote were pretty evocative,” Jiang Cheng said. “You really can’t recite a
couple of lines for me?”
“That crappy poem was just to get it over with.” Gu Fei said. “If I get a chance to write some
new lyrics in the future, then I’ll show it to you.”
“Alright then,” Jiang Cheng sat down on the steps. “I guess the young man is shy.”
Probably since there was no one to copy from, Wang Xu and the others also handed in their
papers early. The first thing they did when they came downstairs was to survey their
surroundings, then started to make their way over after spotting Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng.
“Bin ah,” Wang Xu pulled out 50 yuan and handed it to Lu Xiaobin. “Go buy some snacks
and drinks to give our overachiever here some nourishment.”
“Sure thing.” Lu Xiaobin took the money and immediately started jogging
toward the concession stand.
“Weirdo.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What a friend, such generosity!” Wang Xu clamped his fist at him. “I shouldn’t have a
problem passing this one, maybe I’ll even rise up in the ranks.”
“Fuck me I’ve never done so well on a test!” Zhou Jing marvelled. “But I’m just saying Jiang
Cheng, that handwriting of yours… really is the best anti-cheating mechanism. Good thing I
have excellent eyesight and extensive experience. Hey, when the teachers mark your tests,
do you think they’d take points off because they can’t understand what the hell you wrote?”
“I get points deducted all the time because of my handwriting.” Jiang Cheng said.
They all fell into each other in a fit of giggles.
The classroom nearby hadn’t finished their test yet. The invigilator came out and pointed at
them, so they shifted closer to the washroom, and sat down around the stone table outside.
“I’ve never understood this,” Wang Xu said. “Why did they put a set of tables and chairs
outside the washroom door?”
“This is nothing,” Jiang Cheng glanced at Lu Xiaobin, who had just returned carrying a bag
of snacks and drinks. “When there are people who sit down to eat at the table outside the
washroom.”
Again, the bunch of them giggled like idiots. The teacher bolted out of the classroom once
more and chased them off to the edge of the field.
The next exam is on Politics. Ten minutes before the test started, Lao-Xu ran over with the
wind at his side and called out to him, “Jiang Cheng!”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked toward him.
“How do you feel?” Lao-Xu asked.
“Pretty good, the questions aren’t hard.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What about the writing?” Lao-Xu asked again.
“It’s pretty easy when the form isn’t specified.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“I knew you wouldn’t have a problem.” Lao-Xu’s eyes were practically glowing.
“This time we can trample Class-2 for sure. In the past it’s always been that little girl in
their class going back and forth with our Yi Jing for the first place. This time it’d probably
go to you no problem!”
“I guess.” Jiang Cheng wanted to say that they had only finished one subject.
But considering that this was Fourth High… he really could be pleased with himself for
once.
The Politics exam was a little more annoying. The multiple choice had been fairly simple
guesswork, but the short answers were practically calling for his life. Gu Fei could barely
get anything down, but out of habit, he managed to fill in all the blanks. On the short answer
questions he should at least put down three lines of text per question… that was the
challenging part, it asked a lot of his ability to make stuff up.
Especially when he got to a question worth 14 points that asked them to discuss the
significance of culture-building events in school settings, while incorporating examples
from the Fourth High…… Gu Fei stole a glance toward Jiang Cheng,
and saw that the overachiever was in the same state as when he wrote the Language exam,
resolutely laying down his atrocious handwriting one swift and ugly row at a time.
Overachievers really were fantastical creatures……
Politics weren’t as easy to copy. Wang Xu and Zhou Jing gave up on writing the short
answer questions after they finished copying down the multiple choice.
Compared to deciphering Jiang Cheng’s handwriting, it was probably easier to find ways to
hide answers in their desks, sleeves, and pants.
Jiang Cheng turned in his test early again. Gu Fei figured showing off was probably the
norm for this kid. He took some time to observe during his boredom, Jiang Cheng and Yi
Jing both finished writing at about the same time.
But while Yi Jing was still checking over all her answers and making changes, Jiang Cheng
had already turned in his paper.
Once he turned his test in, the bunch of them who couldn’t come up with an answer and
had lost their source, along with Gu Fei who had finished making shit up, all turned in their
tests as well.
None of them went home at lunch time. Wang Xu was in a persistent state of excitement,
perhaps because he was still caught up in the excitement from all the copying he did in the
morning. He dragged them all to a feast of meat pies.
“Math in the afternoon,” Wang Xu said as he munched on a meat pie. “We’re looking to you,
oh gifted one!”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng lit a cigarette and pushed open the window next to him. He usually
didn’t have much of an appetite after tests.
“Da-Fei, you really aren’t gonna get in on the action?” Wang Xu asked Gu Fei again. “It’s a
free for all, I’ve honestly never encountered such an easy-going overachiever!”
“If you yell any louder, your mom will come and make you into pie filling.” Gu Fei said.
“You really aren’t gonna?” Wang Xu lowered his voice.
“Nah,” Gu Fei said. “You guys do it so you can report a passing grade, it’s not like I have to
report back to anyone.”
Nobody else thought much of what Gu Fei just said, but when Jiang Cheng heard it he
suddenly felt a little sad.
Just as everyone else was busy eating and chatting away, he shifted a little closer to Gu Fei
and asked quietly, “Will you be able to pass the final exams?”
Gu Fei peered at him and laughed, “Just about. My luck hasn’t been too bad so far, I solve
everything through the dice rolls.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng responded and didn’t say anything else. He suddenly felt a little
suffocated, but couldn’t tell whether it was real or in his mind.
He couldn’t stop feeling that there was something not entirely right about Gu Fei’s attitude,
perhaps it was a difference in environment. But even someone unreliable like Pan Zhi
would clench his jaw and put up an act to cram for a few days before a final exam. The way
Gu Fei appeared to have given up entirely, made him a little anxious for some reason.
But what was he anxious about? Gu Fei didn’t have parents at home waiting to
see how his grades were, and didn’t seem to have a valid reason to achieve good grades so
as to get into a good university……
“Stop worrying about me,” Gu Fei gently nudged him with his leg under the table. “I’m just
loafing for a high school diploma.”
“But,” Jiang Cheng squished his brows together. “If you’re just here for a high school
diploma, why don’t you go to a technical collegiate or something instead, isn’t a certificate
from there more useful than a public high school like the Fourth High?”
“That’s a long story,” Gu Fei gave him a smile. “I’ll tell you about it some other time.”
The two tightly packed days of midterm exams was finally over. According to Gu Fei’s
observation and Jiang Cheng’s own undisguised smugness, he could just about figure out
Jiang Cheng’s grades. Yi Jing had gained another competitor for the first place in their year.
“Your questions here are way too easy.” Jiang Cheng had said this at least three times over
the last two days.
Though when Lao-Xu barged into the classroom first thing in the morning, the utter elation
on his face was still a surprise. Gu Fei studied Lao-Xu. If Jiang Cheng simply scored similar
to Yi Jing, Lao-Xu probably wouldn’t be this excited.
“Everyone, everyone!” Lao-Xu stood at the lectern. “I have good news to tell you!”
The roomful of students collectively responded with a lazy round of applause.
“The individual teachers of each subject will probably tell you during their class later, but I
wanted to be the first.” Lao-Xu waved his arm around. “This time we have three perfect
scores in our class!”
This was certainly surprising news. The room immediately broke into excited buzz, more
than a few pairs of eyes converged on Jiang Cheng.
“Ay…” Jiang Cheng was still unaccustomed to being stared at like this, he slouched over his
desk and let out a sigh.
“Can you guess who it is? And which three subjects?” Lao-Xu eagerly played up the
suspense, but didn’t leave much room for them to guess before he announced the answer
right away. “It’s your classmate Jiang Cheng! Math! English!
Geography! All full marks!”
“Holy shit ——” The whole class erupted in chaos, as everyone started shouting at the same
time.
“Fuck yo!” Zhou Jing turned around and thumped his desk hard. “Jiang Cheng!
You the man! You really are the man!”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Sit properly.” Gu Fei gave Zhou Jing a look.
“Damn impressive!” Zhou Jing said again, then turned and sat back in his seat.
Then a second later turned again. “Very impressive!”
Lao-Xu was still talking animatedly at the front of the room. Gu Fei slouched over the desk
as well and peered at Jiang Cheng, “The ranking should be out too, wanna go ask in a bit?”
“Nope,” Jiang Cheng said. “There’s no point. Honestly it’s only a midterm exam, not to
mention your questions here really are easy. I’ve never gotten full marks in Geography
before.”
“Then I’ll go ask.” Gu Fei said.
“What the hell are you so excited about.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I will ask about it very calmly.” Gu Fei said as he stuffed a candy in his mouth.
Gu Fei left as soon as class ended, and walked into the staff office right on Lao-Xu’s heels.
“Xu-zong.” He called out.
“What are you doing here.” Lao-Xu looked at him, then handed him a can of Red Bull. “Here,
you drink this. Teacher Lu just came and handed out a can each, it’s too sweet.”
“Has the ranking by year been published yet?” Gu Fei took the Red Bull and asked.
“Why do you care? Not like you’re one of the first hundred names, not even counting from
the end.” Lao-Xu said.
“The first place is Jiang Cheng right?” Gu Fei smiled and said.
At the mention of this, Lao-Xu once again became delighted. He stood up and walked to one
of the vacant desks in the office and beckoned at him, “Come see.”
Gu Fei pulled out his phone as he walked toward him.
There was a very large piece of red paper on the desk. Lao-Xu had excellent calligraphy
writing. He wrote the grade rankings every year, and posted them out, as part of the
school’s ‘culture-building’.
Gu Fei saw at a glance the first name in the rank, Jiang Cheng.
“So it’s Jiang Cheng?” He quickly lifted up his phone and snapped at the page, then turned
and walked out of the office. “Xu-zong you continue writing.”
After he walked out of Lao-Xu’s office, Gu Fei immediately opened up the Fourth High
forum and made a post with his side account, including the photo he had just taken.
【Overseen while walking past the office…… officesecretcam.avi】
– hotness_overload [2]
Footnotes:
[1] Ji Xianlin: a prominent Chinese Indologist, linguist, paleographer, historian and writer
of the twentieth century ↩
[2] Gu Fei’s side account username: 帅炸苍穹
帅：handsome/hot
炸：explode/combust
苍穹：sky/heaven/expanse
Literal meaning: so handsome he blew up the sky ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6827
TL word count: 4968
TL time: 5:30:49
Edit: 0:49:17
Curse words: 7x fucks, 3x shit
TL’s Notes
Happy birthday to Gu Fei~!!! I’ve been too busy, but at least managed to get a chapter out for
today orz (will prob edit more later)
As for the username, y’all don’t wanna know how bad the alternative versions were lol, thanks
to Suika for her input on the final version XD

Chapter 48
“If this isn’t you, I will start livestreaming a shit-eating mukbang right this second.”
When Gu Fei got back to the classroom, the bell had already rung. As he sat down in his
seat, Jiang Cheng was half folded over his desk, peering at him.
“There’s no surprise, as expected.” Gu Fei said. “First place.”
“You really went and asked?” Jiang Cheng was a little baffled.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded. “Very calmly.”
Jiang Cheng started to laugh and didn’t reply.
“But I didn’t ask how much the total was,” Gu Fei said. “We can add it up after it’s published
today, I feel like……”
He looked up and glanced in Yi Jing’s direction, “Her highness the class leader might be
pretty far off.”
“Is she second place?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei said. “She tends to be either first or second place, but has never gotten a
perfect score. She’s our genius overachiever of Fourth High, but she’s no match against
someone like you from a key high school in the big city.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply.
Pan Zhi had just sent him an email and attached the scanned test papers from their
midterm exams this year. He had briefly skimmed over the English test, the difficulty of
which was not just a one or two levels higher than that from Fourth High. He suddenly felt a
little uneasy, and made a mental note to work through this set of tests after school to see
where he was at.
– My mom agreed to let me visit you for May 1st, prepare to receive me [1]
Pan Zhi had sent him another message.
– OK, you don’t have to stay at a hotel this time, I’ve moved out
– Fucking what? What’s going on
– I’ll explain in person
– Alright then, Lao-Yuan wrote a letter to you, I’ll bring it with me
– ……
– He just sighs whenever he mentions you
Jiang Cheng put the phone back in his pocket, and somehow felt like sighing too.
Lao-Yuan was his old head teacher, a pretty good guy too. He wasn’t in the best of moods
when he left, so he never went to say goodbye to Lao-Yuan, and never contacted him again
either.
Aside from Pan Zhi, he hadn’t felt like contacting any of his family, teachers, old classmates,
or friends. He was afraid of being asked how he was, afraid of hearing words of sympathy,
and afraid of recalling the past through these people.
During the last period of the morning, there was a small commotion in the classroom.
There were still two subjects that haven’t revealed the scores because they didn’t get to
have the classes yet, but somebody already got their hands on the total score.
“The fuck?” Zhou Jing clutched his phone and turned around. “Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng,
Jiang……”
“Have you really never gotten beat up before for being a repetitive machine?”
Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Have you guys checked the forum?!” Zhou Jing peered at him, then glanced at Gu Fei, then
moved his gaze back to his face. “Someone made a post, you’re the top of our year!”
Zhou Jing’s deskmate also turned around, “Your total score is upward of 680!
That’s almost 100 points higher than Yi Jing! She’s 599!”
“Fuck yeah! 686!” Zhou Jing’s eyes were practically coming out of his face. “I don’t think
there’s ever been such a high total score in the history of the Fourth High! Fuck yeah Jiang
Cheng, you really are the man!”
Jiang Cheng was a little surprised himself. In the past he’d simply been in the top ten of his
year, with some occasional shifting up or down. If he fell out of the top five, Lao-Yuan
would call him in for a talking-to. He had gotten first place before too, but never with such a
big gap from the second place……
This news didn’t excite him, but rather made him a little anxious. Judging by the current
circumstances, it wouldn’t be hard to take first place in every test thereafter, but exactly
how much was this first place worth?
Though when school let out at lunch time, and Wang Xu and the others gathered around
him eagerly as if they were the ones who got top of their year with a gap of more than 80
points from the second place, Jiang Cheng had no energy to spare to worry.
The group of them first squeezed to the front of the crowd that was gathered around the
bulletin board, where the red notice list was posted. The first and second place of their year
were both from Class-8. These were all slacker students, but even slacker students were
proud of this achievement. After all, they were slacker students with a sense of collective
honour.
“I think this is still not scientific enough,” Guo Xu said. “They should post up the total scores
too. Just the placements aren’t enough to demonstrate Jiang Cheng’s epicness.”
“I think it’s enough,” Wang Xu quickly said. “We don’t have to step on the second place to
cheer for the first.”
“Right,” Lu Xiaobin said. “After all, the second place is Yi Jing.”
Wang Xu gave him a deathly glare, but didn’t say anything.
After they finished ogling at the notice, they walked out of the school gates together. In a
few days was the final game of the basketball tournament, Wang Xu wanted to drag them to
practice some more in the nearby technical college.
“Damn, who posted this?” Wang Xu stared at his phone while walking. “This was taken in
the staff office, Lao-Xu hadn’t even finished writing the red notice when this photo was
taken……”
“I wonder who it was that passed by,” Guo Xu said. “I don’t believe for a second that it’s just
an accident. So many girls have their eyes on Jiang Cheng right now, it must’ve been an
intentional visit.”
“But this username can’t possibly be a girl,” One of their substitute players chimed in.
“Could it be an enemy trying to stir up trouble?”
Jiang Cheng stared at this substitute for almost two minutes before remembering his name
was Zhang Yuan.
Zhang Yuan’s words piqued his curiosity. He finally couldn’t resist, and also pulled out his
phone to open up the Fourth High forums.
At first glance, he noticed the ‘hot’ post at the very top of the page… What the fuck is this
“officesecretcam”? Not to mention the “.avi”?
Before he even opened up the thread, he swept his gaze over the poster’s username, and
immediately swung his head around to stare at Gu Fei, who was walking at the very back of
the group.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei looked at him with an absolutely stoic expression.
“This is your fucking side account isn’t it? Mr. Freestyle_Handsome?” Jiang Cheng asked in a
low voice.
“Who?” Gu Fei’s face was a picture of innocent confusion.
“Hotness_Overload,” Jiang Cheng was thoroughly impressed with Gu Fei’s naming skills. “If
this isn’t you, I will start livestreaming a shit-eating mukbang right this second.”
“Don’t,” Gu Fei laughed. “For the sake of you not having to eat shit, even if it isn’t me, I’ll
have to admit it’s me.”
“It fucking has to be you.” Jiang Cheng looked again at the time the photo was posted. “After
the first period, you went to talk to Lao-Xu. Did you even come out of the office when you
posted this?”
“I did.” Gu Fei said.
“What…” Jiang Cheng found the whole thing very hard to comprehend. “I mean, what are
you doing this for?”
“Just showing off,” Gu Fei said quietly, looking at the group walking in front of them. “It’s
not like I have much to show off normally, so I’m seizing this opportunity to show off my
desk-mate.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him without a word.
For some reason, when Gu Fei said show off his desk-mate, the phrase was extremely
satisfying to his ears; it came with a faint sense of intimacy.
It wasn’t very far to the technical college from their school. They grabbed something to eat
on the way, and used the rest of the distance to walk it off.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei stayed at the back of the group the entire time, neither of them
speaking. They watched the group of people in front of them, who were all excited and
relaxed now that the exams were over and who all got not-so-bad scores because of Jiang
Cheng’s answers.
The days were warmer now, Jiang Cheng wore only a T-shirt with a thin jacket on top. As
he walked shoulder to shoulder with Gu Fei, their arms occasionally touched. This
accidental contact that all of a sudden became clearer to him was also very enjoyable.
He couldn’t pinpoint what exactly it was, but simply found it very pleasant.
Over the length of the street, subconsciously or not, he knocked into Gu Fei’s arm
numerous times. He was beginning to think there was something wrong with himself.
When they got to a turn in the road, Gu Fei all of a sudden knocked against his arm.
He turned to look at Gu Fei, and found that Gu Fei was also looking at him. Gu Fei then
bumped his arm again.
“What do you want?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m vindictive as hell.” Gu Fei said.
“But I’m not bumping into you on purpose.” Immediately after he said that, Jiang Cheng felt
a sudden wave of embarrassment.
“I’m doing it on purpose.” Gu Fei smiled, then lifted his arm to bump into him again.
“You’re still going?” Jiang Cheng felt like laughing, so he returned the bump.
Gu Fei bumped him right back.
“Wha…” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help it. “How old are you exactly?”
“Either way I’m younger than you.” Gu Fei said as he bumped him again.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng was speechless, and jabbed him with an elbow.
Gu Fei swiftly returned the jab.
He bumped again.
Again, Gu Fei returned the bump.
Are we idiots?
Dumb?
Animal feed got into our brains?
One by one these fly-by comments flitted across Jiang Cheng’s mind, but that didn’t stop his
movements. He and Gu Fei continued to bump into each other the whole way there.
There wasn’t much time at lunch, so they didn’t split into two proper teams for practice,
only focused primarily on teamwork. Wang Xu the captain was a slightly more capable
leader than before; he could at least perceive everyone’s weaknesses, and when handing
out training exercises, did not devolve to giving out random orders.
“I’ve thought about it a lot over these last couple of days,” Wang Xu said. “I really think we
should be mentally prepared. I’ve watched videos of Class-2’s games many times; it might
be a little difficult to win against them.”
“Just giving our all is enough.” Jiang Cheng was crouching by the edge of the
court. “At this point, our goal is not to win first place.”
“What is our goal?” Wang Xu asked.
“…… To not get cavities.” Jiang Cheng started giggling midway through the sentence. [2]
Then everyone else started laughing and couldn’t stop.
“We never thought about getting first place from the start,” Jiang Cheng continued after he
finished laughing. “We just wanted to be the dark horse in the race.”
“That’s right!” Wang Xu waved his hand. “And now we’ve already become the dark horse!”
Jiang Cheng gave him a thumbs up, “And now, we just need to give our all, and that’s
enough. The outcome no longer matters.”
Gu Fei’s phone rang in his pocket. He tossed out the ball in his hands and landed it in the
basket.
When he pulled his phone out, he was surprised to see Monkey’s name on the call display.
Just as he had told Jiang Bin, he didn’t have much of a relationship with Monkey. Though he
had his number, they didn’t usually contact each other. Now that Monkey had called him
directly, he figured this time he really wasn’t going to let it blow over.
“Hello.” He answered as he walked away to the side.
“You guys left pretty early today huh,” Monkey’s voice came through the receiver. “We went
to the school but missed you there.”
“What,” Gu Fei frowned. “Are you trying to get our classmates in on it too?”
“That’s not necessary,” Monkey chuckled, “I don’t usually make trouble with students. I was
just coming to invite you and that Jiang Cheng boy over to play.
You two have big renown, of course I must go in person.”
“When.” Gu Fei asked.
“This afternoon,” Monkey said. “I’ll be waiting for you two at the usual spot.
Aside from that Jiang Cheng, it’s up to you to bring whoever you want to help out. Am I
being sincere enough?”
Gu Fei turned and directed a glance toward Jiang Cheng, and saw that Jiang Cheng was
looking his way as well.
“Alright.” Gu Fei said. “Jiang Bin has to be there, I want to get it done in one go today.”
“No problem.” Monkey said and hung up.
Gu Fei texted Li Yan a message, telling him to call up the other guys, then set an alarm on
his phone. After that he kept his head down and stared at the screen for some time. He only
put the phone back in his pocket after the screen had turned dark, then he headed back to
the court.
Wang Xu and the other guys were in full swing with their training, nobody noticed him. All
except for Jiang Cheng, who walked over and stood in front of him, “Who was that?”
“Monkey.” Gu Fei said.
“It’s arranged?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded. “It’ll be after our final game.”
Jiang Cheng considered it briefly, “Who else aside from us two?”
“Li Yan, Liu Fan, and the other guys.” Gu Fei said. “Our group often played basketball with
them, we’re all familiar with their moves.”
“This actually doesn’t have much to do with you, does it?” Jiang Cheng said after a few
seconds of quiet.
“Doesn’t have much to do with anyone.” Gu Fei crouched down and rested his arms on his
knees. “The fact that Class-7 got Jiang Bin to help is already looking for trouble. Since they
got him here, the guy can’t possibly take a loss, especially a loss on the court.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply, and after a while also squatted down in front of him, holding his
gaze, “If they attempt any more tricks during the game, we’ll just put up with it.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei nodded.
“At most we’ll take a few light injuries,” Jiang Cheng said. “Better than to have it go on and
on.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei continued nodding.
“I’m finding it a little off that you’re being so obliging?” Jiang Cheng stared at his face.
“I’m just agreeing to everything first.” Gu Fei quirked a smile.
“Do not take this on for me again.” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m serious, otherwise there’s no end
to it.”
“Got it.” Gu Fei nodded.
Neither of them spoke, just looked at each other in silence for a moment.
Gu Fei felt something flying at him from one side, and right after, heard Wang Xu’s shouts.
A ball. One had to wonder what kind of move it would require to pass the ball to this corner
of the court, where there was obviously no one to receive it. Gu Fei sighed.
He was about to lift up a hand to block it, but Jiang Cheng already turned and caught the
ball for him.
“This reflex of yours.” Gu Fei marvelled as he laughed.
Jiang Cheng passed the ball back to Wang Xu, then stood up and clapped his hands together
as he got ready to join their practice. After a few steps he paused again, and turned to look
at Gu Fei, “Don’t you go by yourself.”
“I know I know.” Gu Fei waved his hand somewhat exasperatedly.
They spent the whole lunchtime practicing, and still felt the urge to keep going even when
the time was up.
“I do think basketball is quite fun.” Zhang Yuan said. He was only a substitute player, but
over the course of this tournament and the two instances when he actually played, he still
grew to become very excited about the game.
“After the tournament we can still play on our own. We can get in some practice on the side,
then compete again next semester.” Wang Xu slung his jacket over his shoulder, and said
with a flourish.
Everyone nodded in agreement.
“You can also take some time to teach the girls too,” Jiang Cheng said. “This way they won’t
just come out for a one-day walking tour next time.”
“That’s right!” Wang Xu’s eyes suddenly brightened. “I think Yi Jing and the others rather
liked playing, they just don’t have anyone to teach them……”
When they almost reached the school gates, Gu Fei’s cell phone rang. He answered, “What is
it? Oh…… I forgot, now is good, I’ll head back right now.”
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng asked immediately.
“I have to take Er-Miao to get her physical examination this afternoon. I made an
appointment with the doctor a while ago, but forgot.” Gu Fei said quietly.
“Cheng-ge, tell Lao-Xu for me will you? Otherwise he’s gonna bombard my phone again
with calls.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Should I tell him the truth?”
“Tell him the truth.” Gu Fei smiled.
Gu Fei watched as Jiang Cheng and the other guys walked into the school together, then
went to get his bike from the parking shed, and rode back to the convenience store.
Liu Fan’s crappy little Benben was already parked outside the store. [3]
He opened the car door and peered inside, “Is this car even operational?”
There were four people squeezed into the backseat. Three of the ‘Not A Good Bird’ and Li
Yan, who had to sit on Luo Yu’s lap.
“Hurry up,” Li Yan said. “I’m stuck in horse-stance here.” [4]
“Just put all your weight on me, I won’t be repulsed by you.” Luo Yu said.
“I’m repulsed by you.” Li Yan said.
Gu Fei sighed and got in the car.
“You didn’t bring Jiang Cheng?” Liu Fan started the car.
“Can you stuff another person into this car?” Li Yan said. “He can make his own way over.”
“I didn’t tell him.” Gu Fei said.
Everyone in the car suddenly became very quiet. Liu Fan turned the car around, then gave
him a look, but didn’t say anything.
There was a long bout of silence, then Li Yan finally said in a very quiet voice,
“Fuck.”
The “usual place” that Monkey talked about was an old outdoors basketball court. It was
remote, so not many people went there, not that normal people would go. It was occupied
year round by delinquents of all generations, no normal people in their right mind would
come here looking for trouble.
After Liu Fan parked the car, Gu Fei didn’t hurry to get off. He looked at the two concrete
courts in front of him surrounded by tattered old wire fencing. Every time he came here, he
got a feeling that he was walking into a place of high
walls. [5]
None of the guys in the car moved either. They all watched him.
“Regarding this matter,” Gu Fei said. “It’ll be fine if I take it all upon myself, you guys……”
“What kind of bullshit are you farting out, I fucking thought you were about to make some
kind of pre-battle inspirational speech.” Liu Fan opened the car door.
“If Monkey is coming after you, he’s coming after all of us. If it’s obviously a fight you can
maybe call it a one-on-one, but he set up a game, that’s clearly counting all of us in there.
The fuck you take it on for.”
“Come on.” Li Yan clapped his shoulder.
There were quite a few people gathered on the courts already. Gu Fei had a cursory look
around, and found that he recognized most of them. Normally, nobody would come here to
play a proper game, mostly just casual pickups. Or even just hang around here without
playing, chatting to each other if the mood suited them, otherwise turning to fists.
Whether it was a game or a fight, the crowd was riled up just the same.
Monkey and Jiang Bin were already standing on the edge of the court. Monkey was leaning
against the wire fencing with a cigarette in his mouth. As they entered, he tipped his chin at
them.
Monkey wouldn’t be coming on to play. He didn’t like to play basketball, but he had to be
here. Even if this wasn’t his younger cousin and underling’s game, just from the fact that
he’d been waiting for an opportunity to take care of Gu Fei, he had to be at this game.
Gu Fei didn’t think that he was coming from some place of greatness, to want to shoulder
this on Jiang Cheng’s behalf. He simply figured that this time, the conflict between Monkey
and him had become unavoidable, so he might as well resolve it once and for all. He would
rather not drag Jiang Cheng into this lowly and meaningless feud.
“Pick your players, then get on the court.” Monkey looked at Gu Fei. “Half an hour, the team
that scores the highest wins.”
“Rules?” Gu Fei took off his jacket.
“None.” Monkey said.
Gu Fei said nothing more. He turned and walked to the side with Li Yan and the others, “Li
Yan doesn’t go on, the five of us will play. Li Yan, you keep an eye on their guys.”
“Mhm.” Li Yan folded his arms.
Since this kind of game had no rules, then naturally anything goes. If they didn’t leave
someone to keep an eye on things from the side, it would be hard for the players on the
court to attend to everything.
“Da-Fei,” Up on the bleachers, somebody leaned on the railing and called out to Gu Fei.
“Need some help?”
Gu Fei turned around, it was a couple of familiar faces they used to play ball with. He shook
his head, “No rules today.”
The other guys nodded and didn’t say anything else.
If it was a normal game, even if it wasn’t entirely clean, there would still be general rules to
follow. In that case it wouldn’t be a problem if others wanted to join in and play. But once
the game dropped the rules, then everyone knew exactly what kind of game this was.
There were five players on Jiang Bin’s side, all people they had played with in the past.
They all roughly knew the skills of everyone on either side, but for a game like this, nobody
could say for sure. After all, they never went head to head in a group brawl before.
The guys on their side all had things stuffed in their wrist bracers. But Gu Fei didn’t. He
wasn’t accustomed to the usage of tools under these circumstances. If they really were to
get physical, he would much rather use his fists.
At the notion of which, a rather amusing thought suddenly popped into his head.
If Jiang Cheng was here, he could actually arrange for him to not come on the court. He only
needed to find a place to hang out on the bleachers with his slingshot……
Gu Fei was amused by his own mental image. He put his head down and let out a couple of
giggles.
“Hey,” Li Yan looked at him. “Be a little more serious, we’re fighting here.”
“Understood.” Gu Fei let out another couple of giggles before turning to go on the court.
Jiang Cheng was folded over his desk. At the front of the room, Lao-Lu was in the middle of
a passionate lecture. Since the afternoon’s classes were of the main subjects, the whole
roomful of people exhibited very little signs of life, even the chatterers were quiet.
Conversely, Lao-Lu was actually more animated than usual, perhaps because Jiang Cheng’s
perfect score put him in a cheerful mood. They were already halfway through the class, and
he still hadn’t started with his usual tirade.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t listening either. He was looking down at his phone, at the tests that Pan
Zhi had sent him. He began answering the questions when class started, and it was now 20
minutes in. His answering speed was noticeably slower than when writing the Fourth High
midterms.
During recess, he didn’t stop as he continued to sit flopped over his desk, answering the
questions all the way through the self-study period.
When he finished the whole test, he took a picture of the answers and sent it to Pan Zhi,
asking him to bring it to his English teacher to check.
He was actually not in the best state of mind this afternoon. It wasn’t because he was tired
from the practice at lunch, nor was it from poor sleep the night before.
He looked at Gu Fei’s empty seat beside him. It was because of Gu Fei.
For some reason, since after he went to Lao-Xu to ask for leave for Gu Fei, he had been
feeling a weird sense of unease. Currently he was flopped over his desk again, repeatedly
going over in his mind Gu Fei’s actions from when he got the call during practice to when
he went home afterwards, scrutinizing every little detail.
There didn’t seem to be any issue. Everything appeared normal. But still, he couldn’t get rid
of the nagging feeling that left him ungrounded.
He mulled over it restlessly for a long time, then finally couldn’t stand it anymore. Before
the period was even over, he took out his phone and called Gu Fei’s number, skipping over
the messaging option altogether.
Gu Fei had certainly been rough in the way he took care of Gu Miao, but to forget an
appointment with the doctor? At this moment, he just didn’t buy that.
The call connected, which means Gu Fei didn’t turn his phone off.
However, nobody picked up either. The ringing continued until it hung up automatically at
the end. Gu Fei didn’t answer the phone.
Jiang Cheng frowned and called again.
Still nobody picked up.
“Fuck.” All of a sudden it was impossible for him to sit still any longer.
Footnotes:
[1] May 1st is a national holiday in China: Labour Day. It usually extends past just the one
day, depending on its proximity to the weekend. ↩

[2] “What is our goal? To have no cavities!” is a slogan from a toothpaste commercial for
kids hahaha ↩
[3] Benben: A cheap Chinese car brand ↩
[4] Horse-stance: a common posture in Asian martial arts and takes its name from the
position assumed when riding a horse. ↩
[5] A place of high walls: alludes to prison ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6052
TL word count: 4405
TL time: 4:55:48
Edit: 1:22:16
Curse words: 12x fucks, 3x shit
TL’s Notes
It’s about to go downnnnn ＼(º □ º l|l)/

First posted: September 6, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 49
“Look at this mess, if I didn’t know any better I would’ve thought somebody had given you
a good whipping.”
Jiang Bin stood at the edge of the court with his arms crossed. Gu Fei and his team were
already standing in the center of the court, but Jiang Bin made no indication that he was
coming over.
“The motherfucker must be waiting for Jiang Cheng.” Liu Fan said.
Gu Fei turned to look at Jiang Bin, but still he stood there unmoving.
“Are we playing or not?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Bin scoffed and looked down at his black knuckledusters, then finally glanced up after
a long pause, “And Jiang Cheng?”
“Just add his debt on top of mine.” Gu Fei said. He figured that without seeing Jiang Cheng in
person, Jiang Bin wouldn’t agree to start so easily. He had been considering how to solve
this dilemma, but upon seeing the knuckleduster on Jiang Bin’s fingers, he knew how this
could be settled.
The knuckleduster belonged to Monkey. The fact that Monkey gave it to Jiang Bin meant
that the conflict between him and Monkey would also come to some kind of closure today.
And though Monkey seemed to be standing up for Jiang Bin, it was only an excuse;
Monkey’s target wasn’t Jiang Cheng, it was him.
This way, it was a much simpler matter.
“Add it to yours?” Jiang Bin started laughing. “How come I’ve never heard of you taking in a
lackey?”
“It’s not your first day following Monkey around,” Gu Fei said steadily as he readjusted his
bracer. “How is it that none of his hardiness rubbed off on you?”
“Fucking say that one more time!” Jiang Bin was suddenly incensed, as he uncrossed his
arms and came over to him in two long strides, and practically jabbed his finger into Gu
Fei’s face.
“There’s winners and losers in every competition. If you want to play the game, then don’t
be a sore loser. Hasn’t your cousin ever taught you that?” Gu Fei threw a glance in Monkey’s
direction. Monkey stood there watching them wordlessly with a cigarette in his mouth. Gu
Fei turned back to Jiang Bin. “You were the one who started it during the game, and as a
student, he didn’t so much as say a word back to you, never mind fight back, right? Yet you
still wouldn’t
let him go. This is not at all like someone who had been around Monkey.”
Jiang Bin wasn’t bad at fighting and basketball, but when it came to words, it was a little
more challenging. Not to mention there were all these onlookers sitting on the bleachers at
the moment. None of them were good eggs, but all of them more or less liked to come off as
a ‘reasonable’ person. Which is why as Gu Fei finished talking, Jiang Bin’s face flushed
scarlet, but still he couldn’t manage to squeeze out a single word.
At last, he looked in Monkey’s direction furiously.
“Hurry it up.” Monkey said impatiently around his cigarette.
“Today it’s just you, and me.” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Bin. “Whoever concedes or doesn’t, let’s
get it over with in one go.”
Jiang Bin glared at him for almost five minutes, then at last squeezed out a word from
between his clenched teeth, “Fine.”
The game was only thirty minutes long, with no breaks or switches in between.
Aside from someone tossing the jump ball at the beginning, there wouldn’t be any referee
either. There was no score board, that was the job of the audience on the bleachers.
And if there happened to be a bet taking place, then the score would be kept even more
meticulously than any scoreboard.
Liu Fan and Qian Kai were up for the jump ball. They both kept their eyes locked on the
ball, and the onlookers of the game… or rather of the fight, all quieted down.
The person tossing the ball threw it into the air, then immediately dashed off the court as if
running for his life.
In a game like this, everyone would be ‘carrying’. If he hadn’t cleared the court by the time
the game started, there was a chance he could get accidentally hurt.
Even though the point of this match wasn’t actually basketball, and Liu Fan was the only
one on their team who had been arrested, having gone in for a week’s stay at the police
station just after the Lunar New Year, he was also the one on their team who most liked to
play basketball. All this was to say that Liu Fan’s hand was going straight for the ball.
But Qian Kai’s wasn’t. His target was Liu Fan’s arm.
Just as Liu Fan’s slapped the ball toward Gu Fei, Qian Kai’s hand came down hard, drawing
a line from Liu Fan’s wrist down along his forearm.
Gu Fei caught the pass, and at the same time saw the streak of blood along Liu
Fan’s arm.
He turned with the ball and dribbled down the court toward the basket.
Behind him, the sound of footsteps quickly gained on him. Gu Fei took another two steps
with the ball and briskly shuffled to the side, then jumped up to shoot for the basket.
Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Jiang Bin dart out from his right and swipe at his side
with his left hand.
Gu Fei felt something scrape hard against his right flank, but didn’t even feel any pain as he
landed back on the ground. He stared at the basket and watched the ball sink in, before
looking down at himself.
A gash had been ripped open on his T-shirt, and when he lifted the shirt up, he saw a rough
streak on his waist left behind by the knuckleduster. It was only then that blood started to
seep slowly out of the uneven wound.
He grabbed the hem of this shirt and dabbed it carelessly on the wound. It was a fairly
shallow cut; other than looking a little grotesque, it didn’t affect him very much.
Jiang Bin had the rebound, and he passed the ball to Qian Kai. Gu Fei was about to interject,
but seeing that Liu Fan had already made his way over, he went straight to the midline to
prepare for defence.
Liu Fan’s arm was still bloody, though it didn’t look that deep either. Before Gu Fei had time
to lift his gaze off of Liu Fan’s arm, he heard Li Yan’s voice from off the court, “Da-Fei,
behind you!”
Without turning around, he immediately bent down at the waist. A fist broke through the
air above him.
It was only the first ball, and it had already come to this. Gu Fei figured it would be a
miracle to keep this match going for five minutes even if they just took the beating without
fighting back.
And it wasn’t as though they didn’t fight back either. On the other side of the court, when
Liu Fan attempted to intercept the ball, he dished it back to Qian Kai in the same way,
brushing past Qian Kai’s arm with his ‘stuffed’ bracer.
Gu Fei couldn’t see very clearly from his position, but he saw the muscles twitch on Qian
Kai’s face. It must not have been a light scrape.
There was no way this match was going to last the whole thirty minutes, or even five. Gu
Fei stood up straight.
He wasn’t familiar with the guy hurling punches at him from behind. He didn’t
know the guy by his name or his moniker, therefore he could only follow Jiang Cheng’s lead,
and gave the guy the name of ‘Little Hurl’.
Little Hurl’s punch was aiming for the back of his head. If Gu Fei hadn’t gotten out of the
way, he would already be prone on the ground at this moment, with no immediate prospect
of getting back up any time soon.
This bunch was clearly more ruthless than even Monkey’s guys. Monkey was somewhat
about the unspoken code of the streets, and would rather not lose face at least on the
outside. But these guys were different. With these people around, one had to be careful
even when walking, lest an accidental step on somebody’s ego left you face down in the
mud.
Little Hurl’s first punch didn’t land. Without a second of hesitation, he backhanded another
strike toward Gu Fei’s face.
Gu Fei saw the strip of conical steel in his hand. The thing wasn’t particularly sharp; it
tapered to a rounded point. But if one got hit by it…… Gu Fei lifted his left hand to block
against the guy’s forearm, and used it as a fulcrum to push against his elbow, as his right
hand gripped Little Hurl’s wrist and snapped it back.
Little Hurl paused for two whole seconds, then let out a blood-curdling scream.
Gu Fei shoved him off to the side, and caught the ball Luo Yu had just passed to him.
After charging past two more people with the ball, his path forward was cut off by Jiang
Bin, who blocked in front of him. Gu Fei braked abruptly, and prepared to make a three-
point shot.
At the same time when the ball left his hands, Jiang Bin charged in front of him and brought
his hand down. The knuckleduster first landed on his shoulder, then followed the
momentum down into a slash.
There was a frenzy of whistling and clapping from up on the bleachers. Even under these
circumstances the three-point shot had gone in. Gu Fei couldn’t help but be a little
impressed by himself.
However, the match could no longer continue. Apparently Jiang Bin was incapable of
holding it in for very long, and didn’t even bother to put up a facade. If they went on like
this, none of them would be left standing by the end, even if they got more points.
Not to mention under the circumstances of Jiang Bin straight up ignoring the masquerade
of the basketball match that was really a fight, even if they won by the sheer number of
points, this would be far from over.
The only way.
The only way.
Gu Fei suddenly felt like lamenting. He had learned the only way from his dad.
It was to scare your enemy off with one move, so that they dared not touch you again.
Whether it was his mom’s dubious suitor, or the Monkey of the past, or Little Hurl just now.
Whether he intended to or not, his father’s ways that terrified him to the point of
nightmares ever since he was young, had somehow been written into his blood without
him even noticing……
When Jiang Bin’s knuckles came at him a third time, Gu Fei lifted his arm, leaned his
shoulder and hip into it, and landed a heavy slap on the left cheek of Jiang Bin’s face.
There wasn’t the usual sharp sound of a slap. Instead, it was a loud but dull bang.
Jiang Bin was knocked straight off the ground from the force of the strike, and landed on his
back on the concrete court. The sound of his head knocking against the ground wasn’t even
as loud as Gu Fei’s slap.
Everyone on the court froze. There was even a brief moment of quiet from the stands.
Jiang Bin lay prone on the ground. It took him several seconds to even start struggling to
get back up, which he attempted twice and failed. He then pushed himself off the ground on
all fours, and started to vomit.
“Fuck ME ——” The dozens of onlookers watching the show on the stand
started yelling. The sounds of whistles and screaming blended together into an excited
cacophony.
To them, it didn’t matter who won or lost. It didn’t matter who got stricken to the ground
either. They were thrilled as long as somebody was down, or injured, or couldn’t get back
up again.
Everyone on the court had gathered around by now. Qian Kai made his way to Jiang Bin to
help him back up. Gu Fei threw him a look, “Are you the one?”
“…… What?” Qian Kai paused.
“Are you,” Gu Fei looked at him, his voice so low it was almost a rumble.
“Next?”
Qian Kai didn’t make a sound, only froze in place, not daring to continue forward to help.
“We’ll stop the match right here then,” Gu Fei turned and slowly one by one,
stared at each person in the circle around him. “Let’s resolve this directly. Who else is
there, let’s get this over with.”
The situation descended into an awkward stalemate. One single empty-handed slap from
Gu Fei made Jiang Bin unable to even get back up, and even now was still puking himself
into a coma on the ground. On the other side was the guy gingerly holding his arm, which
looked like it might be broken and couldn’t even be touched due to the pain. No one dared
come and face off against him again.
But this was a ‘once-and-over-with ballgame’ after all. If they really held back now, it meant
that after this, they wouldn’t be able to touch him again……
“Help him up.” Monkey’s voice sounded from the behind, and broke the
stalemate.
At last, a couple of guys went over and dragged Jiang Bin up. He was unsteady on his feet,
like he was dizzy. It took the two guys propping him up on either side for him to eventually
stop swaying.
Monkey shot Gu Fei a stare, then walked up to Jiang Bin, “How do you feel?”
“Can’t hear very well,” Jiang Bin coughed. “Ear’s ringing.”
“Take him to the hospital.” Monkey frowned. “And wipe your mouth.”
The guys holding up Jiang Bin started to leave, but as they walked past Gu Fei, Jiang Bin
struggled a little, and glared at him.
The tinnitus was to be expected. Perhaps it would be even worse than tinnitus, but at the
moment Gu Fei wasn’t very concerned about anything. Unlike Jiang Cheng, who worried
whether the guy who collapsed in the snow outside would freeze to death. He had no fear
of consequences.
Gu Fei leaned in closer to Jiang Bin’s right ear, and clearly enunciated,
“Consider this done and over with today. I’m not the type who likes to invite trouble, as
long as you don’t bring trouble to me, I will not go after anyone.”
Jiang Bin didn’t respond, it wasn’t clear if he heard. He only glared at Gu Fei for a little while
longer, then walked away.
Once Jiang Bin’s guys had all left, there were only Monkey’s people and Gu Fei’s team left on
the court. However, the onlookers were no less enthused. No one dared to gather any
closer, but they all stood nearby, waiting eagerly for a potential second round after the first
match.
Wasting their own time, while looking on at other people’s blood. Even though they were
all watching from the sidelines, these people disgusted Gu Fei.
“Still so ruthless huh, always finishing it off with one move.” Monkey looked at Gu Fei. “It’s
been almost two years now, and you haven’t lost a bit of your power.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
To be honest, he wasn’t as utterly unafraid of Monkey as he was of Jiang Bin.
Monkey was quite a few years older, and had started messing about on the streets before
he even graduated middle school. Unlike the people who fooled around for a few years then
went back to the ‘civilian’ life or started working, Monkey was one of those people who
stepped solidly into the darkness, and never planned on getting out.
“I had thought a public high school would teach one to be more self-restrained than a
vocational school,” Monkey chuckled a little. “Though normally, I wouldn’t put myself into
you and Jiang Bin’s affair. I said this was his own matter to settle, so he has to concede to
this result whether or not he wants to.
But now it’s different. Since you took this on for Jiang Cheng, it only makes sense that I have
to settle this for Jiang Bin.”
Gu Fei still didn’t say a word.
“Honestly, I don’t want to do this either,” Monkey raised his arms up in a stretch, then lit a
cigarette and put it in his mouth. “But think about it, we could settle our affair at the same
time, otherwise I don’t think I’ll ever be at peace.”
“I have a game the day after tomorrow.” Gu Fei spoke at last. “It would have to be after
that.”
Monkey was one to hold onto grudges. The whole Jiang Cheng thing was
nothing but an excuse. When he came to collect protection tolls in the early days, Gu Fei
had burst his bladder with a single kick. More than a year had passed since then, but even if
he didn’t hold grudges, it wasn’t something that could be so easily forgiven and forgotten.
To seek retribution after so long required an excuse, and now he had one.
Though after coming head to head in a fight today, Monkey knew that he would be no
match for Gu Fei. But on the other hand, to have a group of people beating on one person
went against his ‘principles’. Therefore, Gu Fei only decided on the time. As to the method
by which they would be settling it, that was up to Monkey to decide.
“A game at the school?” Monkey asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
Monkey put on a shocked expression, the over-exaggeration of which made it clear that he
and Jiang Bin were indeed related. After a long pause he started
laughing, “Then I guess there was some change in you after all. Fourth High is certainly a
good place, that even Gu Fei would join a school tournament.”
Gu Fei didn’t want to engage in his bullshit smalltalk, so he continued to be quiet.
“Fine then, I’ve always been easy going.” Monkey held the cigarette between two fingers
and jabbed Gu Fei’s chest. “The day after tomorrow, 8PM, at the old building by the railway
bridge. Let’s play something fair.”
Gu Fei gave him a look. Beside him, Liu Fan took a step forward, somewhat frantically. Gu
Fei reached out a hand to stop him, “OK.”
“Hurdling.” Monkey said. “You take responsibility for your own consequences.”
“Fine.” Gu Fei said.
“Fucking hell!” Liu Fan gave the steering wheel a hard slap as soon as he got in the car.
“Why did you agree to the hurdle? Can you not fucking beat his ass in a fight?”
“Gotta resolve it somehow.” Gu Fei said.
“Then resolve it by fighting it out! WHY FUCKING HURDLE!” Luo Yu
bellowed from the backseat.
“Is it possible that he’ll agree to a fight?” Gu Fei turned and looked at Luo Yu.
“If he’s willing to resolve it with a fight we’d have done it a long time ago, right? Wouldn’t
have to wait till now.”
“THEN JUST KEEP MAKING HIM WAIT!” Liu Fan started bellowing too.
“He doesn’t dare go after you, so what’s wrong with just ignoring him……”
“What if he plays dirty?” Gu Fei interrupted his rant. “What if he goes after someone else?
What if he goes after Er-Miao?”
Everyone else went quiet.
“Anyway, I’m sick of this.” Gu Fei furrowed his brows as he tugged on his shirt.
The material stuck to his body by the congealed blood was suddenly yanked away, and he
almost yelped from the pain. “Even if I’m meant to languish here my whole life, I want to at
least be on solid ground. I don’t want to live among violence all day every day.”
“Stop badgering him,” Li Yan spoke up. “He already agreed to it anyways, it’s useless to say
all this now. If it can be resolved this way then let’s resolve it. It’s not like anyone will die, at
worst it’s a couple months of hospital stay……”
“Says who! Don’t you watch the news, just a few days ago someone fell down
on flat ground and they fucking died from it!” Liu Fan glared at Li Yan.
“Fucking hell! I spit on your whole family!” Li Yan was anxiously staring back at him. “Hurry
up and spit! You dumbass!” [1]
Liu Fan made a long pause, then at last, slapped the steering wheel again, “Pei pei pei.”
Gu Fei turned to the window and had a long laugh, “Dumbass.”
Jiang Cheng was standing in Gu Fei’s convenience store, looking at Gu Fei’s mom who was
cracking her way through watermelon seeds behind the counter.
He felt a little awkward, unsure whether he should leave or keep standing there.
“Why don’t you sit for a bit,” Gu Fei’s mom said. “He usually comes to the store around meal
time.”
“I……” Jiang Cheng didn’t want to sit. He pointed at the door, and was about to say “I’ll go
for a walk outside”.
Before he was able to finish, Gu Fei’s mom glanced at the clock on the side, and waved her
hand at him, “Aiyoo I didn’t even look at the time, I have to go out.
Good thing you’re here, I don’t have to close down then. You just guard the store, OK.”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng was shook.
“Just help with cashing out and stuff, Li Yan helps cash out all the time.” Gu Fei’s mom said
as she put on her jacket. “Don’t you know how to work the cash register?”
Jiang Cheng wanted to say “I really don’t know”, but before he even got to open his mouth,
Gu Fei’s mom was already out the door like a gust of wind. He stood frozen in the store for a
long time, his mind a tangled mess, then after a while, finally sat down behind the counter.
He didn’t know what Gu Fei was up to this afternoon, but it definitely had nothing to do
with Gu Miao. He asked as soon as he arrived. Gu Miao was at home drawing pictures.
He could almost be sure that Gu Fei had gone to the zoo. [2]
Though where this place was, where one could play basketball and fight at the same time,
nobody knew. The only person he could ask was Wang Xu, and since Wang Xu didn’t know,
there was no way anyone else would. Beside the people from his class, the only other
person he could ask was Ding Zhuxin, but Ding Zhuxin didn’t give him an answer either.
“If it’s something he didn’t want to tell you, even if I knew, I couldn’t tell you
anyway.” Ding Zhuxin was very cordial about it, but didn’t even leave him a chance to
pursue the matter.
Jiang Cheng held his phone in his hand and sat behind the counter, staring off into space. He
couldn’t articulate what exactly he was feeling.
He had been anxious, and infuriated. But the flames of fury had burned down by now, and
all that was left was gloom. The kind of gloom that could only be alleviated if he gave Gu Fei
a good beating.
After sitting there staring at nothing for almost twenty minutes, he heard the sound of an
engine outside. He walked over to the door curtain, and peeped out.
A Benben that looked like it might fall apart after another ten meters on the road was
parked out front. All the windows were closed, so he couldn’t see who was inside. Though
after the car stopped, Gu Fei stepped out from the front passenger side.
Jiang Cheng had entertained the possibility that perhaps Gu Fei really did have other
matters to attend to, that maybe he was overthinking it. But upon seeing the blood on Gu
Fei’s collar as he walked over, his rage suddenly jumped to life.
It was as though he had a blowtorch inside his body, in an instant the fire burned through
the top of his skull and he became a human torch.
Gu Fei probably never expected that someone would be standing directly behind the
curtain. As he lifted the plastic and came through the door, he walked straight into Jiang
Cheng.
“AY!” Gu Fei jumped, and was about to retreat backwards, when Jiang Cheng clutched the
collar of his jacket in his grip.
“What did you do?” Jiang Cheng yanked on his collar and dragged him into the store, then
pressed him up against the wall. “Tell me, what the fuck did you do!”
“What are you doing here?” Gu Fei’s expression was full of shock.
“I’m asking WHAT DID YOU DO!” Jiang Cheng roared at him.
Gu Fei grabbed his wrist and tried to pull it away, with no success. He had no choice but to
give up, and sighed.
“Do you want me to give you five seconds to make up a story?!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“I can’t make one up even if you give me ten more seconds,” Gu Fei said. “It’s too sudden.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, only glared at him some more, then suddenly released his grip.
He turned and walked out the door, leaving behind a fluttering
curtain.
Gu Fei frowned, knocked his head back against the wall, paused for two seconds, then ran
out after him, “Jiang Cheng!”
Jiang Cheng was swinging his arms and making long strides in the direction of his
apartment. He didn’t look back, didn’t even slow down.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei ran after him and grabbed his arm. “Cheng-ge……”
“Cheng what ge!” Jiang Cheng shook off his hand, and turned to stare at him. “I don’t have a
son like you!”
“But I’m calling you ‘ge’.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng paused for a second, but it was clear the rage was quickly rekindled.
He pointed at Gu Fei, “It’s no fucking use even if you call me grandpa!”
Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, then grabbed his arm again and started dragging him back
toward the convenience store.
“The fuck??” Jiang Cheng was shook. He attempted to struggle hard a couple times but
couldn’t shake off his hand. Just as he was about to put more force into it, he glimpsed the
blood on Gu Fei’s collar again. And so the third attempt was suppressed by himself, through
clenched teeth.
All it took was a moment of hesitation, and Gu Fei had dragged him back into the store.
“Let’s have a little chat.” Gu Fei said.
“Chat about what?” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like all his strength had dissipated the
moment Gu Fei let go of his arm. His rage had all but died down as well. He leaned back
against the wall. “About the psychological journey of your lies?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng looked him over. Aside from the streak of blood on his collar, there was
another streak of blood near his waist, “Let’s take care of your injuries first.
Look at this mess, if I didn’t know any better I would’ve thought somebody had given you a
good whipping.”
Footnotes:
[1] Basicallyyy, if you said something jinxing, the Western way is to knock on wood, the
Chinese way is to spit, or just simply say the spitting sound, which is
“pei”. ↩

[2] The zoo, aka wherever Monkey and Wild Boar Head (Jiang Bin) are. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5948
TL word count: 4512
TL time: 5:44:44
Edit: 1:40:28
Curse words: 11x fucks, 1x shit, 3x ass
TL’s Notes
Violence is not the answer violence is not the answer violence is not the answer but DAYUM
that was hot.
If you read between the lines of the last part it’s actually really funny XD.
Post first, more thorough edit later, pls excuse the inevitable mistakes… Updated 9/14 w/edits

First posted: September 14, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 50
“I just want to get a clear look at the kind of person you are.”
Gu Fei seemed fairly normal, Jiang Cheng figured he wasn’t too seriously hurt.
But he still frowned when Gu Fei took his jacket off, and he saw the tear in the shirt near his
waist.
“This is from the ballgame?” He asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei tossed his jacket to the side and glanced at him. “You haven’t eaten yet,
right?”
“No appetite.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“I’m a little hungry.” Gu Fei took out his phone. “I’m going to order two rice bowls, will you
make do and have some?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
“Beef with green peppers,” Gu Fei looked down at the screen. “What do you want? There’s
also brisket with potatoes, tomato scrambled eggs, braised eggplants……”
“Tomato scrambled eggs.” Jiang Cheng let out a sigh.
Gu Fei finished ordering the takeout and took out a medical kit from a little cabinet on the
side. He gave Jiang Cheng a look and hesitated for a few seconds, then reached up and
pulled his shirt off.
“What the flying fuck,” Jiang Cheng was startled when he saw the two large bloody gashes
on his shoulder and flank. “Why didn’t they just finish you off.”
“Who can kill me?” Gu Fei chuckled a little and walked to the inner room.
“ …… Need help?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Thank you.” Gu Fei said.
“Is thank you a fucking yes or a no?” Jiang Cheng stood up.
“Yes.” Gu Fei turned back and looked at him.
There were only two wounds on his body, which wasn’t that bad, all things considered.
Jiang Cheng walked into the room and leaned in close to check out the wounds. Only, the
edges of the wounds were very uneven; the tool that made these wounds was likely not at
all sharp, which meant the wounds were
practically torn open. Jiang Cheng could feel the pain just by imagining it.
He opened the medical kit and brought out the rubbing alcohol, then pondered for some
time before asking, “Was it Monkey? That… knuckleduster of his.”
“Shit,” Gu Fei looked at him, more than a little shocked. “You can tell? I didn’t know genius
overachievers have this kind of secondary ability…… It wasn’t Monkey, it was Jiang Bin.”
“I guessed.” Jiang Cheng held the cotton ball in one hand and the bottle of rubbing alcohol
in the other, and stared at Gu Fei’s wounds, trying to figure out how to go about cleaning a
large wound like this. If he dabbed at it with the alcohol…… a gash this long would take him
ages to clean, and he tried out a few different positions but found them all awkward to hold.
“Maybe you should go next door and get it looked at?”
“Nope. There’s always a bunch of grandpas and grandmas gathered there in the afternoon
and evenings for their nutrition IV drip. It’d be a gossip central right about now. If I go, by
tomorrow everyone around these parts will know how I was knifed by someone, and died
from it too.” Gu Fei said. “It’s not like this is some serious injury, it’s enough to just disinfect
and wrap it up in some gauze.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“You can just……” Gu Fei didn’t get to finish his sentence. Jiang Cheng lifted his hand and
poured the alcohol directly onto the wound on his shoulder. He froze for two seconds, then
abruptly drew in a sharp breath. “The fuck??”
“We should go ask for a bottle of saline…… hurts a lot doesn’t it?” Jiang Cheng looked at
him.
“What dost thou think?” Gu Fei frowned.
“The stinging from the alcohol should pass soon,” Jiang Cheng blew a little on the wound. “I
just wanted to give a rinse.”
“ …… Oh,” Gu Fei peered at the wound. “Done rinsing now?”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng rummaged around the kit again and pulled out a vial of iodine solution.
“I’ll disinfect again with this and it should be done.”
“Does this also get poured on me?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yup,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “With a large gash like this, do you know how long it would take
to dab a little at a time with a cotton ball.”
“How care-free of you.” Gu Fei said.
“Maybe don’t go tempting death if you wish to be comfortable, why don’t you
try not getting hurt if you’re so good.” Jiang Cheng said as he poured the iodine solution
onto the wound as well, then used the cotton to spread it around evenly.
“To be honest… It’s not that I didn’t want to bring you,” Gu Fei leaned against the wall and
lifted his arm to give Jiang Cheng access to the wound on his side.
“But the thing is, this… doesn’t really have to do with you.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng understood what Gu Fei meant, he had guessed as much.
Jiang Bin was a sore loser who wanted to take it out on someone, but Monkey, who was his
support, was the one who had a problem with Gu Fei. “But I was the catalyst. If it wasn’t for
you willingly taking this on for me, Monkey might not have had the chance to go after you.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. He hadn’t expected to run into Jiang Cheng as soon as he got
back, so he never had a chance to mentally comb through what had happened, much less
make up an excuse.
Though Jiang Cheng had him marvelling. Even through a fit of anger, Jiang Cheng still
quickly figured out what had happened based only on a tiny fragment of information. No
wonder he was an overachiever. With logic like this, surely he should go into the STEM
field.
“This is trampling on my ego,” Jiang Cheng liberally splashed some rubbing alcohol onto Gu
Fei’s side. “I……”
“Hey!” Gu Fei couldn’t help but yell out. “Can you give me a warning before you pour it on!”
“Sure I can,” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “Here comes the second splash.”
“You……” Gu Fei didn’t manage to get his sentence out before Jiang Cheng splashed more
iodine solution on the wound. He sucked in a breath. “You’re taking the opportunity to get
back at me?”
“Done.” Jiang Cheng dabbed at it with a cotton ball. “I got a couple of tubes of those wound
closing ointment last time at the hospital, I’ll bring one for you tomorrow. It’ll heal faster
that way.”
“ …… Mmn.” Gu Fei answered.
Even though Jiang Cheng didn’t touch him throughout the entire process, the slightly
painful touch of the cotton ball gently dabbing on his wound still left him feeling tingly and
weak over half of his body. But as Jiang Cheng finished splashing on the rubbing alcohol, his
mind suddenly emptied of all sinful thoughts, it was practically a desert of purity and
abstinence.
The takeout arrived as Jiang Cheng finished applying the gauze to the wound.
He went to bring in the two orders of rice bowls, and Gu Fei set up the little dining table
and sat down.
It was only then, that Gu Fei felt the tensely wound nerves of the afternoon slowly loosen.
“This restaurant,” Jiang Cheng opened his order of rice bowl and stared at it for a long time.
“Would most certainly close within a year.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei opened his container and took a look, it smelled pretty good to him.
“Every time I see a dish of tomato scrambled eggs where the tomatoes are chopped in
chunks larger than your face, and one egg is split across eight orders,” Jiang Cheng said. “I
say this.”
Gu Fei stared for a while at the tomato scrambled eggs in his box, and couldn’t contain his
laughter. He finally stopped after some time, and pushed over his own box of beef with
green peppers, “Wanna trade?”
“It’s alright,” Jiang Cheng peered into the other box. “The way they only spared one cut for
each green pepper and eighty cuts for one slice of beef, this restaurant would certainly
close within a year.”
Gu Fei kept laughing as he ate. Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything more, and kept his head
down as he ate with a displeased expression.
After several minutes of quiet eating, Gu Fei raised his head and put down the chopsticks,
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to lie to you.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, just stared at the chunk of tomato on his chopsticks, and after a
while he finally put it in his mouth, “Is the problem resolved?”
Gu Fei hesitated a little, “I set a time with Monkey for the day after tomorrow, after our
game.”
Jiang Cheng lifted his eyes at him.
“This time it really is between Monkey and me,” Gu Fei said. “Even without you as a
catalyst, it was bound to blow up sooner or later. Might as well get it over and done with.”
Jiang Cheng said nothing as he put his head down and continued eating.
The food was pretty bad. The juice hadn’t been drawn out of the tomatoes during cooking,
there weren’t enough eggs, and the rice was too soft and mushy. He was only able to eat
half before he set down his chopsticks.
“If you can’t finish, just put it on the ledge in the backyard.” Gu Fei ate quickly, his container
already bottoming out. “There are stray cats that will come and eat it.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng stood up, took his leftovers to the backyard, and set it on the ledge. He
stood there and waited for a bit, but didn’t see any sign of cats, so he returned to the store.
“I didn’t see any cat.”
“The one that usually comes is a scaredy cat, it never comes out when people are around.”
Gu Fei threw away his empty container and cleaned up the table. He then lit up a cigarette
and leaned against the front of the cash.
Jiang Cheng sat on a chair and swiped back and forth on his phone aimlessly.
“I know you’re annoyed that I didn’t call you up today.” Gu Fei said with the cigarette in his
mouth, staring down at his feet. “And if it was only Jiang Bin, I would’ve. But Monkey was
there…… so I thought never mind.”
Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
“There are some things, that if you can avoid touching it, if you can avoid participating in it,
you should try your best not to.” Gu Fei blew out a puff of smoke. “More trouble than it’s
worth.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“You asked me the other day, why not go to a technical college or vocational school or
something,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Wanna hear about it?”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei went to close the door, and pulled the rolling shutters halfway down, then pulled up
a chair and sat down across from Jiang Cheng.
“I used to be pretty, you know.” Gu Fei was quiet for a few moments before starting. “In
elementary school I would… get into fights all the time. Even now, if my old classmates
from back then see me on the street, they would give me a wide berth.”
“King of the school, huh.” Jiang Cheng fixed his gaze on him.
“Either way it’s like…… at home I got beaten up by my dad, so outside my home, I’d beat up
other people.” Gu Fei let out a little smile. “I didn’t like to talk very much back then,
whenever I ran into a problem, I preferred to use my fists.
And when the people I injured came around looking for reparations, my dad would give me
another beating.”
Jiang Cheng let out a quiet sigh.
“Then in the first year of middle school, I pushed my deskmate out of a classroom window,
from the second floor.” Gu Fei stretched his legs out and stared at the tip of his toes. “To be
honest, my dad had also thrown me like that once, and I wasn’t very seriously injured……”
[1]
Jiang Cheng stared at him in silent shock.
“But that kid was hurt pretty bad. His arms, legs, and ribs were all broken. The school went
to my mom… my dad had just died around that time.” Gu Fei’s voice was very low. “The
school already thought it wasn’t suitable for me to keep going to a regular middle school in
the state I was in. So after that, they wanted me to go to a reform school.”
“What’s a reform school?” Jiang Cheng asked, then noticed that Gu Fei seemed to be lost in
his own thoughts, so he searched it up on his phone.
Reform Schools are special educational institutions set up by the People’s Republic of China
for underaged offenders who have commited minor crimes or violations of the law, and are
not within the jurisdiction of administrative sanctions or the penal system.
“What the shit?” Jiang Cheng was shook.
“A lot of them were scrapped.” Gu Fei swung the tip of his feet around gently.
“The one I went to was eventually repurposed into a vocational school. There weren’t very
many students even when I was there.”
“Oh.” Was Jiang Cheng’s response. He didn’t know what to say.
“To be honest, the principal at the time also recommended that my mom take me to see a
psychiatrist, he figured I had some serious violent tendencies.” Gu Fei threw his cigarette
stub on the ground and stomped it out, then pulled out another one and lit it. “But my mom
refused. Er-Miao was already like that, she didn’t want to hear talk about how I had
problems too…… so I went to the reform school.”
“Are they all students like you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“In there, people like me are considered one of the good kids,” Gu Fei chuckled a little.
“Spending time with the reform school kids will teach you what unsalvageable really
means. You can’t even imagine if you tried, how terrible a person in their mere teens can
be. I stayed there for a year and a half, and I don’t want to have anything to do with those
people ever again.”
“Give me… a cigarette.” Jiang Cheng said.
“You’re out again?” Gu Fei pulled out his pack. “Next time you run out just go and help
yourself to one from behind the counter.”
“I just happen to be out.” Jiang Cheng took one and lit it up. His brain was a muddled mess.
Frankly, judging by the way Gu Fei normally carried himself, he could’ve guessed at the
kind of backstory Gu Fei would have, but he didn’t think it was
this serious. Just the story about Gu Fei ‘murdering’ his father alone took him a long time to
process, and now he felt like he had been reformatted yet again. He felt like his brain was
buzzing.
“I think I went off-topic just now.” Gu Fei said.
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng looked at him, his thoughts not quite collected yet.
Being thrown from the second floor by your own father was a fact he struggled to process.
Throwing your deskmate out of a second floor window was equally shocking.
“A second floor classroom is higher than the second floor of a residential building.” He said.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei was a little confused, then after a long pause eventually realized what he
was talking about. He turned to the side and burst into laughter. “Cheng-ge I feel like you’re
super good at focusing on the key point.”
“What the hell are you laughing about.” Jiang Cheng had been holding his lit cigarette in his
hand this whole time, and only just now remembered to take a drag from it. “Did you go off-
topic? What was the original topic?”
“In the second half of my third year of middle school, the school was repurposed into a
vocational secondary school. After graduation, most of the other students stayed there and
went to the vocational school,” Gu Fei said. “But I wanted to go to a public high school. I
really don’t want to continue hanging around those people, I don’t want to cross paths with
any of them ever again.”
“So you applied to the Fourth High?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Fourth High sucks, it’s one of the easier ones to get into.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything. He took two drags of the cigarette, then breathed out a
long sigh, suddenly unsure of what to say.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei stood up, grabbed two bottles of beers from the fridge, and took a couple
of sips after opening one with his teeth. “You’re not like the people here, you have no idea
how troublesome it’ll be once you get mixed up with these people.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“If you get in a fight and lose, some people will think you’re a pushover. If you win, there’ll
be some who think you’re a smug bastard. So no matter what you do, you’ll end up getting
tangled up in the mess.” Gu Fei said. “When it comes to these people, the further away you
are from them the better. Do you understand what I mean?”
“ …… Mhm.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and drew in a breath, then slowly exhaled.
“You’re not Wang Xu, or Jiang Bin, and more than anything you’re not Monkey.
You’re a good student,” Gu Fei said. “Attend your classes, learn your stuff, then write your
exams and go to your dream school. Don’t let yourself get dragged into these things.”
Jiang Cheng stubbed out his cigarette in silence and rubbed his hands over his face, then
leaned back in the chair.
“I didn’t let you go, not because I want to take anything on for you.” Gu Fei said. “I just don’t
want you to be trapped here. If it was anyone else I wouldn’t have bothered, because no
one else has ever said something like ‘I wouldn’t rot here’ to me, only you have. You’ve got
to live by your words. Don’t feel like I did you a favour or anything. You don’t have to talk
about yiqi with me either.”
[2]
Jiang Cheng still didn’t say anything, but he suddenly stood up and walked in front of Gu
Fei, then stroked the top of his head.
“ …… If it was anyone else touching my head like this I would beat them up.”
Gu Fei lifted his head and gave him a look.
Jiang Cheng stroked his head again.
“Fuck.” Gu Fei laughed.
Jiang Cheng cupped the back of Gu Fei’s head with his hands, and held him close.
“What are you doing?” Gu Fei’s whole face was pressed against Jiang Cheng’s stomach, so he
could only ask in a muffled voice.
“Stop talking.” Jiang Cheng said.
“But I need to breathe.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng ignored him and held on for several more seconds before letting go, then fell
back into his own chair and looked at Gu Fei. He suddenly felt like laughing. He gazed
across at Gu Fei in a fit of giggles.
Gu Fei was about to take a drink from his beer, but after a couple of attempts of raising the
bottle to his lips and stopping, he finally set the bottle on the ground and also started
laughing.
“So me,” Jiang Cheng said as he continued to laugh. “I’m actually a very serious person.”
“Me too,” Gu Fei took a big gulp of beer and suppressed the giggles. “I hope you don’t get
the wrong impression.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded, and kept on giggling for a while longer before he finally caught
his breath and let out a long drawn-out sigh. Only after a long pause did he speak again.
“Can you tell me how you’re going to resolve this thing with Monkey?”
“Why are you asking?” Gu Fei asked.
“If it’s just a matter of fighting it out, there’s no way he can beat you,” Jiang Cheng said. “It
can’t be a one-on-one. And last time Wang Xu and I were trapped, he was able to play it off
as a favour to you, so it’s unlikely that they’ll gang up on you, right?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled.
“So how are you going to resolve it?” Jiang Cheng stared into Gu Fei’s eyes.
Gu Fei held his gaze, and seemed to hesitate, before eventually saying in a low voice,
“Hurdling.”
“What the what?” Jiang Cheng gave him a perplexed look.
“It’s our own Steel Works tradition around these parts,” Gu Fei said. “An established way of
conflict resolution.”
“What’s the hurdle? How do you hurdle?” Jiang Cheng asked again.
“Did you change your idol recently?” Gu Fei took a swig of beer.
“What?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“Didn’t your idol used to be Xiao-Ming’s grandpa,” Gu Fei said. “Is it not the case anymore?”
[3]
“ …… Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng felt around in his pocket and took out a pack of cigarettes, he
pulled one out and put it in his mouth.
As he was about to light it, Gu Fei tsked, “You have your own, yet you still take mine?”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng glanced at the cigarette in his hand. He did have some. He must’ve
been really out of it just now.
He stared at his pack for a while, then took the cigarette out of his mouth and put it back in
the pack, and back in his pocket. He then reached his hand out to Gu Fei, “Give me one.”
Gu Fei didn’t know what else to say but tossed his pack into Jiang Cheng’s hand.
“How do you go about this hurdling?” Jiang Cheng held the cigarette in his hand but didn’t
light it. He asked again.
“The shop where you bought your bike, if you continue straight down that road, there’s a
railway bridge,” Gu Fei said. “Beside it is an old residential area. After the factories moved
away, somebody bought the land, but never developed it. All the buildings are structural
hazards……”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng cut him off. “Jumping buildings?”
Gu Fei looked at him.
“Hopping from one building to another?” Jiang Cheng stared at him. “Am I right?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei replied. “Until someone gets injured or quits.”
“Is there something wrong with your air quality here around the Steel Works?
Are you all brain damaged from the lack of oxygen?” Jiang Cheng had no words to describe
what he was feeling at the moment. “Why don’t you just say until someone falls and dies?”
“There’s generally no deaths, the gap isn’t very big.” Gu Fei smiled and said.
“Morons,” Jiang Cheng clicked the lighter a few times but wasn’t able to light up his
cigarette. Every time the flame got close it would be blown out by the puffs of air from his
nose. Eventually he tossed both the lighter and the cigarette onto the stool beside them.
“There really are such moronic people in the world, I’ve certainly expanded my horizons!”
Gu Fei leaned over and lit up the cigarette, then handed it to him.
Jiang Cheng gave him a glance, and put it in his mouth.
Neither of them spoke again, it was very quiet inside the store, there were no sounds from
the street outside either. The only thing Jiang Cheng could hear was the sound of his own
heavy breathing.
For some reason, he felt like raging. Not at Gu Fei, or even Monkey; he didn’t know who it
was directed toward, nor what he wanted to rage about. He was simply incensed.
He lifted his eyes and glared at Gu Fei. Gu Fei looked back at him with an utterly calm
expression.
He suddenly felt a pang in his heart.
Gu Fei was his perfect partner, his deskmate with whom he shared an unspeakable secret.
But now, all this was suddenly shoved away by things he had never even given a thought to,
that he had always considered was in a far distance, a chaotic darkness. Gu Fei had all of a
sudden become an unreachable shadow to him.
He lamented for Gu Fei.
The cigarette was quickly finished amidst the silence, but it provided no satisfaction at all.
In fact, he felt a little unwell, his throat was getting dry.
He stubbed the cigarette and extended his hand in front of Gu Fei.
Gu Fei looked at his hand, somewhat unsure what his intention was. Gu Fei hesitated for a
moment before putting his own hand in it.
Jiang Cheng grasped it tightly and gave it a hard squeeze before letting go.
“When is it? The brainless building-hopping?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“After the final match.” Gu Fei rubbed his hand, which had gone a little pale from being
squeezed.
“I want to go watch.” Jiang Cheng said. Gu Fei was about to say something, but Jiang Cheng
cut him off with a wave. “I won’t let anyone know I’m there, I just want to see.”
“See what?” Gu Fei asked in resignation.
“See what kind of person you really are.” Jiang Cheng gazed back at him. “I just want to get a
clear look at the kind of person you are.”
Footnotes:
[1] In China, most elementary schools cover grades 1-6, and middle school (初
中) last from grades 7-9, and high school from grades 10-12. So when Gu Fei mentions first
year of middle school, he’s talking about year 7. ↩
[2] Yiqi (义气): here it refers to an unspoken code among friends to do the right thing for each
other, a sort of honour of friendship I guess, but I’m a little reluctant to use that word. It’s a
nuanced concept and doesn’t really have a Western equivalent, but doesn’t have much to
do with the story, since the idea is almost opposite to a romantic relationship, which is obvs
what’s actually going on here. ↩
[3] Xiao-Ming’s grandpa is a bit from earlier chapters, but also a common joke.
It goes something like this:
I saw Xiao-Ming eating ice-cream, and out of concern, I went up to him and

said, “It’s not good for your health to eat this on such a cold day!”
Xiao-Ming told me, his grandpa lived to 103 years old.
I asked, “From eating ice-cream?”
He said, “No, my grandpa never meddles in other people’s business.”
Moral of the joke: don’t stick your nose where you don’t belong, and you’ll get to live as
long as Xiao-Ming’s grandpa. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5756
TL word count: 4206
TL time: 5:56:23
Edit: 1:15:53
Curse words: 6x fucks, 2x shit
TL’s Notes
they need better recreational activities at the steel works =_= (maybe i should start a
cigarette count as well… don’t smoke cigarettes kids)

First posted: September 19, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 51
“Welcome to the first episode of Moron-Watching With Cheng-ge.”
The two of them sat there in silence. Jiang Cheng didn’t know what Gu Fei was thinking, but
he himself wasn’t thinking about anything. He just sat there and stared into space, his brain
was still turning, but it wasn’t clear what it was revolving around.
When it was almost 9PM, Gu Fei stood up, “Let’s go, I’ll ride back with you?”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng stood up as well, then asked after a second of confusion.
“Ride back with me? Why are you riding back with me?”
“In case you get lost.” Gu Fei said.
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I can get back even with my eyes closed now.”
“Velly implessive.” Gu Fei put on his jacket.
“I’ve always been zis implessive.” Jiang Cheng followed him out the door. [1]
Gu Fei’s home was in the same direction as Jiang Cheng’s apartment. They first had to pass
the intersection that led to Gu Fei’s home, and keep going straight for a stretch before they
could reach Jiang Cheng’s apartment.
They both stayed quiet on their ride home. Jiang Cheng kept wanting to say something, but
couldn’t seem to find anything substantial to say, so he resorted to staring straight ahead
the whole way.
Gu Fei didn’t turn when they passed the intersection to his place. Jiang Cheng noticed, but
didn’t say anything. The two of them kept going until they stopped outside of Jiang Cheng’s
building.
“Are you going to school tomorrow?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Sure.” Gu Fei said. “Didn’t Captain Wang want us to practice from lunchtime through to the
afternoon?”
“That injury of yours,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Will you be OK playing in the final
match?”
“Don’t worry,” Gu Fei patted his side where the wound was. “It doesn’t affect me. And
anyway, the guys from Class-2 are pretty straight shooters.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded.

The conversation came to a stop, but neither of them moved. Jiang Cheng didn’t get off his
bike and go into the stairwell, and Gu Fei didn’t turn around to head back.
After a stretch of silence, Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, “I’ll be going up then.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered.
Still, nobody moved. They both seemed to be paralyzed, stuck in the same position with
their butts on the seat and feet braced against the ground.
It wasn’t until another short while later, that Gu Fei spoke up again, “You go on up then, I’m
leaving now.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng finally moved; he picked up the handlebar and moved to the sidewalk.
“Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng pushed his bike into the stairwell, and after locking it, took a glance back
toward the road. Gu Fei was still there. Only after this glance did Gu Fei finally wave at him
and turned his bike around to leave.
Jiang Cheng returned to his apartment, and after a shower, sat down in front of his desk to
stare at the day’s homework. A long time passed, and still he couldn’t make out a single
word of it.
He felt like his brain had experienced one too many shocks in the span of a single afternoon
and evening. it was filled to the brim with a convoluted mishmash of information. There
was almost no space for information such as homework.
It took him at least ten minutes before he was able to quiet down his mind and start
working.
His phone chimed once, it was a message from Pan Zhi.
– the material i’m sending u is on its way, pay attention to ur phone ok, ur address changed
right, is it far
– not too far, gimme the tracking number
Pan Zhi quickly sent him the tracking number for the package.
Jiang Cheng looked up the phone number for the courier service. He planned to
give them a call tomorrow and ask them not to deliver to his door, he would go pick it up
himself. He really didn’t want to go again to the street where Li Baoguo lived, in case he ran
into Li Baoguo. He wouldn’t know how to deal with him.
– also, there’s a USB drive in there, i made a copy of all the lecture materials from our
courses this semester, see if u find anything useful
Jiang Cheng stared at the text. If Pan Zhi was in front of him right now, he would go over
and give him a big hug. What a devoted grandson.
He picked up his phone and took a selfie with a thumbs-up, then added some funny stickers
and sent it to Pan Zhi.
A few minutes passed and Pan Zhi still didn’t reply. He set the phone to one side, feeling
like he finally made some room in his brain, so he sat down again to continue his
homework.
There wasn’t a lot of homework at Fourth High. Even if he started writing at this time, it
still wouldn’t interfere with his sleep. But he still felt a little unsettled.
He considered perhaps he should ask Pan Zhi to send him a copy of their daily homework
as well……
After almost an hour of writing, his phone chimed again. It was a message.
He picked it up and took a look.
– the caption for this selfie of yours should be “good thing I’m handsome”, I’ll send you
some of the photos I took of you later, don’t take any more selfies Jiang Cheng froze, then as
he collected his thoughts he took a quick glance at the name on the top of the screen.
Good Little Bunny!
“The fuck?” He was shook. He swiped a couple of times, and finally confirmed that he sent
the photo that was meant for Pan Zhi to Gu Fei instead!
– dafuq how did i send this to u?????
– who did you mean to send it to
– i was sending it to my friend!
There wasn’t an immediate answer from Gu Fei’s end. Jiang Cheng received another reply
from him after he re-sent the photo to Pan Zhi.
– you should send this one to your friend
There was a picture under the message. Jiang Cheng felt an intense wave of embarrassment
as he was suddenly confronted with his own face filling up an entire screen.
It was the close-up Gu Fei took the day he had a cut on his lip.
There was even an extremely cringey line of glowing text on the side of the photo: Me & My
Unyielding Wound.
– holy shit, what’s ur problem
He replied to Gu Fei.
– way better than your selfie, I shopped it with great care
– fuck off!
– you would trample on my sentiment like this!
– yea and what are you gonna do about it
– [SCREW_HIM.jpg]
Jiang Cheng stared at the meme Gu Fei just sent him and couldn’t stop laughing, then
eventually sent back a reply.
– i’m fking doing homework right now
– add oil overachiever
When he got up the next morning, Jiang Cheng felt like his brain was weighed down with
lead. He sat spacing out on the edge of the bed for several minutes, but couldn’t recall all
the chaotic dreams that troubled his sleep the night before.
The only thing he could remember was Gu Fei, the zoo, and cameo appearances from Pan
Zhi and Wang Xu. It was rather lively.
He sighed and got up to wash his face.
Perhaps it was from the separation of a night’s sleep, but now when he thought of the
things Gu Fei had told him about his childhood and the ‘fair duel’ with Monkey, he no
longer felt the same shock as he had the day before. Instead, it had begun to feel unreal, as
though it was only a very realistic dream.
Jiang Cheng went downstairs to buy breakfast, then slowly pedaled his bike toward school.
He kept one hand on the handlebar while holding the fried pancake in the other, munching
on it as he went.
The days really were getting warmer. He was halfway through the pancake and it still
hadn’t completely cooled down……
When he passed the intersection, he squeezed on the hand brake, but didn’t hear Gu Fei’s
whistle. He turned and looked around, and did not spot a Gu Fei waiting for him by the side
of the road.
He sighed. At this time in the morning, if there wasn’t a special occasion, Gu Fei must not be
up yet.
Jiang Cheng got to school with some time to spare before class started. He parked his bike
in the parking shed, and walked toward the front gate.
He stopped abruptly when he was still more than ten meters away.
It was Lao-Xu’s turn in the rotation, so he was standing at the gates at this moment. And in
front of him, was another person.
Li Baoguo.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a wave of irritation and panic. He stilled for a few seconds before
putting his head down and crossing the street. He made a big detour around the gate, then
ran toward the fence up ahead.
The spot that Gu Fei told him about last time was not too hard to find.
The concession stand had just opened. As he was making his way up the fence, the owner
who was in the middle of sweeping the floor looked up at him in surprise, “Kid, the bell
hadn’t gone yet, the gate’s still open.”
“I… know.” Jiang Cheng looked back at him with one hand clinging to the fence.
The owner didn’t say anything more, but the expression on his face was as though he was
speaking to a halfwit.
Jiang Cheng didn’t bother explaining to him. He pushed off with one foot on the fence, and
pulled himself to the top. He was just about to check out the pile of bricks at the bottom to
find a good landing spot, when he suddenly saw a person standing next to the brick pile.
“ …… Principal Liu?” Jiang Cheng straddled the top of the fence, frozen in shock.
Principal Liu was even more baffled than the concession stand owner outside.
He stared at Jiang Cheng for a long time, but didn’t manage to say anything.
“Principal Liu… good morning.” At this point, Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure if he should jump
down into the school or out of the school.
“Ah, good morning.” Principal Liu looked at him and answered reflexively.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a few seconds, then decided at last to jump into the school. The
pile of bricks at the bottom must have been used recently, there were less bricks around
the edge than before. He jumped down from the fence, and happened to land in the clear
space right in front of Principal Liu.
When he stood back up, Principal Liu’s eyeballs were practically coming out of their
sockets.
“I… I’m going to class now.” Jiang Cheng pointed straight ahead and raced off before
Principal Liu could get a word out, only slowing down when he finally reached the lecture
building.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure if it was because Principal Liu was caught off-guard, or if he
intended to let him off easy; after all, he didn’t climb the fence because he was late, nor did
he step on any trees…… Either way, three class periods passed by and nobody came looking
for him.
Lao-Xu didn’t come for him either. He had just finished attending Lao-Xu’s class. Lao-Xu had
left the classroom as soon as the lecture was over, and did not come have a heart-to-heart
with Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng felt a little bummed out. He didn’t care much about fence-climbing, but Li
Baoguo coming to the school made him uneasy. He didn’t know what Li Baoguo wanted to
do, or what exactly he told Lao-Xu……
He was more than a little annoyed.
Furthermore, Gu Fei still hadn’t come to school; the seat beside him continued to be
unoccupied, the desk drawer beside him was stuffed chaotically with all kinds of books,
notes, and mock-tests that Gu Fei took but never wrote on.
Nobody else gave a second thought to Gu Fei skipping class; the guy skipped class every
week.
Perhaps out of everyone here, he was the only person who felt some discomfort at Gu Fei’s
absence. With the space beside him empty, he also felt a little emptiness in his heart.
He was so used to the fact that very time he turned around he would see Gu Fei with his
head down playing the idiotic Aixiaochu.
It was halfway into the last period when a figure flitted past the backdoor of the classroom.
Jiang Cheng swiftly turned around, and saw Gu Fei dart into the class.
“I thought you weren’t coming.” Jiang Cheng said quietly.
“I said I would come,” Gu Fei smiled. “We have practice at lunchtime after all.”
“ …… I thought you meant coming to class.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I went to bed late last night, and overslept this morning. I came as soon as I woke up.” Gu
Fei pulled out a few textbooks at random and tossed them on top of the desk. “It makes no
difference whether or not I listen to this lecture, I stopped being able to understand it long
ago.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, just pulled out a tube of wound closing ointment and tossed it
onto his desk.
“What a fancy thing,” Gu Fei picked it up and studied it, then put it in his pocket. “Why don’t
you treat me for lunch today.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, “What for…”
“Based on the fact that I treat you all the time.” Gu Fei interrupted him.
“ …… Fine, but at lunchtime I have to go pick up a parcel first. Oh yeah, take a look at this
place,” Jiang Cheng took out his phone and showed Gu Fei the pickup address for his parcel.
“Do you know where this is?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “It’s by the railway bridge.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng’s mind wandered all of a sudden at the mention of the words
‘railway bridge.
“You bought something?” Gu Fei asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng said. “My classmate sent me some study materials.”
“I’ll go pick it up with you,” Gu Fei said. “Just so happens there’s a pretty good Old Shaan
Noodle Shop there.” [2]
Jiang Cheng started to laugh, “How come you know where all the good food is.”
“Not all of them, I’ve just eaten at most of the places around here.” Gu Fei said.
“I grew up here after all, the radius of my activity is mainly from here to the train station,
and from here to the central square. It’s not like I’ve been anywhere else.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Where are you two off to!” Wang Xu said in displeasure as he got his bike from the parking
shed. “We could eat together then head straight to practice, I even spoke to Lao-Xu and
excused us from the afternoon classes so we can play through lunchtime! This disorderly
uncooperative behaviour from you two……”
“We’ll be there within one hour for sure.” Gu Fei said.
“This disorderly and uncooperative behaviour is……” Wang Xu continued.
“Captain, we’re asking you for leave.” Jiang Cheng said. “Just an hour’s leave to get some
errands done, we promise to be back within an hour and make up for it.”
These words appeased Wang Xu very much. He pondered for a moment, then nodded,
“Alright then, granted.”
The railway bridge looked ancient, it had likely been neglected. The rails in the middle
were covered in rust and weeds. The paths along the side were still walkable, but only
enough for pedestrians, bikes, and motorcycles.
Jiang Cheng kept looking around them after they crossed the bridge. The area wasn’t
deserted, there were quite a few little shops lining the streets, and might even be described
as bustling. He still didn’t see any abandoned residential area or hazardous structures.
“It’s over there, we’ve already passed the intersection,” Gu Fei turned and pointed at the
first intersection they passed after crossing the bridge. “That’s where you go in.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng looked back at it, but couldn’t make out very much.
However, most buildings here weren’t very tall, they were all four or five stories at most. If
they were structural hazards, the buildings were probably older, and perhaps even lower.
Amen.
“If you really want to watch tomorrow,” Gu Fei pedaled slowly on his bike. “I’ll have Ding
Zhuxin go pick you up, she knows……”
“No need.” Jiang Cheng quickly cut him off.
He could sense the subtle cold-shoulder Ding Zhuxin had toward himself. He didn’t want
her by his side while he watched.
“Then…” Gu Fei was looking at him, as if he wanted to say more.
Jiang Cheng waved his hand, “Don’t worry about me. I told you, I won’t let anyone see that
I’m there, and I won’t disrupt your brainless building hopping activity either. You just
worry about yourself and try not to get hurt.”
Gu Fei chuckled.
“The fuck you laughing about,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’re a member of the Steel Works
Morons too.”
Gu Fei laughed even harder.
“Hey! You wanna bet I……” Jiang Cheng’s temper was ready to flare at the
mere thought of the event, but Gu Fei’s laughter extinguished the embers of his anger
before it even started. He let go of the handlebar, and mimicked the meme Gu Fei had sent
him the day before, with one hand in a fist and the other hand pointed at Gu Fei. “Screw
you!”
Gu Fei froze for a second, then laughed so hard his bike veered off course,
“Uncanny.”
The materials that Pan Zhi sent over filled up a small cardboard box. It was tied up sturdily,
and included a USB drive in its own little paper bag. Jiang Cheng didn’t untie them, but just
looking at the spine of the books his mind suddenly felt much more at ease.
“This is still the same guy who went with you to our school that one time?” Gu Fei glanced
at the shipping label. “Pan Shuai?”
“Pan Zhi,” Jiang Cheng took the shipping and looked at it. “This shameless guy, this kid even
used to write ‘Pan An’ on his test papers.” [3]
Gu Fei started laughing, “But his handwriting really does look much more handsome than
yours.”
“Slackers all have good handwriting,” Jiang Cheng said. “Us overachievers don’t have the
energy to care about frivolous little details like whether our handwriting looks good.”
“You really should practice your handwriting,” Gu Fei said. “Lao-Xu almost started bawling
the other day when he talked about the marks you lost for test paper appearance.”
“That’s because he hasn’t seen what my writing looked like before,” Jiang Cheng said. “I
can’t even read what I wrote back then.”
“Ay…” Gu Fei chuckled and let out a sigh. “Let’s go then, noodle time.”
Perhaps it was the pile of study materials he just received, or maybe it was the fact that he
spent the afternoon playing basketball with Gu Fei, Jiang Cheng felt much of the
unhappiness from this morning fade away. Even when he thought of Li Baoguo, it didn’t
leave him feeling as bummed.
When they walked out of the gates after practice, Gu Miao was sitting by the side of the
road, her skateboard under her.
The weather was warmer now, so she no longer wore a hat. The hair that hadn’t been
properly tidied since her head was shaved now lay in a mess atop her head.
A red headband wrapped around her forehead; it had… character.
“I’ll give you fifty bucks.” Jiang Cheng looked to Gu Fei.
“Alright.” Gu Fei said.
This unexpected answer suddenly left Jiang Cheng unable to continue.
Fortunately, after a pause, Gu Fei went along with the bit and asked, “Why?”
“Please take your precious little sister for a haircut, I beg you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded, and stuck his hand out in front of Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng glanced down at the hand, took out his wallet, and placed a fifty yuan bill in it.
Gu Fei pocketed the money, “Though it doesn’t cost money to get her hair cut, Li Yan can do
it, he’s pretty good.”
“…… Give me the money back.” Jiang Cheng was rendered speechless.
“No.” Gu Fei’s answer was clearcut.
Jiang Cheng opened his mouth, but no words came out. How could there be such
unashamed bastards in this world!
As usual, Gu Miao followed the bike on her skateboard, but today she held onto the
backseat of Jiang Cheng’s bike. She happily glided the whole way back to their convenience
store.
“Are you heading back?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng looked at the bundle of study materials on the backseat.
“I’m gonna go back and take a look at this stuff.”
“Alright then,” Gu Fei nodded. “I’ll wait by the intersection for you tomorrow morning, at
eight-thirty.”
“OK,” Jiang Cheng answered, then waved at Gu Miao. “Bye Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao waved her hand. He smiled and pedaled away.
Fourth High scheduled the final match of the basketball tournament for Saturday, probably
to make it easier for all the students and teachers as well as the students from nearby
schools to watch. The game would start at 10AM, but the anxious captain Wang Jiuri
requested that everyone gather at 8:30AM to warm up. After the tournament they were
probably going to have a get-together again as a group, maybe even play another game in
the afternoon while they were still riding the high……
Therefore he probably didn’t have much time tomorrow to stake out the location
of the building-jumping, he could only go tonight.
After he set his things down in the apartment, Jiang Cheng left again with his backpack,
setting course straight for the railway bridge.
The streetside near the railway bridge didn’t look very desolate, but once he turned in at
the side street Gu Fei had pointed out earlier, it clearly looked much more deserted. The
storefronts by the road each looked more shabby and rundown than the one before.
At the end of the road, it split off into two directions. He could see the left side led to a
duvet factory, while on the right side was a little run-down road with cracks in the path.
He turned right, and a few minutes later, arrived at some run-down buildings with
shattered windows.
This was it.
He slowly rode forward while looking around at his surroundings, trying to guess which
buildings would be used by the Steel Works Morons to play their jumping game.
It was probably not these ones on the outside, they were too exposed, anyone passing by
would see them. He needed to go further in.
Jiang Cheng eventually stopped in front of a row of four old buildings.
The garbage strewn about this area was clearly more than anywhere else. All sorts of
empty drink bottles, snack wrappers, and cigarette butts littered the ground. There was
also a large metal pail outside the door.
He went over and peered inside the pail, it was filled with pieces of wood that had since
been burned to charcoal. The morons probably used this to keep warm when they gathered
at night.
There was nobody else nearby. Jiang Cheng leaned his bike haphazardly against the wall
and walked into another ramshackle building across the way.
This building stood by itself on this side, and contained five floors. It was the tallest in this
whole area, and was also so old and run-down that he could see the dead plants that once
grew out of the cracks in the walls. As he walked up the stairs, he felt that if there were two
more people with him the building might just collapse.
Jiang Cheng climbed all the way up to the top floor, walked to the window, and looked
across the alley.
He was pretty certain it would be the four buildings on the other side; the gaps
between them were not large. The two on the right were both four story buildings, while
the two on the left had three stories. The rooftop of the leftmost building was already half
collapsed, so really it was only two stories tall.
“Hello everyone,” Jiang Cheng raised his left hand and made a ‘V’ with his fingers, moving it
slowly in front of his eyes. “Welcome to the first episode of Moron-Watching With Cheng-
ge.”
He walked to the second window, “The four buildings we’re looking at right now, is the site
of the brainless building-hopping game of the Steel Works Morons…… We can probably
guess that they will be jumping from one building to another building. Based on the degree
of brain damage, they might even be going for the quadruple jump… We can see lots of
random objects strewn about the site, these things seem to be placed there intentionally, so
we can determine that they will likely attempt the jump with obstacles……” [4]
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng put his hand down and looked around. “I think we can all see by now,
our view here isn’t the greatest for aiming… let’s see if we can find a better angle……”
Jiang Cheng walked about the various rooms on the fifth floor, and finally found a stairwell
that contained half of a staircase that led to the roof.
He leapt up and grabbed onto the stairs. After a few tries he found it sturdy enough, so he
used the wall as leverage and climbed up the stairs.
“Ladies and gentlemen, friends, let us see……” Jiang Cheng stopped after walking a few
steps toward the edge of the roof. “I’m a little… afraid of heights, but for the sake of……
bringing you all on this moron-watching journey……”
He inched slowly to the edge of the roof, “This is a very good angle.”
From here, he could see very clearly the sights of the rooftop across the alley, it wasn’t too
far away either. However… if he just stood here on the spot, if anyone were to look this way
from the other building, they would very clearly see that a person was standing here.
There was a little shed on the rooftop. He walked over and stood in front of the shed, this
should provide enough cover for him.
“Alrighty, now we can see,” Jiang Cheng said as he rummaged around in his pocket and
pulled out his slingshot and a steel ball bearing. He squared himself at the platform across
the way and pulled the sling back. “What kind of precision we can achieve from this
distance, and with what kind of power.”
After he said this, he drew in a breath and ignored the sensation of his legs turning into
jelly beneath him.
He stared at the building on the other side and took careful aim, then let go. The
steel ball bearing shot out.
Almost immediately, a wooden stand on the other rooftop fell apart.
“That’s it for today’s show,” Jiang Cheng squinted at the collapsed wooden stand. “Please
tune in on time tomorrow after the basketball final, for the second episode of Moron-
Watching With Cheng-ge.”
Footnotes:
[1] Original: instead of lihai (impressive) gf said nihai (doesn’t mean anything).
He intentionally mispronounced to be cute. ↩
[2] Shaan here refers to Shaanxi, which is a northwestern province in China known for
their noodles, buns, and other flour based yummy foods. ↩
[3] Pan An [潘安]: a poet in the Western Jin dynasty, the head of the four most handsome men
of ancient China. And Shuai [帅] = handsome ↩
[4] Quadruple jump: this is Jiang Cheng’s term of the triple jump in track & field but with
one more hop XD ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6383
TL word count: 4542
TL time: 5:35:48
Edit: 1:00:15
Curse words: 4x fucks, 1x shit
TL’s Notes
Cheng-ge is back on his shenanigans, and no smoking this chapter (￣ c￣)y▂ξ

First posted: September 27, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 52
“Class-8, Class-8! Dark horse at the gate!”
Even though it was Saturday, Jiang Cheng still woke up around the same time as he usually
did. When he went downstairs to buy breakfast, he also took the chance to run a couple
laps around the neighbourhood.
There were much more people around at this time of the morning than where Li Baoguo
lived, aside from the grandmas and grandpas, there were quite a few young people around
too.
What to have for breakfast was certainly a dilemma. With hands in his pockets, Jiang Cheng
walked back and forth in front of the breakfast stands, pondering over what he actually
wanted to eat.
“What about soup dumplings.” A voice said from behind him.
The voice was very close to him, it practically came from right beside his ear.
Jiang Cheng jumped, and reached for his phone and turned around all at the same time.
It wasn’t until he was staring face to face with the person behind him that he realized the
voice belonged to Gu Fei.
Of course, it wasn’t just the voice, the face also belonged to Gu Fei.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng took a step back in shock, and looked Gu Fei up and down. He took
out his phone to check the time. “Did the sun rise from the west today……”
He raised his head and glanced up at the sky, “Or maybe it just never set yesterday.”
“Er-Miao got up early today, woke me up with the noise of skateboarding in the apartment.”
Gu Fei smiled. “So I came.”
“Have you eaten?” Jiang Cheng also smiled. For some reason, whenever he saw Gu Fei smile,
it made him want to smile too.
“Are you buying?” Gu Fei asked.
“You just swindled 50 bucks from me yesterday.” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“Fine then,” Gu Fei said. “Soup dumplings?”
“Soup dumplings, regular dumplings, tofu pudding, fried dough fritters,” Jiang Cheng listed
out all the things he was hesitating over in one breath. “One of each, and the braised beef
smells pretty good to me too.”
“Go get a table.” Gu Fei said.
This neighbourhood was situated in the older part of town, but because the residential
buildings were all clustered here, there were a lot of people gathered at the breakfast
stands at this time. Jiang Cheng stood at the side and watched for a while, then at the first
opening, quickly nabbed two recently vacated stools by a little table. He sat down in one,
and put his backpack on the other. [1]
He was about to signal his location to Gu Fei, when he looked up and noticed that two girls
were sitting on the other side of the table from him, and had been looking at him and
smiling. When he looked over, they quickly put their heads down again.
“Here.” Jiang Cheng saw Gu Fei take two trays of dumplings and raised his hand to snap at
him.
Gu Fei walked over and set the things down, “I got everything you mentioned earlier,
anything else you want to eat?”
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng said.
The two girls across from them kept their heads down. They giggled as they went back and
forth pinching each other on the arm and thigh.
Jiang Cheng went over Gu Fei’s words in his mind, and felt as though he understood what
they were going on about.
Gu Fei continued to pile trays and plates onto the table, which was quickly running out of
space.
“Wang Xu called me,” Gu Fei picked up a soup dumpling and said while he ate.
“He’s already there, and he’s the only one.”
“Did he complain about our disregard for authority and order.” Jiang Cheng picked up a
bowl of tofu pudding and took a sip.
“Very sternly.” Gu Fei nodded.
The two girls had finished eating, but didn’t seem to be leaving any time soon.
They both had their heads down, while playing on their phone. To Jiang Cheng, it looked
like they were simply peering across the table through their cameras.
He was just about to turn his head away to avoid getting caught in all kinds of ugly
distorted angles, when Gu Fei looked up at the two girls, “Don’t sneak photos, you’re going
to distort the face.”
“Ah!” The two of them let out a short and suppressed scream.
“Then can we take photos openly?” One of the girls asked.
Gu Fei didn’t answer, so the girl lifted her phone and pointed it at the two of them. Jiang
Cheng had no choice but to follow Gu Fei’s lead and look into the camera.
After taking the photo, the girl got up and said smilingly, while stuffing her phone back into
her bag, “We’ll be posting it on the Fourth High forum, remember to check it out, we’ll be
sure to process it first before posting……”
After the two girls left, Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Fei, “Which class are they from?”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei said. “They might not even be from our school.”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng was stunned.
“There’s going to be a lot of spectators from outside our school at the game today,” Gu Fei
said. “Not to mention, somebody uploaded a video of the match with Class-7. Lots of people
know about that head-dunk moment of yours, they’re gonna want to come watch.”
“…… Shit.” Jiang Cheng felt a little dazed.
“I asked Li Yan to come take photos today.” Gu Fei said. “I promised Jiuri I’d find someone
to take photos of him.”
“He’ll probably unleash his hidden potential when he sees the camera.” Jiang Cheng
chuckled.
“You’ll have to unleash your potential too,” Gu Fei tilted his head and looked at him. “This is
the only tournament I participated in since I came to Fourth High, lots of people are going
to be watching.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded solemnly, then said after some contemplation. “If you hadn’t
joined, would I have had to partner up with Wang Xu?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He couldn’t stop laughing while still holding a dumpling on his
chopsticks.
The game didn’t start until 10 AM, but the spectators filled the field long before then. Jiang
Cheng and the others could only warm up for half an hour before there were so many
people that they no longer had any space to practice.
Looking out at the people that crowded the field, Jiang Cheng sincerely felt that the
students around here were too idle. If it was his old school, he could count on one hand the
number of students who would have time on the weekend to watch
the basketball tournament of another school, played between their own classes.
Fourth High had set up this final match rather formally. They even brought in bleachers
from who-knows-where and placed them around the sides of the court.
When Jiang Cheng and the guys headed in toward the rest area, he could see the bleachers
were already filled to the brim with people, with quite a few of them standing from the lack
of seats.
At 9:30, Li Yan arrived at the rest area carrying Gu Fei’s camera bag, “Look at this setup,
you’d think this is a legitimate city-wide competition or something……”
“Make sure you get some good photos of Wang Xu.” Gu Fei said.
“That will depend on how he plays,” Li Yan said as he assembled the lens. “I’m not you, you
can make a cow look aesthetic. I’ll just make him look however he looks.”
“And the other guys too,” Gu Fei continued. “Take lots of photos, it’s a rare occurrence that
our class could make it to the final match.”
“Got it.” Li Yan held up the camera and peered all around. “It’s also a rare occurrence for
you to care about something this much.”
Before the game started, as if he wanted to milk the moment for as much as it had, Principal
Liu even gave a brief speech, introducing to the spectators the teams in the final game of
the tournament.
One is the reigning champion with no losses on their record, and the other is a dark horse
that burst out of nowhere.
Listening to Principal Liu’s introduction, Jiang Cheng somehow started feeling nervous. It
didn’t help that the cheering squad from both sides didn’t stop chanting throughout
Principal Liu’s speech.
Yi Jing, who was usually soft-spoken and even a little shy, was
uncharacteristically open and unrestrained as the head of their cheering squad; she was
even able to call out the most embarrassing chants in the most righteous way.
“Class-8, Class-8! Dark horse at the gate!”
“Class-8, Class-8! Handsomest in the state!”
The chant was such that Jiang Cheng couldn’t even lift his head up. He sat with his elbows
braced on his knees and stared at his shoes.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei called to him, and very discreetly extended a hand to him from under
the seats.
Jiang Cheng’s mind was full of the plays they were going to put on later, and upon seeing his
hand, didn’t immediately make the connection. He reached out his own hand and dug into
Gu Fei’s palm with his finger.
“…… Give me five.” Gu Fei said.
“Ah.” Only then did Jiang Cheng collect himself, and lightly slapped Gu Fei’s hand with his
own.
“Pay attention to He Zhou,” Gu Fei said. “He’s their point guard. Like you, he can pretty
much do everything, and he’s fast too.”
“Mmn, make sure you don’t keep going in straight lines today.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He
didn’t plan out a specific strategy for this game. When faced with a well-oiled machine like
the Class-2 team, with Class-8’s current abilities, any strategy of theirs would immediately
get messed up on the court. For this game, they could only hope to rely on the tacit
teamwork they’ve developed over these weeks, and adjust as they go.
“Yes sir.” Gu Fei said.
The captain on each team had started to pick sides. Wang Xu won, and in a rare moment of
clarity, chose the side that faced away from the sun.
“Gu Fei does the jump.” Jiang Cheng said before they went on.
“ADD OIL!” Wang Xu roared.
“ADD OIL!” The rest of them followed suit and yelled out in unison. They took their jackets
off and stepped onto the court.
It was a rather gratifying feeling. Jiang Cheng didn’t like to be surrounded and gawked at,
but was not against showing off. As they took their place in the center of the field, he could
even hear the clicking sound of shutters among the cheering and screaming of the crowd.
He felt an instant gratification.
The player chosen to do the jump from Class-2 was about the same height as Gu Fei, but he
noticed from the last game that this guy was exceptionally gifted at jumping. On this point
alone, he had no match in anyone from Class-8.
Sure enough, after the referee tossed the ball into the air, this grasshopper’s initial jumping
height had exceeded Gu Fei by about a palm’s width…… and he hit the pall toward He Zhou.
It was possible for Jiang Cheng, according to his own judgement, to cut in and intercept this
ball. But just as he strode over and extended his arm, He Zhou suddenly accelerated, and in
the same instant that his hand touched the ball, it was slapped away to the side.
The grasshopper that at some point already left the midline now took possession of the
ball.
Fuck! Jiang Cheng cursed in his mind, and exchanged a glance with Gu Fei. Gu Fei
immediately took off after the grasshopper in the direction of the basket.
Jiang Cheng didn’t follow right away, but attached himself to He Zhou’s side.
On one hand, Jiang Cheng wanted to keep him from receiving another pass, and on the
other hand, he wanted to see just how fast this guy was.
Class-2’s offense was very polished. After the ball exchanged hands another two times, the
grasshopper brought the ball around Gu Fei and jumped to make a shot.
Amidst a wave of screams, Gu Fei suddenly jumped up right behind the guy.
Jiang Cheng’s heart almost skipped a beat. With this position, it was way too easy to commit
a foul, he could hit the guy’s hand if he wasn’t careful.
However, since the grasshopper had been briefly hindered by Gu Fei before the jump, his
jumping height wasn’t exactly the best this time.
Amen!
Jiang Cheng temporarily abandoned He Zhou, and rushed over to Gu Fei’s left side.
Gu Fei jumped very high. After he leapt up from behind the grasshopper, he landed a clean
slap on the ball and swept it to the side. Jiang Cheng jumped up amidst a torrent of screams
and caught the ball, he yelled out, “Wang Xu!”
Wang Xu was at midcourt. After hearing this shout, he turned right away and started
running back.
Jiang Cheng walked the ball forward a few steps, and from the corner of his eyes saw He
Zhou coming his way. He shot his hand out and lobbed the ball in Wang Xu’s direction.
Don’t let us down, captain!
Amen amen amen-men!
Wang Xu jumped up mid-sprint, reached out, and caught the pass that was long as well as
high.
Class-8’s cheering squad suddenly jumped up. The rhythmic “add oil” they had been
chanting instantly turned into a chorus of “AaaHHHHhhhh——”
Class-2’s defense was very quick, but Wang Xu took advantage of his head start.
By the time he arrived at the other basket, there was only one person there to
head him off. If he took a shot at this point, there was a high probability of scoring.
However, Wang Xu hesitated at the last second, and instead made a backhanded pass to Gu
Fei, who had just crossed the three-point line.
Gu Fei’s purpose there was clearly to catch any rebounds and take up space under the
basket. He did not anticipate it when Wang Xu’s pass suddenly came to him, he didn’t even
have a chance to adjust his forward momentum.
He received this ball with a backhand catch, and before he could get a firmer grip on it, it
was intercepted by a player from Class-2, who wore his wristband on his bicep.
Next was passing, and quick attack. When He Zhou scored a 3-pointer, nobody from Class-8
had even had a chance to get close to him.
This first score of the game had the spectators erupting in applause and screams.
As Guo Xu got ready to make the rebound, Jiang Cheng walked to Wang Xu’s side, “This
game can’t just depend on me and Gu Fei.”
Wang Xu nodded in silence. It was clear that his mistake was heartwrenching to him, he
almost wrenched his expression into a clockwise crumple. Jiang Cheng clapped him on the
shoulder, “You could’ve scored that shot just now.”
“Mhm!” Wang Xu gave his head a shake and immediately recovered. “That’s how I fucking
felt too.”
Guo Xu set the rebound, the ball was now in Jiang Cheng’s hands. He turned, but didn’t rush
to move. He pointed to the side with his left hand, and Wang Xu immediately ran to the
midcourt, getting ready to receive the pass. With a flourish, Jiang Cheng passed the ball to
Gu Fei on the other side, then charged forward toward the basket.
These days of practice had elevated Wang Xu’s intellect too. He didn’t act shocked that Jiang
Cheng used him as a feint again, but ran straight up to the basket.
The grasshopper had attached himself to Gu Fei’s back. Gu Fei didn’t move with the ball
either, but instead turned in place with his arm out as a guard. As Lu Xiaobin came up to
relieve him, he passed the ball to Jiang Cheng, who was just about to approach the 3-point
line.
Jiang Cheng caught the ball, and immediately the arm-band guy came to intercept. Jiang
Cheng sighed in his mind. Class-2’s reigning champion title wasn’t for nothing. Even after
all that, he still couldn’t shake off their speedy defense.
He already lost the chance to take a shot on the 3-pointer line. He glanced at the markings
on the ground, clenched his jaw, and suddenly launched the ball toward the basket, while
still standing a meter away from the 3-point line.
Gu Fei was without a guard at the moment, he could go get the rebound, he thought.
But just as Gu Fei rushed over, the ball impacted with a loud noise against the backboard,
and bounced into the basket.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng was a little surprised himself.
The spectators on all sides erupted in waves of cheers, so loud that it swallowed the sound
of Wang Xu charging up to him and shouting “Jiang Cheng YOU
FUCKING BOSS” to his face.
Gu Fei jogged up to him, a smile played on the corner of his mouth. As he ran past him, he
kept his palm facing forward, and said, “You the boss, three-pointer king.”
“Let’s do that again,” Jiang Cheng met him halfway and gave his hand a slap, even bumped
his shoulder on the way. “From the right side to the baseline.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered.
Getting a 3-pointer from the baseline was a little difficult, but the defense had to be more
lax than at the center.
Class-2 was unlike the other teams they went up against. For one thing, the abilities of their
players were evenly spread out, every person could carry their own weight. It would be
hard to intercept a ball from their hands.
Two times Jiang Cheng had tried to cut off He Zhou’s trajectory without success.
With the grasshopper providing cover, He Zhou returned the favour with a 3-pointer of
their own.
“DON’T RUSH IT!” Lao-Lu’s voice boomed from between the sounds of
screaming. Perhaps because it was the final match, he wasn’t so brash as to speak through a
megaphone this time. “HOLD STEADY! CLASS-8, CLASS-8,
HANDSOMEST IN THE STATE——”
Jiang Cheng was reluctant to even turn to face him. There were only two lines in the chant,
yet Lao-Lu picked out the most embarrassing one to shout.
This score from Class-2 had people both inside and outside the court in a state of
excitement. When Guo Xu passed the ball to Jiang Cheng it was shot out with a force akin to
a cannonball.
As he turned around, he saw that He Zhou had planted himself right in his path.
Such a quick reaction.
Jiang Cheng dribbled the ball in place a couple of times and charged straight toward He
Zhou. He got all the way up to his face, then just as He Zhou was about to intercept the ball,
Jiang Cheng leaned forward as if going for a hug, but his hand hooked over the side and he
passed the ball to Gu Fei behind him, who had already begun running toward the basket.
The pass was a little low; Gu Fei almost stumbled when he caught the ball.
Jiang Cheng followed up right away, but He Zhou was hot on his trail. Gu Fei didn’t have a
chance to pass the ball back, so without hesitation, he gave the ball to a madly approaching
Wang Xu.
Wang Xu’s brain was clocking at above average speed at this moment. At the same time as
he caught the pass, he flung the ball back to Gu Fei’s hand.
This one back-and-forth gave He Zhou a moment of hesitation. Jiang Cheng quickly shook
him off and charged to the baseline from the right side.
Before he managed to steady his stance, Gu Fei already threw the ball to him.
From this position, Jiang Cheng was practically on the same line as the backboard. The
players from Class-2 immediately swooped into the three-second area.
This was exactly what he was going for!
Jiang Cheng stared at the rim of the basket, lifted his hand, and without a moment of
hesitation threw the ball out.
The shouts from the spectators seemed to be coming from directly behind his back, the
decibel of which shot up in an arc that followed the trajectory of the ball, finally reaching a
crescendo as the ball landed in the basket.
“Great shot!” Jiang Cheng called out in a low voice, he brought down the arm that was still
in the air in a gesture of triumph, and cheered for himself. “Fuck!”
The consecutive 3-pointers kindled everyone’s fighting spirits.
There was no landslide difference on the court at the moment. Class-2’s skills and
cooperation were indeed much better than Class-8, but since they’ve never lost a game and
would never let the winning title go to anyone else, their players were also under much
greater pressure. In comparison, the players on Class-8
were relatively freer in their play. Win or lose, they were already the dark horse.
They were under no pressure, all they had to do was let loose and play.
Even the usually quiet Lu Xiaobin was at the moment shouting loudly as he ran with the
ball, like a door-spirit on drugs. Jiang Cheng kept thinking that he might
accidentally swallow up the opponents around him if he wasn’t careful. [2]
Neither side called for intermission or a change. They both wanted to keep up the
momentum while the spirit was up to get as many points as possible.
The scores were still practically head to head. Class-8 continued to be behind on the points,
but never by much, they kept up the difference of one or two points throughout the whole
game.
At three minutes before the end of the first half, Gu Fei charged up to the basket with two
players from Class-2 blocking him, and successfully overtook the other team’s score by one
point.
In the midst of the crazed screaming from the crowd, Class-2 called for a break.
He Zhou stopped Jiang Cheng as he was walking to the resting area, “You should join the
school team.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng drew a blank.
“You should join the school team.” He Zhou repeated.
It took a while for Jiang Cheng’s mind to process this, “What, I mean, you’re saying this to
me now?”
“I wanted to say it after the game,” He Zhou said. “But I’m a little overexcited right now.”
“…… We’ll talk about it after the tournament then.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What do you say we play another game after this is done?” He Zhou asked.
“You, me, Gu Fei, Tang Xiwei, and Song Yu can be on one team.”
“Song Yu?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t remember who this Song Yu was.
“He plays center,” He Zhou pointed at the grasshopper. “How about it?”
Jiang Cheng stared at the grasshopper in shock. Who knew the kind of
expectations his parents had to give him such a name, but he had the urge to give Pan Zhi a
call to tell him to get his ass over here and become sworn brothers with Song Yu…… [3]
“We’ll see after the game,” Jiang Cheng said. “Let’s finish it seriously.”
“I’ve been serious… fine then,” He Zhou clapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s finish the game
first.”
Jiang Cheng clenched his teeth and almost grabbed his own arm so as to not slap He Zhou’s
hand away out of reflex.
“What did he say to you?” Gu Fei was crouching by the side of the court, and stood up as
Jiang Cheng jogged over.
“Wanted me to join the school team, and said he wants to play another match after this
game.” Jiang Cheng said.
“So eager,” Gu Fei chuckled. “Though he’s always been this way.”
“He’s on the school team?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm, team captain.” Gu Fei said. “Just like you were.”
Jiang Cheng gave him a look but didn’t say anything.
“You guys need to stop running to the same place,” Li Yan said holding the camera. “Create
some distance, when you run don’t just pay attention to the other team and yourself, keep
tabs on where your teammates are, you have to make sure you’re open to receive a pass at
any time.”
“Mhm!” Everyone nodded their understanding.
“If someone is in trouble, one person is enough to help out, don’t all crowd together.” Li Yan
pointed at Guo Xu. “Like you, if somebody is already going to relieve them you just keep
running and prepare to receive a pass.”
“Got it!” Guo Xu nodded.
“You two,” Li Yan looked at Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng, but after a long pause couldn’t think of
what to say. “You two just keep on showing off.”
“Yan-ge,” Wang Xu looked at the camera in Li Yan’s hands. “You must’ve taken lots of
photos today huh?”
Li Yan gave him a sideways glance, “Rest assured it’s enough for you to make an album of it.
Three photos a day for a whole month without repeats.”
“Even though I’m the captain, you can’t just take photos of me only,” Wang Xu said. “You
can take some of Gu Fei ah, and Jiang Cheng ah, and our other teammates……”
“Did you throw all your brain cells into the basket?” Li Yan interrupted him impatiently.
Jiang Cheng laughed and turned his head, just in time to see Yi Jing standing behind Gu Fei
with a bottle of water. He was about to speak up and let Gu Fei know, when Yi Jing handed
the water to him with a smile, “Here, you take this.”
“Thanks.” Jiang Cheng took the water, and while drinking, glanced over at Gu Fei’s
collarbone.
Who knows if his wound would be alright after a game… He saw the corner of the gauze
peeking out of Gu Fei’s collar, there was blood on it.
“Shit,” He frowned and leaned over to tug open Gu Fei’s collar and look inside.
There wasn’t a lot of blood, but it was still more than a smudge. “You……”
Before he even finished, a wave of screaming from the girls nearby sounded in his ears.
Jiang Cheng remembered himself and immediately withdrew his hand and took a step back.
“What’s wrong, what’s wrong?” Wang Xu noticed the commotion right away. He pounced in
front of Gu Fei and yanked at his collar. “I……”
The sound of girls screaming instantly went up a level, then became a torrent of laughter.
“Time’s up.” Li Yan dragged Wang Xu away with one hand.
Jiang Cheng put down his bottle of water. He could still feel the eyes on his back as he
walked onto the court, it burned into his skin and made him uneasy all over.
It was true that he had lots of uncontrollable thoughts and impulses when it came to Gu Fei,
wanting to get closer to him and be intimate with him, and maybe more. But this feeling
from being surrounded and screamed at from a simple mindless gesture was still… a little
panic-inducing.
He struggled internally for a long time, and ultimately had to thank the universe that
arranged to put Wang Xu beside him.
He was grateful to Wang Xu, whose head was missing a whole instrument, for saving him
from the frantic awkwardness…… [4]
“It’s fine.” Gu Fei said beside him.
“Did it tear?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Maybe,” Gu Fei said. “I didn’t even feel anything.”
“…… Will it affect you when you’re doing the moronic building-hopping?”
Jiang Cheng sighed.
“A little, maybe,” Gu Fei said. “But when it comes to that, if I don’t get at least a little hurt by
the end of it, Monkey won’t let it go either.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him without a word.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei ran toward the center of the court and turned back to look at him, then
suddenly pointed very solemnly at Class-2’s basket. “Screw them!”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but burst out laughing. He pointed as well.
“Screw them!”
Footnotes:
[1] Some notes about breakfast stall culture in China (only if you want to know)
↩
[2] hahahaha ok so if you remember, Lu Xiaobin is the super tall brickhouse, hence, “door
spirit”. ↩
[3] As mentioned previously, Pan Zhi liked to write his name as Pan An, who was famously
the most beautiful man of ancient China. Well, Song Yu was a poet from the Warring States
period who was also among the top four most beautiful men ↩
[4] “His brain is missing a string” is used to refer to someone who’s not very smart, or
easily gullible. The string here refers to the string of a qin instrument which typically has 7
strings. So you can guess what it means that Wang Xu’s head was missing the whole
instrument XD ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6362
TL word count: 4666
TL time: 5:53:53
Edit: pending orz
Curse words: 7x fucks, 2x shit, 1x ass
TL’s Notes
if anyone was reading a few days ago while i was having an identity crisis over the blog
themes, sorry! I went through like 20 and ended up right back where I started, just with some
diff colours XD
there might be some bugs and mistakes, will do a thorough edit later when I have more time
orz

First posted: October 4, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 53
Cheng-ge is omnipresent
It was a very appropriate point for Class-2 to call for break. They were only three minutes
away from the end of the first half; this not only interrupted the momentum Class-8 had
going in, but also did not give them a chance to get back into rhythm before the first half
was over. With the addition of the halftime intermission, Class-8 would likely not get their
momentum back.
Jiang Cheng looked at the scoreboard, they were down by four points. This wasn’t a big gap,
and to be fair was very easy to catch up. But since their opponent was Class-2, a team
whose overall and individual skills were much higher than theirs, he had little confidence
in catching up on these four points.
For today’s game, they had Li Yan to thank, who not only took photos, but also acted as an
off-court coach.
During intermission, they all crouched in a cluster around Li Yan to hear his plans.
“I’m going to be blunt, hope you don’t mind. I think you have a pretty slim chance,” Li Yan
concluded. “If you want to win then you’ll have to really give it your all. Not one person
should stay still, you all have to start running. Those guys on their team are part of the
school team, right? They didn’t achieve that level of coordination in just one or two months,
so if you want to win… or rather stop the gap from getting even larger, then you’ve got to
give everything you have.”
“YES!” They put their hands together in the middle and yelled.
“Jiang Cheng, you probably won’t have many chances at 3-pointers in the second half.
They’ll be watching you like a hawk.” Li Yan looked at Jiang Cheng. “You have to create
openings for Da-Fei.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Add oil.” Li Yan held up the camera and took a shot of his face.
Jiang Cheng looked at him and sighed.
“Not bad,” Li Yan showed him the camera. “It’s much more of a challenge taking photos of
your captain, those poses……”
Jiang Cheng started laughing and snuck a glance at Wang Xu, who was at the side drinking
water with his hand braced against his hip.
The second half began, and both teams went at it hard from the start. It wasn’t just the
players on the court, even the cheering squads from each class were screaming like mad on
the sidelines. If it wasn’t for the lines on the ground, and the referee standing nearby, they
likely would’ve ran straight onto the court and shouted at each other.
This time, Jiang Cheng started to feel tired only half an hour into the game. This was
something he hadn’t experienced in the previous matches, the strain on his stamina was a
lot. Because even if Wang Xu and the guys gave it their all, the difference in the two teams’
abilities had to be made up by him and Gu Fei.
After assisting Gu Fei in scoring three layups in a row, Jiang Cheng felt like his sweat was
finally overwhelming his eyes. He didn’t have the habit of wearing sweatbands, so he could
only use his shirt to wipe away the sweat.
“Want it?” Gu Fei asked beside him.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Here,” Gu Fei was a freak who wore a sweatband on each wrist. He took off the one on his
left hand and handed it to Jiang Cheng. “I haven’t wiped with this one yet.”
Jiang Cheng was about to say “do you think your sweat wouldn’t soak through anyway”, but
Gu Fei quickly added, “Take it now before the sweat from my arm reaches my wrist.”
“…… Shit.” Jiang Cheng laughed and put the wristband on, then used it to dab away the
sweat on his forehead.
“See that number 9,” Gu Fei said. “He’s out of energy. He’s been running the left wing, I’m
going to head up from there in a bit.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He and Gu Fei’s play generally stuck to the middle or the right
wing. Going from the left would be a little unwieldy for someone who was used to playing
with their right hand.
“I want to see if I can score a trick.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng had no time to figure out what exactly he had in mind, because Guo Xu was
right there with the rebound and a roar ready to go. He quickly started running.
Lu Xiaobin took a few steps with the ball then immediately passed it to him. Gu Fei had
already crossed the midline. Just as he caught the ball and was about to make the pass, Gu
Fei suddenly leaned a little to the left.
Jiang Cheng passed the ball to him right away. The timing was perfect, the ball bounced into
Gu Fei’s hands just as he crossed over to the left wing.
Jiang Cheng immediately ran down the center toward the basket to aid him.
Gu Fei switched the ball to his left hand as he ran, and all the girls on the bleachers went
wild with screams, their excitement was as if they just witnessed Gu Fei streaking across
the field. Jiang Cheng was unimpressed. Dribbling with the left hand wasn’t some major
feat, most people who often played basketball had had practice with it, otherwise it would
be difficult to go around your opponents most of the time. Gu Fei’s left hand dribbling was
indeed very steady, but his looks and persona definitely factored into it. He didn’t see
anyone screaming like this when the grasshopper passed three people in a row with his left
hand……
Gu Fei quickly closed in on the baseline. It wouldn’t be easy going for a layup from this
angle, which was similar to Jiang Cheng’s position before, when he landed the 3-pointer.
Therefore, the main focus of Class-2’s defense was to keep Gu Fei from passing. They only
had number 9 guarding him up close, to stop him from turning and going up to the basket.
Jiang Cheng straddled the three-second zone while staring at Gu Fei’s movements,
preparing to assist at any second.
But Gu Fei suddenly pivoted on the spot, and with his left hand, lobbed the ball over his
head and toward the hoop.
Fuck! Throwing a 3-pointer from this angle, with this posture? Jiang Cheng quickly shouted,
“Xiaobin!”
Lu Xiaobin immediately arrived and crowded for space under the basket, getting ready to
fight for the rebound.
And yet, the ball that Gu Fei so carelessly flung out flew through the air in a perfect arc, and
went through the hoop.
“Fuck me!” Jiang Cheng jumped up and yelled. “Fuck!”
The sudden noise from the bleachers was loud enough to shake the court. Lao-Lu waved his
arm frantically, “Gu Fei! Good job! GOOD JOB! Class-8, Class-8!
Best looks in the state!”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t even bother to complain about what looks had to do with it that Lao-
Lu was so obsessed with this line. He jumped up and bumped shoulders with Gu Fei,
“What’s your problem.”
“Was that cool.” Gu Fei also jumped up and bumped against him.
“Unbearably cool,” Jiang Cheng said. “The troops are energized again.”
This 3-pointer of Gu Fei’s had lifted the spirits of Class-8’s team, but at the same time
energized Class-2 as well.
Class-2 swiftly launched a quick counterattack and took back two points.
The atmosphere on and off the court came suddenly to a boil, it was more than enough to
steam a few trays of buns.
Just as Li Yan had said, under these circumstances, it would be difficult to even maintain
the score difference. Every time they scored a ball, Class-2 would get right back at them.
By the time they came to the last segment, Class-8 was still behind by three points. With a
difference like this, if they performed at their best, it could be a simple matter of one ball in
the basket to break even. But in reality, especially when Class-2 had already been riled up,
it was more than a little difficult to catch up.
During break, Jiang Cheng stood with his hands on his knees and listened as his teammates
around him huffed and puffed like bulls.
“Guo Xu, come off and take a rest,” Li Yan had stopped talking strategy with them at this
point. “Switch for someone bigger. If they strike, then all of you come back and guard the
basket. If they go for a 3-pointer, just let Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng deal with it.”
“Got it.” Wang Xu nodded.
“You guys don’t really have a problem scoring right now, the key is to keep them from
scoring more points. Otherwise if you keep getting one ball each, you’re done for.” Li Yan
said.
In a game where both sides were going all in but the difference in skills couldn’t be ignored,
it was next to impossible for Class-8 to keep Class-2 from scoring.
When Li Yan said this he gave Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng a look. Jiang Cheng knew that he only
said this so his teammates wouldn’t be discouraged.
After they made the switch, they did gain a little more vertical height under the basket.
However, compared to the grasshopper, the effect wasn’t so pronounced.
With four minutes to go, the score difference was now five points. Li Yan called for another
change, and switched Guo Xu on again.
“Go all in, and let loose,” Was the message Guo Xu brought with him. “Focus everything on
scoring.”
Jiang Cheng felt like he had never been under this much pressure, not even when leading
the school team to a tournament in the past. The pressure came from the onlookers’ cheers
and shouts, the hardworking chants from the cheering squad, his own teammates who
were giving it everything they had, and his opponents who were doing the same.
“Go get us three points.” Said Gu Fei when he ran past.
After a few more rounds of back and forth, the difference was brought down to four points.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the timer as he caught the ball, there was less than a minute left. If
this were between two teams of comparable skill level, there would be some hope left. But
now…… Still, he charged forward with the ball.
He was stopped in his path by He Zhou, so he passed the ball to Gu Fei, who immediately
gave it to Wang Xu.
Wang Xu and Lu Xiaobin coordinated an advance into the other team’s three-second zone,
but their shot got knocked down. Fortunately, Lu Xiaobin’s sudden booming bellow had the
other player vying for the rebound frozen in shock. Lu Xiaobin took advantage of this
fraction of a second and stole the rebound.
Jiang Cheng could feel the power of his roar from all the way outside the 3-point line. If this
was a wuxia novel, the other guy would probably be bleeding out from all his orifices right
about now.
Lu Xiaobin gave the ball to Jiang Cheng.
Go get us three points.
Gu Fei’s words resounded in his mind. He didn’t so much as hesitate before he jumped up.
He Zhou was right in front of him, and jumped up with him.
He leaned back slightly. In this instant, a hundred repetitions of “idol Fujima give me
strength” ran through his brain…… [1]
The ball left his hands.
He Zhou didn’t get to touch the ball, which flew out in a large arc.
As they came back down, He Zhou said without even turning around, “Great shot.”
Jiang Cheng stared at the ball, his arms still in the air. As the ball went through the hoop, he
did as he had always done, and pressed three fingers down with the motion of the ball.
Great shot.
One point difference.
The last 20 seconds almost got everyone in a frenzy. The audience on the bleachers all
stood up, as waves of sound crashed over them. Lao-Xu had started to hop up and down,
waving his arms and yelling, though nobody could hear what he was shouting. Even Lao-
Lu’s usually loud voice was drowned out in the
excitement of the crowd.
As if they were flying, Class-2 ran the ball under the basket in no time. When the
grasshopper got the ball, he didn’t even steady his footing before he jumped up to shoot. Gu
Fei jumped up at the same time, but wasn’t able to knock down the shot, he only managed
to poke the bottom of the ball with his fingertips.
The ball didn’t go in, but the people under the basket immediately tangled together in a
fight for the rebound, they were practically embracing one another.
The feeling that this was the “final match of a boys’ basketball tournament” had just about
faded away, in a daze Jiang Cheng had the illusion that they were actually a bunch of
aunties fighting for a deal at the supermarket’s 90% off sale.
Class-2 still ended up with the ball. Another shot. This time Gu Fei knocked it down, and the
ball landed in Wang Xu’s hands.
Four seconds left.
Wang Xu had no time to pass, he ran straight out to the opposite side with the ball.
Jiang Cheng went after him to provide cover, but He Zhou was like someone who had a
flashbang go off under his ass, his speed was astonishing. Even before Wang Xu crossed the
3-point line, He Zhou already caught up to him. He reached out a hand and slapped the ball
out of Wang Xu’s hands.
By the time Wang Xu once again had the ball back in his possession, the ending whistle
sounded.
“Game over——”
All the students from Class-2 jumped up, their cheers were deafening.
Wang Xu stood there with the ball, unmoving. Gu Fei walked over and patted his shoulder.
He suddenly turned around and tossed the ball away, then with a roar, pulled Gu Fei into
his arms and started crying.
“The fuck?” Gu Fei froze, his arm still up.
“We were so close!” Wang Xu shouted through tears. “Just a little bit more!”
“We already did so well,” Gu Fei patted his back. “Look, we did so well, don’t cry……”
He Zhou exchanged a few high fives with his teammates, then seeing this, was a little
stunned. He jogged over, “Did I… I don’t recall bumping into him……”
“You didn’t,” Jiang Cheng said. “He’s just……”
“Why the hell did you slap my ball away!” Wang Xu pushed Gu Fei off, glared at He Zhou,
and yelled.
“Hey!” He Zhou jumped in surprise and took a step back, he was bewildered. “I had to… slap
it… ah.”
“Captain,” Jiang Cheng was feeling rather dejected and disappointed. After all, they only lost
by one point. But seeing Wang Xu’s state, he had no time to lament their loss. He walked
over and looked at Wang Xu. “Captain, Captain Wang?”
“What.” Wang Xu looked back at him.
“Everyone’s watching you,” Jiang Cheng said. “Hurry up and organize, we still have to shake
hands.”
“Oh right!” Wang Xu’s eyes widened. “I almost forgot! Come on come on!
Everyone on my team line up here!”
Jiang Cheng let out a breath of relief.
After the players from both teams finished shaking hands and patting each other on the
back, they went back to their respective resting areas.
“Most spectacular!” Lao-Xu went down the line and gave them each a hug.
“Most spectacular! You were all amazing! I’m so proud of you all!”
When he got to Jiang Cheng, Jiang Cheng quickly clamped his fist at him and stepped back.
[2]
“Oh you!” Lao-Xu pointed at him and sighed. He grabbed Gu Fei and gave him a hug. “Good
job Gu Fei!”
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t say anything.
After Lao-Xu walked away, he turned to look at Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng held his gaze for a
while, then laughed and opened his arms. Gu Fei walked over and gave him a hug.
In this moment, Jiang Cheng no longer cared if there’d be screaming around them, whether
someone would be holding up a phone, or if there would be a new post in the forum from
this scene.
He just wanted to give Gu Fei a hug. Because of this game, because of this group of
teammates who gave their all, and because of the perfect coordination between him and Gu
Fei. A hug.
Give me a hug, I’ll give you a hug, carrying my meimei onto the palanquin of buds…… [3]
“I haven’t played such a satisfying game in a really long time.” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’ve just never played a normal game of
basketball before huh?”
“…… I have.” Gu Fei let go of him. “I gotta go to the washroom.”
“Were you holding in piss this whole time?” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say.
“No,” Gu Fei grabbed his jacket and pulled out the tube of wound-closing ointment. “I think
the wound on my side tore open too, I gotta go fix it.”
“Do you…” Jiang Cheng lowered his voice. “Need help?”
“I’m OK.” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
Most of the audience was still hanging around. Some were on the court shooting hoops,
some were still sitting on the bleachers excitedly discussing the game, and then there were
those who were…… taking pictures.
“Jiang Cheng,” He Zhou jogged over. “Let’s play another game later?”
“Can we do it another day?” Jiang Cheng glanced toward the washroom. “Today we……”
“Can’t!” Wang Xu suddenly leaned in. “No way! We have to go out and eat now! No time to
play with you!”
He Zhou hesitated for a moment, “Alright then, we’ll schedule another time, let’s add each
other on WeChat?”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng took out his phone and added He Zhou to his contacts.
It didn’t take very long for Gu Fei to come back from the washroom. The players and
cheering squad from Class-8 were still in a conflicted state of excitement, sadness, and joy.
“We have a big group!” Wang Xu was on the phone with the restaurant to make a
reservation. “Don’t you guys have one of those mini conference room types of private
rooms! Exactly! Yes that one!”
“How is it?” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei.
“No problemo,” Gu Fei rolled his shoulders. “We’re going out to eat?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “What time…… are you?”
“Eight o’clock tonight.” Gu Fei said.
Wang Xu ushered the bunch of them to the restaurant, including the reluctant Li Yan.
Jiang Cheng sat beside Gu Fei again, but they didn’t speak more than a couple of sentences
to each other the whole meal. Everyone was in an extremely excited state. Fortunately,
there weren’t many other people dining at this restaurant at lunch time, otherwise they
would have chased out all the other customers by their noise alone.
Jiang Cheng didn’t feel much like talking anyway. Ever since he saw the row of buildings
yesterday, he had harboured a vague sense of unease about Gu Fei’s brainless building-
hopping event.
Now that the tournament was over and he had nothing else to worry about, this feeling
only grew stronger.
Gu Fei would definitely get hurt, and very visibly injured too. He had to get hurt.
Based on Monkey’s M.O, even if Gu Fei admitted defeat, he still had to be injured first.
So then, what kind of injury does this need to be?
How utterly moronic.
They ate and talked and drank and even cried together. At the end they even finished it off
with a chorus of “Friends”. An outsider who didn’t know any better might think they were
having an early farewell party. The meal lasted all the way until past three o’clock in the
afternoon. When it was finally over, Jiang Cheng walked out of the restaurant feeling like
his sweat had been fermented on his body.
Li Yan had his motorcycle, so he rode straight back to Gu Fei’s store. Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei
pedaled back slowly on their bikes; they were quiet the whole way.
It wasn’t until they were at the convenience store that Gu Fei finally said, “Make sure you
be careful tonight. There’ll be a lot of people there, there’s gonna be all kinds.”
“I know,” Jiang Cheng glanced over at him, then finally let out a sigh. “The certain kind of
injury you have to sustain, make sure you… have a good handle on that.”
“Don’t worry,” Gu Fei smiled. “Injuries and I grew up together.”
Jiang Cheng gave him a middle finger and pedaled away on his bike.
The first thing he did when he got home was take a shower. Then he went out again and
after several circles around the neighbourhood, finally found a
pharmacy where he bought some rubber medical tubing and a pair of Rochester-Pean
forceps.
When he first started to fiddle with slingshots it was with rubber medical tubes.
Frankly, these weren’t the best ‘slings’ to use for a slingshot, but because he was so used to
it and was familiar with the way it stretched and warped, he continued to use them.
After he bought the rubber tubes, he went to the market. As someone who was completely
unfamiliar with the layout of the market, he walked around inside for maybe ten whole laps
before he found a stall and purchased a bag of walnuts.
Having done all this, it wasn’t yet five o’clock, still a long way to go until eight.
Nevertheless, he stuffed everything into his backpack and made his way toward the railway
bridge.
He locked his bike on a railing outside a little shop at the intersection, then headed in on
foot.
This place looked even more desolate during the day than at night. He went straight up to
the roof and put down his bag, then sat down by the wall of the rooftop shed.
“Hello everyone, welcome to today’s Moron-Watching with Cheng-ge, episode two.” Jiang
Cheng said quietly as he untied the old rubber tube on the slingshot.
“From now until the Mad Rave of the Morons we still have…… three hours. I figure there’ll
be forerunners of the morons coming in about two hours, so we had to arrive early……
During this time I can show everyone how to fix a rubber tube onto a slingshot……”
He took out the rubber tube and forceps, “I usually, hmm, use an ‘8’ shaped tying method.
It’s very simple, all you need is one pair of forceps, or even two knitting needles… it’s up to
you. Alright I’m done talking, not really in the mood.”
The leather pad was replaced recently, so it didn’t need to be changed. Jiang Cheng quickly
finished tying the rubber tube to the slingshot, then pulled it tight to test the stretch and let
go. Not bad.
He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes for a second. Then he pulled
out a walnut from his backpack.
“Last time we used steel bearings,” He pulled back the sling, and aimed it in turn at each of
the four buildings across the way. “Today we will see the power of a single walnut…… Of
course, these are not those paper skin walnuts, these are regular hard shell walnuts……”
He let go, and the walnut shot out from the sling.
An empty can on the rooftop across the way was knocked off the ledge and fell off the
building to the ground below. The walnut also shattered into pieces.
“Not bad,” Jiang Cheng reached out and grabbed four walnuts, then stood up and inched
forward a couple of steps. “Let us see how an acrophobic person would overcome his
mental……block oh my fuck four in a row……”
Jiang Cheng sucked in a breath, aimed at a glass bottle on the rooftop of the second
building, and shot out the first walnut. The bottle hopped forward. He shot out the second
walnut, the bottle hopped forward again. Next was the third, then the fourth.
The fourth one missed. The bottle had hopped almost to the other side of the building, it
was a little too far.
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng sat back down by the wall. “The preparation is complete.
Now… let’s everyone study for a while with me, the show will resume in two hours.”
He pulled a math practice questions booklet that Pan Zhi had sent him and started reading
through it.
When the sky had completely darkened and he could no longer see anything in front of him,
Jiang Cheng stuffed the book back in his bag. It was then that he heard the sound of
motorcycles coming from downstairs.
The street lamps were already on. He inched forward to the edge of the roof and peered
down. Even though there were only two street lamps, it was enough for him to make out
the three motorcycles outside.
Each motorcycle also carried a passenger, there were four males and two females.
“Everyone, the moronic forerunners have arrived, there are even girls.” Jiang Cheng said
quietly. “I’ve never seen these people before, so they’re probably part of the Moronic
Monkey’s team.”
The people didn’t head upstairs after they got off their bikes, but instead stood around
laughing and chatting.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the time, it was just past seven. He opened his messages and looked
at the conversation between him and Gu Fei. There was no new content; Gu Fei hadn’t
contacted him.
He hesitated for a moment, then put the phone back in his pocket. There was no point in
contacting Gu Fei at this time.
Another ten minutes or so later, more people started to gather downstairs. Some rolled in
on foot, while others arrived on motorcycles. All of them stood around
in clumps outside, smoking. A few of them were even holding bottles of alcohol and
drinking as they talked. He stared at each of these people, and didn’t see anyone from Not A
Good Bird.
Jiang Cheng crouched in this way at the edge of the rooftop looking down until his legs
were numb, until he almost forgot he was afraid of heights, until he finally spotted Li Yan,
who rode in on the motorcycle he was riding earlier today.
A faint disturbance rippled through the crowd downstairs, and the atmosphere suddenly
became a little tense.
Next came two more motorcycles. Jiang Cheng observed them closely, it was
“Not” “Bird”, and “Good” “A”. Exactly four people…… Where was Gu Fei?
After Li Yan and Not A Good Bird had all gotten off their bikes, he finally saw Gu Fei turn in
on his own motorcycle.
“Fuck me,” Jiang Cheng said in a quiet voice. “Dear friends and audience, please turn your
eyes toward the one entering the arena right now, this Moron…
Number 1, he’s riding a black motorcycle and wearing… a night walking outfit.
Currently he’s taking off his helmet…… Putting aside the fact that he has brain damage,
Number 1 really is a rather handsome guy. I wouldn’t mind giving a score of 82 for this
entrance, with the remaining 18 points given out in the form of 666……” [4]
Gu Fei got off his bike, tossed his helmet to hang on the mirror and glanced at the people
around him, “Where’s Monkey?”
“He’ll be here soon.” Someone answered.
“Let’s head up first.” Gu Fei looked at Liu Fan.
“Mn.” Liu Fan kicked away an empty liquor bottle by his feet and the six of them walked
into the building.
Gu Fei was familiar with this building. Since these people in the Steel Works were
passionate about using hurdling to resolve their conflicts, he’d already lost count of how
many times he’d been here. However, this was the first time he came here to put an end to
his own conflict.
“The people I gathered will be here soon,” Liu Fan turned around. “Li Yan, why don’t you
give Xu-ge a call, let him know to come straight up.”
“Sure.” Li Yan took out his phone and made a call.
Gu Fei walked at the very front all the way up to the roof. It was a very windy day, he got a
face full of wind as soon as he walked out to the rooftop.
He looked around him, then pulled out a pair of glasses from his pocket and put them on.
“Probably in that building across the way.” Li Yan said quietly beside him.
He gave Li Yan a look, then looked out at the building across. It was pitch dark, he couldn’t
make out a single thing. There didn’t seem to be a human shaped shadow or anything on
the rooftop either.
Monkey had come up with a bunch of people in tow. The main characters of the event were
now all assembled. All the excited bystanders had all made their way to the rooftops as
well. One, two, three, and four. Gu Fei glanced around, all four building’s rooftops were full
of viewers.
Some of them were Monkey’s people, but some were called here by Liu Fan and the guys.
There were also more than a few ‘neutral’ parties present as well.
Despite this conflict being only between himself and Monkey, it was necessary to gather
these people here. For ‘leaders’ like Monkey, he liked having this setup, whereas for Gu Fei,
he only wanted there to be witnesses.
If he wished to get this over with once and for all, if he wished to cut off all possibility of
any followup nonsense, then there had to be other people present, as many as possible. As
long as it was widely known that the conflict between the two of them was resolved here
and now, if they wanted to look for trouble again in the future, then it would be a matter of
face. To someone like Monkey, who had a reputation to uphold and who valued his face, it
would be difficult to pursue it further.
Only… Gu Fei pushed his glasses up and carefully scanned the crowd around him once
more, then searched the other three rooftops one by one. No sign of Jiang Cheng.
He was all too familiar with Jiang Cheng’s presence by now, even if the dude was hiding
amongst a crowd of people, he would still be able to spot him at once. Yet he couldn’t find
any sign of Jiang Cheng.
The building across the way? It was still a picture of stillness.
He was feeling a little unmoored. After a long internal battle, he eventually pulled out his
phone and sent Jiang Cheng a message.
– where are you
Jiang Cheng’s reply came very quickly.
– Cheng-ge is omnipresent
“Fuck.” Gu Fei stared at this line of text, he could almost see Jiang Cheng’s
unbelievably smug face.
– where exactly are you, in the building across?
There was no light source in these buildings. However, if Jiang Cheng turned his screen
brightness all the way down, he still wouldn’t be able to see any light from here.
– come to the edge of the roof
Gu Fei glanced at Monkey. He was chatting with a group of people he hadn’t seen in a while,
his face so calm it was as if nothing of import was happening tonight.
Gu Fei walked slowly to the edge of the roof.
Just as he was about to send another message to Jiang Cheng, he suddenly felt something
hit his shoe. He looked down, and saw that it was a walnut.
“The hell? Well aren’t you well hidden,” He sent a voice message back, then walked over
and crushed the walnut under his feet. That’s when he saw the shattered remains of more
walnuts on the side. “What are you trying to do?”
– give us a smile
Jiang Cheng replied.
Gu Fei turned and faced the pitch darkness of the crumbling building across the alley, what
the hell was that supposed to mean?
– I can see you
Jiang Cheng replied again.
Gu Fei glanced at the people standing around him, and while no one was watching, he
turned back and smiled into the darkness.
It was probably the dorkiest thing he had ever done in his life.
“Very good.” Jiang Cheng crouched in the darkness. On the rooftop on the other side,
somebody had started a fire in one of the old oil pails, it suddenly got very bright. “What we
just saw was Moron Number 1’s smile, which means visibility is optimal at the moment……
They look like they’re about to start, it’s starting.”
With one leg bent and the other kneeling on the pavement, he picked up a walnut and drew
back on the sling.
The people on the rooftop had backed off on either side. Both Gu Fei and Monkey were
standing at the very edge of the rooftop, their runway was the
width of the building.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng frowned. A few empty glass bottles had been kicked to the middle from
the sides. There were at least three bottles in Gu Fei’s path, followed by a few bricks and
strips of wood. It was the same situation on the next rooftop over, which was the
destination of their first jump. Somebody even threw down a whole case of beer in the
middle. He clenched his teeth. “Fucking brainless idiots.”
Somebody walked to the middle and stood facing Monkey and Gu Fei with his hand up.
There was no way for Jiang Cheng to calculate Gu Fei’s strides, and therefore no way for
him to clear Gu Fei’s path with the walnuts. All he could do was follow Gu Fei’s movements
after they started, then after the jump, estimate his landing spot and get in there before……
The man in the middle brought his hand down firmly.
Gu Fei and Monkey bolted forward at the same time.
Gu Fei did not look down at his feet at all, each of his strides were long, as he dashed out
with the wind around him, it was as if he was about to take off into the air.
Jiang Cheng kept his eyes locked on him.
Gu Fei’s ‘all in’ attitude was clear to him from his first step; no looking down, only moving
forward.
As Gu Fei stepped onto the edge of the roof, where one more inch forward would’ve had
him falling off the building, and pushed off into a jump, Jiang Cheng’s heart momentarily
ground to a halt.
The way Gu Fei sprinted forward without a care, the way he leapt into the air, every
movement he made while embracing the wind, as if he was flying……
“What kind of person are you?” Jiang Cheng drew the sling back, and as he let go, the
walnut flew out. Its target was an empty bottle near Gu Fei’s landing spot.
Footnotes:
[1] Fujima Kenji of.. you know, Slam Dunk, the ultimate basketball anime! ↩
[2] An ancient style of greeting that’s mostly used by modern people as a joke,
Jet Li for ref ↩

[3] Jiang Cheng regularly bursts into song in his head, but this is… ↩
[4] 666: Common internet slang that means “good job”, “perfect”, or “smooth”
↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 7876
TL word count: 5836
TL time: 8:12:52
Edit: 0:55:31
Curse words: 9x fucks, 1x shit, 1x ass
TL’s Notes
Ohhhhh boy… See, this city is such a crappy little place with crappy amenities and crappy
resources, but it has a certain charm, doesn’t it? Other than the hooligans, the people aren’t
half bad. Without the immense pressure of the university entrance exam that big city kids
have, the kids here have a little more free time to just be kids.
And you know what, kids like Wang Xu probably never got close to excelling or winning at
anything in their whole life. Because whether it be academics or basketball or something else,
the people who are already ‘good’ wouldn’t think to involve him, so he would never even have
a chance to get better. That is, until Jiang Cheng came along and airdropped into their lives.
That he had this opportunity to get involved in something with his peers and actually have a
chance at winning, is so precious.
I’m emo.

First posted: October 12, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 54
Ten thousand alpacas skipped across buildings in contestant Jiang Cheng’s mind……
The first building was of the same height as the second building, but the gap between them
was the smallest.
Gu Fei hadn’t measured just how far it was, but the people who jumped over it in the past
mostly landed more than a meter in from the edge on the other side.
The people Liu Fan had brought were spread across the four rooftops. The addition of
obstacles was also a battle in and of itself. There were people throwing things onto his path,
and at the same time there were people throwing things onto Monkey’s path. The rules
were fair in this regard, nobody would be beaten up for throwing stuff.
And these people, no matter who won or lost, would be thrilled regardless. They wanted
nothing more than to see someone fall, see someone get hurt, or even better, see someone
fall off the building.
The noise in Gu Fei’s ears was a cacophony of sounds. There were people laughing, yelling,
and girls screaming. For a split second it sounded almost like the basketball game, but upon
a closer listen, all he could feel was darkness.
These people, Gu Fei looked around him, these people stood on all sorts of garbage that
littered the rooftop: wrappers, liquor bottles, bits of food waste, at times he even saw a
used condom.
What a brain dead world indeed.
The only thing that drew more than a few glances from him were the
inconspicuous bits of shattered walnut on the ground. This type of garbage wasn’t at all out
of the ordinary on the roofs here. If it wasn’t for Jiang Cheng shooting one of them at his
shoe earlier, he would’ve never noticed these remnants by his feet.
These shattered bits were left behind by Jiang Cheng.
What’s the overachiever planning?
He wasn’t worried that Jiang Cheng would do anything too over the top, but still, he was a
little anxious.
Because whatever it was that Jiang Cheng was planning to do, it would be because of him.
Even a building-hopping contest for morons would need a judge, or otherwise known as a
middle man. Gu Fei recognized this guy, he was a retired ex-gang boss of some sort,
everyone referred to him as Hu-ge. It would seem more fair if he was the one who called
out the start of the contest. [1]
Despite being retired, Tiger Bro wasn’t actually that old, he wasn’t yet 30. Gu Fei had even
played ball with him at some point while he was at the Reform School. Back then, he was
already done with matters of the jianghu, and even said things to him like “come back to
shore”, as someone who had already been there and done that.
 Does this count as coming back to shore?
He never wanted to wade into the water in the first place, and yet he had to endure words
like “come back to shore”. It was amusing to think about.
Gu Fei looked at the roadblocks ahead of him but didn’t bother to calculate which step
should land further or with more care. This was something he had to do to shake off certain
burdens. He didn’t want to dwell on it too much.
All he wanted to do was run, jump, and land back on the ground.
If he injured himself, then it would be over. If not, then they would continue.
The only thing he could control was to delay his injury as much as possible. If he got hurt
on the first landing, the dissatisfied audience might demand that he continue despite the
injury.
Besides, he already planned out a location and method with which he would get hurt.
Tiger Bro lifted his hand, and the rooftops were overwhelmed with the sounds of
screaming and whistling.
In the next second, Tiger Bro brought his arm down.
Gu Fei didn’t care whether Monkey had set off, or how he did. He just kept his eyes locked
on the far edge of the roof and sprinted out.
You say one two three, breaking what’s gone by……
Gu Fei’s right foot kicked off hard against the far ledge of the rooftop and leapt into the air,
as if buoyed by the wind.
There was only darkness below his feet, and fiery light ahead.
Where there were dancing flames and dancing shadows that flitted between light and
darkness.
In that moment when he became airborne, Gu Fei suddenly felt a sense of release. He
wanted to shout out loud, he wanted to laugh.
The corners of his mouth curled upward.
He could almost predict where he was going to land. With the momentum of his jump, he
was going to skip over the old beer carton near the edge of the other rooftop.
He would also miss the two drink bottles on the ground.
Stepping on a plastic bottle wouldn’t make him twist his ankle, but it would make him lose
his balance. If he slipped on something while going at such velocity, the result of which
would be out of his control.
But just as he began his descent, a beer bottle suddenly rolled in from the side.
Gu Fei’s heart sank as he saw this bottle that was heading right for his landing spot.
He had no way or time to manipulate his body at this point, and if he landed on the bottle
now……
Motherfucker.
Gu Fei shut his eyes for an instant. To hell with it.
The walnut impacted at a spot on the neck of the bottle, which accelerated and rolled out
from underneath Gu Fei’s feet almost at the same time as when he landed.
Gu Fei stuck his landing perfectly without any swaying, steady and solid. He made one roll
forward on the momentum of the jump, then stood up.
Jiang Cheng released a long held breath amidst the cacophony of screams, whistles, and
banging of metal rods against oil drums around him, and sat back on the ground.
“Very good.” He took a couple of seconds to collect himself, then pulled out two more
walnuts. “You see, deep breathing really is useful for calming nervousness and fear……
shit.”
Jiang Cheng’s hands were shaking hard. He dropped the walnut twice as he tried to hold it
against the leather band, “It’s obvious that it’s the first time for contestant Jiang Cheng to be
taking shots under such immense pressure, his hands are shaking so much that… he can’t
even hold the weapon.”
“To be honest, even my legs are shaking,” With his back hunched over, Jiang Cheng shifted
himself to the side of the shed on his hands and knees. From there,
he was a little closer to the second building. With this kind of lighting, even a difference of
one meter made him feel more assured. He braced one knee against the concrete stump on
the edge of the roof. “Ah, I need to pee so bad.”
Gu Fei wasn’t hurt, and neither was Monkey. In comparison, Gu Fei had jumped further,
and made a way better landing than Monkey had.
But this was only the first round.
Jiang Cheng peered out from between the forks of the slingshot at the scene on rooftop
number two. At the moment it looked like they were waiting for people from the first
building to go down, so everyone was shifting about.
A few minutes later he heard music coming from the other side.
“Obviously he’s dense, but full of self confidence, dreaming of hot ladies who don’t have any
sense……” [2]
It was a rich earful of the typical rural-urban salon flavour.
“That’s so……” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but tsk. “I have no words……”
The boneheaded country youth taste left him speechless. It was on par with the dumbasses
who thought they were hot shit just because they hung a couple of speakers from their
motorcycles.
Gu Fei exchanged a few words with Li Yan, who had just come over from the first building.
Then he stood at the edge of the roof, lit a smoke, and held it between his lips while looking
ahead.
Jiang Cheng also dug out a cigarette, which he quickly lit while turning around and using his
clothes to ward off the wind, then took a drag.
Sitting down near the edge, he looked across at Gu Fei on the other side.
In the time between Gu Fei’s first jump and landing to now, Jiang Cheng’s out of control
heartbeat had slowly calmed down. He was able to stare quietly at Gu Fei again.
There wasn’t much emotion on Gu Fei’s face. He just stood there with the cigarette in his
mouth, like he was looking at something, but he could also just be spacing out.
Jiang Cheng spaced out with him.
Gu Fei was unlike everyone else, he was different from those people who constantly chased
thrill in all shapes and forms. Jiang Cheng felt it from the very first step he took.
Gu Fei wasn’t after the “I won”, he wasn’t after the cheers and attention, he only wanted
closure.
Closure on the conflict with Monkey, and closure on the past Gu Fei so calmly brought up
the other day.
Nobody noticed the sudden acceleration of that bottle, nor did anyone see the walnut that
had been smashed into pieces at his feet from impact with both the ground and the bottle.
It happened way too fast. Gu Fei himself only realized why he didn’t step on that bottle
when he put his hands on the ground and felt bits of walnut shell.
At this moment, he wanted more than anything to send Jiang Cheng a message, to look
toward that building beside them, but he didn’t dare.
Under the current circumstance, any reaction on his part would be noticed. If he looked in
that direction, it might lead somebody to head up that way.
He stared at the ground, at the walnut bits that had already been stomped into powder and
scattered by the people walking back and forth. It was hard for him to pinpoint what
exactly he was feeling at the moment.
He didn’t wish to drag Jiang Cheng into this mess, yet Jiang Cheng still inserted his presence
in the form of an ‘outsider’.
Cheng-ge is omnipresent.
It was a line that was so full to the brim with dorkiness that it was practically bursting out
of the screen. But when Gu Fei recalled it now, his heart was suddenly overwhelmed with a
surge of warmth.
To him, Jiang Cheng wasn’t simply ‘exceptional’. That crystal-like purity hidden under his
over-the-top smug dorkiness and occasional fiery temper… it tugged on his heart every
time it flickered past his eyes in this chaotic mess of a life.
“The morons are starting to clear the field,” Jiang Cheng straightened up, still with one knee
on the ground. In fact, even if he stood up, nobody on the other buildings would notice, and
he would get a slightly better view. But here at the edge of a rooftop on a five-story
building, in the dark, and with the wind around him, he truly could not bring himself to
stand up again. He drew the sling all the way back. “Looks like the second round is about to
begin…… fuck I’ll stop talking, you can see for yourself.”
The third building was one story lower than the second building, and further away too……
Jiang Cheng could feel his palms sweating, and was glad that his slingshot had great anti-
slipping properties. If it was one of those props like what they used during the photoshoot
that day, the whole thing might very well fly out of his hands at this point.
The morons on the third rooftop had begun to throw things onto the ‘runway’
again, somebody even threw down a few currently on fire wooden poles. This certainly
improved visibility on the ground for him.
Jiang Cheng slowed down his breathing and took aim at a strip of wooden dowel on the
third roof. Aside from bricks and liquor bottles, this piece of wood that lay parallel to the
direction of Gu Fei’s run was the most dangerous. One would almost certainly break an
ankle if one stepped on it. It would be much better if it lay across the ‘runway’, that way
even if he stepped on it, his ankle wouldn’t roll to either side.
Like before, somebody stood at the center facing Gu Fei and Monkey, and lifted his arm.
In the next second, he swung it back down.
The two raced out at the same time. Gu Fei still with the same approach, the same speed,
flying out from the edge of the rooftop.
Since the gap was wider, Jiang Cheng could even see Gu Fei’s legs take one stride in mid-air
to maintain the body’s acceleration.
If he wasn’t so nervous at the moment, Jiang Cheng would’ve cheered for Gu Fei’s crazy hot
flying move. Such long legs, such well-executed stride and jump……
Just then, there was some sort of commotion on the third rooftop that Jiang Cheng had been
keeping an eye on, something happened that he didn’t at all anticipate.
Wooden boards, rods, and various other items he couldn’t make out was tossed out from
both sides into the air above the roof.
FUCK. YOUR. WHOLE. FAMILY.
The shock and fury that Jiang Cheng felt in this instant was the most he’d ever experienced
in his life. He almost wanted to get out the steel ball bearings and shoot it at the heads
across the way. Better if the ‘bullets’ came through on the other side, so these brains that
were clearly lacking in oxygen could finally get some air!
But he didn’t have time to think, he was even thankful to those over excited people for
throwing things so early. If they waited to throw when Gu Fei was coming down from the
jump, there was no way he’d have time to react.
Between clearing the obstacles on the ground or the ones in the air, Jiang Cheng chose the
latter.
It was difficult for him to see the situation by Gu Fei’s landing spot, the clutter of
objects was blocking his view. He held his breath, there was no time to think.
A slingshot wasn’t a gun, nor walnuts bullets. Jiang Cheng couldn’t afford to wait for
something to head toward Gu Fei before making a move. He could only use the brief instant
he had to identify the object that was the most dangerous to Gu Fei.
The difficulty of this challenge was more than anything he’d ever attempted. His head was a
chaotic mess that echoed the frenzy of noises from across the alley.
Someone in the crowd picked up a piece of broken brick. Jiang Cheng pulled hard on the
sling just as the guy tossed it out.
His timing wasn’t too big of an issue, but he could only guess at the angle.
He managed to knock the brick off course just as it got close to Gu Fei’s face. It practically
swiped his cheek as it continued on its way, slamming into a wooden board that came in
from the other side. The wooden board was also knocked off its course; it glanced off Gu
Fei’s face then bounced away.
The whole time, Gu Fei did not so much as flinch. Amidst all the chaos around him, he acted
as if he couldn’t feel a thing. Only, when the board glanced off his cheek, Jiang Cheng saw
him sway ever so slightly.
Shit!
There must’ve been nails on that board.
Jiang Cheng didn’t have time to clear away the obstacles from underneath Gu Fei’s feet. He
could only watch as Gu Fei landed on the other roof, tumbling sideways amidst the heap of
junk on the ground, then rolled off to the side.
Next, all the objects in mid-air started crashing down.
Gu Fei guessed he had Jiang Cheng to thank that nothing heavy smashed into his head.
Though he still stepped on something as he landed, he could feel his left foot roll violently
outward.
That’s it then.
He clenched his teeth and kicked off hard with his right foot that landed immediately after,
and used the momentum to roll away to the left side.
The ground was a littered mess. In these short seconds he couldn’t even make out any pain
at all. He figured he must have injuries on his leg and arm, but he couldn’t tell where
exactly.
As he finally came to a stop, he reached out his left hand to balance himself and placed it on
an empty can beside him.
The feeling of the edge of the can cutting his palm open was sharp and clear. He pulled back
some of the weight on his hand and fell to the other side.
Liu Fan was the first to arrive, he rushed to Gu Fei’s side, “Where are you hurt!”
“…… Leg.” Gu Fei frowned and held his left leg.
“Is it broken?” Li Yan kicked away the junk around them and reached out a hand to touch
Gu Fei’s shin.
“Aghhh!” Gu Fei yelled out. “…… Don’t touch it.”
The crowd gathered around them, each of them wore expressions of excitement on their
face.
Monkey had a pretty bad fall himself, Gu Fei could see that he was helped to his feet by the
others. Upon seeing that Monkey was able to stand, however unsteadily, Gu Fei suddenly
let out a breath of relief and laid back down on the ground.
That’s it.
Finally.
It’s over.
“How’re you doing?” Monkey shook off the people who reached out to help him, and slowly
walked through the path the others made for him. He stopped beside Gu Fei and leaned
down.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything.
“I think his leg’s broken.” Somebody said nearby.
“Really?” A smile immediately surfaced on Monkey’s face, he looked down at Gu Fei’s leg.
“Is it this one? It’s all crooked?”
Before anybody responded, he gave Gu Fei’s leg a little kick, “Hurt pretty bad, huh?”
Gu Fei recoiled and curled up painfully into a ball on his side.
“Let’s end it right here,” Liu Fan stood up and wedged himself in front of Monkey. “A
gambler has to be willing to accept losses, this time Da-Fei lost.”
“That’s too bad,” Monkey folded his arms. There might be blood dripping down his temple,
but his expression was one of glee. “I thought this kid would play all
the way till the second floor with me.”
Liu Fan didn’t respond to his goading, just looked toward Xu-ge who had just walked over
from the next building.
“What’s the verdict, Hu-ge?” Xu-ge asked the Tiger Bro who had stayed quiet up until this
point.
“Is he unable to get up?” Somebody yelled.
The intention was obvious. As long as Gu Fei could still stand up, this wasn’t over.
Tiger Bro walked over to Gu Fei and crouched down beside him. He examined Gu Fei’s
lower leg, which even through his pants looked visibly misshapen. He reached out and
grabbed at the location of the fracture, pressing his fingers down.
Gu Fei sucked in a breath and couldn’t even make a sound.
Tiger Bro stared wordlessly into Gu Fei’s eyes.
Gu Fei looked directly back at him with his brows knitted.
A few seconds later, Tiger Bro moved his hand away and stood back up, “The leg’s broken.”
A round of disappointed whining sounded around them.
“Today’s hurdling, is a method willingly chosen by both of you. One and done, you each
shoulder your own consequence, and everyone here was a witness.”
Tiger Bro said. “The bad blood between you two is now cleared up, any problems with
that?”
Tiger Bro looked at Monkey, and Monkey looked down at Gu Fei who was still lying on the
ground, “No problem.”
“Any problems with that?” Tiger Bro directed his gaze at Gu Fei.
“None.” Gu Fei said.
“Go to the hospital,” Tiger Bro waved his hand. “After this, everyone stick to your own
path.”
Jiang Cheng leaned against the little rooftop shed. From here, he couldn’t tell how badly Gu
Fei was injured, but he could see that Gu Fei was unable to stand up. Not to mention, even
from this distance he could see that Gu Fei’s hand was covered in blood.
He couldn’t make out what they were saying on the other side. At the moment, he just felt
weak all over; his hands were shaking violently, and his back was covered in cold sweat.
The sequence of Gu Fei crashing down hard and rolling off to the side played over and over
in his mind.
That fall was solid and heavy, he could almost feel the pain himself.
He didn’t dare look over there again after Liu Fan pulled Gu Fei onto his back, only lit a
cigarette and held it in his mouth.
No matter what, an injury was unavoidable. If it was only a broken leg, then it was already
the best case scenario.
With this resigned yet fearless, and especially nonchalant approach, Gu Fei had put an end
to certain things. Certain things that might seem to not call for such urgency for many
people.
In the instant when Gu Fei so recklessly flew into the air and stepped forward without
hesitation, Jiang Cheng felt like he no longer wanted to consider anything else.
The fear, anxiety, and worry that Jiang Cheng endured in that single moment was nothing
like he had ever felt before. He had never experienced this kind of panic, for anyone, it was
as though something had gripped him tightly and plucked him off the ground.
The people on the other side had already dispersed, only a few stragglers remained
downstairs who were in the process of getting their bikes and leaving.
Jiang Cheng sat by the shed, he had already been through three cigarettes.
He snubbed out the last one and started to gather his stuff, planning to go downstairs after
everyone had left.
It was then that his phone chimed. He felt he didn’t take even one second to pull out his
phone. This hand speed.
It was a message from Gu Fei.
– I’m fine
The utterly useless words of comfort made Jiang Cheng want to curse.
– where r u
– at the store, come
 Come your great uncle! Jiang Cheng was at a loss for words. With his leg like that he didn’t
even go to the hospital! But instead went back to the store! Or did
he go to the community clinic to get it taken care of?
Jiang Cheng didn’t send Gu Fei any more messages. He grabbed his things and leaned over
the ledge, and saw that there was no one else there.
Just this one look overwhelmed him with dizziness. It could be that his wound up nerves
had all of a sudden relaxed, but the fear of heights now crashed over him like a wave, even
stronger than usual.
His legs gave out, as he plopped down by the edge and took a while to recover.
“Fuck!” He cursed quietly and turning, crawled slowly on his hands and knees to the
stairwell, dragging his backpack behind him. “Fuck, ten thousand alpacas skipped across
buildings in contestant Jiang Cheng’s mind, he must be very glad that nobody is here to
witness him in this cowardly state……” [3]
After he came downstairs and before exiting the building, Jiang Cheng looked through the
window again, scanning the surroundings to make sure that everyone had left, then finally
walked out.
There was much more junk outside than before, most of which were thrown down from the
roofs. It looked like a disaster had swept through; one of the oil drums was lying on its side,
the not yet burned through wood inside was still flickering with flames in the middle of the
road.
Jiang Cheng slowly walked past the heaping mess on the ground and kicked a few of the
bigger pieces of flaming wood into the ditch on the side of the road.
The street lamps were limited to the area near the buildings. After he turned onto the main
path, there was only the moon to light his way.
He walked all the way out to the intersection, and only upon seeing his bike with the
backseat randomly smashed crooked, did he start to feel some soreness in his legs.
After all, he had just played in a basketball tournament, then proceeded to kneel on a
rooftop for the rest of the day…… But in comparison, Moron Number 1’s leg had gone
through even worse…… He frowned and got onto his bike, and quickly set out.
The whole way there, it was as if he had electricity running through his veins and the wind
at his back, he felt like the bicycle ride had turned into an F1 race.
Only when he saw the light from Gu Fei’s convenience store ahead of him, did he abruptly
slow down.
Jiang Cheng tossed his bike to the side of the road, not bothering to lock it, and bolted
toward the door. As he lifted the sheet curtain he noticed the rolling shutters were halfway
down, but his body couldn’t catch up with his mind. He slammed into the door head first.
“Oi!” Came Gu Fei’s startled voice from inside the store. “Cheng-ge?”
“It’s your grandpa-Jiang!” Jiang Cheng yelled out and ducked into the store, the first thing
he saw was Gu Fei standing at the doorway of the inner chamber.
His left pant leg was rolled up to the knee, his lower leg was wrapped up in gauze and
splints. There was a thick layer of gauze wrapped around his hand as well, and a patch of it
on his face.
Jiang Cheng glared at him, it took him a long time to center himself, then he said in a loving
voice that suggested “I do have so much pity for you people with brain damage”: “You’re
still standing then, mister? Why don’t you get down and do a little dance for me while
you’re at it?”
Gu Fei was stunned for as long as ten seconds before he burst into laughter. He couldn’t
stop laughing even as he doubled up against the door frame.
“THE FUCK you laughing about!” Jiang Cheng pointed at him, with rage
boiling up inside. “Keep laughing, you wanna bet I’ll beat you up right now?!
You dumbass-fucker!”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei grabbed Jiang Cheng’s hand and pushed it down. “Cheng-ge, I’m fine.”
“It’d be way fucking better if you’re far from fine! Moron Number 1!” Jiang Cheng yelled at
him.
“I really am fine,” Gu Fei lifted his left leg and banged it against the door frame a couple
times. “I didn’t……”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng wanted to reach out and catch his own falling eyeballs.
“What’s the meaning of this?”
“I wasn’t hurt too badly,” Gu Fei lifted up his bandaged right hand. “It’s just my hand, and
some scrapes. I didn’t hurt my leg.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him, he was having trouble pulling his thoughts together,
“Your leg is fine?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei went to pull the rolling shutter all the way down, and walked into the inner
chamber. “I’m……”
“Really fine?” Jiang Cheng watched as he walked back and forth, not at all like someone
with a leg injury, and suddenly felt an indescribable sense of elation, like he lost a thousand
bucks but then found the money floating around in the washing machine.
“Really.” Gu Fei gave him a smile.
“Shit, really?” Jiang Cheng went over and knocked on his leg. “Fuck!”
“Really really really really,” Gu Fei said. “Quit worrying.”
“But I saw your leg……” Jiang Cheng gestured with his hands. “Do that?!”
Gu Fei picked up a strip of bent steel that was lying on the floor by the wall, “It was this, I
was using it to prevent a twisted ankle and ……”
“Damn,” Jiang Cheng took it in his hands and looked it over. “My dude, your acting skill is
hella impressive you know?”
“I did think that I would break a bone somewhere, but who knew that I’d still be OK even
after that fall and the tumble,” Gu Fei said. “So I had no choice but to act it out.”
“Didn’t I see someone examine your injury?” Jiang Cheng turned the strip of steel over in
his hands. “He didn’t notice that your bone was outside of your body?”
“He probably noticed,” Gu Fei leaned back against the headboard on the cot.
“But he didn’t say anything.”
“…… Gotta go present him with a flag of distinction tomorrow, thank goodness for the real
live Lei Feng.” [4,5]
“Thank you.” Gu Fei said.
“What?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Thank you for never missing a shot.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“…… It’s nothing.” Jiang Cheng waved his hand. “You almost… scared me to death.”
Gu Fei continued to laugh. Jiang Cheng gave him a look, “Are you gonna giggle like a fool
again? We’re about to join the ranks of legal adults, can you……”
Gu Fei kept a hand pressed against the gauze on his face and laughed even harder. Jiang
Cheng was infected by his laughter, who didn’t even manage to finish his sentence before
he collapsed on a chair and cackled at the ground.
It was somewhat in celebration, and also as a release. But more realistically it was out of
delight and feeling of ease from knowing that Gu Fei’s leg was not injured.
After the bout of wild laughter, neither of them spoke for a while.
Gu Fei leaned against the headboard and let out a soft sigh.
Jiang Cheng put his head down and rubbed his face.
“You’re not crying are you?” Gu Fei turned to look at him, and sat up on the cot.
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng kept his head down and squeezed his hands together repeatedly. After a
long pause he lifted his head and took in a deep breath. “Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered.
“Have you considered,” Jiang Cheng said with some difficulty, but still, it was without any
hesitation. “Getting a boyfriend?”
Footnotes:
[1] Hu-ge, aka Tiger Bro ↩
[2] A … how do I put this, very country bumpkin flavoured song. Cheng-ge might sing songs
in his head and out loud, but at worst they’re old classics and therefore immune from
scrutiny, not… this. ↩
[3] Alpacas: In Mandarin the insult “fuck your mom” is “cao ni ma”, which sounds like cao
(草) ni (泥) ma (马), meaning literally “grass mud horse”. It originated from the Chinese World of
Warcraft community, probably b/c the actual curse is censored in chat. “Grass Mud Horse”
wasn’t a real animal, until the netizens decided to visualize it as an alpaca XD ↩
[4] Flag of distinction: given out usually by upper levels of govnt to a department below
them for exceptional performance OR given by regular people to an individual or
organization as thanks for good deed/contribution. They look like this ↩
[5] Lei Feng: a Chinese soldier from the 50s-60s whose name is immortalized as a symbol
for altruistic behaviour. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 7067
TL word count: 5056
TL time: ???
Edit: 1:22:30
Curse words: 12x fucks, 4x shit, 2x ass
TL’s Notes

Also, not sure if everyone saw but I posted the full lyrics to saye.mp3 last week!
Also RE: “dumbass-fucker”, this is I think the second or third time Jiang Cheng unknowingly
insults himself while trying to insult Gu Fei, see previous instances when he called Gu Fei a
“dog-fucker” ( ͡° ʖ͜ ͡°)

First posted: October 17, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 55
That would not only ruin the mood, but also look extremely stupid!
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng, for a second there he felt that nevermind giving an answer
right now, he was struggling to even express any emotion aside from shock and
disorientation.
How many times has it been? That Jiang Cheng bombarded him so suddenly like this
leaving no room to think.
Gu Fei called Jiang Cheng here simply to ease his worry. He had sent Jiang Cheng a message
immediately after Liu Fan and Li Yan wrapped up his leg with the fake splint and left. He
didn’t know how Jiang Cheng was faring on the other side, but he knew that he would be
anxious with worry after seeing him fall over on the roof, he simply wanted Jiang Cheng to
come see for himself that he was alright, so he could be at ease.
Never in a million years did he imagine that Jiang Cheng would suddenly spring this on him.
In that spark-filled fraction of a second his brain had spun around itself for at least thirteen
thousand rotations, the thoughts that flitted through his mind were enough to fill a football
field.
Whether he meant to or not, Jiang Cheng’s question certainly left himself enough room, at
least he didn’t ask directly if Gu Fei wanted to go out with him.
However he answered the question, Jiang Cheng would still have the space to maneuver
around it.
But he knew without a doubt what kind of answer Jiang Cheng really wanted. It was a
question that appeared accommodating on the surface, but in reality could only have one
answer.
Yes, I have considered it, with you.
Gu Fei wanted very much to give a response like this, but the words that should’ve been
blurted out were all of a sudden difficult to say out loud.
Because he didn’t know what kind of boyfriend Jiang Cheng wanted, he figured that Jiang
Cheng himself hadn’t even thought about that.
After all, that’s what they’re supposed to be like at this age, even if one was to mull over it,
the mulling wouldn’t extend very far. Do I like him? Yes. This is me liking him, this is me
giving in to it, and this me wanting to be in a romantic
relationship …… What else does one need? Nothing.
Yet he had thought about it, a little too much.
Perhaps Jiang Cheng was acting impulsively; perhaps Jiang Cheng wasn’t being impulsive,
but simply chose a seemingly impulsive timing.
Either way, Gu Fei felt that he couldn’t determine exactly what Jiang Cheng was thinking in
such a short amount of time, nor express his own thoughts on the matter. What kind of
boyfriend are you looking for? What kind of relationship are you after?
Any answer he gave under these circumstances would seem too casual.
He figured that his only path forward at this moment was to stall, so that both he and Jiang
Cheng could work out what the other one was thinking.
“Ah forbidden… puppy love?” Gu Fei managed to squeeze out, then shut his mouth
immediately. [1]
“Did you hit your head just now?” Jiang Cheng gazed at him with a conflicted look in his
eyes that seemed to be reserved for pitying on dim-witted children.
Gu Fei felt like his own measure of dorkiness had just leveled up following the incident of
smiling idiotically into a random building in the night.
“What I meant was……” Gu Fei quickly gathered his thoughts in an attempt to explain
further.
But Jiang Cheng suddenly stood up.
Gu Fei instinctively stood up with him. He didn’t want Jiang Cheng to walk off at this
moment, he especially didn’t want Jiang Cheng to think that after all the things they did that
were out of the normal range of ‘desk-mates’, that he would still hesitate on this question.
Before he was able to get a word out, Jiang Cheng frowned and made a retching sound.
Gu Fei was simply unable to contain his shock. Was Jiang Cheng so disgusted by his words?
“Washroom?” Jiang Cheng asked him through clenched teeth.
“Back there,” Gu Fei pointed. “Next to the kitchen……”
Jiang Cheng bolted off before he even finished his sentence, dashing through the back door
and into the courtyard.
Gu Fei quickly grabbed a bottle of water from the shelves and followed him out.
When he got to the washroom, he found Jiang Cheng bent over with his hands on his knees
staring into the toilet. He paused for a second, “What’s the matter?”
“I suddenly feel nauseous.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What did I say that had……” Gu Fei was almost speechless. “Such power?”
“Fuck off.” Was Jiang Cheng’s brief response before he dry heaved again, and still didn’t
manage to throw anything up.
“Are you feeling sick?” Gu Fei was a little worried now. “Did you catch a cold?
There’s still someone on staff at the community clinic, let’s go get checked out?”
“No need,” Jiang Cheng sucked in a breath and straightened up. “This is just a side effect of
my fear of heights.”
Gu Fei was frozen for almost ten whole seconds before he managed to ask, “Fear of
heights?”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng didn’t end up barfing anything out, he walked to the basin and
washed his face. “Is that so strange.”
Gu Fei was quiet.
Jiang Cheng wiped his face and turned to face Gu Fei, “This isn’t really appropriate to say in
the bathroom, but since we’re already here and I already started it off, I won’t be bothered
with the timing or location.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“What I said just now, take the night and think about it.” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m gonna head
back, I suddenly feel really drowsy, I need to sleep. Give me a call when you get up
tomorrow.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei said.
“Goodnight.” Jiang Cheng waved at him and turned back into the store, making his way to
the front door.
Gu Fei wiped at the water droplets Jiang Cheng splattered onto his face and followed.
From his words to his actions, Jiang Cheng had executed everything with an effortless ease.
He was cool and poised up until the moment he walked up to the front door, but his two
failed efforts at pulling up the rolling shutters somewhat disrupted the aesthetic.
“What the hell is wrong with your door?” Jiang Cheng peered at him while still half bent, a
displeased look on his face.
“Let me.” Gu Fei went over and yanked up the shutter for him.
Jiang Cheng ducked out before the shutters were fully up, then said again outside the door,
“Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.” Gu Fei kept his hand on the door and looked back at him.
Jiang Cheng climbed onto his bike and rode away without a backward glance.
After shutting the door again, Gu Fei sank down into the little stool on the side, and got lost
in his thoughts.
Jiang Cheng wanted to go right to sleep once he got back, but considering the night he had,
crawling around on a rooftop littered with dirt and garbage, he forced himself to take a
shower first.
As he collapsed onto the bed, he felt like he must’ve fallen asleep before his head even hit
the pillow.
His body felt leaden, but his heart was light. As light as a feather.
Maybe it was because everything was over. What needed to be done was done, what
needed to be considered, he did, and what needed to be said was said.
Everything that weighed his heart down, whatever feelings it contained, was all gone.
Whatever tomorrow would bring, whatever happens, none of that mattered anymore.
Ah, feels good.
This feeling of ease was probably akin to what Pan Zhi described as “after getting beat on
by my pops I sleep as soundly as though I just got a massage”.
He sank into his pillow and smiled.
When the dawn broke the next day, it was the first time Jiang Cheng’s biological clock failed
to pull him out of the heavy slumber. He could hear the birds chirping outside his window,
could hear the sounds of grannies going outside to exercise, and excited kids screaming the
whole way as their parents took them out to play……
Yet he still didn’t wake up. It was a rather delightful feeling, the awareness that he was
asleep but while still sleeping soundly and comfortably.
It wasn’t until his phone rang the second time that he opened his eyes reluctantly.
Second time?
Oh right, it was the second time. The first time was probably when the grannies were going
about their exercise.
He pulled his phone close and struggled to make his eyes focus on the too-bright screen,
and saw that it was Gu Fei calling.
Gu Fei?
……Gu Fei!
All of a sudden he was wide awake, even his vision became crystal clear.
Even though he had already concluded yesterday that Gu Fei’s answer no longer mattered,
he simply wanted to express that, I kinda like you a lot, and if we can be in a romantic
relationship then that would be pretty great too.
He simply wanted to throw the idea out there, to Gu Fei, then no matter what Gu Fei’s
response was, he no longer cared. Or rather, he never thought to imagine what Gu Fei’s
response would be.
But now considering that Gu Fei was very likely calling to give him an answer……
suddenlynervous.jpg
He stared at Gu Fei’s name for a long time, then remembered to pick up the phone, but
before his outreached hand even touched the screen, the call ended.
Good good good, very good, good thing the call ended.
He tossed his phone to the side and sat up, glancing at the time, it was just past 8
AM.
Gu Fei was up this early on a Sunday morning? Then the missed call from earlier…… he
picked up his phone again to check who the first caller was.
The phone chimed once, there was an incoming text message from Gu Fei.
– not up yet?
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply, he first checked out the missed call from earlier, 6:45, Gu Fei.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was a little shook, Gu Fei had gotten up before 7?
It was nothing short of a miracle. Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but check the time again, and
confirmed that it was currently morning, and the time stamp said 6:45, not 16:45.
– just woke up
He sent Gu Fei a reply.
Just as he rose from the bed, his phone rang again. This time it wasn’t a notification, it was
his ringtone.
Jiang Cheng picked up the call.
“Did you want to date me, or did you want to go on a date with me?” Gu Fei opened with a
question before he even said hello.
Jiang Cheng dragged his slippers over to the window and opened the curtains, the bit of
trepidation in his mind vanished just as suddenly as it appeared, “Thou art not concerned
about forbidden puppy love then?”
Gu Fei was quiet.
“Is there a difference?” Jiang Cheng said. “I just wanted to let you know that I thought about
it and I…… like you a lot, and if you want……”
“Come downstairs.” Gu Fei interrupted him.
“What?” Jiang Cheng paused.
“I’m outside your building,” Gu Fei said. “Come down and have some breakfast, boyfriend.”
Jiang Cheng froze for several more seconds before he was able to chase out the mess of
noise bouncing around in his head, “I still have to wash up and get dressed.”
“Mmn,” Gu Fei said. “The breakfast stall from yesterday then, I’ll go get us a seat first.”
Jiang Cheng hung up the phone and blanked out for a while longer.
What the fuck what’s the meaning of this?
A few sentences later and just like that his relationship with Gu Fei changed?
What the fuck?
It was just a little bit fantastical…… He tossed aside his phone and went to brush his teeth
in a daze. Then while he was washing his face, he stared at himself in the mirror for a while.
I have a boyfriend now? I don’t look any different though, still so……
handsome.
No no, something was different. His sense of logic was all gone.
When he finished washing up and opened the door to his wardrobe, he suddenly didn’t
know what outfit to wear.
Even though he would usually try on a few different outfits before stepping out the door
anyway, until he found the one that best expressed his ‘handsomest of the day’ energy. But
today, he couldn’t even pick out a backup option.
“Fucking hell.” Jiang Cheng blurted out after standing in front of the wardrobe for a few
minutes. It was just Gu Fei after all, just a person who transformed from his desk-mate to
his boyfriend, waiting for him to eat a fried pancake together at the breakfast stall
downstairs. Was this necessary? He pulled out a pair of pants at random and put it on,
closed his eyes and yanked a t-shirt off the hanger, then grabbed a light jacket and walked
out the door.
When he got downstairs, he was able to spot Gu Fei from a long way away. Gu Fei usually
stood out from the crowd on a normal day, but today especially so, Jiang Cheng could hit
the splint board on Gu Fei’s leg with a slingshot even if he was 20 meters further from
where he was currently standing.
He quickened his pace and approached. It was past the prime time for breakfast at that
point, Gu Fei had a table all to himself, and it was piled high with breakfast dishes. He sat
his butt down onto the seat across from Gu Fei.
“Took you long enough.” Gu Fei glanced at him.
“Us overachievers like to put effort into getting ready,” Jiang Cheng looked back at him. “If I
recall correctly sir, you haven’t even changed your pants from yesterday?”
“Mmn,” Gu Fei looked down at the splint and said quietly. “This board was attached so
professionally, I couldn’t get my pants off.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh, he also lowered his voice. “Take the splint off
first then.”
“I can’t be bothered to,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll just leave it for tonight.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything more as he put his head down and took a sip out of a bowl
of soy milk.
Once the conversation came to a stop, the mood suddenly became very strange.
While he drank the soy milk, Jiang Cheng felt that the way he was holding the bowl was all
manners of awkwardness, even though he had been holding bowls this way for almost
twenty years.
He couldn’t even taste whether the soy milk was sweetened or not.
Nervous, awkward, and a little panicky.
But not uncomfortable. He snuck a glance at Gu Fei, who was chewing on a stick of fried
dough fritter and watching him without any expression on his face.
“Did I not wash my face properly?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m just looking,” Gu Fei chuckled. “I look at you all the time anyways.”
“Oh, continue then.” Jiang Cheng picked up a little soup dumpling with his chopsticks, he
suddenly felt like this strange and slightly awkward atmosphere was rather enjoyable.
What the hell is wrong with me.
“Oh yeah,” Gu Fei finished the dough fritter and said as he wiped his hands with a napkin. “I
have a little…… gift for you.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng was dumbfounded.
Gu Fei looked around them, probably making sure that there weren’t anyone around who
knew the two of them, then pulled something out of his pocket and handed it to Jiang
Cheng, “Let’s just say this is a…… Labour Day present.”
“Would’ve been great if you just called it a Children’s Day present.” Jiang Cheng accepted
the thing and looked down at it. It was a fairly large and squishy bundle.
“It’s a little early for June 1st,” Gu Fei said. “I also have to get Er-Miao something for June
1st, I’ll get you two something each then.” [2]
“Go away,” Jiang Cheng answered shortly, and realized that he was holding a soft and
squishy ball made of blue yarn, with a loose yarn sticking out from the top. He held the yarn
ball up by the loose string, and was more than a little surprised. “A sunny doll?” [3]
“Mhm, may all your days be sunny and bright.” Gu Fei said. “It’s supposed to be white, but I
just remembered that skein of yarn you bought last time was never used for anything, so I
knitted a……”
“What did you stuff it with?” Jiang Cheng gave it a squeeze, it was soft.
“It’s also yarn, I stuffed the leftover bits I had in there.” Gu Fei said. “There’s actually still
some left, I gave it to Er-Miao to play with, it’s not enough to make anything else anyway.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet as he looked down at this blue sunny doll.
The doll had eyes too. Probably due to it being made of yarn, and blue yarn at that, it was
hard to draw the eyes on, so where the eyes were Gu Fei had sewn on two little buttons.
Classmate Jiang Cheng!
Please control your emotions!
Please do not cry at a breakfast stall where you have to squat at a wooden plank bench to eat!
That would not only ruin the mood, but also look extremely stupid!
“You weren’t too lazy to undo the splint and change clothes yesterday, were you.” Jiang
Cheng pressed the round head of the doll to his eyes for a second, then looked up at Gu Fei.
“You didn’t even sleep, right?”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, just smiled.
“Did you have to do that,” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what else to say, he clutched the doll
tightly in his hands. “You could’ve just grabbed a bag of snacks from the store……”
“Too many things happened yesterday, I couldn’t really fall asleep anyways.” Gu Fei said. “I
just figured that if I came over, and brought a flower with me……
you’d probably stand at the front door and kill the flower with the slingshot first before
walking out, so I made this thing, it’s pretty simple anyway.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng looked down and squeezed the doll again, then held it by the string and
gave it a gentle shake. This chubby sunny doll that was at least three times larger than
regular sunny dolls was as cute as a penguin when it swayed in the air. “Then I’ll give you a
little gift too.”
“It’s not a gift exchange or anything.” Gu Fei said.
“Are you going to refuse?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Nope.” Gu Fei said right away.
Jiang Cheng grabbed his backpack and unzipped it.
“You really are the overachiever,” Gu Fei marveled. “Bringing your backpack out with you
even when there’s no classes.”
“It’s not like there are any books inside,” Jiang Cheng said as he put the doll in the bag. “I
just have a habit of carrying a bag with me, gives me a sense of safety, plus it looks bad to
have bulging pockets full of stuff.”
He pulled out his slingshot from the bag and set it down in front of Gu Fei, “You can have
this, to commemorate the day when you showcased your extraordinary acting skills.”
Gu Fei laughed as he picked up the slingshot and examined it, then pulled on the
elastic, “Doesn’t that mean you won’t have one to play with?”
“I feel like Pan Zhi would bring a new one for me.” Jiang Cheng said. “The last time he came
to visit he brought me a tin whistle, if he were to bring me another little trinket this time
then it’ll have to be a slingshot.”
“When is he coming?” Gu Fei put the slingshot in his pocket.
“Labour Day.” Jiang Cheng said. “Not too far away now, do you guys have anything fun
around here? He’ll probably be staying for three or four days, I can’t exactly take him
shopping in the main square every single day.”
Gu Fei gave him a look but didn’t say anything.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“I’m thinking.” Gu Fei said.
“Preferably somewhere nearby, not too far, otherwise it’ll be a long trip.” Jiang Cheng said
again.
“Hm,” Gu Fei thought about it as he picked up a steamed dumpling and took a bite, and
eventually said after a while. “There’s an amusement park on the newer side of the city,
they opened a haunted house last year, I heard it’s pretty good. It even made it on the news,
apparently it’s really scary.”
“Is it big?” Jiang Cheng asked right away with great interest.
“Pretty big, three levels in total including the basement, and it covers a pretty big area,” Gu
Fei said. “Though I’ve never been.”
“Come with us then,” Jiang Cheng said. “Who would’ve thought that this shitty little place
would have a haunted house.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, just clucked his tongue a few times as he ate his steamed
dumpling.
“You got something to say?” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“Nothing to say,” Gu Fei said. “To be honest, if it wasn’t for this haunted house I don’t even
know what else to suggest, the only thing left is the nearby mountain, but the snow has
already melted so there’s nothing to see there.”
After breakfast, Gu Fei stood up and stretched, “You’re not studying today then?”
“Mn,” Jiang Cheng answered. “Do you have any plans?”
“Nope,” Gu Fei thought about it. “How about we go…… watch a movie?”
“How do we get there?” Jiang Cheng glanced at his leg and said quietly. “Should I be
pretending to support you?”
“No need, I came here on my bike.” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck, aren’t you afraid that Monkey’s guys would see you!” Jiang Cheng was all of a sudden
frantic as he grabbed Gu Fei’s wrist and pulled his arm onto his own shoulder, then
wrapped his arm around Gu Fei’s waist. “If someone were to see you, it’d be a total waste of
your acting performance yesterday!”
“…… I peddled here with one leg,” Gu Fei leaned himself on Jiang Cheng. “It was super
convincing.”
Jiang Cheng supported Gu Fei as they walked toward his bike.
It was…… a strange feeling.
He had touched Gu Fei’s waist before, not only that he had squeezed it too. But this was the
first time, out on the street, that he so publicly and openly put his hand on Gu Fei’s waist.
It was a well-toned waist, he could feel the muscles shifting under his palm as Gu Fei
hopped along on one leg.
He couldn’t help but give it a squeeze, or two.
“Hey,” Gu Fei straightened up a little and grabbed his hand. “I’m ticklish.”
“Let go!” Jiang Cheng quickly scanned their surroundings. Arm on shoulder, arm around
waist, these were all completely normal based on Gu Fei’s current condition, but grabbing
his hand like this, that’d be a little too much.
Gu Fei didn’t release him, just grabbed his hand and shoved it into his pocket.
Jiang Cheng was quiet. Gu Fei’s jacket was loose-fitting with large pockets, at a quick glance
nobody would see that there were two hands inside.
Besides, he didn’t really want to take his hand out either.
This faint sense of excitement that stemmed from feeling not quite different from normal
but actually different in every single way, this feeling of the two of them, was very
satisfying.
“What’s playing today?” Inside the pocket, Jiang Cheng squeezed the tip of Gu Fei’s pinky
finger.
“Dunno,” Gu Fei slipped a piece of round candy into Jiang Cheng’s palm. “Let’s just see
what’s there, our primary objective isn’t to watch the movie anyway.”
“…… Shit,” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “What are you gonna do? Do you not know that the
security cameras in the movie theatres are all infrared?”
“I’ve never actually thought about that…… wait,” Gu Fei looked at him in surprise, then
started laughing after a long pause. “Cheng-ge are you maybe overthinking this?”
“Fuck off!” Jiang Cheng clenched his teeth.
“I was thinking of something a little simpler……” Gu Fei said.
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“I just wanted to find a dark corner,” Gu Fei said. “And hang out there with you.”
“…… Why does it have to be a dark corner?” Jiang Cheng let go and took the bike keys out
from Gu Fei’s pocket as he did. “I’ll take you there on the bike?”
“Ok.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Why does it have to be a dark corner?” Jiang Cheng asked again as he unlocked the bike
and got on.
“At the breakfast stall just now,” Gu Fei said. “If I touched you, don’t tell me you wouldn’t
have jumped all the way up to the street lamp?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng paused. “The fuck you’re not thinking any less than me!”
“Really?” Gu Fei got onto the backseat. “I think you’re talking about bigger movements that
could be clearly captured with infrared surveillance. If it’s just some hand holding and leg
touching, no need to be concerned about whether the cameras are infrared.”
“Never mind, stop talking about this.” Jiang Cheng tsked.
Jiang Cheng had already rode out for several meters, but then suddenly stopped the bike
again. He turned around to look at Gu Fei, “There’s something I wanted to say formally,
even though I think I’ve already said it once.”
“I really like you,” Gu Fei said. “I will keep on liking you until you don’t need me to like you
anymore.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him with his mouth half open, not able to get a single word out. He
could only feel buzzing in his head.
 I really like you. This sentence coming out of Gu Fei’s mouth made him a little dizzy.
“What were you going to say?” Gu Fei rubbed his back.
“…… Forgot.” Jiang Cheng said.
The corners of Gu Fei’s mouth twitched but he didn’t say anything.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his nose. “I remember, it’s…… I really do like you very much, I
have never liked anyone the way I like you.”
Footnotes:
[1] 早恋: In China, any sort of romantic relationship before 18 is strictly forbidden by teachers
and parents because it distracts from academic studies. Of course, this is enforced in
varying degrees in different regions and within different families. Literal translation is
“premature love” or “early romance”.But considering everything that Gu Fei was actually
concerned about, it was maybe the dumbest response he could give XD ↩
[2] May 1 is Labour Day, June 1 is Children’s Day, so this is probably some time in April. ↩
[3] Otherwise known as a teru teru bōzu. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6313
TL word count: 4412
TL time: 4:39:03
Edit: 0:52:50
Curse words: 8x fucks, 3x shit
TL’s Notes
Anyways, *screams*

First posted: October 25, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 56
movietheatre.avi
If they wanted to go to one of the better cinemas, they had to go to the shopping centre
downtown. Normally, Jiang Cheng would be pretty reluctant to ride his bike all the way
from here to the shopping centre all the while carrying another person on the backseat; it’s
fucking far.
But today was different. The person on the backseat with his head pressed into Jiang
Cheng’s back and hands in Jiang Cheng’s pocket — which really was pulling his collar down
and digging into his neck — was his boyfriend Gu Fei.
Before 8 o’clock that morning, the guy was still just his desk-mate, but now he was his
boyfriend. What a fantastical turn of events.
Jiang Cheng had often imagined what ‘dating’ would be like, not unlike the various fantasies
anybody at this age would have, but during the short time when he was with Yu Xin, he
couldn’t match the experience with any of the supposed feelings no matter how hard he
tried. He thought perhaps his expectations had been too high.
Not until now, with this person on his back seat wrapped in real and fake bandages on their
way to see a movie, did he suddenly get a rush of what
‘dating’ feels like.
It was a kind of relationship he had always been avoiding, rejecting, and afraid of, but all
the fears and trepidation he’d felt since realizing there was something
‘different’ about himself was now buried under a mountain of elation and happiness.
At first, when Gu Fei suggested they go see a movie, he didn’t quite understand.
Why go hang out at such a crowded place? But on the way there, as they rode with the wind
around them, he suddenly understood.
It was the feeling of being among a crowd with their own little secret.
Look, all these people, and we’re here too. We came here together, we’re leaving together.
Among the crowd, under the gaze of strangers, there is a sense of concealed safety.
Behind him, Gu Fei’s head that had been resting against his back suddenly slipped to the
side, followed right after by his body swaying to the side as well.
“Oh shit,” Jiang Cheng quickly steadied the bike and turned around. “Did you fall asleep?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei put his head back in position against Jiang Cheng’s back, and readjusted the
grip of his hands in Jiang Cheng’s pockets. “You keep going, I was just having a false
snooze.” [1]
“Do you even know what a false snooze means you illiterate,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You’re straight up taking a nap back there.”
“I was having a false snooze, but then it accidentally became a real snooze.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng laughed, then sighed after a pause, “Maybe we shouldn’t go to the movies, why
don’t you go back home and sleep for a bit?”
“Nah,” Gu Fei said. “At this point I won’t be able to sleep properly anyways. I just want to
watch a movie with you.”
“What if you fall asleep in the movie theatre?” Jiang Cheng said.
“I won’t,” With the hand that was in his pocket, Gu Fei suddenly caressed Jiang Cheng’s leg.
“We’ll pick a more exciting movie, with a more exciting sort of viewing tactic……”
“Fucking watch yourself!” Under Gu Fei’s touch, Jiang Cheng almost crashed them into the
electric scooter beside them.
“Mn, I’ll keep snoozing.” Gu Fei stopped moving.
Since they were at the shopping centre downtown, they were unlikely to run into anyone
from the Steel Works. Once they arrived, before Jiang Cheng even finished locking up the
bike, Gu Fei already made a beeline for the sporting goods store.
“You can at least slow down a little,” Jiang Cheng said as he followed. “The way you’re
trudging along like this, you won’t even have time to put up an act if we run into anyone we
know.”
“The Steel Works is way too far from here, I only come a couple times a year at most.” Gu
Fei sauntered along slowly between the aisles. “Those guys usually never go shopping, even
if they do, they mostly hang around the bridge area, the retail strip near Jiuri’s restaurant.”
“Really,” Jiang Cheng considered for a moment. “No wonder they’re all dressed like that,
you can’t even piece together their style with the stuff found in the shopping centre.”
“What style?” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Every one of them is as skinny as a toothpick, but wears such tight-fitting tops, and tight-
fitting cropped pants. If you don’t look carefully you won’t even notice
that they have legs.” Jiang Cheng recalled the crowd from the night before, and suddenly
felt his rage boil up all over again. “I’m telling you, from where I was I could hit a strip of
wood no problem, but I’d have trouble if you want me to hit one of those guys……”
Gu Fei picked up a baseball glove and couldn’t stop laughing, “They’re not all skinny, there
are buff ones too.”
“Right, the meat on their tummies are pretty buff.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ayy…” Gu Fei finished laughing and sighed. “But aren’t there also people like me.”
“You’re not one of those people,” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “Even though you were
dressed pretty flashy yesterday. How come you’re not wearing that leather motorcycle
jacket today huh?”
“It’s torn from the fall of course,” Gu Fei thought about it for a second. “But when it comes
to tight-fitting clothes, I really did used to have……”
“If you still wear them now, I promise that we won’t even be desk-mates.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ooh, scared me.” Gu Fei put on the baseball glove and tossed a ball up and down in his
gloved hand.
“You’re buying this? You guys at the Steel Works won’t even play basketball without
weapons,” Jiang Cheng said. “With this, are you planning to throw grenades?”
“It’s for Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said. “She saw it on TV the other day and wants one too.”
“Why not get a child-sized one, isn’t this too big?” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s got to be adult sized, these things don’t break that easily. When she gets older and the
glove is too small for her, if I change it, she’ll throw a fit, if I don’t change it, she won’t be
able to fit her hands in and will throw a fit anyway.”
“…… Alright.” Jiang Cheng sighed. Who knew how many problems one had to consider as Gu
Miao’s older brother.
After they bought the glove and ball, Gu Fei forcefully stuffed everything into Jiang Cheng’s
backpack.
“…… I’ll stop carrying a backpack with me from now on.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ll carry it.” Gu Fei said.
“Give it up already you disabled person,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not like I’m a girl.”
“I should’ve bought them when we’re leaving.” Gu Fei said.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Right? Why did you buy them now?”
“Yeah why?” Gu Fei looked back at him.
“I don’t want to laugh,” Jiang Cheng turned and walked briskly away. “Seriously can we
make a pact, no more idiotic giggling from now on, day in day out like this it’s way too
dumb.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei followed with him an extremely solemn look on his face.
Jiang Cheng felt rather accomplished that he finally managed to kill the urge to giggle
before it bursted out of his nose.
“Which floor is the cinema on?” Jiang Cheng asked when they were standing on the
escalator heading upstairs.
“Dunno,” Gu Fei looked around and pointed at a sign behind them. “Fifth floor.”
“You’ve never been here?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“No,” Gu Fei thought about it, then said quietly in his ear. “I think the last time I watched a
movie was at the reform school, when the school gathered everyone to watch some
documentary about prisoner interviews.”
“That can’t possibly count as a movie,” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a pit in his stomach. “And
before that?”
“When I was in elementary school, my mom took me to see some kind of
animated film, I can’t remember.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng felt an ache in his heart, “You never just come watch a movie with somebody?”
“With whom?” Gu Fei gave him a little smile.
Jiang Cheng paused, and didn’t say anything else.
Right, with whom? If Gu Fei’s usual demeanor is any indication, it couldn’t possibly be with
classmates. With friends…… Not A Good Bird didn’t seem like the type who’d want to go to
the movies either. As for family…… the fact that Gu Fei’s mom took him to see a movie even
once was already a surprise to him.
Suddenly, he realized that the reason Gu Fei wanted to watch a movie with him might not
be entirely to find a corner among the crowd for two people to hang
out close together, it might also be because he had hardly ever watched a movie before.
At the cinema, they looked up at the rolling display, there weren’t any good flicks playing at
this time. They sat down on the sofa together, and Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone, “I’ll
check the promotions first.”
“Let me,” Gu Fei said. “I……”
“You probably still have to install the app,” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t fight me on this.”
“Then you go ahead,” Gu Fei leaned back on the sofa and said while smiling.
“Don’t forget to buy snacks.”
Jiang Cheng scrolled around for a while on his phone, but didn’t manage to find anything he
wanted to watch. He turned around to look at Gu Fei, “Do you think made-in-China horror
movies count as a somewhat exciting flick?”
“…… Is there nothing else?” Gu Fei asked.
“Only ones left are arthouse films.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Chinese horror it is then.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng ordered a combo with extra large popcorn and drink, then hesitated again
when it was time to pick the seats. This showing was still mostly empty, so initially he
picked seats in the middle, then after some pondering, figured it might be too centered, and
if they were to do anything…… He cancelled it and switched their seats to the very last row,
but then felt it might be a little too shameless, as if he really intended to do something. He
snuck a glance at Gu Fei sitting beside him; Gu Fei was looking down at his phone, playing
the idiotic Aixiaochu.
Fine, let’s go for the middle route. Jiang Cheng cancelled the seats on the last row, and
picked two seats on the second last row, then pressed confirm.
After that was done, when he stood up to get the ticket from the machine, a staff member
approached them pushing a wheelchair, “Gentlemen, this is the
wheelchair provided for you by our cinema.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng froze.
“The theatre is a bit of a walk,” The staff member said. “This is more convenient.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng looked at the wheelchair. “Thank…… thank you.”
“When you come back out after the movie, just return it to the service desk.”
The staff member left, leaving them with the wheelchair.
Jiang Cheng turned and looked at Gu Fei, Gu Fei had already been laughing for a while on
the sofa with his hand over his face.
“Sir, do you need this?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Yes,” Gu Fei nodded. “Why don’t you push me in.”
“Damn,” Jiang Cheng was a little speechless. “If the producers knew that we’re so desperate
to watch their horror movie without ghosts that we’d go in a wheelchair, they’d probably
shed tears of happiness.” [2]
“Hurry it up,” Gu Fei glanced at the rolling display and said while laughing. “It starts in 20
minutes.”
After retrieving the ticket, Jiang Cheng pushed the wheelchair next to Gu Fei’s legs, “Come
on then Mr. Gu.”
Gu Fei struggled to stand up while supporting himself on the sofa armrest, hopped on one
leg to turn around, then lowered himself into the wheelchair slowly, “Done.”
“Look at this acting,” Jiang Cheng said. “I doubt anyone in the movie we’re about to watch is
going to surpass you.”
“You’re too kind.” Gu Fei set his feet on the footrest. “Ah, feels good.”
Jiang Cheng pushed the wheelchair over to pick up the snacks. Large bucket of popcorn, a
large drink, along with the complimentary water and wet wipes, all were placed onto Gu
Fei’s lap.
As he pushed Gu Fei to the theatre, he could feel the somewhat surprised looks from the
people around them.
Oiyoo this guy must be bored to such an extent that he’ll come out in a time when nothing
good is playing to watch a movie in a wheelchair.
“Which theatre are we in?” Gu Fei cleaned his hands with a wet wipe, then asked as he
munched on popcorn.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei turned around.
He stared down at Gu Fei, “You’re really enjoying this aren’t you?”
Gu Fei immediately picked a piece of popcorn coated with lots of caramel and held it beside
Jiang Cheng’s mouth, “Here.”
Jiang Cheng quickly glanced around, there wasn’t anyone nearby. He swiftly took the
popcorn into his mouth.
“You bit my finger.” Gu Fei said.
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei munched on a few more kernels then picked another few well coated ones and held
it up, Jiang Cheng lowered his head and took them into his mouth again.
A bit silly.
And yet…… even though he felt like a stupid hamster being fed by hand, it still made him
very happy.
As they rolled up to the theatre, the ticket attendant at the door was looking around in
boredom. When she spotted them, a look of shock appeared on her face, and she quickly
approached, “There are steps inside, I’ll help you.”
“Oh no it’s alright,” Gu Fei waved his hand right away. “I’ll just hop my way in.”
Perhaps it was because there were very few people watching this showing, the attendant
had nothing better to do. She ended up forcefully carrying the popcorn in for them, then
went back and pushed the wheelchair to the bottom of the steps, before walking away
while looking back at them every other step.
“This accommodation.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Why didn’t you pick the last row?” Gu Fei sat down.
“…… What are you planning to do?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Haven’t decided yet,” Gu Fei smiled and pointed at the seat beside him further away from
the aisle. “You sit here.”
“Just go ahead and shift over,” Jiang Cheng said. “What’s the big deal.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, but raised his bandaged right hand and waved it in front of Jiang
Cheng’s face.
Jiang Cheng instantly understood what he meant, and in that same instant felt his heart rate
increase, as his cheeks suddenly started burning, as though he’d put it right up to a
radiator.
He brushed ever so slightly against Gu Fei as he squeezed his way past, and immediately
felt his root of all evil start to rear its head.
“Ayy…” He sighed quietly as he sat down, and tugged on his pants.
“Young people huh.” Gu Fei sat down again and took a sip of his drink.
Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
“I’m still calm as water right now,” Gu Fei looked back at Jiang Cheng, then down at his own
crotch. “See?”
“The hell do I see!” Jiang Cheng felt the strong urge to give it a big slap.
Gu Fei sipped on the drink as he looked straight forward, and smiled without a word.
“Honestly,” Jiang Cheng said. “I never would’ve imagined you to be this kind of person.”
“I also never imagined that,” Gu Fei pulled up the armrest between the two seats, and
shifted a little closer to Jiang Cheng so that they were pressed against each other. “As the
one feared by all in and around the Steel Works……”
“Alright enough already,” Jiang Cheng cut him off, then chuckled again after a second.
“Really though, your little sister is way cooler than you are.”
“Don’t you think about my sister,” Gu Fei reached out and grabbed hold of his hand. “Just
focus your efforts on me.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng squeezed his hand back.
Gu Fei’s hand was very warm, even though the weather was warmer now, and even more
so in the theatre, he still found the warmth of Gu Fei’s hand extremely pleasant.
Jiang Cheng looked behind them, there was nobody sitting in the last row, though the
theatre wasn’t as empty as he expected. Especially when in the last few minutes before the
movie started, some twenty odd people suddenly entered in pairs at a time.
It was obvious from a glance that they were all little lovers coming in on a date.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little…… peculiar. When mixed in among this crowd of people
whose intentions were obvious, he felt that he and Gu Fei’s intentions also became much
more obvious.
Fortunately, the next group to enter was a family of four, who seated themselves a few
rows in front of them.
Jiang Cheng immediately let out a breath of relief.
He wondered why he was such a wuss all of a sudden..
He stole a glance at Gu Fei sitting beside him, and saw that Gu Fei was busy munching away
at the popcorn on his lap, his expression calm as ever.
“Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Hm?” Gu Fei turned.
He actually wasn’t sure what he wanted when he said Gu Fei’s name, he didn’t really have
anything to say.
When Gu Fei turned to him, the lights in the theatre suddenly dimmed.
Gu Fei’s face was immediately plunged into darkness, leaving only a slim outline of his face
backlit by the light from the screen.
Without even thinking, Jiang Cheng leaned over, but as soon as he moved, Gu Fei was
already there, planting a gentle kiss on his lips.
The theatre had just gone dark, there were still people moving about around them, with
some people still chatting.
At the moment, the atmosphere hadn’t become quite reassuring enough, yet Jiang Cheng
still stopped breathing momentarily from the kiss. His heart was a little slower in its
reaction, it only started beating wildly after two seconds had passed, so violently in fact,
that he felt like Gu Fei’s face was shaking along with it.
Gu Fei did not make any more advances, only kept his lips gently pressed against his,
neither of them moving.
Compared to the various forms of contact they’ve had in the past, this kiss really wasn’t
that big of a deal. They’ve jerked each other off two times already, but Jiang Cheng felt
something in this moment that he had never experienced before.
As a prodigal overachiever, he could not for the life of him find the appropriate word to
describe this feeling.
After a while of quietly pressing their lips against each other, Jiang Cheng licked Gu Fei’s
lips with the tip of his tongue.
It was sweet.
The movie had started playing, but Jiang Cheng did not feel the urge to turn back to the
screen at all. Gu Fei’s lips were still there, the moist lips tinged with a hint of popcorn
aroma was still there beside his tongue.
In a moment like this, nevermind a movie, it might take him a few seconds to
wake up even if somebody he knew was standing right beside them……
But reality tends to slap you on the face.
It was obviously not a very scary horror movie, but unfortunately, the theatre had amazing
acoustics.
A piercing scream that suddenly reverberated from all around them drew startled sounds
out of the whole audience.
Jiang Cheng’s pounding heart, which was already in somewhat of a hurry, almost split in
two at this sudden sound, his whole body bounced a little in the seat.
It seemed like Gu Fei was also startled by this, he bounced almost at the same time.
The two of them turned and glanced at the screen together, then turned back and stared at
each other in the darkness. It took a while before Gu Fei finally said quietly, “Fuck, it almost
withdrew back into my body from the scare.”
Jiang Cheng paused for a long time, then when the thought finally registered, he could no
longer hold it in anymore, he bowed his head down and started laughing through clenched
teeth.
“Can you spare a little sympathy please?” Gu Fei said quietly also with laughter in his voice.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng answered, then turned to look at him, and asked while trying to keep a
straight face. “So did it or did it not draw back inside?”
“Nah,” Gu Fei said. “Do you want to……”
Jiang Cheng figured there must be poison in the theatre’s air freshener, maybe the poison
was in the popcorn, or even on Gu Fei’s lips…… Either way, with these symptoms, he
must’ve been poisoned.
He suddenly reached out his hand to touch Gu Fei, and in the process almost knocked over
the popcorn on Gu Fei’s lap.
The laughter that Gu Fei had been trying to suppress suddenly disappeared, his body
stiffened ever so slightly.
Jiang Cheng could feel under his palm that it clearly did not withdraw back inside. And the
reason that it did not retreat, was probably because of little Gu Fei’s impressive
resilience……
The fuck?
What are you doing Jiang Cheng?
Are you really so thirsty! It hasn’t even been two minutes into the movie! The supporting
character had come out and screamed only once! She didn’t even have time to die yet!
Suddenly, he didn’t know what to do with the hand on Gu Fei’s crotch.
After blanking out for a few seconds, he made up his mind to overcome all adversity and
take his hand back, but it was then that Gu Fei suddenly tossed the popcorn to the seat
beside them and pulled his hand into his grip.
“Are there really infrared cameras?” Gu Fei pushed his hand down and leaned over to
whisper in his ear.
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng answered quietly. “Should we be…… holding back a little?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He slid down a little in the seat as he let go of Jiang Cheng’s hand, then
without any warning, stuck his own hand directly into Jiang Cheng’s pants.
Jiang Cheng’s head was instantly overwhelmed with all sorts of images of movietheatre.avi,
as he also shifted down in the seat and yanked on Gu Fei’s waistband.
The movie was still playing, and for the sake of “holding back”, even though he and Gu Fei
were squeezed together side by side, both of them were still facing forward with eyes glued
to the screen. Even if Jiang Cheng had no idea why the woman on screen was running up
and down the house.
Before him was a criss-crossed show of light and shadow, it was a flick that was entirely
inexplicable and nonsensical but was made to take on a certain peculiar aesthetic in his
thirsty fire-addled mind.
The only thing was…… the screaming.
The screaming supporting character was already lost to who knows where, the female lead
kept up the work where her friend left off.
After three consecutive screams, the two of them were a little too immersed in their
shameful activity to be thoroughly frightened, but still they felt each other’s hands tighten
slightly.
“We picked the wrong movie.” Jiang Cheng shut his eyes briefly.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei cocked his head and said his name.
Jiang Cheng turned, and Gu Fei leaned in for a kiss.

Footnotes:
[1] 假寐: false snooze is an expression used when you close your eyes and rest while still
staying conscious. ↩
[2] Horror movie without ghosts: the term for horror movie is literally “ghost movie”.
Chinese govnt media censorship (vaguely) dictates that modern broadcast media must not
contain explicit supernatural elements, which means horror movies cannot contain
monsters/ghosts. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5864
TL word count: 3971
TL time: 5:02:25
Edit: 0:34:02
Curse words: 4x fucks, 1x shit
TL’s Notes
first date

First posted: October 31, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 57
The kind of pride that made one proud.
Due to their extremely improper viewing strategy, by the time they’d exhausted all ten of
the wet wipes in the complimentary pack provided by the cinema, checked thoroughly that
there was nothing on their clothing, and that their hands had been wiped clean, they were
completely lost on the plot of this horror movie that seemed to insist on consistent
screaming throughout.
“Why is that woman……” Gu Fei asked quietly while stuffing all sorts of crumpled up paper
into a small plastic bag. “Wait, is this the same woman from before?”
“……Which one?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“That…… how many women are there?” Gu Fei looked at the screen.
“Three I think, this one must be the orphan that the earlier guy mentioned.” Jiang Cheng
made an educated guess.
“Which guy said she’s an orphan?” Gu Fei asked.
“…… Why don’t you play the idiotic Aixiaochu for a while,” Jiang Cheng glanced over at him.
“We’re at the back, so it won’t affect other people.”
Gu Fei chuckled, “You got a problem? Do you understand what’s going on?”
“Nope,” Jiang Cheng said. “But you see, I didn’t think to ask you about it.”
Gu Fei laughed and took a sip of the drink, “Are there really infrared cameras?”
“I really can’t say for sure,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the walls around them, then said in a
very quiet voice. “I saw a thread on Tianya once, everyone there was talking about the
unspeakable things they did while watching movies, then suddenly this person popped in
in the replies, and said I’m warning you as a projectionist, we can see everything you’re
doing in the back room, and the security cameras are all infrared…… I feel like this reply left
a big shadow in the hearts of everyone on that thread …… including me.” [1]
“Makes sense,” Gu Fei whispered as he leaned in close to Jiang Cheng’s ear.
“See, with how dark this is, if it was normal cameras it wouldn’t be able to see anything.”
“Sit properly.” Jiang Cheng sat up straight.
“Alrighty.” Gu Fei also sat up straight.
Together they sat there and continued watching the movie with the plot that was nowhere
to be found.
……And even made it all the way to the end.
When the lights came back on in the theatre, Jiang Cheng quickly glanced down to check if
there were any untoward traces left on them, then looked on the floor for any missed
pieces of paper, before finally standing up.
For some reason, looking at the little couples walking away in pairs with arms around each
other, Jiang Cheng felt like they all had “unfinished and unsatisfied”
written on their faces.
A guilty person probably sees guilt in everyone else. By the Divine Jade Emperor. Probably.
“Check the back of my pants,” Jiang Cheng was still not entirely convinced and turned his
back to Gu Fei. “Is there anything there?”
“You……” Gu Fei sighed. “What kind of angle will get it to reach the back?”
“Screw your great uncle!” Jiang Cheng turned around with temper flaring and yanked Gu
Fei up by the arm. “Come on, gimpy!”
Gu Fei walked a couple of steps toward the exit, then suddenly switched to a one legged
hop.
“Oh shit,” Jiang Cheng peered forward, and found the attendant from before had come
inside, and was waiting beside the wheelchair. “Look at this service.”
“I’ll let you borrow the whole set next time,” Gu Fei said. “You too can experience this.”
“What the hell kind of experience is this, if we’re talking about experience I’d rather have
the experience of you piggyback carrying me up that mountain you talked about.” Jiang
Cheng chuckled.
“Sure, we’ll go there someday, I’ll carry you up the mountain.” Gu Fei said.
They weren’t sure what kind of activities would typically be involved on a romantic date,
but coming out of the cinema, they decided to find a place to eat first, except it was early
still, so they sat down by the edge of the square.
The square was lively and bustling. There was an event hosted by some kind of real estate
team, which involved a lot of people who were singing, dancing, and even some striding
down a catwalk.
“I saw the photos you shared in the Friends Circle,” Jiang Cheng gazed out at the festivity.
“Were some of them taken here? Like that one with two aunties fighting over a fan.”
Gu Fei laughed and swiped through his phone, then held it up to Jiang Cheng’s face, “You’re
talking about this one?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “When did you take this?”
“Must’ve been last Summer, right here at this spot.” Gu Fei said. “They ended up fighting
physically too.”
“Shit, how did it end?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“An old man came and broke the fan in half, they each got one half.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop laughing, then after some thought, let out a sigh, “It’s just a fan,
what’s there to fight about?”
“There’s all kinds of people,” Gu Fei took out a cigarette and lit it. “If you sit here for a whole
day, you’ll be able to see all the different kinds.”
“Do you look often?” Jiang Cheng watched the people passing by in front of them.
“Mhm, it’s different still when you look through a lens,” Gu Fei held his left hand in front of
Jiang Cheng, and made half of a frame with his thumb and index finger. “Try it.”
Jiang Cheng paused, and looked around. No one was paying special attention to them, so he
reached out his right hand, and put his own thumb and index finger up to Gu Fei’s,
completing the frame.
“This way you would see a different side of people, without as many
distractions.” Gu Fei slowly guided his hand as he moved the frame, when they stopped,
their fingers happened to frame around a girl spacing out toward the stage. “A passerby? Or
a fan? Or maybe just simply daydreaming?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
“Who’s looking at me when I’m looking at you, ” Gu Fei sang out quietly. “In our gazes
brushing past, regardless of missing out……”
“What song is this?” Jiang Cheng asked, the melody was unfamiliar to him, but he liked how
light and upbeat it was.
“It’s not anything,” Gu Fei smiled. “I’m just making things up.”
Jiang Cheng froze for a second, then turned to look at him, “And the lyrics?”
“Randomly made it up,” Gu Fei said. “Crappy lyrics like this I can give you 800
characters of them on the spot.”
Jiang Cheng smiled without another word, and following Gu Fei’s fingers, watched the
people slowly drift through the frame.
It was a side of Gu Fei that was well hidden. Jiang Cheng would often forget that he was
actually a sensitive and meticulous person, and rather artistically inclined too.
Since Gu Fei was a gimp, and one who walked on the street like the wind, they didn’t walk
very far after completing their “watching from the sidelines”
activity. For lunch, they ate at the eatery-lined street beside the square. [2]
Whether it was because he just got a boyfriend, and on top of which there was some ever-
excitement during the movies, they didn’t eat nearly as much at lunch as they did at
breakfast.
“I should get some takeout at the fried rice cake place when we leave,” Gu Fei said. “We’ll
get hungry in the afternoon for sure.”
“Why don’t we just go have another meal of fried rice cake later.” Jiang Cheng recalled the
taste of the fried rice cakes from the other day, and suddenly felt a craving for it.
“Why not,” Gu Fei thought for a second. “Actually……”
“Actually we didn’t have to eat here at all,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Right?”
“Right,” Gu Fei started laughing. “Ayy, our brainpower is about to catch up to Jiuri.”
While chauffeuring Gu Fei back on the bike, Jiang Cheng’s mind continued to ponder.
They’ll be back soon, when they get back they’ll head straight to the fried rice cake place,
and eat rice cakes.
And then what?
Go back to their own respective homes?
Or…… have Gu Fei come over to his place?
Come over and do what?
Every time he reached this particular point he would suddenly feel embarrassed.
It wasn’t as if he had to do something with Gu Fei, but of course if they really did end up
doing something it would be totally normal, it wasn’t as if they’ve
never done anything before. But the main thing was that his primary objective wasn’t to do
something, not to mention they’ve already done a little something in the movie theatre just
now……
He felt like the words “come hang out at my place for a while” once spoken, came naturally
with undeniably crooked innuendos.
…… What is this stupid tangled mess of thoughts!
How could a man be so fussy!
“Wanna come over to my place after the rice cakes?” Jiang Cheng turned a little and asked.
“Mmn,” Gu Fei nodded, still with the forehead against his back. “And I can borrow your
homework to copy.”
“Are you really unable to write it or do you just not want to,” Jiang Cheng was a little at loss
for words. “You didn’t seem completely lost on the midterm papers, and there I was
expecting you to rank near the very end.”
“Can’t be bothered to.” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
Jiang Cheng was about to say something more, but held his tongue after a little more
thought.
Gu Fei’s stoic response made him feel like anything else he said would be redundant. He
didn’t want to go on and on as though he was Lao-Xu, but more importantly, and perhaps
he was overly sensitive on this, he couldn’t shake off the feeling that Gu Fei’s voice
contained signs of resignation, as well as the composure of not wanting to further discuss
the matter.
“Let’s go back to the store first, there’s a shipment today, and I’m not sure if my mom has it
all figured out.” Gu Fei added.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng replied.
Jiang Cheng stopped the bike outside the door, and rested his weight on one leg.
Now that they were back on Steel Works grounds, Gu Fei’s acting was back on line, it took
him at least five whole seconds to get off the backseat of the bike.
“Aren’t you overdoing it a little.” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
“It hurts.” Gu Fei knitted his brows together.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng suppressed his giggle. “You’re making me cry.”
“Hurry up and park the bike and come give me a hand.” Gu Fei was very into it.
Jiang Cheng leaned the bike against a wall, then came and helped him into the store. The
moment he lifted the curtains, he heard a familiar voice yell out,
“What’s the matter with Gu Fei?”
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei both froze in the doorway, together they stared at Lao-Xu, who was
standing in front of the front counter.
“Oii!” Gu Fei’s mom, who was standing behind the front counter, also yelled out. “Did you
fall or is this from a fight?”
“I fell.” Gu Fei said.
“Broke your leg?” Lao-Xu walked over. “Is it serious?”
“Not serious,” Gu Fei gave Lao-Xu a look. “Sir, what are you doing here?”
“Teacher Xu is here for a home visit,” Gu Fei’s mom brought over a chair.
“Hurry up and sit down, didn’t even tell me that your leg is like this, and there you go
running around everywhere.”
Gu Fei sat down and kept quiet.
With Lao-Xu standing here, Jiang Cheng figured they probably couldn’t have fried rice cake
any time soon. Not to mention the fact that Li Baoguo went to Lao-Xu the other day…… He
felt like he should disappear before Lao-Xu noticed him and had time to react.
But just as he lifted the curtains to leave, Lao-Xu already called out his name,
“Jiang Cheng! I was about to go looking for you too!”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng didn’t respond, and stubbornly continued to hold up the curtain at the
door.
“Wait for me, after I finish chatting with Gu Fei’s mom, the two of us can have a little chat.”
Lao-Xu said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
“You wait for me,” Lao-Xu said again. “Just a little while.”
Jiang Cheng sighed. Lao-Xu’s tone made it hard for him to walk away, he could only agree
somewhat grumpily.
Lao-Xu and Gu Fei’s mom went to the courtyard in the back. He brought out a stool and sat
down beside Gu Fei.
As he sat down, Lao-Xu walked back into the store, “Gu Fei, later you gonna tell me what’s
going on with this leg of yours?”
“I fell,” Gu Fei said. “Went too fast on the motorcycle and crashed.”
“Is it bad?” Lao-Xu walked in front of him and examined it.
“It’s alright.” Gu Fei drew his leg back, a little uncomfortable.
“Don’t move,” Lao-Xu gestured, then straightened up. “Why don’t you take a few days off,
get some bedrest.”
“……Oh.” Gu Fei nodded.
Lao-Xu sighed, then went back out to the courtyard.
“What’s Lao-Xu doing here?” Jiang Cheng said quietly.
“He pretty much does the rounds at each house once a month,” Gu Fei said.
“Main focus is my place, and Wang Xu and the other guys.”
“He really doesn’t get tired huh,” Jiang Cheng frowned a little, Lao-Xu really was one of the
more dedicated teachers. “I feel like he’s going to talk to me about Li Baoguo again.”
“Probably, other than Li Baoguo, there’s nothing else that’s worrisome when it comes to
you.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Li Baoguo went to the school a while ago, saying god-knows-what to Lao-Xu at the gate,”
Jiang Cheng stuck his leg out in irritation. “What the hell does he want!”
Gu Fei didn’t answer at first, just reached out and patted his leg, “See what Lao-Xu says,
don’t stress. When it comes down to it, isn’t it just a matter of going home or not, and
whether you’re still his son or not.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng stole a glance toward the courtyard, then gave Gu Fei’s hand a squeeze.
“Let me know when you’re done chatting with Lao-Xu, we’ll go get some fried rice cakes.”
Gu Fei said.
“I can’t eat anymore, no appetite.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then you can watch me eat,” Gu Fei said. “I have appetite.”
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
Lao-Xu chatted with Gu Fei’s mom for almost twenty minutes, then came back into the
store.
“Teacher Xu, here, take a case of milk home,” Gu Fei’s mom brought him a big cardboard
box of milk. “You’ve worked hard.”
“No no no no……” Lao-Xu waved his hand frantically. “It’s all part of the job, there’s no need
for this. I’m just happy when parents are so cooperative with my work.”
“Yes, I’m very cooperative,” Gu Fei’s mom said as she tried to shove the big box of milk into
Lao-Xu’s hands. “Teacher Xu, sir……”
“Mom,” Gu Fei stood up and stopped her. “I’ll take it to Teacher Xu’s home tomorrow.”
“Ok, ok then.” She nodded.
“It’s really not necessary, really.” Lao-Xu waved at Jiang Cheng as he walked out the door.
“Jiang Cheng, come on, let’s go out and sit down somewhere.”
Jiang Cheng stood up and gave Gu Fei a look, Gu Fei smiled at him and made a phone call
gesture with his hand.
Jiang Cheng nodded, then turned and followed Lao-Xu outside.
Lao-Xu walked at the front, and he followed behind without quickening his pace to catch
up.
Even though it was like Gu Fei said, it wasn’t a big deal if they really were to talk about Li
Baoguo. At the end of the day, it was about whether or not he would go back. But the good
mood he had maintained for the whole morning was still completely ruined.
If it wasn’t for Gu Fei’s smile at the end, he really would turn around right this second and
shake Lao-Xu off without a sound.
“We’ll go and drink some tea, just ahead.” Lao-Xu turned around and said.
“Drink tea?” Jiang Cheng was rather shocked. He had been on this street more than a few
times by now, and though he’d never looked very closely at the bleak and grungy little
shops, he was pretty sure there wasn’t such a leisurely place as a tea room.
“You don’t like tea?” Lao-Xu smiled. “But of course, young people eh, the first time Gu Fei
took me here for tea I was pretty surprised myself, who knew the kid drinks tea!”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng was again surprised.
He only knew that Gu Fei liked to put lemon in his water, but was completely unaware that
Gu Fei liked to drink tea.
He was suddenly a little displeased.
Something that even Lao-Xu knew, but he didn’t!
Lao-Xu knew, then did Not A Good Bird and Li Yan also know? Did Ding
Zhuxin know, did Wang Xu know……
Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue quietly.
Tsk tsk.
The tea drinking place was a bleak and grungy tea shop that Jiang Cheng had passed by
more than once, but had simply never noticed before.
The place wasn’t a dedicated tea room, there was only one little tea table set up by the
window, it was primarily still a shop that sold tea. If you wanted to drink tea, then you
could buy some and brew it on the spot.
Lao-Xu asked for a pot of green tea and they sat down. Jiang Cheng kept quiet, his mind
wandering. It was only when Lao-Xu poured him a cup that he
collected his thoughts, he was a little embarrassed, “Thanks Xu-zong.”
“Are your midterm test results to your satisfaction this time?” Lao-Xu asked.
“It is what it is.” Jiang Cheng said.
“By Fourth High’s standards, it’s already very good.” Lao-Xu said as he opened his bag. “But
I had a look through it, other than the three subjects where you got full marks, you got
quite a few marks taken off on the other subjects, and that’s excluding the visual
presentation marks you lost for the ugly handwriting……”
“That’s what you wanted to talk to me about?” Jiang Cheng said. “If the final exams are still
like this then I can leave second place behind by at least 100
points.”
“Kid…” Lao-Xu laughed and pulled out a file folder from his bag and set it down in front of
Jiang Cheng. “These are tests I got through a friend, from where you used to live, though I
don’t know anyone in the Affiliated High, so these tests are from the Third High, they’re all
key high schools so the difficulty level should be about the same……”
Jiang Cheng was bewildered.
“When you get time, you can time yourself doing it,” Lao-Xu said. “After you’re done I’ll get
the other teachers to mark it for you, what do you think?”
Jiang Cheng had never imagined that Lao-Xu would go so far for him, he opened the folder
and looked down at the contents, inside was indeed a whole stack of test papers for all the
various subjects.
“Xu-zong, you……” He stared at the papers, and didn’t know what else to say.
“No problem no problem,” Lao-Xu said. “All these years I’ve been at Fourth High, it’s my
first time meeting someone like you, with such potential, of course I have to do my best.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng closed the folder.
“There’s also something else I wanted to talk about, you probably already guessed.” Lao-Xu
said. “This family situation of yours, I know you don’t want to get into it, so I won’t ask too
many questions, but I’m just worried it will affect your studies, so I’m still hoping that you
can……”
“What did Li Baoguo say to you?” Jiang Cheng lifted his eyes and looked at Lao-Xu.
“Nothing much really, just said that you’re not going home anymore,” Lao-Xu sighed. “And
that he’s sick…… Jiang Cheng ah, I get why you don’t want to go home, but I’m still hoping
that you can talk it out with him, otherwise……”
“I understand.” Jiang Cheng said.
Lao-Xu didn’t continue, he let out another sigh, “I would’ve never imagined that Li Baoguo
can have a son like this.”
Jiang Cheng gave him another look.
“Li Hui, his eldest son,” Lao-Xu said as he gestured with his hand. “Used to be my student
too. Ayyy… he couldn’t pull himself together at all.”
Jiang Cheng gave a smile, then even though he didn’t at all want to ask, still opened his
mouth and asked, “What’s making him sick?”
“Some lung problem, he was being vague about it too.” Lao-Xu said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng frowned. The way Li Baoguo went on with the cigarettes and alcohol all
day every day, coughing nonstop from morning until night, Jiang Cheng wouldn’t be at all
surprised if there really was something wrong with his lungs.
But what exactly, is this “lung problem”?
Lao-Xu was not quite as talkative as he usually was, after saying all this and finishing two
cups of tea, he let Jiang Cheng go.
“I’ll leave after I finish drinking this,” Lao-Xu said. “You go on, regarding your dad…… Li
Baoguo, try to communicate a little.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng stood up, grabbed the file folder, and gave Lao-Xu a bow.
“Thank you Xu-zong.”
“Oyy,” Lao-Xu had probably never encountered a student who showed him such a grand
gesture before, he quickly stood up and returned a bow. “Go on then, get back.”
Jiang Cheng turned and walked out of the tea room…… No, tea shop.
As he walked slowly toward Gu Fei’s convenience store, he took out his phone and gave Gu
Fei a call.
“All done?” Gu Fei answered.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng said. “Are you able to leave now?”
“Fried rice cake?” Gu Fei asked.
“But of course.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Come and help me walk then.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng went and helped Gu-gimpy out of the store, carried him on the bike to the fried
rice cake place, then helped him into the shop and into the chair.
“How indulgent,” Gu Fei smiled. “In the past when I broke a bone or something, I had to lie
on the bed on my own and get through it, there wasn’t anyone to bring me out for food.”
“That’s because you don’t actually have a broken bone right now, alright?” Jiang Cheng
looked down at the menu and was about to order some cold dishes, then after a couple of
glances, raised his head again abruptly. “Did you often have a broken bone?”
“Not that often,” Gu Fei said. “About three or four times maybe, it was never that serious, I
just wanted to bring it up so your heart can ache for me.”
“What the hell,” Jiang Cheng glared at him, then a few seconds later he suddenly pressed a
hand to his chest, braced his other hand on the side wall, and with his brows knitted, said
with a face full of pain. “It…… it, hurts…… I might, might be…… I can’t……”
“I…… fuck.” Gu Fei was so startled at first that he was about to jump up from his seat, then
after realization hit, he laughed so hard he couldn’t even keep hold of the cup in his hand.
“Now this is the real impressive acting, I was just about ready to dial 120.” [3]
“Us overachievers have a whole arsenal of talents, you don’t have to be so down on
yourself.” Jiang Cheng gathered himself and continued looking through the menu. He didn’t
dare tell Gu Fei that this whole set of expressions was the result of him practicing in the
mirror every time he brushed his teeth, it had to be well-honed at this point.
After finishing the rice cakes, Jiang Cheng really was stuffed. On the way back to his
apartment with Gu Fei, he rubbed his stomach the whole way as he pedaled back.
When they arrived outside the building, Gu Fei got off the bike and waited for Jiang Cheng
to help him. Jiang Cheng looked around, there was not even a single soul around, so he
walked straight into the corridor, “Getting used to it aren’t we?”
Gu Fei laughed and followed him.
As soon as Jiang Cheng opened the door to the apartment, Gu Fei came up and hugged him
from behind, then nuzzled against his ear, “I just had fried rice cakes, so I won’t kiss you.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Well I had fermented cabbage……”
“Let’s switch to cuddling then,” Gu Fei hooked the door with his foot and closed it, then
started pushing Jiang Cheng toward the bedroom. As they walked he continued to rub his
head against Jiang Cheng’s neck. “You’re covered in the smell of fried rice cakes.”
“Geez,” Jiang Cheng poked him with an elbow. “Hurry up and get lost then.”
“It’s alright, I’m good at making do.” Gu Fei let his hands wander.
When Jiang Cheng turned around, he tripped on the bed beside them, and Gu Fei took the
chance to push him back. The two of them crashed onto the bed.
“Fuck, this bed is made of wood!” Jiang Cheng knocked on the bed with his hand. “If you
push any harder we’ll both crash right through it to the floor.”
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t say anything, he bent down and kissed the side of Jiang Cheng’s
neck, then lay on top of him and buried his face in the crook between Jiang Cheng’s neck
and shoulder.
Neither of them moved again. They just lay there, still.
Gu Fei could hear Jiang Cheng’s breathing and feel the pulse beating on his neck.
The real miracle was, in this isolated space, while the two of them were tangled in such a
tight embrace, his mind was actually not thinking of anything improper.
He felt only comfort, he wanted to stay like this forever, whether it was just daydreaming,
or even falling asleep.
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng’s hand reached into his shirt, and stroked the skin on his
side. “I just realized that you’re much heavier than you look.”
“Are you having trouble breathing?” Gu Fei asked.
“I can hold on for another minute.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei laughed and flipped over to lie on Jiang Cheng’s side.
“Are you gonna copy my homework later?” Jiang Cheng turned his face to look at him.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei also turned. “You?”
“I’m going to work through a set of test questions,” Jiang Cheng said. “Lao-Xu actually found
a bunch of tests for me, from Third High in the city I used to live in.”
“……Shit.” Gu Fei was a little shocked. “Lao-Xu really is……”
“To be honest, Pan Zhi already got me some tests, and I did them already.” Jiang Cheng said.
“But this set from Lao-Xu, I still gotta do them.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei sat up.
“Keep an eye on the time for me,” Jiang Cheng got off the bed and sat down at the desk
beside the bed. “You sit……”
“I’ll copy the homework after you’re done with the test,” Gu Fei leaned back against the
headboard and looked at him. “Go ahead and start.”
“Then what will you do?” Jiang Cheng reached out and touched the tip of Gu Fei’s nose.
“I’m invigilating.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say any more. He took out a test and started to read through it.
Gu Fei glanced at the time and made a mental note for Jiang Cheng, then turned and
watched him quietly.
Jiang Cheng had a talent that he really admired, it was the fact that Jiang Cheng only
required one second to concentrate his mind. Starting with the moment that he looked
down at the paper, it was as though everything else around him disappeared.
Gu Fei had never seen this state in anyone else around him, including Yi Jing.
Jiang Cheng really was special, he was unlike anybody else.
Unlike anybody else.
Gu Fei closed one eye, and with his remaining eye looked at Jiang Cheng’s side profile
through a circle formed with his hand.
In the instant that Jiang Cheng’s pencil hit paper, the aura that surrounded him that
subconsciously drew the gazes of others was filled to the brim with pride, the kind of pride
that made one proud.
Footnotes:
[1] Tianya: a popular internet forum in the 2000-2010. ↩
[2] Watching from the sidelines: a reference to ch. 37, when Gu Fei got destroyed by
buttons. ↩
[3] 120: The number for medical emergency in China. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6998
TL word count: 4769
TL time: 5:06:28
Edit: 0:38:29
Curse words: 2x fucks, 5x shit
TL’s Notes
I just want to say thanks everyone for coming with on this journey with me
:DDD
Also Gu Fei’s tea habit actually made a brief cameo in chapter 32, I guess Cheng-ge just wasn’t
paying very close attention back then

First posted: November 6, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 58
In your dreams!
What is it like having an overachiever for a boyfriend?
It’s while you’re both filled with passion, affection, and tenderness, he would suddenly want to
work on a set of test questions, and you can only sit by and watch the clock while invigilating
for him. Especially if this is a super intense overachiever, because as he goes into a trance and
starts writing away, he will be able to turn the extremely boring act of “writing a set of test
questions” into an almost holy endeavour.
This sense of sacredness that arises so naturally out of nowhere, makes you feel like you can’t
get hard even when face to face with someone you have so much affection for. Or even if you
did, you’d be racked with guilt.
 And when he finally finishes a set of test questions, it will already be dinner time. You’re just
about to suggest something to eat, but he’ll suddenly remind you that you still have homework
to copy.
And after you finish copying said homework, all the while looking down at yourself in disdain,
and think that it’s finally done, your phone will ping and……
Gu Fei picked up his phone and glanced at it, on the screen was a very short, simple, and to
the point message from Gu Miao.
– return
He didn’t go home for dinner yesterday, or rather he simply hadn’t returned from the time
he left for the final tournament yesterday morning until now. Gu Miao must be missing him.
– return
He sent a response back to Gu Miao.
“What are you eating tonight?” He peered at Jiang Cheng after sending the message.
“…… Fried rice cakes?” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a second.
“Shit,” Gu Fei laughed. “Are you not tired of it?”
“Or I’ll order takeout,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his belly. “The rice cakes are pretty filling, I’m
still not hungry yet…… who messaged you?”
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said. “Telling me to go back.”
“Then you should go, you’re done copying the homework anyway.” Jiang Cheng grabbed his
notebook and looked through it. “You could at least change some of the answers mister,
they’re exactly the same……”
“Not like it’s a test,” Gu Fei said. “Under the assistance of my genius desk-mate, I got all the
homework questions right, what’s the problem?”
“Your genius desk-mate just wants to sigh,” Jiang Cheng gathered up the test questions he
finished. “Will you be on bedrest tomorrow?”
“No rest,” Gu Fei shook his head. “Why don’t you come pick me up at my place?”
“Can you get up that early? How come you’re so keen all of a sudden.” Jiang Cheng leaned
back in the chair and raised his arms up in a stretch.
“What do you think.” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng insisted on going through the whole motion of his stretch, then stood up and
wrapped Gu Fei in a hug.
Gu Fei held him tight, and shut his eyes for a second.
The question set that Jiang Cheng did that afternoon was the Language Arts test, he felt he
did alright. After taking Gu Fei home, he planned to go get something to eat, then work on
the English test that evening.
“Are you able to get upstairs on your own?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei, who couldn’t
seem to bring himself out of his limping act.
“Yep, I’ll be able to run like the wind once I’m in the building.” Gu Fei hopped up and down
on one leg. “Take the bike home with you, you have to come get me tomorrow anyways.”
“I’ll call you before I leave, don’t be slow, I don’t want to be late.” Jiang Cheng said. “After all
Lao-Xu…… gotta show him some goodwill.”
“Mmn, don’t worry.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Then you…… go on,” Jiang Cheng looked left and right, there were quite a few people
walking up and down the stairs around this time, there was no way for him to do anything
else. “I’ll be going.”
Gu Fei quickly reached out and caressed Jiang Cheng’s hand that was gripping the
handlebar.
“You just had to,” Jiang Cheng said, and swiftly touched Gu Fei’s hand as well,
then turned his bike around and looked at him. “I’ll leave after you head up.”
“Message me after you finish doing the questions tonight.” Gu Fei hopped a couple of times
in the doorway to the corridor.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Only after watching Gu Fei hop into the corridor, then bound up the stairs three steps at a
time, did Jiang Cheng finally ride away on the bike.
What is it like having a fake cripple for a boyfriend?
It’s getting up 20 minutes earlier than usual in the morning, giving him a wake up call, then
riding to his home on a bike, and watching as he continues the cripple act until he’s sat on the
back of your bike. You then take him to breakfast, and after breakfast you still have to take
him to school.
To make it all as convincing as possible, you have to buy him water between classes, help him
walk to the washroom, and if he wants to have a smoke before the next class, you have to go
for another walk with him.
You don’t get much time with him after school, you have to take him home on time, because
his little sister is very worried, she’s been waiting at the school gates as soon as class ended.
Though after two or three days of this kind of life, you get used to it. After all, this guy almost
never comes to school on time normally, being able to go to school together so early in the
morning is a pretty great feeling.
The next day was the start of the May 1st holidays, even though they only got three days
off, everyone was still very excited. They were all excitedly discussing where to go, while
cursing out the teachers for giving them a bunch of homework to drag them down.
In fact, there wasn’t that much homework for this holiday, compared to what Jiang Cheng
had before, this was next to nothing. In the past, whenever they got three days off in a row,
they would get seven days worth of homework.
Back then, Pan Zhi would always copy off of him. Who knows where Pan Zhi would get his
answers from this year.
“I have to go to the community clinic later.” Gu Fei said.
“What for?” Jiang Cheng paused.
“To change up the bandages, and switch to a smaller splint, one that’s a little more mobile.”
Gu Fei said.
“Wouldn’t that give you away?” Jiang Cheng looked at his leg, the splint was
wrapped a little too extravagantly.
“I just have to buy it from them,” Gu Fei said. “Li Yan and the guys bought it the first time,
and wrapped it up for me, this time I’ll get a smaller one.”
“Alright, I’ll take you later.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“It’s mostly to let the grandpas and grandmas see that my leg really has been broken for a
few days now.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng thought about it and laughed. “How much longer until you can take it
off?”
“Half a month maybe,” Gu Fei said. “After I take it off I’ll just limp for a little while longer.”
Jiang Cheng’s phone pinged once, he took it out for a look, it was a message from Pan Zhi.
– we’re on our way!
Jiang Cheng blanked, then quickly replied.
– we?
– relax there’s no Yu Xin
– who else?
– Hu Craycray and Da-Li, and two girls you probably don’t know [1]
– who?
– i’ll introduce you when we get there
– both need introductions? very nice dude, good for you
– goddamnit! prepare some night snacks for us
– where will you stay?
Jiang Cheng continued to type on his phone while helping Gu Fei walk toward the school
gate. He knew that Pan Zhi would bring other people, but didn’t expect him to bring girls,
and all mysteriously too…… had he successfully stolen his target so quickly? Or did he
change his target already?
“Is it Pan An?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm, they’re arriving this evening,” Jiang Cheng said. “And I have to go pick up these
grandkids.”
“Why don’t you eat in my store later,” Gu Fei said. “Go pick them up after dinner?”
“Sure, you got groceries?” Jiang Cheng turned his head to look at Gu Fei. Gu Fei’s arm was
slung around his shoulder, once he turned, he was practically within kissing distance of Gu
Fei’s nose. He hurriedly turned his face away, in fear that he would let down his guard and
plant a kiss there.
“Yeah, my mom got some.” Gu Fei smiled.
Pan Zhi’s reply came a while later.
– I’ll squeeze with you, the others will stay in a hotel, don’t worry it’s already booked
– you’re not staying with one of the two girls?
– i am telling you very seriously that i’m not that kind of person
Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop laughing.
“You look happy.” Gu Fei said.
“This dumb idiot brought two girls along,” Jiang Cheng said while still laughing.
“I wonder what’s going on between them.”
“Where are they staying?” Gu Fei asked.
“Pan Zhi is staying with me, the rest are all staying in a hotel.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh——” Gu Fei answered with a drawn out voice.
“If I’d known I would’ve bought two pillows, oh well, he can just use a rolled up blanket.”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh——” Gu Fei continued to draw out his reply.
“Huh, you……” Jiang Cheng paused, then it suddenly dawned on him. “The fuck, are you……”
“Can’t he sleep on the sofa?” Gu Fei interrupted him. “He has to sleep on the bed? It’s not
even cold anymore, will he freeze if he sleeps on the sofa?”
“No he won’t.” Jiang Cheng tried and failed to hold back his laughter. “He’ll sleep on the
sofa! Let him sleep on the sofa!”
“Why must he sleep on the sofa,” Gu Fei continued to say. “Can’t he go stay in the hotel?
Everyone else is staying in the hotel, why does he have to stay with you?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, a little speechless. “Yeah.”
Gu Fei turned and stared back at him, then said laughingly after a while, “Yeah what?”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng said. “Are you for real jealous or just faking it?”
“Half real half fake,” Gu Fei said. “I just think that under these circumstances I should show
a little jealousy, otherwise it doesn’t show my importance.”
“How important are you, you’re the most important, I’ve never in my life waited on a fake
cripple like this,” Jiang Cheng chuckled. “The only thing I haven’t helped you with is going
to the washroom.”
“Forget about the washroom,” Gu Fei sighed. “Just ‘helping’ me on any regular day is
enough……”
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng spotted Gu Miao standing at the gate.
The thing about this jealousy, it was actually a little hard to tell real from fake.
[2]
Gu Fei had never been jealous for as long as he was alive, not that he had much opportunity
to be, he didn’t know what jealousy even feels like. But it probably felt something like this:
the feeling of being mildly and subtly pissed off at this Pan Zhi who liked to call himself
“Pan An”, who to be fair wasn’t at all bad looking either. Though it was clear to him that
there was no possibility of anything between Jiang Cheng and Mr. Pan An, who brought two
mysterious girls with him on this trip.
Most of the so-called ‘vinegar’, was probably for the sense of distance evoked by the
environment Jiang Cheng had grown up in, those friends he used to have, all those people
and things Gu Fei never got to witness.
But Jiang Cheng was in a very good mood, and so he was more than willing to overlook
these feelings and let himself be happy with him.
Back at the store, Jiang Cheng continued to support him, and the two of them walked into
the community clinic with expressions full of pain. They bought a lighter, more mobile
splint, and got some bandages and ointment.
The doctor knew Gu Fei well, he had had his share of injuries over the years after all. The
doctor didn’t even ask any questions as they purchased these items, nor did he ask why
they didn’t just change the splint and bandages right there in the clinic.
With all these things, Gu Fei went back to the inner room of the store to change it on his
own, while Jiang Cheng stood guard as he leaned against the door of the room, in case
anyone suddenly entered the store and saw him.
Gu Miao stood in front of Gu Fei, with her skateboard in hand, and an impassive expression
on her face as she watched. She already knew that Gu Fei’s injury was fake, but she was
filled with curiosity about the things he was tying onto his leg.
After Gu Fei strapped on the new splint, she stuck her own leg in front of Gu Fei, pulled up
her pant leg, and stared at him.
“…… Alright.” Gu Fei sighed, and grabbed the bandages on the side, bent down and wrapped
it a few times around Gu Miao’s leg, then secured it with medical tape.
Gu Miao made her satisfaction known. There was even a little wind in her steps as she
squeezed by Jiang Cheng’s side with her skateboard in her arms.
“You just sit,” Jiang Cheng watched as she walked all the way to the courtyard in the back,
then turned and said while smiling. “And tell me what to do with those ingredients.”
“Just put them all in one pot to cook……” Before Gu Fei finished his sentence, Gu Miao had
come running back again, and stood still beside Jiang Cheng.
“What’s the matter?” Jiang Cheng asked her.
Gu Miao bent down and tugged on Jiang Cheng’s pant leg.
“I’m fine,” Jiang Cheng said. “My leg is great, there’s nothing wrong with your brother’s leg
either……”
“Come on,” Gu Fei started laughing, and grabbed the roll of bandages. “She wants to share
the fun new thing with you.”
“…… The heck?” Jiang Cheng blanked for a second, took another glance at Gu Miao, then
walked over hesitantly. “I have to wear this too?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng pulled up a stool in resignation, and sat down in front of him, pulling up his
pant leg, “Alright then.”
Gu Fei lifted Jiang Cheng’s leg up and set it on top of his own, then wrapped the bandage
around it once.
Jiang Cheng’s calf was very straight, and very…… toned and firm. It looks……
it feels…… Gu Fei cleared his throat and stole a glance at Gu Miao, who was staring directly
at his hands.
He had no choice but to focus on wrapping the bandage. Once around, his fingertip brushed
lightly against Jiang Cheng’s skin. Twice around, his fingertip
brushed lightly against Jiang Cheng’s skin. Three times around, his fingertip brushed lightly
against……
“Screw you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Hmm?” He raised his eyes at Jiang Cheng.
The expression on Jiang Cheng’s face was a little mystifying, “Do you even know how to do
this, if not I’ll go next door and ask the doctor.”
“Yes,” Gu Fei suppressed his laugh, put his head down and quickly wrapped the bandage
around another two times, then secured it with tape. “Done.”
Jiang Cheng put his pant leg down, stood up and stomped his foot a couple of times, and
followed Gu Miao out of the inner room, but not before turning and pointing a finger at him,
“Gu Fei, today I’m finally seeing you for the kind of person you really are.”
“What kind of person?” Gu Fei chuckled and looked at him.
“You just keep playing,” Jiang Cheng said. “To know all the top players, one need only look
to Gu Fei.”
Gu Fei laughed until he collapsed onto the cot, and didn’t manage to recover even several
minutes later.
Jiang Cheng glared at him for a while without laughing and without a word. He glanced
toward the courtyard, then suddenly walked over and jumped on him, planting a firm kiss
on Gu Fei’s lips, and reached a hand inside his pants.
“Fucking hell.” Gu Fei jumped in surprise, but as a young man with a healthy body and
mind, in the time of his life that could be aptly described as “spring is here and the animals
are in heat”, even if he was startled, he would still have an immediate response to this kind
of straightforward teasing.
But just as he rose to the challenge, Jiang Cheng got up off his body, and said as he turned to
walk out, “Enjoy this moment, young man.”
“Fuck.” Gu Fei froze for a long while, then lay back on the cot and continued laughing for
even longer.
Compared to his academic competency, Jiang Cheng’s culinary skills really was much more
like a slacker, with a capital S too. Sitting behind the cash register, Gu Fei could hear him
busy at work in the kitchen, as he chopped up the vegetables in a flurry of chaos under Gu
Miao’s instructions, then threw them all in the pot.
He was just about to pull out his phone to record a video to commemorate the occasion,
when he saw a few figures walking through the door. He swept his
eyes over them quickly, then set his phone down on the counter, “Ma-ge.” [3]
Monkey’s surname was Ma. Since he had now officially lost to Monkey, he decided to call
him Ma-ge, to allow him to feel thoroughly satisfied.
“How’s the leg?” Monkey grabbed a pack of cigarettes from the shelves behind him, opened
it, and lit one up.
“Just changed the splints today, might have to keep it on for another week.” Gu Fei said.
“Get some good rest,” Monkey glanced behind him. One of the guys who
followed him in walked up, and set a case of milk on the counter. Monkey patted the box.
“This is for you.”
“Thanks for the concern, Ma-ge.” Gu Fei said.
Monkey didn’t answer, he turned and strolled slowly between the aisles, occasionally
tossing things to the guys following behind him.
There was only one familiar face among these people, the other ones were likely new
recruits of Monkey’s. He probably brought his new followers here to show them that he had
the power to screw somebody up, but also the grace to forgive and forget.
Gu Fei didn’t mind acting weak, he was more worried that Monkey might be pissed to see
Jiang Cheng here.
After all, Jiang Cheng was supposed to be his lackey. That his lackey was still making dinner
for him when he was down on his luck, was on a different level than simply taking him to
school.
Gu Fei glanced toward the courtyard, and discovered that Jiang Cheng was no longer in the
kitchen. There was only Gu Miao standing in front of the stove, quietly guarding the pot of
soup.
Now that’s tacit understanding.
Gu Fei suddenly felt like laughing. Jiang Cheng really was smart, and had a quick reaction
too. It took only a moment for him to go into hiding.
Monkey finished his stroll around the store, took some snacks, then led his guys away
without another word to Gu Fei.
Gu Fei waited a few more minutes before standing up and hopping on one leg to the
courtyard at the back.
“Cheng-ge?” He called out.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng walked out of the washroom, and even tugged on the waist of his
pants as he walked. “All gone?”
“Gone,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Still acting huh.”
“Look who’s talking.” Jiang Cheng also threw a glance at Gu Fei’s one leg that was still
curled up off the ground.
Gu Fei put his foot down and smiled. Jiang Cheng went into the kitchen, the soup had come
to a boil, he turned the heat down to low, “Monkey’s surname is Ma?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“How could he stand having a moniker like Monkey,” Jiang Cheng said. “Isn’t he worried
about people calling him a big horse monkey behind his back?” [4]
Gu Fei didn’t answer, but started to laugh.
Putting all the vegetables and meat in a pot together was a surefire way to make something
taste good, it was also the one cooking method that best covered for the lack of culinary
skills.
With just the three of them, they managed to finish off the whole pot of food. Gu Miao even
ate two bowls of rice by herself.
After clearing the table, the two of them sat in the store and played with their phones, while
Gu Miao slumped over a little table writing her homework. After leaving school, Gu Fei still
made sure she read her school books on her own every day and gave her homework.
The little girly was writing very diligently, but almost all the answers were wrong.
Since Gu Miao was present, they could only flirt in the way of bumping legs or touching
hands, but were able to find delight in those activities nonetheless. It was true then,
humans really did lower their expectations under tougher conditions……
“Will it be enough to leave half an hour early?” Jiang Cheng glanced at the phone when it
was almost 9 PM.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “If you leave now it’ll be fine, are you calling a cab or taking the
bus?”
“Bus,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’ll get a cab after I collect them.”
“Then you gotta leave now.” Gu Fei said.
“I’ll give you a call after I meet up with them,” Jiang Cheng said. “Let’s all go get some food
together.”
“It’s alright, your classmates…… I won’t come along and eat again.” Gu Fei hesitated.
“But the point isn’t to eat,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “It’s just…… Don’t you want to meet
my old classmates? The others are whatever, but Pan Zhi, he was the only one I was really
close to.”
“Ok,” Gu Fei nodded. “I’ll wait for your call then.”
Standing once again at the exit gate of the train station, Jiang Cheng looked around him. The
jumble of crowd, the little rundown shops, none of which changed from when he first
arrived here.
It was strange indeed. Jiang Cheng lit up a cigarette and kept it in his mouth, he felt that any
second now, he could turn around and see Gu Miao with her old messy head of hair.
In the span of several months, he had experienced feeling angry, hurt, lost, going through it
all, and ended up standing here calmly with hints of excitement as he waited for Pan Zhi
and the others.
These classmates, there were traces of his old life and memories of the past on them, but at
the thought of this, he didn’t feel as gloomy as he would’ve been a few months ago.
He really did have strong adaptation skills, he thought.
Jiang Cheng gave himself a thumbs up with the hand that was in his pocket.
Gooda jobu.
A train was arriving at the station. Jiang Cheng didn’t notice which train it was, nor could he
be bothered to scan the crowd of people, so he climbed onto one of the stone stumps on the
side and waited for Pan Zhi and the others to find him.
“Cheng-er!” A few minutes later, Pan Zhi’s enthusiastic roar came to him from the left.
Jiang Cheng turned and saw Pan Zhi run up, dragging a suitcase behind him. He laughed as
he jumped off the stone stump and yelled out, “Grandson!”
“Grandpa!” Pan Zhi ran until he was in front of him, then yelled again, and gave him a hug.
“How long have you been waiting!”
“Just got here,” Jiang Cheng looked behind Pan Zhi, and saw Hu Feng and Li Song, as well as
the two girls behind them. Even though he didn’t know them, he
still recognized that they were in the same class as Huang Hui. He immediately leaned close
and asked Pan Zhi in a quiet voice. “How did you get your sight locked on people from
Huang Hui’s class? Are there no girls in other classes?”
“Grandpa, be reasonable.” Pan Zhi kept his voice down. “Li Yuqing, she’s the one who has
her eyes on me, she’s the mushroom head. The other one’s called Xu Meng.”
Jiang Cheng took another look, the two girls had similar hairstyles, one was longer and the
other was shorter. He tsked, “Is it the one with long hair or short hair?”
“Short, why would long hair be called mushroom head?” Pan Zhi said as he turned, then
shouted at the others. “Hurry up!” [5]
When Hu Feng and Li Song came over and joined in the yelling match, Jiang Cheng suddenly
felt like a long time had passed indeed. It had really only been a few months, and he had
already gotten used to his current situation, but there was still a sense of indescribable
glee.
“Craycray how come you gained weight again.” Jiang Cheng looked to Hu Feng.
“Nono, I didn’t gain weight, Da-Li is wasting away every day, I only look fat in comparison.”
Hu Feng said.
“I’m quite alright,” Li Song took a step back and looked Jiang Cheng up and down. “Jiang
Cheng, you’re the one who didn’t change much huh, still so handsome.”
“No shit,” Pan Zhi said. “Grass of the School isn’t just a title, once he’s gone, they suddenly
can’t find the next blade of grass.” [6]
The two girls didn’t say anything the whole time, just stood at the side and watched them
while giggling.
“Shut up,” Jiang Cheng said to Pan Zhi. “Let’s go, we’ll take a cab, which hotel did you guys
book? Let’s go set your stuff down first, then we’ll go get something to eat.”
“We booked a Rujia, it’s probably not far from your place, didn’t you say you didn’t move
very far away?” Pan Zhi said.
“Mhm, that is pretty close,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “After we put your stuff down we’ll go get
my…… friend, and eat together.”
Jiang Cheng was about to say “classmate”, but decided ultimately on “friend”.
While he couldn’t come out directly and say “boyfriend”, he would still rather say friend
than a term like classmate.
Classmate was too official, while friend was more intimate.
The group of them called for two cabs, and headed straight for the Rujia.
Jiang Cheng had been reminiscing the whole way. After he finished reminiscing at the train
station exit, he reminisced again as he stood outside of the Rujia entrance, then when he
turned around and saw the Zhoujia inn across the street, Jiang Cheng almost started to feel
a little disoriented. [7]
Some things seemed to have been forgotten in time, but only when they appeared before
his eyes, did he realize with a start that it had only been a few months since he and Gu Fei
had brawled like morons on a pile of snow by the side of a street.
Yeah, only a few months.
He smiled, and that moron already ended up as his boyfriend.
The group of them went out again after setting down their luggage in their rooms. Li
Yuqing and Xu Meng stood outside the hotel, looking left and right,
“Where are we going to eat?”
“Not too far,” Jiang Cheng dialed Gu Fei’s number. “We can walk over on foot.”
“Let’s eat something local, what’s the local delicacy here?” Hu Feng said.
“Not sure, I’ll ask in a minute.” Jiang Cheng was leading them toward the next street when
Gu Fei answered the phone. It had been less than an hour, but for some reason when he
heard Gu Fei’s voice, he suddenly realized he missed Gu Fei very much. What the hell was
wrong with him?
“You got them?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm, checked in at Rujia. We’re heading over now,” Jiang Cheng said. “Is Gu Miao there?
Bring her too.”
“She went home to sleep,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll just wait for you at the door.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng hung up.
When they arrived at the convenience store, Gu Fei had already finished locking up, and
was leaning against a lamp post on the sidewalk with a cigarette in his mouth.
“Huh?” Pan Zhi froze. “It’s this fella?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng answered. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, just a little unexpected.” Pan Zhi said quietly. “I just didn’t think you
could hang out with a guy like this without you two beating each other to death.”
“What kind of description is that.” Jiang Cheng laughed out loud. Pan Zhi really was his
bestie.
Gu Fei heard the sound of their voices approaching, and stubbed his cigarette on the
garbage can nearby as he turned around.
“My friend,” Jiang Cheng turned and introduced him to the others following behind. “Gu
Fei.”
It was the second time referring to Gu Fei as his friend, Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little
nervous, he worried that he would suddenly blurt out “my boyfriend, Gu Fei” instead.
“Ah!” Xu Meng exclaimed quietly at the back, as she grabbed Li Yuqing’s arm and swung it.
“So good looking!”
Li Yuqing reacted very quickly as she laughed and said, “Jiang Cheng, is your friend single?
Why don’t you introduce him to Mengmeng.”
In your dreams!
In that instant Jiang Cheng imagined the giant rolling commentary in his head crashing
down hard at Xu Meng. He didn’t answer, just looked at the two of them with a fake smile
on his face.
Footnotes:
[1] “Craycray” is a nickname, this guy’s name is Hu Feng, “feng” sound the same as the
character for crazy. “Da-Li” is “Big Li”, his surname is Li. ↩
[2] A colloquial term for jealousy, specifically in the romantic context, is 吃醋, which means to
eat vinegar XD Wherever the text refers to jealousy, the original text is saying “eat vinegar”
↩
[3] Ma [马] is a common surname, it also means horse. So, Monkey’s surname is horse
hahahahhahaha ↩
[4] Big horse monkey [大马猴]: a fictional creature used by parents and
grandparents of northeast China to scare children into submission, much like the
boogeyman. It is however widely accepted that they look comical and ugly. ↩
[5] Mushroom head: a hairstyle, a meme ↩
[6] Flower of the School is used to refer to the prettiest girl, and “Grass” is for the boys. ↩

[7] Zhoujia inn is where jc stayed when he jumped through the window at Li Baoguo’s place
near the beginning. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 7001
TL word count: 4993
TL time: 4:56:42
Edit: 0:51:17
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x shit
TL’s Notes
IDK why there are so many footnotes on this one either orz
I finally received my sa ye merch in the mail today I’m so happy ^ ^

First posted: November 13, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 59
He turned to glare at Gu Fei, and kept his voice down, “What the FUCK?”
Among these classmates of Jiang Cheng, none of the guys were particularly handsome, nor
the girls particularly pretty. But just like the first time Gu Fei set eyes on Jiang Cheng, it was
clear at a glance that these people weren’t from around here.
It was the inherent air that belonged to those regular high school students from big cities,
which set them apart so clearly from the environment here.
“You’ve met Pan Zhi, my buddy, maybe you don’t remember,” Jiang Cheng walked up to him
and introduced his other classmates. “Let’s go find a place to eat?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Let’s have fried rice cakes.”
Jiang Cheng opened his eyes wide, and was about to say more fried rice cakes?
All he’s been eating for the past two days were fried rice cakes. But before he even opened
his mouth, Pan Zhi piped up from behind him, “Hey that sounds good, I haven’t had fried
rice cakes in a long time.”
“Sure, let’s get that, rice cakes in syrup is really good too.” Li Yuqing said right away.
“Come on then,” Gu Fei grabbed his bike nearby and got on, resting his bandaged leg on the
pedal as he pushed lightly against the ground with his other foot. “It’s not far.”
“Will your leg be alright?” Pan Zhi asked.
“It’s fine.” Gu Fei said.
“Let’s go.” Jiang Cheng beckoned, then pretended to walk up to steady the handlebar, and
quickly rubbed his hand over Gu Fei’s.
Gu Fei immediately stuck out his thumb, and stroked it across Jiang Cheng’s palm just as he
was taking his hand away.
As the rest of them caught up, Gu Fei moved to the side of the road as he listened to them
chat.
Jiang Cheng didn’t talk very much, most of the talking was done by Pan Zhi and the others,
mainly reporting on the various gossip that accumulated at school since the semester
started. Gu Fei listened as he followed along beside them.
“Oh yeah Cheng-er, here’s the letter he wrote you,” When the conversation got to their head
teacher, Pan Zhi pulled out a brown paper envelope from his pocket. “Almost forgot.”
“Mm.” Jiang Cheng took it and put it in his own pocket.
This head teacher must also be one of the really good ones, Gu Fei thought as he slowly
pushed forward on the bike, might even be comparable to Lao-Xu……
Cheng-er? [1]
Gu Fei turned his head, just as Jiang Cheng also happened to turn to look at him as well. Gu
Fei narrowed his eyes slightly.
Jiang Cheng tilted his head at him in confusion, so he also tilted his head and mouthed the
words.
WTF.jpg [Eng]
Jiang Cheng suddenly realized where Gu Fei’s focus was, and first felt a slight
embarrassment, then after thinking about it for a second, he just wanted to laugh.
Pan Zhi only ever addressed him in two ways, Cheng-er, and grandpa.
The term grandpa was usually reserved for their private conversations or when speaking
with particularly excited tones, whereas Cheng-er was more of an every day name…… It
wasn’t a big deal really, but if Gu Fei held onto it the way he did with the “why would he
sleep on the bed and not the sofa why must he sleep on the sofa and not at the hotel”, Jiang
Cheng wouldn’t know what to say in response either.
Because normally he just referred to Pan Zhi as Pan Zhi.
Why do you call him Pan Zhi but he calls you Cheng-er?
Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Fei again, Gu Fei had his head down while lighting a
cigarette, but turned his head this way again after sensing Jiang Cheng’s gaze, he mouthed
another soundless phrase.
WTF??? [Eng]
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help bursting out in laughter.
“Right?!” Pan Zhi said beside him. “I almost died laughing, almost got kicked out halfway
through the class……”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng answered. “Dumbass.”
He had no idea what Pan Zhi was talking about, but this was a foolproof reply between
them.
“Oh yeah, are there videos of your basketball tournament last time?” Pan Zhi asked. “Send it
to me and so I can see, it’s been so long since we played together, at least let me have a
look.”
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng turned to ask Gu Fei. “Are there?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei said. “Jiuri must have some saved.” [2]
“Fuck who?” Pan Zhi asked, then immediately changed the subject again. “Send me a copy?”
“You can add me.” Gu Fei tapped a few times on his phone, and turned the screen toward
Pan Zhi.
“Sure,” Pan Zhi quickly pulled out his phone and scanned the AR code on the screen, and
added Gu Fei as a contact. “This is your username? Rather…… uh…
endearing.”
Jiang Cheng watched from the side as the two of them added each other as friends, then
right after Pan Zhi put his phone back in his pocket, he got dragged to the side by Xu Meng.
“No, no way,” Pan Zhi said quietly. “I can’t…… go ask for it yourself.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng suddenly couldn’t hold it in anymore. Pan Zhi wasn’t about to give
Xu Meng Gu Fei’s contact information now, but after they go back…… Or perhaps even
before they go back, what if Xu Meng came and
asked for it herself? If it never gets brought up again that’s one thing, but if she came over
now and asked directly, it’d be odd if Gu Fei refused to even give out a WeChat handle.
He turned to glare at Gu Fei, and kept his voice down, “What the FUCK?” [Eng]
“Cheng-er??” Gu Fei also suppressed his voice.
“Screw you Gu Fei are you past five years old?” Jiang Cheng continued to keep his voice
down.
“Nope.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng was having trouble keeping a straight face, he laughed until snot almost came
out of his nostril.
“Fuck.” He rubbed his nose.
There were quite a few little shops beside the fried rice cake place. After the group of them
found a table, the two girls went out to have a look around, and brought back a bunch of
barbequed wings, meat on a stick, and soft drinks.
Gu Fei sat at the table with his head down and played with his phone, he didn’t have very
much in common with these old classmates of Jiang Cheng’s. These people were like Jiang
Cheng, clean. Even if their topics of conversation were about so-and-so getting together
with another so-and-so, it still sounded full of a romantic innocence.
It was like Li Yan said, “There’s already a goddamn generation gap between you and other
people your age, you look at your peers as though you’re looking at your sons”.
But still, Jiang Cheng was different. Jiang Cheng was clearly more mature than Pan Zhi and
the rest, therefore there was no gap between the two of them. Or even if there was, it
wouldn’t be this kind of gap.
Jiang Cheng still didn’t talk much, most of the time he just sat back in his chair and watched
his old classmates talk. Gu Fei studied the face that hardly displayed any kind of expression
other than that hint of inherent arrogance, this was the Jiang Cheng he met at the
beginning.
If he hadn’t seen this side of Jiang Cheng again, it would be almost impossible for him to
imagine that Jiang Cheng’s adoption had been retracted due to his relationship with his
adopted family deteriorating to an irreconcilable point.
Gu Fei extended his leg under the table, and lightly stepped on Jiang Cheng’s shoe.
Jiang Cheng turned to look at him, curving his eyes a little at Gu Fei, then turned back to
watch his old classmates who were laughing wildly in their
conversations.
This is Jiang Cheng now. No, this is Jiang Cheng when he’s with him.
“Niu Xiaoyang really is letting it go to his head, he’s walking on sunshine.” Pan Zhi said as
he munched on chicken wings. “Aiyoo, once Jiang Cheng was gone, he finally managed to
squeeze his way into the top 3, that face of his is practically glowing on its own, every day it
twinkle twinkles.”
“Who cares,” Li Song said. “Even if he doesn’t twinkle twinkle, it wouldn’t be up to you, why
bother getting worked up over it.”
“That’s different,” Pan Zhi said. “Just you wait, I must tell him when I get back, he has to
write a thank you note to Cheng-er, a really sincere one, and throw in a whole strand of
firecrackers.”
“Whose tests are you copying from these days.” Jiang Cheng smiled and lit a cigarette.
“I’m relying on myself now,” Pan Zhi sighed. “After the midterm scores came out, my dad
beat me so hard that my mom couldn’t even recognize me.”
They all laughed at that, and continued the conversation around the most recent midterm
exams.
Jiang Cheng stayed quiet. He was like this before, other than Pan Zhi, he didn’t have very
much in common to talk about with his other classmates, even though they all got along
well enough.
Listening to these conversations now, he felt a little out of it.
Over the last few months, these kinds of discussions that centered around tests and
rankings had grown foreign to him. It was the sort of atmosphere that didn’t exist at the
Fourth High. Here, the only possible discussion that could carry on around tests was
probably about cheating.
As he listened, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little panicked.
Of the test papers Lao-Xu gave him, he had only done two sets. He probably wouldn’t have
time for them during the few days they had off from school, he could only wait until Pan Zhi
and the others left……
Since the group had come here all the way on the train, then chatted excitedly for almost
two hours, they were now finally feeling tired. Pan Zhi went to pay the bill, then yelled
about going back and getting some sleep.
“I probably can’t get up very early tomorrow,” Pan Zhi glanced at his phone, then looking at
Gu Fei, asked. “Would it be alright to get up just before 10?”
Gu Fei glanced at him, and wanted to blurt out you better get up at 3 AM.
“Pretty much, depends on where you’re going, it’s a little late for hiking up the mountain.”
Gu Fei said.
“Let’s go to the haunted house first,” Li Yuqing said. “I’ve always wanted to visit one.”
“If it’s the haunted house, then that’s fine,” Gu Fei said. “We can even check out the park,
there’s some sort of ancient tower…… We used to visit every semester in elementary school
and write essays about it.”
“Sure,” Pan Zhi grinned. “It’s perfect since I haven’t written my weekly journal yet……”
After they left the restaurant, Gu Fei went back to slowly rolling forward on his bike.
About 50 meters ahead was the intersection, from there if they turned left and went
another 50 meters, he’d have to take a different turn and go home.
Tsk.
He stole a glance at Jiang Cheng, at the same time when Jiang Cheng was also looking in his
direction. After their eyes met, Jiang Cheng walked to his side,
“Message me later when you get home.”
“You message me.” Gu Fei said.
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng answered. “But you still have to message.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei looked at the others. “So you’re going home with Pan Zhi later?”
“How should I answer that?” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye.
Gu Fei started laughing, “He sleeps on the sofa, don’t forget.”
“I won’t,” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t give out your WeChat to just anyone either, don’t forget.”
“No problemo,” Gu Fei rang the bell on the handlebar, and everyone turned to look at him.
He waved his hand and pointed to the intersection up ahead. “I’m going that way.”
“Then we’ll see you tomorrow!” Pan Zhi said. “We’ll go pick you up after we call a car.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered, then added quietly. “Good night.”
“Good night.” Jiang Cheng said quietly.
Pan Zhi had brought his change of clothes with him instead of leaving it at the hotel, so they
headed straight for Jiang Cheng’s rented apartment. The others left for the hotel after
agreeing on a meeting time for the next day.
“Will your friend be able to go tomorrow?” Pan Zhi said as they walked. “To make him come
with us with his leg like that, might not be such a good idea?”
“His leg will be fine once we leave this area.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Huh?” Pan Zhi couldn’t comprehend.
Jiang Cheng’s phone pinged once, he pulled it out and took a look, it was a message from Gu
Fei.
– Chengcheng you just walk on boldly just trudge on ahead oh don’t look back The fuck?
While Pan Zhi was busy turning around and fumbling with his backpack, Jiang Cheng stole a
swift glance over his shoulder. The distant figure of Gu Fei on his bike with one foot on the
ground under the streetlamp was already blurry, but he
spotted him right away.
He sent a reply back to Gu Fei.
– muackmuackmuack
Gu Fei quickly sent back another reply.
– want hughug
– hughug
– want kisskiss
– i just did
– oh, right
Jiang Cheng held back his laughter as he put the phone back in his pocket.
“That Gu Fei,” Pan Zhi asked after he finished adjusting the straps on his bag.
“Did he get into some kind of trouble?”
“Not necessarily, more like resolved the trouble.” Jiang Cheng said. He often liked to call
Pan Zhi a dumbass, but Pan Zhi wasn’t dumb, he could immediately tell that something was
off from just one sentence.
“Cheng-er,” Pan Zhi hesitated for a moment. “You just be careful, don’t get caught up in it.”
“I’m aware.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m not saying that your friend is……” Pan Zhi thought about it again, and wanted to
explain.
“Got it,” Jiang Cheng interrupted him and patted him on the shoulder. “I know what you
mean.”
“I have one more thing to say.” Pan Zhi said.
“So resilient,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Fine, shoot.”
“We’re bros,” Pan Zhi said. “Always will be, don’t you forget about me.”
“I won’t,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “You’ll always be my grandson.”
“After some thought, I’ve decided to take back what I just said.” Pan Zhi said.
Jiang Cheng started laughing, “Dumbass.”
Pan Zhi didn’t have any objections to being set up on the couch with a rolled up towel as a
pillow, when there was clearly a double bed available. This was an important reason why
Jiang Cheng was so close with him. Pan Zhi was oblivious and lazy. When it came to these
kinds of things, he wouldn’t even think to inquire further, nor could he be bothered to.
Jiang Cheng didn’t close the bedroom door. After they both lay down, they chatted from
their respective sleeping arrangements for another half an hour while he continued to
message Gu Fei.
The main topic of discussion was the classmate Li Yuqing, who had written four whole love
letters to Pan Zhi within the span of a month.
“Are you going to agree?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not yet, we’re just hanging out as normal friends first.” Pan Zhi said. “I don’t like that
mushroom head of hers, I’ll consider it again after it grows longer.”
“What, you’re just going by hairstyle?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“Not just hairstyle,” Pan Zhi said seriously. “I’m also looking at the face and figure. At our
age, we’ve got to be this shallow. She’s pretty much looking at my face too, we’re all the
same.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, he thought about Gu Fei.
To be honest, the thing about Gu Fei that attracted him at first glance was also his face……
and legs.
After prattling on some more, Pan Zhi suddenly went quiet, Jiang Cheng figured he fell
asleep. He put down his phone and pulled out Lao-Yuan’s letter from his jacket nearby.
Hello, my dear student Jiang Cheng.
He almost laughed out loud at the first sentence.
It has been almost half a year since our parting, this teacher does miss you dearly.
He ended up laughing out loud at the second sentence anyway.
He had to compose himself, then proceeded to read the rest of the letter.
This letter from Lao-Yuan wasn’t a long one, the main content of which were consolation
and encouragement, not unlike his usual tone. But for some reason halfway through the
letter, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like crying.
“Gold will shine no matter what” is a fairly useless saying, but gold really is
very shiny, so half of this saying does apply to you at this time, don’t bury yourself away……
You’ve got to improve your temper, and learn to control it. On this point, I think a change of
scenery is actually a good thing for you, at least your temper will not be completely
uninhibited, the foreignness of your surroundings will allow you to learn how to hold back and
control yourself……
Pan Zhi showed me the tests you finished, it seems that you have not regressed so far, this is a
pleasant surprise. It tells me that you possess extraordinary adaptability and self-discipline
(my choice of the word “extraordinary” might be going a little heavy on the praise), and are
indeed a chunk of gold……
Do not harbour the thought that you have been somehow abandoned, it’s only when you
abandon yourself, that you are really lost. As long as you hold on and not let go, then nothing
will have changed……
The letter was signed “Always your head teacher, Lao-Yuan”.
Smiling, Jiang Cheng folded the letter up and put it back into the envelope, then placed it
under his pillow, and closed his eyes.
The next morning, Jiang Cheng was woken up by the sound of Pan Zhi talking on the phone.
He glanced at the time on his own phone, it wasn’t yet 9 AM, a little far from the agreed
upon ten o’clock.
“Down the stairs and to the right?” Pan Zhi said in the living room. “That’s the direction of
your store, right?”
Jiang Cheng was still a little hazy from sleep, but when he heard this he woke up
completely. This is a call with Gu Fei?
“Ah I got it now,” Pan Zhi said. “Why don’t you come by and eat with us? Jiang Cheng’s still
not up yet…… I don’t dare go wake him up, this guy’s morning temper is enough to kill a
person, I experienced it once before and never want to try it again……”
Gu Fei said something on the other end, and Pan Zhi started laughing in delight, then
continued on with the conversation.
Jiang Cheng lay on the bed and listened for a while, then got up. All else aside, Pan Zhi’s
ability to chat up just about anyone was simply unparalleled, there was no other person on
this earth who could compare.
“Huh? He’s up,” Pan Zhi looked up and noticed him. “Oh…… alright. Cheng-er, Gu Fei wants
to talk to you.”
Jiang Cheng accepted the phone Pan Zhi handed him, and walked into the bathroom,
“Hello?”
“This bro of yours sure talks a lot,” Gu Fei opened with this exclamation. “I didn’t even
know how to end the conversation……”
“Did you call him?” Jiang Cheng chuckled. “He’s not usually that talkative either, must be the
excitement from coming out on a trip.”
“He probably woke up too early and got bored, so he asked me if I’m up yet, and where to
eat breakfast. Then he got confused, so he asked for my number and gave me a call.” Gu Fei
said. “Then we ended up talking for almost 20 minutes.”
“Hold off on your breakfast,” Jiang Cheng laughed and said. “We’ll head over in a bit and eat
together.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered.
The ones who stayed at the hotel must’ve stayed up all night talking. The three of them
finished their breakfast, then waited another 20 minutes at the breakfast stall before the
others eventually showed up, yawning the whole way.
“Ah, smells so good,” Xu Meng said. “I was fine before, but now that I smelled this I’m so
hungry.”
“Hurry up and eat, then we’ll head out.” Pan Zhi said. “If we get there later it’s going to be
more crowded, then we’ll have to line up.”
The others all sat down at the table. When Xu Meng seated herself beside Gu Fei, Jiang
Cheng suddenly regretted sitting between Gu Fei and Pan Zhi.
“It’s pretty chilly here in the morning.” Xu Meng tried to make small talk with Gu Fei.
“It’s already May.” Gu Fei said.
Xu Meng covered her mouth and smiled, a little embarrassed.
Gu Fei took out his phone and started playing with it.
When finally they all finished eating and got ready to go, Gu Fei was the first to stand up,
forgetting for a moment about his limp. It took Jiang Cheng poking him on the leg for him to
remember to reach out and support himself on a tree trunk nearby.
There weren’t many taxis around at this hour. When finally they managed to gather two
rides, Gu Fei dashed into the car with the speed of an old man fighting for a seat on the bus,
and sat himself in the front passenger seat.
Jiang Cheng held back his laughter and got into the back, with Pan Zhi and Li Yuqing beside
him. Xu Meng, Hu Feng, and Li Song rode together in the second car.
As soon as the taxi started moving, Li Yuqing laughed and said, “Did Mengmeng scare you,
Gu Fei?”
“Nah.” After telling the driver where to go, Gu Fei put his head down and continued to play
with his phone.
“She’s alright, a little dorky, but really cute.” Li Yuqing chuckled.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“You’re not interested in her at all then?” Li Yuqing asked again.
“Why don’t you go get a prosthetic mole.” Pan Zhi chimed in.
“What?” Li Yuqing looked at Pan Zhi.
“Right here,” Pan Zhi pointed at the corner of his own mouth. “Put one right here.”
Li Yuqing was confused for a long while before she connected the dots, “Hey what’s wrong
with you! Who are you calling a matchmaker!” [3]
They all started laughing, even the driver joined in for a while.
Jiang Cheng turned to look outside the window. When Li Yuqing was busy trying to sell Xu
Meng, he didn’t feel jealous, but rather a little nervous.
He was very conflicted.
On one hand he was afraid of what Gu Fei might say if they pushed him hard enough.
Even though there was no way Gu Fei would say that he had a boyfriend, he didn’t want to
hear Gu Fei say he had a girlfriend either…… But on the other hand, not saying anything
also made him feel unhappy.
“She’s not my type,” Gu Fei said as he played with his phone. “Really, far far from it.”
“Ah? Really?” Li Yuqing sighed, then after a second of consideration, said quietly. “Sorry
about that.”
“It’s alright.” Gu Fei turned and gave her a smile.
His gaze swept over Jiang Cheng as he turned his head back.
The corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth turned up a little. Pan Zhi was sitting right beside him;
with a solid bestie here who understood him so well, he didn’t dare make any overt
gesture.
Even though Pan Zhi knew about him. He never really had anything with another guy
before, and he didn’t plan to tell Pan Zhi right now.
Gu Fei’s reply settled his mind. But there was still a creeping feeling he couldn’t quite
describe, he was afraid that Gu Fei could sense that bit of fear in his heart.
He was the one who took the first step, he was also the one who took the second step, each
step of the way was made by him. But he was also the scared one, the one who jumped at
the slightest sign of anything.
He suddenly remembered the question Gu Fei had asked him earlier. Did you want to date
me, or did you want to go on a date with me?
He furrowed his brows. The brain that was stricken by the word “boyfriend” was only now
realizing that he hadn’t at all considered the intention behind Gu Fei’s question.
Footnotes:
[1] “-er” is a suffix sometimes added to one’s first name, it is a diminutive suffix, kind of like
“kun” in Japanese. It’s also often used by people who want to demonstrate an intimacy to
the other person, but northerners like to attach it to the end of pretty much every
noun/proper noun XD
And since we are in the northeast, the pronunciation of “Cheng-er” probably sounds much
more like a slightly nasally “Char!” ↩
[2] Ah, as mentioned previously, the Xu [旭] of Wang Xu breaks down to Jiuri
[九日] which either means 9 suns, 9 days, or 9 fucks. ↩
[3] A mole beside the mouth is the stereotypical imagery of a busy-bodied
matchmaker ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5938
TL word count: 4116
TL time: 3:56:04
Edit: 0:44:01
Curse words: 6x fucks, 3x ass
TL’s Notes
Tbh, if i receive words like that from an esteemed teacher i would cry too. Also…

uh… oof.

First posted: November 18, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 60
Uneventful and calm for the rest of the days.
There wasn’t too much time to think in the car. The social butterfly Pan Zhi was talking, and
Jiang Cheng couldn’t very well continue to reflect upon his life without engaging in the
conversation every once in a while. But once he responded a few times, he would lose his
train of thought.
Oh well, might as well let it go for now. Jiang Cheng looked at the back of Gu Fei’s head. It
wasn’t every day that they were going out together like this, it would affect his mood if he
kept overthinking. Affecting his own mood one thing, but Gu Fei was so perceptive that he
would be influenced for sure.
When they arrived outside the park, Jiang Cheng got out his wallet to pay for the fare, but
Pan Zhi reached out a hand and stopped him as he pulled his own wallet out, “I asked my
mom for a bunch of money before I came, you don’t have to play host.”
“I am your grandpa after all……” Jiang Cheng struggled to pull his hand out.
“I know, grandpa, please let me fulfill my filial duties.” Pan Zhi continued blocking his hand.
In the more than ten seconds that they were struggling, Gu Fei took out some bills and paid
the driver, then got out of the car.
“Fucking hell!” Pan Zhi yelped, then hastily rushed Li Yuqing off the car. “How can we let Gu
Fei pay!”
“Have mercy on the driver please, the man has to pick up his next fare.” Gu Fei said.
Pan Zhi took out his money and force-stuffed it into Gu Fei’s pocket, then turned and ran
away like the wind toward the second cab, “Here! Come on, get off!”
“Why did you pay?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“You two were all up in each other’s business, if I didn’t rain some bills down you’d
probably be making out by now.” Gu Fei glanced at him. “It doesn’t reflect well on
society……”
“Shut up,” Jiang Cheng laughed and glanced toward the ticket window. “I’ll go see how
much the entry ticket is, maybe there are deals.”
“I have a resident’s pass,” Gu Fei pulled out a card from his pocket. “I’ll take
you guys inside.”
“How?” Jiang Cheng said. “We don’t have it.”
“I know somebody,” Gu Fei smiled. “A small place like this, they’re not that strict. Just tell
them to be quiet and follow behind me with their IDs.”
After everyone had gotten off the cabs, Gu Fei led them toward the side gate. If it wasn’t for
Gu Fei leading the way, they probably wouldn’t have even noticed a path there, nor would
they see the gate at the end of the path.
“We’re coming now, are you here?” Gu Fei spoke to someone on the phone as they walked.
“Is his leg alright now?” Li Song asked from the back. “I remember yesterday it couldn’t
even touch the ground?”
“It’s probably almost healed,” Pan Zhi said. “Remember last semester when I had my arm in
a sling, whether I’m able to move it or not was dependent on my mood of the day.”
“……That’s, how amazing of you.” Li Song said.
They all giggled together at that. Jiang Cheng sighed, “When we get there you can giggle, but
don’t say anything.”
“Okay.” Hu Feng replied immediately.
They all shut their mouths, and held on for a while before bursting out in hysterical
laughter again.
Gu Fei turned and gave them a look, then peered at Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng came up and
walked by his side, “It feels like they’re all high on something this morning.”
“Don’t you often do that too?” Gu Fei said.
“Bullshit,” Jiang Cheng said, then remembered all the times he giggled like an idiot with Gu
Fei over the last few months, it was indeed quite often. He felt like a dumbass just thinking
about it, so he sighed. “It’s probably only when I’m with you that I act like I’m on something,
and you’re not much better yourself.”
“We are young after all.” Gu Fei said.
The side gate was very small and unremarkable. There were only two people checking
tickets at the gate, a man and a woman.
Gu Fei walked over beside the man and handed him the card in his hand. The guy looked
out behind Gu Fei and counted the heads, punched a few holes on the
card and glanced at each of their IDs, then let them in.
“That guy looks a little familiar?” After they were inside, Jiang Cheng said after a brief
contemplation.
“Liu Fan’s older brother.” Gu Fei quirked a smile.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng was surprised. “He looks way more serious than Liu Fan.”
“Liu Fan will be serious too in a few years,” Gu Fei said. “That’s the way these people are.
Fool around for a few years before returning to the so-called correct path, then settle and
make do. Date, marry, then have kids, uneventful and calm for the rest of the days.”
“Is that so?” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. Gu Fei had spoken calmly, but as he listened, he
suddenly felt a sense of melancholy.
“At least that’s what it looks like on the surface,” Gu Fei said as he smiled. “As to whether
they have any other ideas on the inside, I don’t know, but who wouldn’t have ideas? Even
Wang Xu wants to move to some big city nearby and open up a meat pie restaurant.”
And you?
Jiang Cheng wanted very much to ask, what about you?
Will you also go along with this ‘correct path’, and like all those people around you, live out
the rest of your days?
But he didn’t ask.
He once again remembered Gu Fei’s question.
The haunted house was on the furthest end of the park, and wasn’t always part of the park.
In the last couple of years, the park went through an expansion and brought the nearby
spaces into it. The haunted house was formerly an old factory that took up quite a bit of
land.
“This place used to be an abandoned burial mound,” Pan Zhi was reading the introduction
of the haunted house. “Wherein contained only unclaimed
corpses……”
“Aiiya that sounds scary.” Li Yuqing said.
“After the factory was built, strange things kept happening……” Pan Zhi continued to read.
“The night shift workers would always hear sounds of singing coming from rooms with
nobody in it……”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “They say that like it’s real.”
“What if it really is real?” Gu Fei said. “We have a lot of unused wild land around here, and
lots of abandoned burial mounds too. Many schools were actually built on top of graves.”
“You shut your mouth.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You know that technical college next to Fourth High……” Gu Fei got halfway through the
sentence, then paused and gave him a look. “You’re not scared, are you?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
Gu Fei was quiet for a moment, then started laughing, “I never would’ve guessed that you’d
be scared of these things.”
“I’m afraid of cockroaches even,” Jiang Cheng said. “You got a problem with that?”
“Nope,” Gu Fei straightened up his expression and cleared his throat. “No.
Honestly I’m a little scared of cockroaches myself, and spiders……”
Jiang Cheng actually quite liked watching ghost movies, horror movies, disaster movies, sci-
fi movies…… But the reason he liked watching ghost movies was because they scared him.
It wasn’t anything else, he was only scared of ghosts. They were the things that he firmly
believed do not exist, yet was also firmly afraid of.
When he was younger, on the way home from school when he passed through the hallway,
he would always fix his eyes at the end of the corridor where it turned into the stairwell. He
was afraid that once he reached the corner, there would be……
“LET ME!” Pan Zhi’s booming roar suddenly rang out from behind.
Still fully immersed in his self-scaring childhood memory complete with goosebumps, Jiang
Cheng was so startled by this noise that he almost shot all the hair on his body directly out
of their follicles. He didn’t manage to hold back as he yelled out as well, “AH FUCK!”
“What’s wrong!” Pan Zhi was shaken by his yelling, it took him a while before he continued.
“I already said before I came that I’ll pay for the haunted house, this is the thing I was
looking forward to the most.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng glared at him for a while, then waved his hand. “Go on then, go buy the
tickets.”
“It’s probably pretty dark inside.” Gu Fei chuckled and said quietly.
“No shit, would it still be a haunted house if they had 200 watts lightbulbs shining?” Jiang
Cheng said.
“What I’m saying is,” Gu Fei tsked. “If you get scared, there’s nobody to see if you held on to
me.”
“……Oh,” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye. “Or maybe mister, I wouldn’t need to hold on to
you, don’t overthink on your own.”
“If you don’t hold on to me,” Gu Fei peered behind Jiang Cheng. “Someone else might……”
Jiang Cheng turned around and saw Xu Meng, who was rubbing arms with Li Yuqing and
hopping in place. He immediately whipped his head back and looked at Gu Fei, “I’m telling
you you better watch yourself.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei smiled and nodded.
Since it was the May 1st holidays, there were more people than usual lined up outside the
haunted house. When they were standing outside waiting to get in, they could hear the
people screaming inside.
“Is it that scary?” Pan Zhi turned back and said to Jiang Cheng. “The way they’re screaming.”
“No idea,” Jiang Cheng said. “When we go in later, who knows how these two girls will be
screaming.”
“I was going to go through it by myself too,” Pan Zhi clucked his tongue. “I asked but they
won’t let you do it solo.”
Jiang Cheng was about to say something, when a group of terrified people came racing out
of the building. There were guys and girls among them; the girls’
cheeks were streaked with tears, even their hair was a mess.
“I’m never coming here again……” One of the girls said as she wiped her tears.
“Ah,” Xu Meng stomped her feet nervously. “These people went in when we were buying
the tickets. Didn’t they say the whole thing takes about 40 minutes?
They came out before it’s even finished? It’s that scary?”
“Maybe they got lost.” Jiang Cheng said.
“We should make sure to stick together,” Xu Meng was a little worried. “Yuqing you hold on
to me.”
“Mhm,” Li Yuqing nodded solemnly. “We’ll walk in the middle, the boys can go in the front
and back.”
They continued to discuss the formation for a while, but by the time it was their turn to
enter, they still didn’t reach a consensus.
“Nevermind,” Pan Zhi waved his hand. “Let’s go!”
As he walked in, the rest of the group who hadn’t yet made up their minds also pushed and
shoved their way through the door, for fear of being left behind.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng said quietly as he followed them through the little door.
“Why am I sensing that it’s a little sca……”
Outside there were miles of clear blue sky, but once they were through the little door, the
sun suddenly disappeared. The only thing remaining was the dark narrow hallway in front
of them, that didn’t have a single window.
Jiang Cheng suddenly froze in place, his hand quickly reached behind, “Gu Fei?”
“Here.” Gu Fei patted his hand.
Jiang Cheng’s mind was somewhat settled, he looked back again to confirm Gu Fei’s
proximity, “Follow closely.”
“Mhm.” The corners of Gu Fei’s mouth turned upward.
What a charming smile, Jiang Cheng thought despairingly. Under these
circumstances, even Gu Fei’s smile wasn’t able to evoke any inappropriate thoughts from
him.
Pan Zhi and the others were right up ahead, walking forward while keeping their heads on
a swivel. This hallway wasn’t actually part of the haunted house, but the passage itself
already gave off a horror-filled vibe.
Some waterlogged parts of the stripped wall had algae growing on them. Jiang Cheng
suspected that these must be fake, but did not dare touch it to confirm.
Nobody in the group dared get too close to the sides, so they all squeezed together in the
middle. As they approached the pitch black doorway that was the official entrance of the
haunted house, Jiang Cheng saw a few bloody handprints on the wall.
“Oh my god, look you guys.” Li Yuqing said quietly.
“Don’tmakemelook don’tmakemelook, I’m not looking at anything.” There was slight
tremor in Xu Meng’s voice.
Jiang Cheng reached behind with his hand again, and grabbed on tight after feeling the
material of Gu Fei’s jacket. Gu Fei sighed and grabbed his hand, then leaned over and said in
a very low voice, “Turns out you do have some guts after
all, aren’t you afraid of reaching back and grabbing something else instead?”
Jiang Cheng gritted his teeth as he turned back and said, “Shut up.”
After entering the first room, they all became quiet. Their eyes had not yet grown
accustomed to the dark; it was pitch black all around them, and there were no sounds.
“Are we all…… here?” Hu Feng asked.
“Yep.” Pan Zhi said.
“Let’s do a count?” Hu Feng said.
“Weirdo,” Pan Zhi said. “One.”
“Two.” Hu Feng said.
“Three.” Li Song also opened his mouth.
“Four.” “Five.” Li Yuqing and Xu Meng said at almost the same time.
“Six seven.” Gu Fei chimed in.
“…… Ah, I’m next to seven.” Jiang Cheng said.
They had just started laughing, when out of nowhere a female voice sounded amidst their
laughter, “Eight……”
This slightly airy voice caused everyone to suddenly quiet down.
“Fucking hell!” Pan Zhi, who was laughing the loudest of all of them, yelled out.
“Who’s there!”
“AHHH——” Under Xu Meng and Li Yuqing’s lead, they instantly became a
cluster of screams.
Jiang Cheng didn’t make a sound, but he had Gu Fei’s hand in a deathgrip from the fright.
WHAT IN THE EVER-LOVING FUCK!
There are actors in this haunted house!
A haunted house in a shitty little town!
And as if that’s not enough why is the actor so dedicated to their job!
The noise they just made was much louder than the screams they heard on the outside, the
people waiting outside probably thought they got taken away by the
ghosts.
“There’s a light!” Pan Zhi yelled. “There’s a light! I see the switch on the wall I’m going to
turn on the……”
With a “whack”, the room was suddenly flooded with light. But the lights immediately
started to flicker wildly.
Jiang Cheng felt that in this moment, he had suffered twice the shock and horror.
The first was that under the flickering lights, he was able to see the room they were
standing in had walls that were covered in bloody texts that included
“HELP ME” “SHE’S IN THERE” and “DON’T GO INSIDE”. The second was
that he didn’t have a chance to release his hand that was still tightly interlocked with Gu
Fei’s.
Though under these circumstances, nobody had the mind to notice that kind of detail. The
two girls already had their arms around each other, even Hu Feng was holding on to Pan
Zhi’s arm.
Even if he and Gu Fei had each other in an embrace at this moment, it wouldn’t be weird in
the slightest…… but just as he was about to let go of Gu Fei’s hand, the closed door on the
other side of the room suddenly opened. Before anyone had time to react, a figure dropped
down from the other side of the door and hung itself from the doorframe.
“OH FUCK!” Gu Fei, who happened to be facing that direction and who
witnessed the whole thing, sprang up immediately and grabbed Jiang Cheng in his arms.
Jiang Cheng was already in a horror state of mind, without even looking to see what was
happening, he also let out a yell and put his arms around Gu Fei.
Once again they became a screaming mass, and each held onto the person beside them.
After at least ten seconds of eyes-shut screaming, they finally managed to slowly calm
down.
“Fucking hell,” Pan Zhi leaned against the wall with one hand, and stared at the figure
hanging from the door. “It’s fake!”
“No shit, did you really think there would be a real person hanging there.” Jiang Cheng took
in two breaths. “I think we should try to calm down, we’re only in the first room and we’ve
been screaming for two minutes already. The groups of three that came before us didn’t
even scream so pitifully, this is too fucking embarassing.”
The light was still flickering, but the trigger must’ve run its course, there were no more
scary incidents.
Pan Zhi pushed on the hanging fake person, and it didn’t move again. He stuck his head
around and checked the vicinity, “There’s light over there, let’s go this way?”
They slowly made their way over through the doorway.
“And I thought you had some fucking guts?” Jiang Cheng rubbed his sore arm, where Gu Fei
had held on with his death grip, and gave Gu Fei a look, saying quietly. “If I was any shorter
would you have straight up climbed onto my head?”
“Hey,” Gu Fei looked at the hanging fake person again, considered for a second, then
laughed. “I didn’t say I wasn’t afraid…… Fuck me that scared me half to death.”
After that first round of fright, everyone finally grew used to the horror atmosphere. It was
an achievement that when they got to the next room and heard the sound of quiet sobbing,
none of them screamed out loud.
“Sound-controlled,” Pan Zhi pointed to the corner. “It must’ve sensed it when we walked
in.”
The room was quite large, like it used to be a small machine room. There were two large
electric sanding tables in the middle of the room, with bloodstains on them, and tattered
clothes covered with blood on the floor.
“They made it pretty……” Pan Zhi leaned in close to take a look, but one of the piles of
clothes on the floor suddenly shifted and revealed half of a hand.
“AHHH——”
Nobody else had approached, and so did not get as visually intense an experience as Pan
Zhi did. They all took a step back in fear, but Pan Zhi got such a good fright that he plopped
right down on the ground, and still persisted in yelling out the rest of his sentence, “—
REALISTIC! Fuck!”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh.
“Which door next?” Pan Zhi sighed.
“Isn’t there only one?” Gu Fei looked at the two doors in front of them. “The one on the right
is an emergency exit, it probably leads outside.”
“Oh,” Pan Zhi looked and saw a little light under the door on the right, it was labeled “Exit”.
“Then let’s go left.”
Li Yuqing followed after him right away, with hands clinging on to his hem.
“Don’t pull on me when you get nervous, you almost dragged my pants down just now.” Pan
Zhi gave her a look.
“Oh.” Li Yuqing froze for a second, then couldn’t stop laughing.
Outside of this room was another corridor, with a wall on the right side, and a row of rooms
on the left. There was no exit up ahead, they had to find the way out through one of these
rooms.
Jiang Cheng felt his high-strung nerves start to slowly calm down a little. Even though he
and Gu Fei were walking at the back of the group, the most commonly dead position in any
horror movie, and yet…… He glanced to the side at Gu Fei.
He didn’t feel like someone who was going to be offed any time soon.
“Do you think there could be something behind us?” Gu Fei asked quietly.
“Oh shit don’t scare me.” Pan Zhi said from the front.
“You have the six of us behind you,” Jiang Cheng said. “What’s there to be scared of?”
“Who knows,” Pan Zhi said. “You’ve watched a whole bunch of these flicks, isn’t there
always a person at the front who just walks and walks, then turn around and sees that he’s
the only fucking one left.”
“This is a man-made haunted house,” Hu Feng reminded him. “Even if there are actors, it’s
not very likely that they can drag someone away.”
“With a melee stat like Jiang Cheng’s, they wouldn’t even get halfway before turning into a
real ghost.” Li Song said.
In extremely nervous situations, it was very easy for a person’s laugh switch to act like it
was stuck in the ‘on’ position. Just this one sentence was enough to trigger an inexplicable
round of laughter from the whole group. They were looking around in terror, but at the
same time could not stop the hysterical laughter.
“Ah, dumbasses.” Jiang Cheng exclaimed in a sigh.
It was more apparent now than ever, that while the whole gang was in hysterics, he did not
join in. He remembered that even in the past, he rarely joined the ranks of the stupid
giggles. At most he would laugh along with Pan Zhi whenever he was laughing like an idiot,
to show that they were on the same side.
It was only when he was with Gu Fei…… He turned and glanced at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was to his right and slightly behind. The room they just entered had crimson
coloured lights that brightened and darkened at odd intervals. Though the atmosphere was
eerie, when he saw Gu Fei flash his teeth at him, he still thought the dude was perfect in all
720 degrees of him. [1]
Far too handsome!
Much better looking than the ghost dripping with blood who had just drifted in from the
door behind him……
Oh FUCK!
“AHHH—— fuck fuck FUCK——” As the sounds left his mouth, he thought
that it would’ve been better if he was laughing along instead, his voice almost cracked in
the middle of the scream.
In his mind, it was very clear that this was a paid extra with a crooked wig. Still, it terrified
him so much that his heart practically jumped out from his throat and gave itself to Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was still making fun of him as they entered the room, but hearing his scream, also
started yelling without even a glance back. As Jiang Cheng turned, grabbed Gu Fei’s hand,
and doved into the cluster of people, he felt that any and all pride he had over the last
almost 18 years were about to be thrown away in this place.
Good thing the people in front of them were even more thorough in disposing of their
pride. The girls simply collapsed onto the floor, while Hu Feng and Li Song darted off to the
right as they screamed at two times their decibel.
At the very front, Pan Zhi turned around and widened his eyes, but couldn’t even make out
a sound as he stumbled backward. It wasn’t clear if he was trying to get away from Jiang
Cheng and Gu Fei, or the ghost with the crooked wig behind them.
From the time that the ghost entered the room until it turned and bumped into the
doorframe, then running away with hands around its head, only a few seconds had passed.
And yet the roomful of lively youths had already exhausted themselves from all the
screaming.
Jiang Cheng panted for a while and caught his breath, then sighed, “Ah, this really is…… a
big production.”
“Do you think there’s security cameras in here?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Yes,” Gu Fei pointed to the top of the doorframe. “If we fall down like this a couple more
times, the guards will probably come and forcefully remove us.”
“Hold on,” Pan Zhi pointed at the two of them, and laughed after a moment of thought.
“Maybe you two should just continue with your eyes closed, I really wouldn’t have guessed
that the two people who seemed the bravest would be so……”
Pan Zhi’s gaze fell on their hands, and paused for a beat, “I almost bust a liver
when you guys ran at me.”
Jiang Cheng chuckled without a word.
The look in Pan Zhi’s eyes made him let out a breath of relief.
He figured it out.
Pan Zhi’s intellect was actually a relatively good match for his name. After all, their
friendship was so rock solid that it probably only took a glance for him to figure everything
out. [2]
Jiang Cheng looked at Pan Zhi. Perhaps it wasn’t that he didn’t want to tell Pan Zhi about
this, but rather that he didn’t know where to start.
He stole another glance at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei tilted his head, very discreetly turned up the corners of his mouth, and smiled at
him.
Jiang Cheng’s heart was all of a sudden fluffy soft, he wanted very much to go and give Gu
Fei a big hug.
“Let’s go,” Pan Zhi beckoned. “Follow closely, hold onto shirttails if you must, hang onto
each other if you want……”
He then turned and gave Jiang Cheng a look, and said with a smile in his voice,
“And hand-holders hurry up and grab on tight.”
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng laughed, and silently mouthed a word at him. Dumbass.
You two. Pan Zhi mouthed the words back at him.
Jiang Cheng reached over to grab Gu Fei’s hand and gave it a squeeze. Gu Fei squeezed his
hand back, rather forcefully. Jiang Cheng immediately squeezed back, with increased
strength. And again Gu Fei retaliated……
Just before they got to the door, Jiang Cheng heard the sound of his knuckles cracking. He
turned to glare at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei quickly put his hands together, and gently cracked his own knuckles as well.
Jiang Cheng fought the urge to laugh. With a solemn expression, he caught up with the rest
of the party. He suspected that if Pan Zhi knew how dumb his grandpa acted around Gu Fei,
he might just sever their friendship.
Footnotes:
[1] A common saying is 360 度无死角, which is literally no dead angle from all 360 degrees, it’s
used to describe someone who is so good looking that they look attractive from any and all
angles. ↩
[2] The “Zhi” [智] of Pan Zhi means intellect or intelligent ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6350
TL word count: 4411
TL time: 4:43:02
Edit: 1:28:03
Curse words: 15x fucks hahahahahahah, 8x shits, 3x ass
TL’s Notes
Firstly, haunted house fan art!
MILD SPOILER? MAYBE?
I want to dissect Gu Fei’s question a little for those who are confused, since even the
Chinese readers were a little confused. If you think you understand then disregard!
Regarding Gu Fei’s question, it’s not that Jiang Cheng doesn’t understand what it means, it’s
that he doesn’t understand why Gu Fei is asking him that question.
The Chinese here is 谈恋爱 vs 谈个恋爱, you can see the similarity.
谈 is the verb, it’s generally interpreted as “discuss” or “chat” but for this purpose it is the act
of dating or being in a relationship.
恋爱 is… romance, or love, or romantic relationship, or dating.
So the difference is 个, which is a character that means “one unit” of something.
What Gu Fei was asking is do you want to be together for an indefinite length of time
(maybe forever), no units involved here, or do you want to go through a one and done
romance with me, and we’ll enjoy it however long this lasts?

First posted: November 23, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 61
May we both be as brave as each other.
There were at least three levels to the haunted house. The intro outside said the entire
course should take about 40 minutes, but this 40 minutes probably didn’t take into account
the time visitors spent standing in one spot screaming their heads off. Either way, Jiang
Cheng felt that during the time they’ve been making all sorts of screams that could easily
scare off a ghost, they had already walked from one room of flashing lights to another for
almost 20 minutes, but still didn’t walk on even one flight of stairs.
“Should we be looking for a way to get upstairs?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m looking,” Pan Zhi answered from the very front. “Have we been in this room before?”
“No.” Gu Fei said.
“We wouldn’t have gone through that door either,” Pan Zhi pointed at a closed door ahead.
“Maybe that goes……”
Before he finished his sentence, a round of children’s giggling drifted by behind them.
Even though Jiang Cheng could tell from the static background noise that the laughter
must’ve been broadcasted from a speaker hidden in a corner of the room, it didn’t stop him
from getting goosebumps all over his body.
“There’s a ghost behind us?” Li Song asked.
“Come on let’s go……” Xu Meng tugged on Li Yuqing’s hem, and kept her head low, not
daring to look around.
As she was talking, another round of childish giggles rang out.
“AHH——” They all started screaming at the same time, and tried to squeeze past Pan Zhi
as they threw themselves at the door .
“Don’t freak out don’t be scar……” Pan Zhi was shoved until he was unsteady on his feet, so
he rushed to pull open the door. This was immediately followed by a sudden explosive
howl. “AHHH——”
Outside the door stood a ‘ghost’, who might very well be passing by, or might have been
waiting outside this whole time. The pushing and shoving landed Pan Zhi right in the arms
of the ‘ghost’.
Amidst all the chaotic screaming, even the ghost was pushed against the wall, and had no
choice but to forcefully shove Pan Zhi away.
“AHH——” They turned and raced away.
There was another door behind them. The party in their panic, didn’t give it so much as a
glance before charging at the door like the world was ending. With a swift movement, they
pulled open the door and rushed in.
The bright and glaring sunlight shone down on the world even as they screeched and
howled.
The group of them stood under the sun, letting their screaming go on for a few more beats,
before finally stopping with faces full of confusion.
“The fuck?” Pan Zhi squinted his eyes in shock. “How are we outside?”
“We came out before even going upstairs?” Jiang Cheng turned back and looked at the little
door. “Is that a fucking emergency exit?”
Gu Fei stood at the very back with his arms crossed, and cleared his throat.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng turned back and looked at him.
Gu Fei signaled to the side with his eyes. They all followed his direction, and suddenly
wanted to sprint right back into the haunted house.
About 30 m to their right was the lineup for the entrance. About 30-50 people were
standing in line, all looking this way. The expressions on their faces were hard to describe,
but a few were already bent over in laughter.
“What the fuck, who led the way!” Pan Zhi asked, devastated.
“Craycray?” Li Yuqing said.
“Not me,” Hu Feng spoke up right away. “I came out behind Da-Li!”
“Me?” Li Song blanked out for a while all confused, even gestured for a while with his
hands. “I might have done a…… door opening action?”
“Idiot!” Pan Zhi jumped on him and gave him several thumps in a row. Under his lead, they
each went up and gave Li Song a whack.
Now that they were out, there was no way to get back in again. They could only straighten
their face and put on an expression of “we simply went the wrong way”, as the gazes from
the people in line followed them away from the haunted house.
“Let’s go check out the ancient tower?” Xu Meng suggested. “It’s a cultural
attraction, should be pretty interesting.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei took out his phone and checked the time. “After we come out of the
tower…… it should be just about time to go eat something. I think there’s a place in the park
that’s pretty good, let me just ask where it is.”
“Do you also have no sense of direction,” Li Yuqing asked laughing. “You can’t even
remember where the food place is?”
“It’s not that,” Gu Fei said as he dialed a number. “The last time I was here was during the
Spring trip in elementary school.”
“Hah?” Li Yuqing was baffled. “I saw there’s an amusement park area here, and even a zoo.
If it was me I’d probably come here several times a semester.” [1]
“Which just goes to show that your mind is not yet fully developed.” Pan Zhi said.
“You’re the one who’s not fully developed!” Li Yuqing gave him a glare.
Gu Fei walked to the side, probably calling Liu Fan’s brother again to ask where the food
place was.
Jiang Cheng looked at his silhouette, casted in shadow.
Whether it was the movie theatre, or the amusement park, Gu Fei’s leisure activities
seemed to have been left behind in the past. Even though Jiang Cheng didn’t much like
going to the park himself, he had still been more than a few times with classmates and
friends. After the school stopped organizing the Spring and Fall trips, they went out by
themselves all the time.
Whereas Gu Fei’s life was only in the Steel Works. Other than the couple times he bailed on
school to venture out by himself, it seemed like he had always stayed in and around the
Steel Works.
These past months that Jiang Cheng spent here would’ve been the same, if it wasn’t for Gu
Fei. The world around him seemed to be frozen in time,
everybody walked along the same few streets under their feet, as they stayed trapped in
this tiny space.
Carrying on a dull and feeble existence.
This kind of life could be tolerated for one or two days, endured with teeth clenched for one
or two months, but after one or two years he might just implode. Jiang Cheng walked to a
nearby garbage can and lit up a cigarette in his mouth. But as time passed, one might start
getting used to it — whether there were still feelings of resignation or reluctance — and
eventually sink down.
The old tower was next to a small lake in the park, the lake water wasn’t exactly
the cleanest, but the tower was very beautiful.
It was a tall tower, standing at the top, one could look down and see the streets outside the
park and the cars in the traffic. At the same time, it was also easier to get a clear look of the
grey and grim aura of the city under the sunlight.
“Let me just take down the description,” Pan Zhi said as he took photos of the introduction
on the wall with his phone. “Quite a few words too, I’ll copy some of this when I get back,
and my weekly journal will be good!”
“That’s not a bad idea.” Li Song also started taking pictures.
“I’m telling you guys,” Pan Zhi looked at the others who had also taken out their phones and
started snapping at the wall. “Don’t all go and copy the same things as me.”
“It’s fine, we’ll just clarify that it’s a reference, of course the reference has to be the same.”
Hu Feng said.
“It’s real sad if you think about it,” Pan Zhi sighed. “A weekly journal of only several
hundred words, but probably only the last line is written by ourselves, everything above
will be referenced from the Ancient Tower tourist
iIllustration.”
They all doubled up in laughter.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve written a weekly journal,” Jiang Cheng leaned back on the
railing and stretched. “Lao-Xu never asks for these kinds of things.”
“Nobody would do it even if he asked,” Gu Fei said. “If you asked me to write one of these
things every week, I wouldn’t be able to write it for sure.”
“Not necessarily, you’d probably be able to,” Jiang Cheng chuckled. “You can write poetry.”
Gu Fei laughed, “Oh yeah.”
“Hey I have to tell you,” Jiang Cheng turned and leaned over the railing, peered over at Pan
Zhi, then turned back and said quietly. “The grandson Pan has probably…… figured it out.”
“Mhm, I figured that he figured it out,” Gu Fei lowered his voice as well. “Will that be a
problem?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng said. “I just haven’t decided how to break it to him, but since he figured it
out, that’s good too. Saves me the trouble of finding the words.”
“He had always known about you right?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “He’s the only one…… Of course, now you know too.”
Gu Fei laughed, “I’ve got leverage on youuu.”
“I’ve got leverage on you toooo.” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye.
Gu Fei kept laughing and didn’t say anything.
“Although,” Jiang Cheng was quiet for a while. “To you, this doesn’t quite count as a
leverage, does it?”
“Is it for you?” Gu Fei threw the question back at him.
“I don’t know, I guess,” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows. “I’m not sure. I don’t like to be
stared at, to be the topic of other people’s discussions, I especially don’t like to be……
chastised.”
Gu Fei looked at him, and Jiang Cheng paused for a moment before continuing,
“‘You shouldn’t be doing that, you’re doing that wrong, here’s what you need to correct,
here’s where you need to improve’. I hate being scolded and told that I’m doing this wrong
and doing that wrong, I’ve heard way too much of that growing up, I’m just…… really……”
“I know,” Gu Fei said. “I know what you mean.”
“I wasn’t planning on talking about this,” Jiang Cheng sighed softly and hunched over on the
railing. “I don’t want you to think that I’m…… cowardly.”
“This doesn’t have much to do with whether you’re cowardly, does it.” Gu Fei also hunched
over the railing beside him. “Being brave doesn’t mean
broadcasting this matter for the whole world to know, just like I don’t mind people
knowing what kind of underwear I’m wearing, but it doesn’t mean that I’ll walk around
everywhere in only my underwear.”
Jiang Cheng cocked his head to look at Gu Fei, then after a moment couldn’t hold in his
laugh anymore, “What kind of shitty example is that.”
“I already tried my best.” Gu Fei said.
Since coming out of the haunted house, Pan Zhi hadn’t talked to Jiang Cheng about Gu Fei.
Until the holiday was almost over and they had to go back on the evening train, in the
afternoon after they had lunch and went back to Jiang Cheng’s apartment. Pan Zhi finished
packing his bags, and finally said, “You and that Gu Fei……”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng was sitting back on the sofa.
“So when did it start?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Not very long ago,” Jiang Cheng said. “Do you have some suggestions for me?
“Nope,” Pan Zhi grinned. “What’s there to suggest, the rain’s gonna fall and the grandpa’s
gonna date, how normal is that, how could I hold you back?”
Jiang Cheng laughed and didn’t say anything.
“But to be quite honest, I’m kinda surprised.” Pan Zhi said. “I just didn’t expect you to come
here and actually find love.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“What do you mean why,” Pan Zhi sat down beside him. “I just figured you wouldn’t be in
the mood, given the circumstances.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng leaned on the armrest, and rested his chin on his arm. “I wasn’t
expecting it myself.”
“But it’s totally understandable,” Pan Zhi thought for a moment. “I was pretty worried
about you before, then I saw that you didn’t break down or
anything…… It’s gotta be better than sitting here by yourself.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He stared at the ceiling and spaced out for a long time, then
turned to Pan Zhi, “Pan Zhi.”
“Call me something else.” Pan Zhi rubbed his arm.
“Grandson.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What’s up gramps.” Pan Zhi turned to him.
“Dating, and going on dates,” Jiang Cheng said. “What do you think is the difference?”
“Is this a brain teaser?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Tease your great uncle.” Jiang Cheng said.
“You gotta ask me this?” Pan Zhi looked at him. “Doesn’t seem like your style.”
“I just want to hear what a person with relatively low intellect thinks about it,”
Jiang Cheng pulled out a cigarette and kept it between his lips. “Us high intellect folks tend
to overthink.”
“Isn’t it just the difference between overthinking and brainless, I want to go on dates,” Pan
Zhi said. “For example me, I just want to go on dates, with Huang Hui, if not, then……”
“No,” Jiang Cheng cut him off. “Let’s change up the wording. What about ‘want to date me’,
versus ‘want to go on dates with me’?”
“Goddamn,” Pan Zhi knitted his brows. “So fussy. If they’re both about you, then whether
it’s dating or going on dates, it all has to be with you.”
Jiang Cheng gave him a thumbs up.
Jiang Cheng was a little surprised at Gu Fei’s meticulousness. Whether it was dating or go
on dates, they were both preceded by Gu Fei himself. Whichever answer he chose, they
were both him.
The corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth curled up. At least on this point, Gu Fei knew his
thoughts.
It wasn’t that Jiang Cheng felt very lonely, or isolated, that he needed to find a random
whoever in this place to begin a relationship with. It was only because the other person
was Gu Fei. Whichever kind of relationship it was, the premise was that it had to be Gu Fei.
He had been mulling over this line for the last couple of days, and to be honest, he’d long
figured out what they meant.
He also understood what Gu Fei really meant when he said “I will keep on liking you until
you don’t need me to like you anymore”.
He had to admit, Gu Fei really had considered much much more than he had.
Jiang Cheng didn’t think of himself as a very impulsive person, but after all, the reason he
went for it was only because ‘I like you’ and ‘I want to be with you’.
I want to date you, not just go on dates. With you, and nobody else.
That was the reason Gu Fei ended up outside his building waiting for him that day.
If there comes a day however, when the road runs out from beneath them, Gu Fei’s choice
will probably be “let’s end it here”, but what would Jiang Cheng choose?
That was the question Gu Fei wanted him to answer.
Gu Fei must be used to thinking of everything. The environment he grew up in, his family,
his past experiences, these all made it a habit for him to think of all the possibilities, and
find a corresponding method to deal with each possibility.
But Jiang Cheng was different.
He didn’t have the environment that required him to think and to ascertain everything like
this. Even if he was suddenly thrown into a place like this, he still didn’t think very much
about it. He would deal with each problem as they came up.
I’m not their biological son, this is what my real mom and dad are like, my environment has
changed from heaven to earth…… He hadn’t probed very deeply into any one of these matters,
all of his actions were based on what was directly in front of him. Over there is a boulder, how
should I get around that, here is a ditch, how do I cross it.
On this point, he and Gu Fei’s ways of thinking were entirely different yet similarly
ingrained.
“Is that something he asked you?” Pan Zhi asked beside him.
“I asked him.” Jiang Cheng picked up the ashtray on the side table and set it on the floor by
the sofa, then flicked some ash into it.
“No way,” Pan Zhi looked at him. “I know you too well.”
“Then watch that you don’t get permanently silenced by me one day.” Jiang Cheng said.
“So the feeling he gives me,” Pan Zhi also pulled out a cigarette from the pack on the side
table and lit it. “Is like…… How do I say this, when I see him I just want to call him ‘ge’.” [2]
“He’s younger than you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“…… I’m just saying,” Pan Zhi tsked. “You’re younger than me too, but I call you grandpa.
What I mean is, he just gives off the impression as…… someone who’s shouldered a lot of
things.”
“Really.” Jiang Cheng sighed softly. It was a pretty accurate assessment.
“Some people you just know right off the bat, there’s this air around them, it’s something
you can sense.” Pan Zhi said. “Even though in the haunted house……
But at first glance I just felt the urge to call him Fei-ge, you know what I mean, right.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng said.
“But that’s not why I call you gramps.” Pan Zhi continued.
“You don’t have to provide a clarification on that.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng-er,” Pan Zhi took a drag on the cigarette, and pondered for a long while with a very
solemn expression. “What you and Yu Xin had didn’t count as dating, it didn’t even count as
‘going on dates’.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng answered, and also gazed back at him with a solemn
expression.
“So,” Pan Zhi was quiet again for a long time. “Gu Fei is your first love.”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng laughed out loud. “You’ve been brewing for all this time, I thought you
were gonna say something big. If you gotta fart at least make it a loud one.”
“I’m not done, not done!” Pan Zhi looked at him grumpily. “Can you please slow down your
mockery of me from a sprint to a saunter, will you die if you slow down!”
“Saunter, I’ll saunter.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Do please go on sir.”
“So generally speaking, first loves usually…… tend to hurt a little, after all we’re…… still
young.” Pan Zhi held the cigarette as he tried hard to find the right words, and struggled as
he blundered on. “I’m just saying, don’t let yourself get hurt too badly, you know what I
mean? Just…… gramps, looking at that…… my grandm…… my other grandpa I guess, he
seems like the kind of person who already knows how to protect himself very well…… is all
I’m trying to say.”
“Ah.” It took Jiang Cheng a long time to gather from this tangle of chaotic addresses the
meaning Pan Zhi was trying to express.
“Don’t think that my words are uh, inappropriate.” Pan Zhi said.
“Thank you,” Jiang Cheng stubbed out his cigarette, then got up and patted Pan Zhi on the
shoulder. “I understand.”
“Mmn.” Pan Zhi nodded.
“Put the ash in here,” Jiang Cheng set the ashtray down in front of him. “If you flick it onto
the table again I’ll make you lick the whole table.”
“The fuck!” Pan Zhi froze. “I was fucking puting it on a napkin OK!”
“That’s why I’m not making you lick the table right now.” Jiang Cheng laughed as he fell
back into the sofa.
Gu Fei did not participate in the activity of taking Pan Zhi and the others to the train
station. He hadn’t really participated in all the activities over the last few days, but to Gu
Miao, he was still not spending enough time at home. Therefore that evening Gu Fei was
taking her for some meat pies at Wang Xu’s place.
Jiang Cheng took Pan Zhi and the others to the station, and said, “Alright, don’t go making
any farewell speech, I can’t take the cheese.”
“We won’t,” Hu Feng said. “Come back and visit during Summer break alright, let’s not be
strangers, what do you say?”
“…… This I really can’t say for sure.” The thought hadn’t really crossed Jiang Cheng’s mind
all these months. Whether it was going back, or what he was going to do if he went back
there, he hadn’t considered it at all.
“Or we can make a plan to go somewhere together.” Li Song said.
“We’ll work out the details when the time comes.” Pan Zhi said.
“Oh right, Gu Fei had been playing tour guide for the last few days, and we didn’t even get
to say thanks.” Li Yuqing handed Jiang Cheng the bag she’d been holding. “Didn’t he say the
other day that he has a little sister, it might not be appropriate to buy something for him
directly, so we got a doll……”
Jiang Cheng smiled and accepted it, “No need to be so courteous.”
He figured if these people had met the little sister, none of them would think to buy her a
doll.
After they went into the station, Jiang Cheng turned to walk to the bus stop, and very
frugally took the bus back to his apartment.
When he got home, he took a picture of the doll and sent it to Gu Fei.
– my classmates got it for Gu Miao
Gu Fei quickly sent him a message in reply.
– they’re gone?
– mhm, you guys still at Jiuri’s place?
– yep, are you coming
– nah, i’m a little tired, gonna lie down for a bit and rest my old back
–
Jiang Cheng laughed for a long time, then walked around the apartment a few times to see if
Pan Zhi had left anything behind, before walking back to his room. It was still early, there
was enough time to…… do another set of test questions.
Jiang Cheng stood in front of his desk, and felt a profound reverence for the choice he just
made.
This, is the property of the overachiever.
Kneel.
The phone rang once again, Gu Fei sent over a picture of Gu Miao.
In the photo, Gu Miao was holding a meat pie with a confused expression on her face.
– i showed her the picture of the doll, this is her reaction
– hhhhhhh, what a great brother you are, that this is the face of a little girl seeing a doll
Jiang Cheng picked up the twisted bundle of covers on the bed and shook them out. Even
though he was going to do some test questions, the environment was also important, it had
to be clean and organized…… He saw the corner of a black box peeking out from under his
pillow.
He picked it up, and after a brief glance opened the lid, though he already guessed what it
was when he saw the box.
But when he opened it and saw that it really was a fountain pen decked in a very
provocative red colour lying inside, he was still a little shocked that Pan Zhi would actually
gift him a pen. [3]
There was a tiny slip of paper inside with a line of writing on it.
You’d mock me for sure if I give this to you in person, so I’m leaving it here. I’m giving you a
pen, so you can always remember that you are a genius overachiever.
Jiang Cheng sat down in front of the desk with the pen, and laughed for a good while.
After thinking it over some more, he sighed in amazement. He was friends with Pan Zhi for
a reason. This guy enjoyed the grandson’s treatment while fretting like a grandpa.
He grabbed a piece of paper and randomly scribbled down a few characters with the pen.
The only problem was with his handwriting, it was impossible to show off how good the
pen was no matter what pen he used.
He stared at the paper for a while, then slowly took in a few breaths, and wrote down a line
of words.
May we both be as brave as each other.
Footnotes:
[1] In China, when they say “park” it more often than not refers to a place built with a
purpose, whether it’s themed, has rides, or some other attraction, with fences around it and
clear entrance and exits. It usually does not simply refer to a plot of land within a city with
trees and grass and benches, where people go to

just sit and look at birds. ↩

[2] Hahaha don’t get the wrong idea, ‘gege’ and ‘ge’ has very different …
nuances. ‘Gege’ is used to show intimacy, while ‘ge’ is used to show deference, often
employed in more ‘macho’ settings between actual bro-y bros. In this case it’s because Gu
Fei seemed so mature, that Pan Zhi felt compelled to call him big bro. ↩
[3] Fountain pen is kind of a common/stereotypical/old fashioned gift to give to a friend
who is moving away. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5769
TL word count: 4091
TL time: 4:12:32
Edit: 1:07:32
Curse words: 6x fucks, 1x shits
TL’s Notes
MAY WE BOTH BE AS BRAVE AS EACH OTHER.

First posted: November 28, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 62
The internet really does corrupt your mind after all!
The May 1st holidays were way too short, in reality it was only a day longer than a normal
weekend. By the time the students went back to school, it didn’t even feel like they had a
holiday.
Furthermore, Lao-Xu had been standing at the lectern hammering in the focus points of the
upcoming final exams for four consecutive days. Also emphasized repeatedly, was the
university entrance exam they had to face only a year after these finals.
Jiang Cheng slouched down on the desk with his chin on a notebook, his eyes were half
closed as he listened to Lao-Xu ramble on with utmost sincerity up on the lectern, while the
hum of conversations continued on around him.
Keeping with the atmosphere of the Fourth High, he figured the whole
classroom of people probably only took one thing away from Lao-Xu’s
reminders of the finals and university entrance exams, and that was the Summer break
between the two events.
Despite the fact that high school seniors had to begin their school year early, even with only
half a Summer break, it was still much better than the three day holiday they just had. The
people around him already started to discuss their plans well in advance.
“What do you usually do in the Summer?” Jiang Cheng tilted his head and asked Gu Fei, who
was currently looking down and playing with his phone.
“Work part-time jobs, sit in the store and listen to Li Yan and the guys yak about stuff, eat
out once in a while,” Gu Fei said. “And spend time with Er-Miao.
There’s time in the Summer to take her for systematic rehabilitation exercises.”
“…… Oh.” Jiang Cheng paused, it seemed like a rather boring and tiresome Summer break
just from the sound of it.
“Do you want to work some part-time jobs together?” Gu Fei said quietly. “Ding Zhuxin has
work, it’ll be for herself but also her friends.”
Jiang Cheng never thought the term “part-time job” would one day appear in his Summer
break plans. But the daily costs of living: the rent, the water bill, the hydro bill, the phone
bill, next year’s tuition, as well as any costs for his unknown future, all of it combined made
him feel like the bank card in his possession didn’t offer him much assurance.
It wasn’t until this moment that he realized how naive it was to imagine all the ways he
would relax this Summer, or at most get through some more question banks. He
contemplated for a while, “Will you be there?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered. “I wouldn’t ask you if I wasn’t going too.”
“Do you usually shoot models and stuff?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not always, I take other work too, commercial products and such, it’s actually easier when
there’s no human models involved.” Gu Fei smiled. “And if I have time I would take some
pictures for freelance submission, but I haven’t had a chance to submit anything this year.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “Wherefore art thou so impressive? Where did you submit
to in the past?”
“Just some magazines, photography ones and some travel ones,” Gu Fei put his phone
down. “It’s not a lot of money or anything, but it gives me leverage when discussing rates
for other jobs.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei didn’t pay any attention at all to his studies, and seemed never to think about his
academic future either, but he was certainly impressive when he focused his attention in
other areas.
Perhaps in the future, Gu Fei wouldn’t need the reinforcement of grades or a school to
sustain himself.
But on the other hand, perhaps Jiang Cheng was already used to measuring himself by
these standards, so he couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy about how nonchalant Gu Fei
was.
After Pan Zhi went back, he quickly sifted through all the photos he took during their recent
trip, and made quite a few Friends Circle posts. He even went so far as to pack up a zip file
and send it to Jiang Cheng separately.
“You know what I realize,” Jiang Cheng said as he scrolled through the photos.
“Pan Zhi really is a great creator of original meme packs.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei leaned over and looked for a while with him. “Even your face can’t rival his
skills.”
“Am I supposed to flatter you back?” Jiang Cheng said.
“No need,” Gu Fei said. “I know how handsome I am.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng peered sideways at him. “Do your fangirls know what a narcissist you
are?”
“I’m well hidden,” Gu Fei chuckled. “But I know what a narcissist you are.”
“Go away.” Jiang Cheng said.
Before class ended he went and visited Lao-Xu’s office, bringing all the test papers he had
finished over the last few days.
Lao-Xu looked at the papers with a pleased look on his face, “I’ll go find some other
teachers to grade these for you right away, don’t lose this momentum, you gotta keep
adding oil for the final exams.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei’s ‘injured’ leg was much better by then, he only needed a little help to stand up,
before being able to slowly walk along by himself, no longer needing a support person to
hold his arm while he hopped. ‘Doctor’ Gu’s idea was it will be another week or so before he
could take off the splint.
When they walked out of the school gates together, Jiang Cheng noticed Gu Miao, who he
hadn’t seen for almost a week.
…… And the doll hanging off of Gu Miao’s back pocket.
“That……” Jiang Cheng was baffled for a moment, then walked over and bent down to get a
closer look. The doll wasn’t big, but it was definitely out of the size range of even the largest
bag charm. Yet here it was, with a cord around its neck, hanging from the buttonhole of Gu
Miao’s back pocket.
The visual impact was hard to describe in so few words.
“She requested this herself,” Gu Fei said. “It took me two days to teach her how to tie the
cord.”
“It takes her two days just to learn how to tie a cord?” Jiang Cheng knew that Gu Miao
struggled even with addition and subtraction, but he figured maybe she wasn’t good at
mental calculation, that perhaps she was better at working with her hands, since she was
all too fabulous on the skateboard.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei looked at Gu Miao. “Sometimes when I think about it I just feel like…… it’s so
tiring, she doesn’t get it no matter how I try to teach her.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, just went and walked their bikes out of the shed with Gu Fei. As
soon as he got on and started riding, Gu Miao swiftly caught up to them on her skateboard.
The endlessly cool moves, the expression that seemed to look down on the whole of the
mortal world, the wild and unruly hairstyle……
“Weren’t you gonna have Li Yan give her a haircut? How long are you going to
hold on to that 50 bucks you swindled from me?” Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Fei, who
was slowly pedaling along with one leg.
“I’ll call him over right now,” Gu Fei took out his phone. “Will you come eat at the store?
Keep me company for a bit.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng answered.
They didn’t get to have much time together after the May 1st holiday. Since school started,
Gu Fei’s mom had been squatting in the store for days on end, as if preoccupied with
something, so Gu Fei had to be with Gu Miao as well as keep an eye on his own mother……
“Your mom is alright?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Who the hell knows,” Gu Fei sent a message to Li Yan. “Probably got together with some
guy again, I don’t know.”
“But why…… is she like this?” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Whenever I tell her to go see a therapist, she would freak out at me.” Gu Fei said. “I don’t
even bother anymore, but if she dares to bring them home, I’ll beat up every single one I
see.”
“…… Like the one from last time?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei quirked a smile.
“Maybe don’t go blindly beating them up, what if next time it’s a good guy.”
Jiang Cheng recalled the scene when the man got thrown against a tree, and felt like he
could feel the pain dimly all over his own body, from his nose to his ribs to his buttcheeks.
“The way she’s holding on to her sweetly naive and imaginative teenage heart, if she’s able
to find a good guy in this place I’ll go streaking on the street.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, laughed for a while, then after a moment sighed again.
The master stylist Li who was also the master chef Li showed up with a bag of produce, but
he froze immediately upon entering the store and seeing Gu Miao and the doll hanging off
her back pocket, “Are we making a horror movie here?”
“What horror movie?” Gu Fei was sitting behind the cash register checking inventory.
“Little Sister and the Doll On Her Back.” Jiang Cheng and Li Yan both said at the same time.
[1]
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei called out to Gu Miao. “Come and kick Li Yan gege out.”
Gu Miao came in on her skateboard and rolled straight toward Li Yan’s leg. Li Yan pointed
at Gu Fei while backing away toward the door, “Do you know what I really want to say
about you at this very moment?”
“That I prioritize lust over friendship?” Gu Fei said.
“What kind of impact does that have,” Li Yan said. “How about that you’re tossing me away
after you’re tired of playing with me!”
“Keep yelling,” Gu Fei pointed to the street outside. “Yell a little louder, if any less than ten
people hear you I’ll let you break my legs.”
“Gu Er-Miao!” Li Yan yelled out when he’d retreated to the doorway. “What happened to the
bond we had over the years!”
“Li Yan……” Jiang Cheng hesitated for a second, then walked to the counter and said quietly.
“Knows?”
“Not sure, I didn’t tell him,” Gu Fei gave him a look. “But he probably figured it out just from
observation, we don’t usually talk about this…… Do you want me to tell them?”
“No, it’s OK,” Jiang Cheng shook his head. “It’s weird if it’s too intentional.”
Even though Gu Fei, Li Yan, and the other guys didn’t hang out together all the time, he
could tell that the solid bond between them wasn’t established in mere days. Which was
why Jiang Cheng didn’t want Gu Fei to explain anything on purpose. It would make anyone
sick just to consider how something like this might destroy the usual dynamic of a friend
group.
Li Yan came back in with the bag of produce after a while of bouncing around with Gu Miao
outside, “It’s only the four of us, so I’ll just whip something up quickly?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
Li Yan certainly didn’t look like someone who can cook, but every time food was being
made here in Gu Fei’s store, if Li Yan was here, he would always be the one to cook, even
though the taste was fairly unremarkable.
However, his strength was that he was fast. Jiang Cheng pulled out one of the texts Pan Zhi
shipped to him last time to read, but after only a few pages, the plates of food were already
on the table.
“Hurry up and eat,” Li Yan sat down. “I’ll do Er-Miao’s hair after this, I got plans tonight.”
“What plans?” Gu Fei also sat down at the table.
“Fun plans.” Li Yan said.
“You haven’t gone home this whole time, have you.” Gu Fei asked.
“Go home for what.” Li Yan frowned.
Jiang Cheng picked up a bowl and ate quietly on the side. Gu Fei had mentioned to him
about Li Yan not wanting to go home, at the time he rejoiced in the fact that he didn’t have
anyone to boss him around anymore.
No matter what, at least he wouldn’t be having a big fight with his family over something
such as this.
Even though he still felt bummed out every time he thought about Li Baoguo.
Li Baoguo hadn’t contacted him for such a long time, that he didn’t know whether to feel
anxious or relieved, he wondered what other changes lay waiting for him up ahead.
Gu Miao was very good throughout the entire hair cutting process. She sat by the counter
unmoving, with a cloth wrapped around her neck, patiently letting Li Yan snip away at her
hair.
“Why don’t you give her a style that’ll look good as it grows out,” Jiang Cheng leaned back in
the chair with a book, reading as he glanced at Gu Miao. “She’s a little girl after all.”
“That’s what I’ve been thinking,” Li Yan sighed. “But no can do, once the hair grows longer
she’ll start chewing it off, not to mention she’ll get mad if it takes too long to wash it.”
“Let her wear wigs in the future.” Gu Fei said.
“Aren’t you afraid that she’ll chomp up the whole wig.” Li Yan said.
“Who knows, maybe she’ll develop some new problem in the future, and stop chewing on
hair.” Gu Fei raised his arms up in a stretch, and reached out a leg to give Gu Miao’s foot a
little kick. “Right?”
Gu Miao looked at him with a completely blank expression.
“You got any new problems that you haven’t shown big brother yet?” Gu Fei gave her foot
another little kick.
Gu Miao continued to show absolutely no expression.
“Hurry and grow up,” Gu Fei leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, and
looked at her. “Quit making me worry, alright?”
Li Yan gave Gu Miao a very adorable round bob that cut off just below her ears.
It even made Gu Miao’s perpetually cool expression look much cuter.
“And your hair?” Li Yan threw a glance at Gu Fei as he started cleaning up.
“Hm?” Gu Fei quickly shifted his eyes in Jiang Cheng’s direction. “Nah not today, when it
gets warmer I’ll just shave the whole thing off.”
“Shave it off?” Li Yan paused for a moment, then started laughing after a while.
“Alright, understood.”
Jiang Cheng was spacing out about whether Gu Fei’s beauty was enough to prop up a bald
look, when Li Yan turned to him and asked, “Do you want a haircut?”
“Oh no no,” Jiang Cheng instinctively leaned backward. “I……”
“Mhm, got it,” Li Yan laughed again. “Are you waiting to shave your head bald too?”
“No!” Jiang Cheng gave a firm negative.
“I’m leaving,” Li Yan collected his tools into a box, then kicked it under the cash register.
“There’s something I promised Liu Fan I wouldn’t tell you, but then on second thought I
figured I should say something.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Dude’s in the hospital,” Li Yan said. “He said……”
“What?” Gu Fei got up immediately. “He’s hurt?”
“No,” Li Yan cleared his throat. “It’s uh, hemorrhoids, the surgery is tomorrow. I was the
one who drove him to the hospital the day before yesterday, but he wouldn’t let me tell
anyone, didn’t want any visits either, but you see I figured……”
“We should go anyway.” Gu Fei sighed his relief and sat back down. “Nobody should miss
such an hilarious occasion.”
“Right,” Li Yan nodded. “So you’ll notify Luo Yu and the others? Let’s go visit him tomorrow,
I ordered a giant fruit basket.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei laughed.
After Li Yan left, Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei, “You people are brutal.”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei started laughing. “These guys are so bored, they love these kinds of
shenanigans. Will you tag along tomorrow? Take a tour of Liu Fan’s
butt together.”
“…… I don’t think hemorrhoid surgery necessarily requires that you stay butt naked the
whole time after,” Jiang Cheng thought about it and laughed as well.
“But if I look at your butt……”
He quickly stopped himself before finishing the sentence. Gu Miao was still nearby,
concentrating all her energy on grabbing at her newly shortened hair.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei took her hand. “Your new hairstyle looks very good.”
Gu Miao didn’t react. As soon as he let go, she immediately started grabbing at her hair
again. Gu Fei sighed, reached out a hand to cover hers, and grabbed once along with her,
then left her alone.
“Won’t she pull her hair out?” Jiang Cheng was a little worried.
“I just tried her grip, she’s not pulling hard, just not used to the shortness, she’ll be fine
after a while.” Gu Fei said.
“…… Oh,” Jiang Cheng watched Gu Miao, then after a long time sighed as well.
“I didn’t know she’d be like this after a haircut, otherwise I wouldn’t pester you about
cutting her hair.”
“Have to do it eventually, if it gets longer she’ll even chew on it,” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
“And anyways, it’s not like this every time.”
Jiang Cheng was somewhat glum, as he looked down at the book in his hands, “I don’t even
know her as well as Li Yan.”
“Li Yan and I pretty much grew up together,” Gu Fei said. “He watched Er-Miao grow up,
nothing strange about that. Plus if you’re gonna think that way, Li Yan should be the
grumpy one. All these years and Er-Miao hardly ever responds to him, but she’s close with
you.”
Jiang Cheng chuckled. That’s right.
Although…… When he finished laughing he still felt a little cross, “But I also didn’t know
that you like drinking tea?”
“Hm?” Gu Fei was suddenly confused.
“Even Lao-Xu knows that you drink tea,” Jiang Cheng tsked once. “You even took Lao-Xu for
tea, aiyoo how cultured of you, young man.”
Gu Fei blanked, then burst out laughing, “Hey……”
“Hey what hey?” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m just a little glum, I don’t know anything, right now I
don’t even know what you like to eat.”
“The places I took you to are all my favourite foods,” Gu Fei shifted closer to his side, and
squeezed against him with his hand on Jiang Cheng’s back. “And that tea place, Lao-Xu’s the
only one who knows about it, but I don’t go often either.
If you want, we’ll go there right now.”
“It’s not that,” Jiang Cheng felt he was being very childish. “I just want to express the woe of
having missed the first seventeen years of your life.”
“It’s a good thing you missed those years,” Gu Fei looked at him. “Honestly I can tell you
anything you want to know, but I don’t wish for you to see it for yourself, if we came along
that way, there’s absolutely no way we’d be together.
Not to mention, if you really grew up around here for seventeen years, I probably wouldn’t
even spare you a second glance, no matter how handsome you are.”
“Get out.” Jiang Cheng quirked a smile.
That’s right. If he really grew up here, in the Steel Works, in Li Baoguo’s home……
“And I didn’t even mention how sad I was,” Gu Fei reached out a hand in front of Gu Miao,
who was slumped over with her forehead almost touching the table writing her
‘homework’, and nudged it back up. “Following behind those old classmates of yours,
listening to you talk about the things you did together back then. Who should I be crying
to.”
“Geez,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “My past could not be simpler, just going to class,
skipping class, fighting people for the grade’s top three spots……”
“Didn’t you also have a girlfriend.” Gu Fei said.
“That wasn’t a girlfriend,” Jiang Cheng considered for a moment. “Just, I don’t know how to
explain, it was like I just wanted to join the party. The people around us were cheering it
on, she started bringing me breakfast, and sometimes we’d call each other or send a few
messages back and forth. And then it was just her getting mad, I comfort her, her getting
mad, I comfort, her getting mad again, I comfort……”
“Oii,” Gu Fei was a little surprised. “You would even comfort people?”
“While holding in my irritation, what else am I supposed to do, she’s a girl.
Anyways it was just annoying,” Jiang Cheng frowned. “I was like a dumbass, didn’t do shit,
just spent all my time consoling her.”
“Didn’t do anything?” Gu Fei smirked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng shot him a look. “Never even held hands.”
“So innocent,” Gu Fei glanced toward Gu Miao’s direction, then leaned in and
said quietly beside Jiang Cheng’s ear. “How come you’re not at all innocent now.”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng leaned in close to his ear and also lowered his voice. “Am I not innocent
now? I’m as handsome and innocent as ever.”
“Yes, right,” Gu Fei continued to whisper. “As innocent as me.”
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “Can you pull your thick-skinned face back a little, it’s
squishing me!”
Gu Fei burst out laughing, and looked at Jiang Cheng as he couldn’t seem to stop.
“What the hell are you laughing about,” Jiang Cheng sighed, and kept his voice low with
some effort. “It was just a few handies, don’t laugh like we actually did something.”
“Do the handies not count as having done something?” Gu Fei continued laughing and said.
“Then what do we have to do for it to count for something?”
Gu Fei probably didn’t run these words through his brain first, and as the words landed,
both of them descended into a tension-filled state that was all at once sheepish, awkward,
and as though they wanted to blush but were too
embarrassed to even blush.
Jiang Cheng thought his reaction would be countless shameless dirty pictures passing in
front of his eyes, which obviously included images of Gu Fei’s shameless butt.
He didn’t expect the first thoughts that jumped out to be so out of the box.
> We’re not even 18 yet.
> Minors Protection Law.
> How to view the phenomenon of premarital sexual interactions.
…… What in all hell is this?!
By the time he stopped spacing out, Gu Fei was already bent over correcting Gu Miao’s
nose-to-paper writing posture. He stared at Gu Fei’s back.
It was only in this moment that all sorts of indescribable scenes erupted in his mind.
Fuck!
He felt like he could set Gu Fei’s clothes on fire with the power of his mind

alone.
Fuck!
He didn’t realize he’d unwittingly consumed so many dirty little videos!
Fuck!
The internet really does corrupt your mind after all!
Footnotes:
[1] A children’s song that was remade by the internet into a horror song with a backstory.
No tl on this but full creepy warning for those who click. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5621
TL word count: 3830
TL time: 4:14:10
Edit: 0:39:41
Curse words: 4x fucks, 3x shits
TL’s Notes
∠( ᐛ 」∠)＿

First posted: December 3, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 63
If it wasn’t for all the people around them, he would go up and give it a lick.
As soon as this kind of dirty thinking starts, it’s as unstoppable as dumb puppies fighting
for food, there’s to be no end until both the food and the bowl was chewed up and gone.
But at the moment, he had no way of getting at the food, let along the rest of the bowl.
He fixed his eyes on Gu Fei for the longest time, and at last, could only settle for giving his
lower back a grouchy slap. Then he yanked on the elastic band of Gu Fei’s sweatpants, and
pinched his buttcheeks.
“Hey,” Gu Fei jumped, and looked back at him. “What do you want?”
“……To spank you.” Jiang Cheng put his pants back.
“There’s a whole room of innocent youths here,” Gu Fei started laughing. “Will you watch
your actions.”
“It’s not like I did anything,” Jiang Cheng leaned back in his chair. “Can’t innocent youths do
some pinching…… for fun.”
Gu Fei stared back at him for a while, and smirked as he narrowed his eyes,
“Were you thinking about something inappropriate?”
“Such as?” Jiang Cheng also narrowed his eyes.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He turned around and leaned his arm against the back of the chair
while still looking at Jiang Cheng, then started chuckling.
“What are you laughing at?” Jiang Cheng’s face was entirely serious.
Still Gu Fei didn’t say a word, just kept looking at him and grinning. The meaningful smile
that said “I know everything” made it hard for Jiang Cheng to keep up the facade.
“What,” Jiang Cheng got up and poured himself a cup of water before sitting back down. “A
gentleman bares it all, just say what you want to say.”
“We sure did our share of baring,” Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing. “What are you thinking
about?”
“What are you thinking about?” Jiang Cheng tsked.
“I know what you’re thinking about,” Gu Fei snatched the cup from him and took a sip, then
put it back in his hand. “And you know that I know what you’re thinking about.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a moment then laughed gleefully. “I was thinking
about some stupid obscene stuff, but if it wasn’t for you mentioning it, I’ve really never
thought about it in detail before.”
“Neither have I.” Gu Fei said.
“Not sure if I can even believe you,” Jiang Cheng gazed at him. “You even said so yourself,
you’re well hidden.”
“It’s not that I haven’t thought about it at all……” Gu Fei said and laughed again, and
eventually said after a while. “Though I was remembering something I saw once.”
“What?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“So there was a guy, who got himself a boyfriend, and the two of them were getting along
great,” Gu Fei said quietly before stopping halfway to turn and glance at Gu Miao, then
dragged his chair closer to Jiang Cheng and leaned in close to his ear. “And then they, you
know…… slept together……”
Jiang Cheng choked. He turned around and coughed for a long time, “Fuck, that’s all?”
“I’m not finished,” Gu Fei said. “Are you done coughing?”
“I’m done,” Jiang Cheng turned back and stuck his ear next to Gu Fei again. “Go on.”
“It’s only then that they realized, that their…… uh, alignments…… are the same.” Gu Fei was
struggling a little, when he got to the key words his voice was so low it was like it was
pixelated for censorship. “And what’s more, both of them were firm on not budging, so they
could only…… rub each other into oblivion……”
Jiang Cheng bursted out laughing before he had a chance to blush at what Gu Fei said, then
after a while finally got it together and stopped.
“Holy shit,” Jiang Cheng turned to look at Gu Fei. “And your point is?”
“An after-meal joke.” Gu Fei also put his smile away and answered with a serious face.
“The hell it’s after-meal, it’s already been years since the end of the meal,” Jiang Cheng said,
then paused and thought for almost 20 seconds. When he opened his mouth again, his voice
was even more censored than Gu Fei’s just then, it was
practically black bars. “Then you…… are…… ah? What?”
“What what?” Gu Fei was baffled.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng also peered in Gu Miao’s direction. Gu Miao was probably having trouble
answering questions, she had started drawing circle after circle on a piece of paper, and
seemed to be engrossed in the activity. He raised his voice very slightly. “Do the two of us
need to rub each other into oblivion?”
“Ah,” Gu Fei looked at him. He seemed unsure of how to answer. “Ah.”
For two people whose most intimate activities so far had been rubbing out each other’s
sticks, when the conversation suddenly jumped to sleeping together, and directly breached
such a shameless 18+ topic as body positions, the mood was all at once a little unspeakable.
suddenlyawkward.jpg
Both of them were unable to continue. They could only stare across at each other.
However, Gu Miao broke the awkward atmosphere in a very timely manner. She must’ve
been having trouble doing the calculations on her math questions as well as drawing round
enough circles, so she started repeatedly jabbing the paper with her pencil.
When Gu Fei turned around to take the pencil from her, the tip was already broken, even
the wooden casing was splintered from the impact.
Jiang Cheng was in shock as he stared on, he understood then why Gu Fei refused to buy
her mechanical pencils. With strength like that, the more mechanical pencils he bought the
more she would break, at least wooden pencils could be fixed with some sharpening.
After Gu Miao’s hand was free of the pencil, she did not stop the motion of her hand. It
continued to come down on the table top rhythmically. There was no trace of anger on her
face, which was as calm as ever, the only sign of her displeasure was demonstrated in the
thumps of her fist against the table.
“Er-Miao, Er-Miao, look at me, Er-Miao,” Gu Fei didn’t stop her, just crouched by the table as
he repeated the words. “Er-Miao, look at your big brother, Er-Miao……”
All the ecstatic thoughts Jiang Cheng had earlier was dissipating along with the thump-
thumping sounds and Gu Fei’s non-stop words. He didn’t know what he could do at this
time, he could only sit by and watch in silence.
Gu Miao wasn’t like other kids, and her behaviour at this moment wasn’t simply acting out.
Other than patience, there was no other way.
Jiang Cheng watched Gu Fei, he couldn’t understand what Gu Fei must be feeling at that
moment, neither could he imagine how much he himself would be able to do if he was in
the same position.
It wasn’t one or two incidents, or one or two days. Gu Miao might appear small for her age,
but she was already 10 years old. All these years, he didn’t dare imagine how Gu Fei
persisted for so long.
But he was slowly starting to see how Gu Fei had developed his air of unwavering
composure.
Gu Miao’s mini tantrum continued for more than ten minutes. Under Gu Fei’s untiring
repetitions, she finally looked at him and stilled her movements.
“You don’t have to do the questions you don’t know how to do,” Gu Fei looked into her eyes,
and said steadily. “No need to get mad, do you understand?”
Gu Miao looked back at him, completely unaffected.
“Nod to let big brother know that you understand.” Gu Fei said again.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Cheng-ge is thirsty,” Gu Fei pointed at Jiang Cheng. “Will you pour him a cup of water?”
Jiang Cheng was unprepared. Upon hearing this, he immediately picked up his cup to chug
down the rest of the water, but not before Gu Miao already nodded, walked to his side, and
grabbed the cup from his hand.
“I……” Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure what he should say.
Gu Miao looked down at the unfinished half cup of water, and went ahead and dumped it all
onto the ground in one smooth motion. She then walked away to pour another cup, and
handed it to him.
“Thank you sweetie,” Jiang Cheng accepted the cup, and immediately gulped down half the
contents. “I’m parched.”
Good thing Gu Miao’s way of thinking wasn’t like normal kids, otherwise just from that
sentence alone, she would’ve relegated Jiang Cheng into the category of brainless idiots.
“How about Cheng-ge play with you on the skateboard for half an hour?” Gu Fei asked.
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng put down the cup right away, and crouched in front of Gu Miao. “Let’s
go on the skateboard for a bit?”
Gu Miao’s eyes brightened, and she nodded. With her toes, she flicked the edge of the
skateboard up, and caught it in her hands, then turned to go outside.
“Thanks for the hard work,” Gu Fei let out a breath of relief. “Cheng-ge.”
“You can massage your Cheng-ge’s legs later.” Jiang Cheng stood up and followed Gu Miao
outside.
It was actually very pleasant weather to play on the skateboard, not too cold or too warm.
Jiang Cheng could feel the wind gliding past his body as they rolled forth on the road, it was
very enjoyable indeed.
Gu Miao took turns with Jiang Cheng on her skateboard, while sporting her new adorable
dollish bob and cool expression.
Every time she jumped on the skateboard with seasoned familiarity, and carried out all
sorts of high difficulty maneuvers, Jiang Cheng would think that if time stopped there, or if
it simply extended forth from the state Gu Miao was in when she was skateboarding, how
great that would be.
Gu Miao would be trouble-free, and Gu Fei would not have to continue bearing the
pressure.
Jiang Cheng rolled past the front door of the convenience store, and glanced at Gu Fei
sitting on the stoop, who was watching him with a cigarette in his mouth.
Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers at him.
Gu Fei immediately returned a whistle, the sharp trill of it followed him for more than 10
meters before fading.
Their previous conversation had Jiang Cheng’s mind wandering in all sorts of inappropriate
directions, but after half an hour on the skateboard with Gu Miao and working up a sweat,
the inappropriate directions were temporarily kept under control.
He recalled an article he read back in middle school. It talked about using exercise as a way
of quitting the vile habit of masturbation…… At the time he assumed it was a crock of
bullshit, but thinking about it now, perhaps it had a point……
However, by the time Gu Miao was back at the table again gathering up her books, and Gu
Fei walked into the inner chamber and beckoned him, Jiang Cheng once again realized how
much that article was a crock of bullshit.
He swooped in the room, wrapped Gu Fei in his arms and started nibbling. He only stopped
with a sharply drawn breath when Gu Fei suddenly bit down hard on his shoulder.
“The hell? Why don’t you just bite my face instead?” He rubbed his shoulder,
kept his voice low, then reached out and grabbed a handful of Gu Fei’s side again. “Do you
have a secret identity as a vampire!”
“The way you say that with a straight face, as if you hadn’t been biting me.” Gu Fei tugged a
little on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder, and pulled his shirt over to cover the teeth mark. “If you
keep this up we’re not gonna be able to walk out this door.”
“I……” Jiang Cheng didn’t finish his sentence, they heard the sound of Gu Miao kicking away
the table outside.
The two of them sprang apart with god-like speed, by the time Gu Miao walked to the
doorway of the inner chamber, there was at least one meter of distance between them. Gu
Fei was standing by the window, while Jiang Cheng stood beside the bed; he even took out
his phone at the speed of thoughts and pretended to scroll through it.
“All packed up?” Gu Fei asked.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei called out to Jiang Cheng, a hint of laughter in his voice.
“This acting skill.”
“Let’s go?” Jiang Cheng looked up and put the phone back in his pocket.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Gu Miao had been especially clingy with Gu Fei lately, possibly because Gu Fei hadn’t spent
very much time with her in the few days around the May 1st break.
If Gu Fei wasn’t home at night, she would sit spacing out on the bed, and refuse to sleep.
“Would you have any objections?” Gu Fei asked quietly when they bid each other goodbye
at the crossroads.
“What objections?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I was originally planning to go over to your place tonight……” Gu Fei cleared his throat.
“And hang out for a while.”
“…… I’m not that thirsty.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I’m talking about hanging out for a while, not doing it for a while,” Gu Fei said.
“Not to mention the way you were just now, it’s not convincing at all to say that you’re not
thirsty……”
“Get out,” Jiang Cheng cut him off, and felt like laughing. “It’s a civilized society, don’t be so
explicit out in public.”
“Wait for me at the breakfast stalls again tomorrow morning.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered. Relying on extraordinary determination and resolve, Gu Fei
hadn’t been late to school once since the leg ‘injury’.
“Good night.” Gu Fei swayed his handlebar, and whistled at Gu Miao, who was busy weaving
around on her skateboard on the sidewalk.
“Good night.” Jiang Cheng pinched the back of Gu Fei’s hand.
Jiang Cheng went back to his apartment, and started to methodically shower and change
clothes. He checked the teeth mark Gu Fei had left, it was not too bad overall. It wasn’t very
obvious, though the two little indents left by his fangs were deeper than the others. If this
mark was any closer to his neck, he’d have to wear a button-up shirt tomorrow.
“Must’ve morphed from a dog!” He grinded his teeth at the mirror, then turned and went
back to his room, sat down at his desk, and started doing homework.
Since the difficulty of said homework was relatively low, he could write it while still leaving
a good portion of his brain free to think about other things.
Such as a topic like body positions, the very thought of which made his heart race and his
ears flush.
He hadn’t carefully considered this question before, or rather, every time they rolled on the
bed together, with the sound of Gu Fei’s panting by his ear, he never visualized any
scenario other than various fantasies of him on top of Gu Fei……
But after Gu Fei suddenly told him this story, he just then realized that perhaps his own
imagination had been a little simplistic, that perhaps it needed a little more enrichment.
This top and bottom…… he stared at the tip of his pen. Since he didn’t have any practical
experience…… he didn’t know what either one felt like.
However.
For such a giving, dashing, handsome…… man, such as himself, it wasn’t entirely out of the
question to give in to his boyfriend a little. After all, Gu Fei was a month younger than him.
So if Gu Fei…… even though he didn’t know for sure, but if…… So What? [Eng]
Jiang Cheng tsked. Big deal.
Though compared to this yet to be determined issue of top or bottom, to Jiang Cheng, he
was more concerned with his seeming lack of mental preparation of playing with live
ammunitions with Gu Fei.
Gu Fei also hadn’t taken any steps toward furthering their physical relationship.
Anyway, they’d both been pretty satisfied after each shameless session.
Perhaps the timing was not yet right?
Jiang Cheng held the pen between his teeth, and swung it up and down.
How embarrassing, that his head was swarming with this kind of stuff while he was doing
homework.
Neither of them continued the discussion of this topic. The next day, at the sight of Gu Fei’s
silhouette appearing at the end of the road, walking toward the breakfast stall, all Jiang
Cheng could feel was a sense of comfort in his heart.
What the hell, why obsess over this stuff, it was enough just to set eyes on this person.
He only then realized it wasn’t that dumb to fixate your eyes on someone’s face, it all
depended on who this person was.
Take this day for example, when he was listening to the lecture all the while looking at Gu
Fei, even the droning of the teachers’ voices sounded much less like religious chanting.
Only, he couldn’t stare to his heart’s content during Lao-Lu’s class. Lao-Lu was much too
passionate in his teaching, and what more, he took great joy in directing his pointer to the
back of the classroom and saying,
“Jiang Cheng, you come and answer this.”
During the self-study period, Jiang Cheng was slumped over the desk writing his
homework, but he continued to sweep his gaze over Gu Fei’s face from time to time. Gu Fei
glanced at him, smiled, then looked down and swiped a few times on his phone.
Jiang Cheng’s phone vibrated. He took it out and saw that it was a message from Good Little
Bunny.
– been staring at me more intensely than usual today, huh boyfriend
Jiang Cheng smiled, and threw him a glance, Gu Fei still had his head down, playing with his
phone.
– why don’t you look at me
– I just like the way you keep staring at me
“Why?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly, still slumped over the desk.
“Makes me feel grounded.” Gu Fei turned and smiled, and bumped his leg against Jiang
Cheng’s under the desk.
– I want, to run free without a care, in your eyes, I want, one look, to last a lifetime
Jiang Cheng looked at the words Gu Fei just sent him, and looked around to make sure that
no one was paying attention, then reached out a hand and rubbed Gu Fei’s leg.
When they walked out of the school gates at the end of the day, they
immediately spotted Liu Fan’s crappy little sedan parked by the side of the road, with Li
Yan sitting in the driver’s seat.
“Come on let’s go,” Li Yan beckoned. “They’ve already headed over, we’re meeting outside
the hospital.”
Gu Fei got in the car, “Is the surgery done?”
“Did it this morning, he’s probably lying ass up on the hospital bed at this moment thinking
about the flavours of life.” Li Yan said.
“What flavour,” Jiang Cheng got in the backseat, and looked at the giant fruit basket beside
him, with a card tacked on it. He read out the words on the card.
“Everyone lifts up the little daisy…… just from this heartfelt sincerity alone, he probably
won’t even be able to taste the spicy, the only thing left for him is bitterness.” [1]
“When he gets out he’ll take care of each one of you.” Gu Fei said.
“You too.” Li Yan said.
“Ask him if he dares.” Gu Fei tsked.
After meeting up with Not A Good Bird at the door, the group of them made their way to the
inpatient wing with the instigatory fruit basket.
The room wasn’t too bad, only two of the three bedspaces in Liu Fan’s room were occupied.
When they came in, Liu Fan was sitting up on the bed playing with his phone.
He turned around at the sound of newcomers, and as soon as his eyes focused on them, he
let out a wholehearted roar, “Li Yan, I’ll fucking kill you one of these days!”
“We’re all bros after all,” Li Yan set the fruit basket down on the bedside table.
“How could we let you languish in the hospital all by yourself.”
“Then you can go tell the doctor to give you each a jab and we’ll all lie here together!” Liu
Fan glared down the line with his eyes wide. “Holy shit Jiang Cheng, I thought you were a
serious fucker, what the hell are you doing here!”
“I’m just passing by.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ll remember all of you,” Liu Fan clamped his fist at them. “Won’t forget this for the rest of
my life!”
“Fan-ge, how does it feel?” Luo Yu leaned over and asked.
“Feels like a blasted open ass hole is how I feel! Do you want to try!” Liu Fan glared at him.
They all had a hearty laugh.
The family of the patient on the next cot frowned, they must’ve thought these guys were
being too noisy. Though truth be told, when this group of guys stood there together, each
with “don’t provoke me” hanging out on their faces, they looked no different from gang
members out to survey their domain. The family members only stole a few glances but
didn’t dare say anything.
“Keep it down.” Gu Fei leaned against the wall and said.
The guys finally collected themselves, and started consoling Liu Fan while holding in
laughter.
Like a blasted ass hole.
Tsk tsk.
Jiang Cheng stood beside Gu Fei and also leaned against the wall, though he wasn’t at all
listening to what the others were saying. These words were the only thing left in his mind.
Even though Liu Fan was clearly being hyperbolic, still, he could pretty much imagine just
how un-delightful a first experience would be…… tsk tsk.
Jiang Cheng peered at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was leaning with the side of his head against the wall, drawing an attractive and sexy
curve from his neck to his collarbone.
If it wasn’t for all the people around them, he would go up and give it a lick.
Tsk tsk.
With a Gu Fei like this, how could he bear it?
They didn’t stay very long with Liu Fan before they were chased out by the nurse, on the
ground of disrupting the patients’ rest.
“Where are you headed?” Li Yan asked in the elevator. “I have Liu Fan’s car, I can drive
you.”
“You can take us back.” Gu Fei said.
“Let’s all go to Da-Fei’s place then, it’s been a while since we drank together.”
Luo Yu said.
“Alright.” Gu Fei answered.
The elevator stopped after descending two floors. They could hear a mess of rowdy roars
outside before the doors even opened.
And when the doors opened, the noise suddenly became even louder.
“YOU’RE JUST TRYING TO CON MY MONEY!” A man’s voice boomed.
“What surgery! You had to make me stay in the hospital! Won’t do the surgery if I don’t stay
here! Well I damn well ain’t doing no surgery! Some bullshit radiation therapy! It’s all a
fucking scam! YOU GUYS CHEATED ME OUT OF
MY MONEY AND NOW YOU’RE FUCKING SAYING IT’S NOT ENOUGH?
YOU WANNA BET I CAN TAKE THIS PLACE APART!”
“Da-shu, your treatment protocol can be discussed with the attending doctor, the
medications we used on you are all itemized as well……”
Jiang Cheng stood stunned in the elevator. After the doors opened, he spotted at a glance
the man outside, swinging his arms with a face full of anger.
His biological father, Li Baoguo.
“I’m not looking at no list! I’ve decided I don’t want to treat this anymore!
REFUND!” Li Baoguo pushed and shoved at the doctors and nurses around him.
“If I die then I’ll die! I’m not going to let you cheat me of my money! IF YOU
DON’T GIVE BACK THE MONEY I PAID, I’LL NEVER LET THIS GO!”
The people who just entered the elevator were still looking outside, and talking quietly
with each other. There was even a person standing in the doorway, not wanting to step in
completely lest he missed the drama.
Jiang Cheng made to move, and Gu Fei grabbed his arm.
Li Yan was standing by the door. After a glance back at them, he shoved the man in the
doorway out with one palm and hit the close button.
The guy turned around like he wanted to come back in, but stopped in his tracks after
taking one look inside the door.
No one else in the elevator said anything more. When they got to the ground floor, Gu Fei
dragged Jiang Cheng out of the elevator by his arm.
“We’ll just go on then, should we wait for you in the store or……” Li Yan asked.
“In the store, my mom’s probably out again.” Gu Fei said.
“Sure.” Li Yan and the others turned and left.
Numbly, Jiang Cheng followed Gu Fei to a corner of the lobby.
“Cheng-ge?” Gu Fei called to him.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“This thing……” Gu Fei hesitated for a second. “You can’t get involved.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, and didn’t make a sound.
“You can’t solve it,” Gu Fei looked straight at him. “You have no way of resolving this, you
can wait for him to go home first, and then go talk to him.
But you can’t go over there right now, do you know what I’m saying?”
“I know.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and took in a deep breath, then slowly let it out.
Of course he knew what Gu Fei was saying.
Footnotes:
[1] The Chinese for “daisy” is 雏菊, which means baby chrysanthemum, which is common
euphemism for anus, because uh… the visual of the uh… wrinkles.
↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6032
TL word count: 4263
TL time: 6:05:29
Edit: 0:55:32
Curse words: 5x fucks, 6x shits, 3x asses
TL’s Notes
Huhuhue Li Baoguo is back!

First posted: December 10, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 64
“Rub-a-dub-dub, hush little cub.”
Being at rock bottom of your pit of emotions wasn’t the worst thing, even worse than that
was having your mood drop straight from the mountaintop to the rock bottom.
Jiang Cheng’s good mood had smashed into a million pieces from the fall, not leaving a
single trace behind.
It had been a long time since Jiang Cheng felt such an intense lump in his throat.
He sat with Gu Fei in the lobby for almost ten minutes, and still couldn’t manage to snap out
of it.
Li Baoguo’s illness, he could pretty much determine what it was; it must’ve been lung
cancer. Jiang Cheng stared down at his fingers. Li Baoguo’s lungs were in a poor condition,
he coughed all day long, and now terms like “radiation therapy”
were appearing.
Jiang Cheng felt like he was at the very bottom of a whirlpool, with chaos all around him,
but eerie silence in his ears.
He understood very well why Gu Fei wouldn’t let him go over just then.
There was only so much money on that card of his. It was enough for tuition and day to day
expenses, but he didn’t have any income. Before he can seriously make a living to feed
himself, every single expense had to be taken out from this sum.
He didn’t know if Li Baoguo still owed the hospital anything, but if he did go over at the
time, he could pretty much imagine how that would unfold.
This was different from Li Baoguo getting surrounded and beaten up. Back then, partly for
venting, and partly to help Li Baoguo, he could rush over and get in a fight with other
people, but what about now?
A security guard stepped out of the elevator, jogged to the entrance of the inpatient wing,
brought two police officers with him, then entered the elevator again with the officers in
tow.
“Let’s go.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his face hard a few times, then stood up. He didn’t want to
stick around to see the officers escort Li Baoguo out.
Gu Fei got up and walked out of the hospital with him.
Coming out of the hospital, Jiang Cheng headed straight for the bus stop, but Gu Fei held
him back, “Let’s take a taxi.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng stopped, and stood by and watched as Gu Fei flagged down a taxi.
“Coming to eat at my place?” Gu Fei asked him once they were in the car.
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng felt like his head was swelling.
“Then I’ll go with you to get some food later?” Gu Fei asked again.
“I don’t really have an appetite right now,” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and pinched the
bridge of his nose. “I’m going straight to Li Baoguo’s place later to wait for him. If he’s taken
away by the cops, he’ll probably be back by evening.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei looked like he was going to say more, but after taking in a deep breath, didn’t
end up saying anything else.
The car stopped at the intersection, and the two of them got off.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the road that led to Li Baoguo’s home. Ever since he picked up his
stuff from Li Baoguo’s place that day, he hadn’t been on that street again.
Looking down the street now, there was a sort of crumbling peacefulness to it.
There were warm yellow lights that glowed within the buildings on either side, and what
looked like units of peaceful families. Yet underneath all that, what the people were like,
and what kind of homes they had, that was beyond
imagination.
“I’m heading over then,” Jiang Cheng slung his backpack onto his shoulder, as if cementing
his resolve. “You should go back to the store, I’ll call you when I’m done.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei answered. Jiang Cheng turned to leave, but Gu Fei called out again
hesitantly. “Cheng-ge.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng turned around to face him.
“I don’t know what you’re thinking,” Gu Fei said gently. “This might not be suitable for me
to say, but I still want to remind you.”
“Go ahead.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Don’t hand over money just yet,” Gu Fei said. “Li Baoguo really might not use the money
for his treatment. You might not have met the kind of people who would put their own lives
behind a lot of other things, but he’s one of them.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him, then nodded after a while.
“He has two other children,” Gu Fei said. “If you want to do something, consider it only after
looking at your older brother and sister’s stances first. You have to…… learn to leave a path
for yourself.”
“Understood.” Jiang Cheng walked back to the car and stood in front of Gu Fei, looking at
him.
“Don’t think that I’m cold for saying this,” Gu Fei said. “I grew up here. These people, these
things, I’ve seen way too much of it. I’m used to assessing things like this. You don’t have to
be as extreme as me, but you can’t be too naive about it either.”
When Gu Fei was saying these words, there was an unfamiliar air about him, but it still
made Jiang Cheng feel warm. He reached out and squeezed Gu Fei’s arm,
“I got it.”
When Gu Fei returned to the store, the other guys had already finished preparing the food.
Gu Miao had already eaten, and had been dispatched to the inner chamber by Li Yan to
write her homework.
“What’s going on with Li Baoguo?” Luo Yu asked when he saw Gu Fei walk in.
“Dunno, lung cancer probably,” Gu Fei went out to wash his hands in the courtyard, then
headed in to sit with Gu Miao for a while, before coming back out and sitting down at the
table. “We drinking?”
“Of course we’re drinking!” Chen Jie picked up two bottles from the floor and set it on the
table. “We’ve just been waiting for you to come back to start.”
“Don’t I have drinks here.” Gu Fei said.
“Li Yan wouldn’t let us.” Zhao Yihui laughed beside him.
“You just like taking advantage of people all the time.” Li Yan said.
“Go ahead and take advantage,” Gu Fei ladled out some soup for himself.
“Never did pay you guys any salary for helping out here.”
“That’s a different matter,” Luo Yu opened a bottle, and started pouring into each cup. “How
come Jiang Cheng didn’t come along?”
“How could he still show up here,” Li Yan tsked. “What, should he come and listen to us
discuss whether Li Baoguo is gonna die?”
“Honestly, I never would’ve known. He just looks like that all the time, his face looks unwell
too.” Chen Jie said. “I was here last week when I ran into him after a whole night of
gambling, his cards are more important than his life.”
“Has Li Hui and Li Qian come back?” Li Yan asked.
“Haven’t seen them.” Gu Fei said.
It seemed like other than the card playing career he devoted himself to even through his
struggling health, there really were very little else Li Baoguo bothered to keep up with.
After lunch Gu Fei flipped through the notebook of the store’s owing tabs. Li Baoguo hasn’t
been here since the last time he came by to buy yogurt.
It had been a long time, it would seem that his condition really was serious this time. Gu Fei
closed the notebook. If it really was lung cancer…… he’d already been coughing for such a
long time, long enough that Gu Fei couldn’t remember what he was like when he didn’t
cough, though his voice had been hoarse through the better part of this past year. Based on
his usual habits and way of life, if it was lung cancer, there was no way it was early stage.
He took out his phone and opened up his chat with Jiang Cheng. There was still no news
from Jiang Cheng, though it had only been a span of a meal’s time, Li Baoguo might not even
be back yet…… He kept scrolling through their
messages until he reached the very top.
There weren’t that many messages between them. They sat beside each other during the
day, and in the evenings they usually started talking directly on the phone after exchanging
a few messages. However, for every message, Gu Fei could remember exactly how he felt at
the time.
“Jiang Cheng has some money on hand right now?” Li Yan sat down beside him.
“Mhm, some, his adoptive mother gave it to him before.” Gu Fei said.
“Tell him not to be stupid and hand the money over to Li Baoguo for treatment,”
Li Yan said. “That guy, he won’t put it to good use for sure. He’ll just use it to gamble.”
“I already told him,” Gu Fei tossed his phone onto the counter. “It’s up to him now.”
“Why do I feel like it’s likely,” Li Yan said. “The kid might look full of himself, but really he’s
just a young master from a big city. Even in his wildest dreams, he can’t imagine the kind of
person an environment like the Steel Works can produce.”
“What are you so concerned for,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Even if he hands over money, it
won’t be to you.”
“I’m reflecting on life,” Li Yan gave a smile, and raised his arms up in a stretch.
“Just trying to share your worry. You’re not even playing your game anymore, just sitting
here blanking out.”
“Go away.” Gu Fei said.
“Can I say another thing before I go away?” Li Yan said.
Gu Fei didn’t respond.
“If he really wants to give Li Baoguo money, don’t try to hold him back too much,” Li Yan
said. “In case he thinks you’re too heartless. The way Li Baoguo is going, he’s just headed
for death. Why leave a thorn in his heart.”
“Do you know why you’re so skinny.” Gu Fei said.
“I’m not skinny.” Li Yan grabbed some flesh on his own waist.
“If you don’t strain yourself worrying so much, you might grow some meat on those bones.”
Gu Fei said.
Li Yan laughed, “Why the hell did I become bros with someone like you, can never get a
good word in return.”
“Thanks.” Gu Fei gave him a smile.
The battery in his phone was down to 9%. Jiang Cheng glanced at the time, then took out
his portable charger and connected it to his phone, and stuffed it back into his backpack.
He had already been sitting on the stone stump under the tree outside Li Baoguo’s
apartment for two hours. Fortunately it was already past the evening rush, there were not
many neighbours walking around.
He could make a trip back to his apartment, he hadn’t gotten rid of the key to Li Baoguo’s
place. But frankly he would rather not sit by himself in that place that stank of mold,
smelling the various bizarre smells that would drift past from time to time from the lack of
tidying.
It was a place that was clearly inhabited, but lacked any sign of the living. Just thinking
about it made him uncomfortable all over, and if he stayed there for a while longer, he’d
feel depressed through and through.
Another half hour later, when the cigarette in his hand was almost out, he finally saw Li
Baoguo’s silhouette approaching from the main street.
It was strange indeed, that he was able to recognize Li Baoguo simply from a backlit figure.
Li Baoguo was walking very slowly. When he passed the building he frequented to play
cards, he looked up and shouted a couple of times at the second floor.
Somebody’s head popped out, and he exchanged a few more shouts with that person. Jiang
Cheng was only able to make out the words “I’ll be back later”,
after which Li Baoguo continued walking this way.
Jiang Cheng stubbed out his cigarette and stood up. Li Baoguo’s eyes never looked this way,
only when he stood up, did Li Baoguo shoot a startled glance toward him, then froze.
“You’re…… back, ah.” Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure how to open the conversation.
“You? Who’s ‘you’?” Li Baoguo was swinging a bottle in his hand, his words were aggressive
right out the gate. “You you you you, who are you calling?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, he could smell the stench of alcohol.
Li Baoguo let out a torrent of coughs in Jiang Cheng’s direction once he finished talking, it
sounded heart-wrenching, and was furthermore punctuated by gurgles of phlegm stuck in
his throat.
Jiang Cheng didn’t back away. He waited quietly for Li Baoguo’s intentional or otherwise
bout of coughs to run its course, then said, “I wanted to speak with you.”
“Speak with me,” Li Baoguo smirked, then spat out a mouthful of phlegm at his feet. “How
refined, I don’t understand what you mean by speak with me.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet again.
It wasn’t that he wanted to be quiet, but the way Li Baoguo was, he had no idea how he
should begin again, nor did he know what his next sentence should be.
Li Baoguo didn’t say anything else. After another coughing fit, he turned and walked into
the corridor.
Jiang Cheng walked around the phlegm on the ground, and followed him into the corridor,
then into the apartment.
As soon as he entered and saw the bleak mess, he felt a wave of discomfort coming over
him. He walked over and opened the closed windows.
“So your feathers have filled in huh, having a good time flying?” Li Baoguo plopped down
onto the sofa. “Happened to fly past my place so you decided to drop in and check if I’ve
died yet?”
“What’s going on with your illness?” Jiang Cheng asked him directly.
“Aha,” Li Baoguo started laughing, which was followed by another bout of coughing. “My
youngest son finally found out I’m sick huh?”
Only under the indoor lighting did Jiang Cheng realize that Li Baoguo had lost a lot of
weight, but his face and neck were a little swollen.
“Lung cancer, late stage.” Li Baoguo got up to pour some water. The water came out of the
hot water thermos, but didn’t release a hint of steam. “Don’t have many months left, the
bullshit doctor wanted me to have surgery earlier, I didn’t agree. What fucking surgery,
what fucking good is surgery for cancer! And now they’re saying my body won’t be able to
stand the surgery, wanted me to do radiation or something. Bullshit! They’re just going in
circles trying to con my money!”
Jiang Cheng was so stunned that he didn’t even know how to respond. He didn’t know how
long Li Baoguo had dragged this illness on for, that it changed from operable, to surgery no
longer being an option due to the state of his health……
“I did some research,” Jiang Cheng picked up the kettle on the table and peered inside,
making sure there were no spiders, cockroaches, or anything else in there, before filling it
with water to boil in the kitchen. “For lung cancer, if you cooperate well with the doctor, it
can extend……”
“Bull fucking shit!” Li Baoguo cut him off. “All that studying must’ve made you dumb! Right
now, your old man can’t even sit still while playing cards, chest hurts like all hell, can’t even
fall asleep. So fucking extend for what! And you wanna give money to the hospital! You’re a
dumbass just waiting for people to scam your money in the future! If you have so much
money why don’t you give any to your old man!”
Jiang Cheng braced himself against the table, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. It took
a lot of suppressing to push his emotions back down, “Then what are you thinking?”
“I’m telling you!” Li Baoguo jabbed a finger at him. “My whole life, I’ve been living it the way
I want, I get to curse at whoever I damn like, and beat up anyone I want! My life is
carefree!”
Jiang Cheng looked at him, and couldn’t find the connection between these sentences and
the current topic at hand.
“You don’t have to pretend to care and persuade me to get treatment,” Li Baoguo said as he
began to cough again. After a while he spat another mouthful of phlegm on the floor, then
rubbed it out with his shoes. “And I don’t have that kind of money to treat it. I have three
kids, and not one of them has any conscience!”
There was practically a storm happening in Jiang Cheng’s stomach as he quickly turned his
head, but unfortunately he still caught a glimpse of the speck of blood on the floor.
“You should have medical insurance, right?” Jiang Cheng said.
“You think having insurance means I don’t have to pay?” Li Baoguo glared at
him. “There’s still a whole bunch of those out-of-pocket medications! Doctors are all
fucking black-hearted, they only prescribe you out-of-pocket meds!”
“Doctors are trying to treat the condition, they’re not going to just……” Jiang Cheng felt it
was impossible to communicate with Li Baoguo.
“What did you come here to say today?” Li Baoguo cut him off. “Talked a bunch of
nonsense, what’s your point?”
“I just wanted to ask about your condition.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I thought you had a rude awakening and thought to give some money for your father’s
treatment,” Li Baoguo chortled. “Turns out you’re just here to find out how long much
longer it is until I die.”
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and took a moment to ground his thoughts.
After a minute, he opened his eyes again and looked at Li Baoguo, “Give Li Hui and Li Qian a
call, tell them to find a time to come back here and discuss……”
“YOU DON’T GET TO GIVE ME FUCKING ORDERS!” Li Baoguo screamed
out, his voice was hoarse with phlegm. “It’s not up to you to……”
“YOU SHUT UP!” Jiang Cheng suddenly kicked over the table in front of him, and also
screamed out while pointing at him. “You! Shut your mouth!”
Li Baoguo froze, and went quiet.
“If you want to treat this, call them back, and we can talk about what to do,”
Jiang Cheng was still pointing at him. “If you no longer want to treat this, that’s up to you! If
I’m giving money it’ll be to the hospital directly. Don’t even think about me giving you
money so you can use it to gamble!”
Li Baoguo looked at him with a hint of a sneer, as though he’d said something extremely
amusing.
Jiang Cheng didn’t pay him any more attention. He went into the kitchen, and after the
water boiled, he poured it into the hot water thermos, then slammed the door as he left.
It wasn’t that he cared very much for Li Baoguo, he was only afraid that if he left just like
that, Li Baoguo might turn around and forget about the kettle completely as he rushed out
the door to play cards. Then either the kettle will dry up and set fire to the whole
apartment, or the water will overflow and snuff out the fire, giving rise to some good old
carbon monoxide.
It wasn’t after he went out the door and walked against the night wind for a stretch toward
Gu Fei’s store, that the trouble that filled his head and heart finally dissipated somewhat.
He turned into the side street, and pulled out his phone as he walked.
A soft whistle sounded from the shadow of a tree on the left side of the road. He turned
around, and saw Gu Fei leaning by a wall.
“What are you doing here?” Jiang Cheng walked over.
“Waiting for you.” Gu Fei smiled.
Seeing Gu Fei’s smile, Jiang Cheng instantly felt much lighter. All kinds of complicated
emotions he couldn’t quite make sense of or explain all rushed up all of a sudden.
He went up and pulled Gu Fei into an embrace.
Gu Fei squeezed him in his arms, gently patted him a few times on the back, then backed up
into the shadow of the tree with his arms still around Jiang Cheng, “How did it go?”
“Dunno how to explain,” Jiang Cheng knocked his chin against Gu Fei’s shoulder hard a few
times, then tipped his head and bit Gu Fei on the neck.
“You’ve been drinking eh, boyfriend.”
“Mhm, had one drink,” Gu Fei said while smiling. “I brushed my teeth before I came out, you
can still smell it?”
“No shit, the smell is on your person.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then shall I take my clothes off?” Gu Fei said.
“Try to be civil,” Jiang Cheng tsked. “I was just wondering, not repulsed.”
“Are you going home?” Gu Fei asked. “I’ll walk you back.”
“Li Yan and the others left already?” Jiang Cheng let go of him and straightened his clothes.
“Left a while ago,” Gu Fei said. “Went to sing karaoke. I closed the store down already, took
Er-Miao back too.”
“How about,” Jiang Cheng let out a soft sigh. “You come hang out at my place tonight, I don’t
wanna be by myself.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
There was potential for it to be a very pleasant evening, a great opportunity for rolling
around, rubbing around, nibbling around, kissing around, and feeling around. But since
Jiang Cheng’s mood was even more decrepit than Li Baoguo’s home, he didn’t feel like
moving after only a few laps of rolling around on the
bed with Gu Fei.
“How about I help you,” Jiang Cheng reached a hand inside Gu Fei’s pants.
“I……”
“Hey,” Gu Fei chuckled and grabbed his hand. “With how upset you are right now, even if it
makes me feel good, it’ll make me wonder if I didn’t pay you enough or something.”
“Get out!” Jiang Cheng pulled his hand away and flopped backward on the bed.
“Fuck! Come here and massage your Master Cheng’s legs.”
“Alrighty!” Gu Fei sat up, and set one of Jiang Cheng’s legs on top of his own, and gently
kneaded it a couple times. “Master Cheng sir, is this pressure OK?”
“Continue,” Jiang Cheng waved his hand with his eyes closed. “There will be a bonus if you
make me feel good.”
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t say anything more, just continued kneading his leg.
Jiang Cheng lay for a while with his eyes shut, before finally saying quietly, “Li Baoguo has
late stage lung cancer. I looked up some information when I waited for him today, his
condition looks pretty bad; he’s coughing up blood, and both his face and neck are swollen.”
“Has he decided to give up treatment?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm, pretty much, said he has no money for it.” Jiang Cheng knitted his brows. “He was
still setting up card games when he came back.”
“Then how did your talk with him go?” Gu Fei asked.
“He still would rather have the money,” Jiang Cheng said. “But I feel like it’s not going to be
used on the treatment. I’m thinking……”
Jiang Cheng opened his eyes, pillowed his arms under his head, and looked at Gu Fei, “Don’t
tell me I’m an idiot, and don’t say I’m being a saint either.”
“I won’t.” Gu Fei nodded.
“I’m thinking, if he wants to treat it, I can contribute the fund along with Li Hui and Li Qian.
He has medical insurance, the surgery is off the table now, but he can still do radiation or
chemo, it’ll keep it under control.” Jiang Cheng said.
“The costs shouldn’t be too high……”
“How much are you planning to give?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ten thousand.” Jiang Cheng said. “Regardless of how much Li Hui and the others give.”
“Mmn,” Gu Fei nodded. “Then you’ll have to be nicer to me, I can introduce you to some jobs
that won’t take up any of your class time.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, “Why does that sound so wrong.”
“And what if Li Hui and the others won’t contribute?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng looked at him, and drew a blank.
If Li Hui and the others don’t contribute? He hadn’t considered this possibility.
At first he thought it was unlikely, he was their father after all…… But after thinking about it
some more, he figured it wasn’t entirely impossible.
“So do you think…… If they don’t put in any money, what should I do?” Jiang Cheng covered
his eyes with his hand, and sighed quietly. His brain was a mess, he couldn’t make sense of
anything at the moment.
“First you tell me, what’s the reason for you giving him money.” Gu Fei said.
“I don’t want him to say that I don’t have any conscience, I don’t want him to bulge his eyes
and go your old man this and your old man that……” Jiang Cheng said. “I told you, I
really…… hate it, being scolded like that. Not to mention he’s my…… I can’t treat it like he’s
a complete stranger……”
“Got it,” Gu Fei held his hand, and gently massaged his palm. “If it’s up to me, Cheng-ge, you
just give this money to Li Baoguo. Don’t worry about whether Li Hui gives anything.”
“Why, so he can use it to gamble?” Jiang Cheng said.
“If he really wants to treat it,” Gu Fei looked at him. “And you give him the money, he’ll use
it on the treatment himself. If he was never going to treat it, and you forcefully pay for
those bills, he’s not going to be grateful either.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t respond.
“This might not sound very good,” Gu Fei said. “But he probably already gave up, just
waiting to die now. If you must give money, then just give it to him directly. Let him do
whatever he wants with it, whether it’s food, alcohol, or gambling, at least he’ll enjoy it. But
don’t give it to him all at once, split it into installments of 2000 at a time.”
Jiang Cheng released a long dragged out sigh.
“Another thing, you must hand him this money in front of Li Hui and Li Qian. Li Qian is fine,
it’s mainly about Li Hui.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered, and closed his eyes again. “Got it.”

Gu Fei didn’t say anything else, just continued to knead his leg.
After a while, Jiang Cheng opened his eyes again, “Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Hug please,” Jiang Cheng said. “Why do I feel a little scared.”
“Coming,” Gu Fei smiled, lay down beside him, and reached over to pull him into a tight hug,
then caressed his head. “Rub-a-dub-dub, hush little cub.”
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
Gu Fei then picked up a tuft of his hair and smoothed it out, “Rock-rock-rock, hush little
cock.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng giggled. “Damn shameless.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6352
TL word count: 4520
TL time: ???
Edit: 0:42:10
Curse words: 7x fucks, 5x shits, 1x asses
TL’s Notes
I want art of them embracing under the evening tree shade T__T

First posted: December 20, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 65
“Can’t,” Gu Fei said. “I was wrong, Cheng-ge.”
Since Jiang Cheng started at Fourth High, this was the first time he didn’t finish his
homework.
He had written half of it during the self-study, and was planning to write the rest that
evening. But the Li Baoguo problem stressed him out, and completely put him out of the
homework mood. Not to mention, sitting there chatting idly on and off with Gu Fei, he
didn’t feel like moving at all.
It wasn’t until he reached for his phone and saw that it was almost 2 AM, that he reluctantly
sat up, “How is it so late already.”
“I won’t be able to get up tomorrow,” Gu Fei sat leaning against the headboard.
“You head to school on your own tomorrow when you get up, no need to wake me.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, “You haven’t been late at all lately, must’ve been really hard on
you.”
“What can I do, it’s not my fault my boyfriend is an overachiever.” Gu Fei said.
“Babee just suffers quietly on the inside, it’s not usually verbalized.”
“Get outta here,” Jiang Cheng got off the bed and opened his wardrobe. “Let’s sleep, you can
wear my pyjamas.”
“You only have that one lone pillow right?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng took out a set of pyjamas and tossed it to him. “You can take a blanket
and roll it up.”
“I’m not sleeping on that thing.” Gu Fei replied.
“Then you sleep on the pillow, and I’ll sleep on the blanket.” Jiang Cheng said.
“No.” Gu Fei said.
“You want me to smack you?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I want it to be the same height, can’t have one higher than the other.” Gu Fei said.
“What kind of bizarre rule is that.” Jiang Cheng threw the blanket on him. “You can make it
the same height yourself.”
“Alrighty!” Gu Fei stood up.
When Jiang Cheng came back to the bedroom after washing up, he discovered his lone
pillow had been moved to the desk. The spot at the head of the bed had been usurped by a
blanket shaped into a long roll.
“……What the shit?” Jiang Cheng was baffled.
“Now it’s the same height,” Gu Fei clapped his hands together. “A couple’s pillow…… Do you
have a toothbrush for me?”
Jiang Cheng took out a toothbrush from the drawers and handed it to him, then looked at
the bed again. If only he went ahead and bought a couple’s pillow that day. At the end of the
day he was still too innocent, when buying bedding he never thought to question how many
people will be sharing his bed.
“Why isn’t this toothbrush in its packaging,” Gu Fei waved the toothbrush in front of his
face. “Is it because Pan Zhi used it?”
“It was a set of two, after I opened it……” Jiang Cheng stopped halfway through, and
narrowed his eyes at him. “Yes you’re right it was used by Pan Zhi, it was too dear to throw
away.”
“That’s great,” Gu Fei said as he walked out the room. “So Pan Zhi, has a pretty good face,
and personality wise, is even better than you……”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He watched Gu Fei go into the bathroom, then walked over and
pulled the door shut.
“Trying to lock me in the bathroom?” Gu Fei said from the other side as he laughed. “Do you
overachievers all lack common sense, bathroom doors are usually locked from the inside.”
Jiang Cheng smirked, “You slackers really do have poor perception skills.”
Previously, this apartment was only occupied by the middle-aged landlady. And probably
for safety…… He reached out and flicked a tab on the bathroom door handle, locking the
door from the outside.
Gu Fei’s voice suddenly stopped. This was followed by the sound of him jiggling the
doorknob.
“There’s a whole world for you to explore.” Jiang Cheng said leaning by the door.
“The fuck?” Gu Fei knocked on the door as he continued to jiggle the doorknob.
“You can’t be serious, what is this behaviour, it’s the middle of the night.”
“A strike,” Jiang Cheng said. “For payback.”
“I was wrong.” Gu Fei said immediately.
“……What,” Jiang Cheng was amused. “Can you have a little more integrity please, don’t
forget you’re the Mini Tyrant of the Steel Works.”
“Can’t,” Gu Fei said. “I was wrong, Cheng-ge.”
“Can you please follow the script,” Jiang Cheng said. “At least act tough and threaten me a
little, and then beg for forgiveness?”
“Cheng-ge I was wrong,” Gu Fei leaned on the door and gently tapped on it over and over.
“Can you let me ouuut, I was wrong.”
“……Have some grit will you!” Jiang Cheng said.
“Will not,” Gu Fei continued to say in a pitiful tone. “I was wrong, I won’t get randomly
jealous again, please let me out Cheng-ge.”
“Wash up first, stop wasting time!” Jiang Cheng said. “Look at how late it is!”
“Oh.” Gu Fei answered.
Then came the sounds of his washing his face and brushing his teeth. Jiang Cheng went to
his room and came back with his phone.
“Cheng-ge,” After the water sounds stopped, Gu Fei’s voice reappeared behind the door,
still woefully pitiful. “Cheng-ge, are you out there?”
Jiang Cheng pressed record, and pressed his phone to the door, “Say that again.”
“Cheng-ge I was wrong.” Gu Fei said.
“The line before that, the really pitiful one.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng-ge are you ouuut there?” Gu Fei was very cooperative, he even
scratched the door a few times. “Can you let me out pleeease.”
“Let’s hear a little more of that begging, make it sincere.” Jiang Cheng held in his laughter.
“I’m begging you Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said in a small voice. “I won’t dare to do this again in the
future, I was wrong, please let me out.”
“Tell me, who are you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m Good Little Bunny.” Gu Fei said, still with the small voice.
The fact that a persona like the one Gu Fei usually put up, with a face as cold as a flower on
a high cliff that once dropped was enough to give one chills, could so naturally play cute
like this…… It deluded him into thinking that perhaps Gu
Fei had always been a delicate flower.
Jiang Cheng almost wanted to go and touch Good Little Bunny’s head to see if there really
was a little floret sticking out the top. After happily saving the recording to his phone, he
opened the bathroom door, “I’m telling you……”
He didn’t get to finish, when the door was suddenly yanked wide open by Gu Fei. Next, Jiang
Cheng felt like a gust of wind rushed out, and before he was able to react, he already
grabbed the phone out of his hand. Gu Fei then locked Jiang Cheng in his arms and bit down
hard on his neck, “You even made a recording?”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was a little stunned. Where was the promised Good Little Bunny?!
“Enjoying yourself aren’t you!” Gu Fei bit him again, then pushed him roughly into the
bedroom. “Cheng-ge!”
Jiang Cheng let out an amused giggle, “Shit, was I too careless?”
“Way too careless!” Gu Fei pushed again, and shoved him straight onto the bed.
He jumped onto Jiang Cheng, grabbed him, and started pelting him with kisses.
“The bunny’s desperate for some meat.”
“Get out!” Jiang Cheng felt for his leg and pinched it. “Damn it quit fooling around, it’s too
late. By the time we finish frolicking and clean up, you can forget about sleep tonight!”
“Roger that,” Gu Fei instantly released him and got up. He picked up the pyjamas, and said
as he started to change out of his clothes. “See, aren’t I great at turning it on and off at will.”
Jiang Cheng lay on the bed and couldn’t stop laughing…… until he couldn’t laugh anymore.
Once Gu Fei was stripped all the way down to his underwear, Jiang Cheng felt his breath
hitch.
But before he could get his visual fill, Gu Fei already pulled on the pyjama bottoms, so he
could only stare at the waist and back. This time he only got a few glimpses before Gu Fei
started to put the shirt on too.
“Wait.” Jiang Cheng reached out his Er-kang hand.
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked back, his hands paused in the middle of pulling his shirt down.
This exact position…… he simply could not deal. Jiang Cheng stared at the back of Gu Fei’s
waist — the only strip of shameless real estate on Gu Fei’s body aside from Gu Fei’s face
that was still exposed to his view.
“Don’t move.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei asked incredulously.
Jiang Cheng quickly pulled his hand back and felt below his nose. Fortunately, no
nosebleed. Next, he sprung up from the bed and threw himself around Gu Fei, biting down
on his waist.
“AHH——” Gu Fei howled, and tried tugging on Jiang Cheng’s hair but wasn’t able to pull
his head away, so he resorted to grabbing his shoulders and forcing it back. “Jiang Cheng
did you ingest some fucking acid that burned down your brain or something!”
Jiang Cheng ignored him and continued biting. His hand slid down, pulled down Gu Fei’s
pants, and grabbed hold.
“I……” Gu Fei’s body immediately tensed, his grip on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder also tightened.
His other hand braced against the desk for balance. “Didn’t you say yourself that it’s too late
and that after…… we still have to……”
Gu Fei tilted his head back, sucked in a breath, and didn’t end up finishing the rest of the
sentence.
Jiang Cheng pulled him backward, and the two of them fell onto the bed with two hard
thumps.
Jiang Cheng even took a second in the midst of the shameless activity to reflect on the
audible impact. He figured the bed was bound to collapse sooner or later.
The hard-working citizens of this neighbourhood were more industrious than the residents
around Li Baoguo’s home. They were earlier risers, and with louder voices too. If there
were no special circumstances, Jiang Cheng rarely overslept.
And yet, he overslept that day. After all, a bad-mood-induced late night conversation with
his boyfriend followed by a most enthusiastic and energetic handshake certainly counted
as a very special circumstance.
Which was why when he opened his eyes and felt for his phone to check the time, he saw
that it was almost the end of the first period.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng tossed his phone aside and closed his eyes. Late…… So he was late, oh
well. It would be a little time-off for himself.
After another few minutes spent in a half-awake daze, he reached back to feel around,
when his hand touched Gu Fei’s butt.
Gu Fei didn’t move, likely still sound asleep.
Although…… Jiang Cheng propped himself up and glanced behind. He
remembered when they fell asleep the night before, Gu Fei was wrapped around him in the
so-called most popular spooning position. And yet when he woke up in the morning, the
dude had his back to him.
Tsk.
Not sweet at all.
Jiang Cheng grabbed his shirt and haphazardly threw it on before getting out of bed. He
leaned close to look at Gu Fei again. To be honest, he had seen Gu Fei in his various
different states, but he didn’t really have a chance to see Gu Fei when he was asleep, the
way he was right then.
Gu Fei was a rather solid sleeper, even his sideways position was very on point.
Half of his face was buried beneath the covers, and his eyelashes rested quietly on his
cheeks. Jiang Cheng watched for a while, and couldn’t resist the urge to reach out and touch
his eyelashes.
Gu Fei’s eyelid quivered, and Jiang Cheng drew his hand back. A few seconds later he
reached over and touched it again.
“Imma smack you.” Gu Fei said with his eyes closed and still buried within the covers, his
voice was heavy with the dregs of sleep.
“Crap,” Jiang Cheng grinned. “You’re awake?”
“You sir are so handsy, as if I even had a choice.” Gu Fei opened his eyes.
“Staring at me first thing in the morning, did you notice any eye goop?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a second, and immediately took a few steps back and
rubbed his eyes. “Do I have any?”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei said. “I didn’t get a chance to look.”
“Are you getting up? It’s almost the end of the first period.” Jiang Cheng said as he started
putting on his pants. “Why do you sleep with your back to me?”
“Ayy…” Gu Fei turned over to lie flat on his back. “I was going to hold you, but you’re real
fucking eccentric when you’re asleep. As soon as I reached over, you immediately gave me
an elbow, almost broke my ribs. It’s a wonder I didn’t move to the sofa.”
“No way?” Jiang Cheng blinked. “But I wasn’t like that the last time I slept at your place.”
“No shit,” Gu Fei sighed. “I didn’t touch you back then, did I. And you were ready to fight me
just for climbing over you.”
“…… Come on come here, let Cheng-ge massage it for you.” Jiang Cheng
reached out and touched Gu Fei’s flank.
Gu Fei stretched out on the bed, “You go on first. If we’re late to school at the same time,
then show up at the same time, you wanna bet the forum will implode today.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “You’re enjoying this huh? Look, the forum imploded because
of me, and I, am the drop-dead freestyle_handsome; I, am also the dashing
hotness_overload.”
“Dumbass.” Gu Fei laughed.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t been in the best mood the night before, but it was soothed after the
physical activity, and continued to rise when he saw Gu Fei after he woke up in the
morning. As he walked out the door, he thought of Li Baoguo again, and his mood suddenly
dropped. He quickly took out his phone and pulled up Gu Fei’s photo to take a hit……
Jiang Cheng wrote his name down on the late register at the security guard’s post.
“Jiang Cheng ah,” The guard took a look at him. “Top of the grade and you’re late?”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng answered. “Top of the grade also has days when he can’t wake up.”
He entered the classroom just as the bell rang for the second period. Jiang Cheng sat down
at his seat in the very last row. As his butt touched the chair, Zhou Jing turned around,
“You’re a whole period late?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng said. “Great mathing there.”
“You’re late?” Zhou Jing continued.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng took out his books. “I skip class too.”
Zhou Jing continued on, “You……”
“Shhh,” Jiang Cheng put a finger. “Shut up or I’ll smack you.”
Zhou Jing tsked unhappily and turned around. Then turned back not two seconds later,
“Hey Jiang……”
Jiang Cheng reached over and flicked his head hard.
“Ah!” Zhou Jing covered his head. “Damn it, so vicious! I was just asking if there are
mosquitos already!”
Jiang Cheng looked at him, not quite understanding what he was talking about.
“Your neck.” Zhou Jing pointed.
Neck.
What Jiang Cheng felt at this moment was an urge to leap up and silence Zhou Jing on the
spot, permanently.
He didn’t even need to touch or see or think about it, just hearing the word was enough for
him to understand what Zhou Jing saw!
It was Gu Fei’s bite from the night before!
He fucking bit him right on the neck!
The dog-fucking bastard bit pretty hard too!
It must’ve left a teeth mark!
And due to his muddled mental state this morning, he didn’t even get to carefully inspect
his own handsome face and handsome neck!
Oh fuck!
“I guess.” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s only May……” Zhou Jing rubbed his head as he turned around, all the while still
mumbling to himself. “Does your family keep a lot of flowers and plants or something……”
Fortunately the second period is Lao-Lu’s class. He bellowed out as soon as he walked to
the lectern, “ARE YOU ALL AWAKE YET!”
Jiang Cheng could feel a whole bunch of lowered heads around him lift up at the same time.
Zhou Jing’s memory was naturally also jumbled by the booming noise, and he let go of the
mosquito bite.
“COMMENCING CLASS!” Lao-Lu roared out.
Jiang Cheng put his head down, took out his phone, and quickly turned on the front-facing
camera. He pretended to be playing on his phone, and pointed the camera toward his neck.
Fuck.
There really were two obvious red dots left behind by Gu Fei’s fangs. The only consolation
was that the round imprint had faded somewhat after a night’s rest, one couldn’t tell it was
a ring of teeth mark unless they leaned in close.
He took a photo of his neck and sent it to Gu Fei.
– look what you fucking did!
Gu Fei replied very quickly.
– you have such a beautiful neck, boyfriend!
– get out!!!!!
– I have band-aids in my desk drawer, you can stick some on it
Jiang Cheng put down his phone, and reached into Gu Fei’s drawer, and found a box of
band-aids. He took out two, and while everyone around him was in a state of shock from
Lao-Lu’s yelling, quickly opened them and stuck them onto the teeth mark.
He picked up his phone and checked again, making sure there were no other mosquito
bites, and finally let out a breath of relief.
All the way until the end of third period, Gu Fei still hadn’t come to school.
Jiang Cheng was just about to send him a message to ask if he’d gotten out of bed yet, when
he heard girls screaming on the walkway outside.
“My god I’m going crazy, is he crazy?!”
“I think it looks really good, aaaaahhh it looks so cool! Don’t you think it’s cool!”
“Ahhh but I like the way he looked before!”
“It’s not like his face is ruined, I think the way it looks pretty awesome the way it is
now……”
Jiang Cheng turned and saw a row of girls leaning over the railings looking down.
“Who are they looking at?” Wang Xu was beside him. “What kinda cool person could this
school possibly have, bunch of ignorant fools.”
“I’ll go see,” Zhou Jing eagerly got up and walked out of the classroom. He leaned over the
railing to look, then immediately whipped his head around. “Oh shit, Gu Fei!”
“What about him?” Wang Xu blinked.
“He shaved his head bald,” Zhou Jing said, then took another look. When he turned around
he couldn’t stop laughing. “He’s standing on the field talking to Lao-Xu right now.”
“Oh crap let me see,” Wang Xu immediately squeezed by behind Jiang Cheng.
“Don’t we have school rules that say we’re not allowed to shave our heads bald……”
“We have school rules?” Zhou Jing’s deskmate said, bewildered.
Gu Fei’s hair… shaved off just like that. Gu Fei didn’t even mention it this morning when he
left. Jiang Cheng sat unmoving on the chair, his insides were a little jumbled.
It didn’t matter to him whether Gu Fei shaved his head or not. Based on Gu Fei’s
attractiveness, as long as it wasn’t male pattern baldness on his crown, he could pull off just
about any hairstyle.
But the fact that Gu Fei was suddenly a baldy still left him in shock. Though after the shock
he also wanted to laugh.
He very much wanted to follow the crowd and lean over the railing to take a look, but the
anxiety of being discovered overruled that desire. He ultimately decided to stay in his seat.
Gu Fei was going to come up in a while anyway. Not only could he look, he could even
touch, and kiss……
He wondered how it would feel to kiss it.
After a few minutes, when the bell rang for the next period, Gu Fei rolled in from the front
door of the classroom with a baseball cap on his head.
There was a chorus of whistling and desk-banging right as he stepped in, mixed in there
were barely suppressed screams from the girls.
Gu Fei slowly ambled up to Jiang Cheng’s side and sat down, his face blank.
Jiang Cheng also kept his face blank. He could see a dark fuz showing from the edge of Gu
Fei’s hat. Technically, he didn’t shave it off completely, it stayed very close to the scalp, but
visually it had the same impact as a clean shaved head.
“Gu Fei,” Zhou Jing bumped their desk, and turned around. “Hey Gu Fei, Gu……”
Gu Fei pointed a finger at him. He stopped, then two seconds later continued,
“Take off the hat so we can see, did you shave it all off?! What did Lao-Xu say?”
“Go away.” Gu Fei answered simply.
Zhou Jing tsked disappointedly and turned back around.
Beside him, Gu Fei cleared his throat. Jiang Cheng twisted around to look at
him.
Gu Fei also turned and looked back at Jiang Cheng. The two of them stared blankly at each
for a long time, then Gu Fei asked quietly, “What do you think.”
Jiang Cheng collapsed on the desk with his face down, and burst out in laughter, he was
practically coughing from laughing too hard.
“Wait,” Gu Fei also hunched over the desk. “Is it that funny?”
“Dunno,” It took Jiang Cheng a while to calm down. “You didn’t say you were going to shave
your head this morning.”
“I said yesterday that I was going to shave my head.” Gu Fei said.
“A man of his words.” Jiang Cheng looked around, and detected quite a number of gazes
directed this way. “Ayy, I was gonna ask you to take off the hat so I can see.”
“You want to see?” Gu Fei touched the brim.
Immediately there was a low level of commotion around them. Jiang Cheng shook his head,
“Forget it, they’re all waiting to see.”
“It looks pretty good.” Gu Fei said.
“Then don’t take it off,” Jiang Cheng said in a low voice. “Let me take my time to appreciate
it when we get back.”
Gu Fei quirked a smile, “I think Er-Miao is going to touch it for at least half an hour tonight.”
“Why did you decide to shave it off?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly. “Wasn’t it fine the way it
was.”
“That design,” Gu Fei took out his phone, slumped over his desk, and swiped at it. “Didn’t
want to keep it anymore.”
“I never asked you,” Jiang Cheng considered for a second. “That music note you had, was it a
set with the one on Ding Zhuxin’s ear?”
“……Something like that, we got it together.” Gu Fei said hesitantly. “It’s been a pretty long
time, just never changed it.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “When you were in a band together?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded, then gave him a look. “You’re actually……”
“What?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not jelly?” Gu Fei said.
“Huh,” Jiang Cheng blinked. “Oh shit, I forgot.”
Gu Fei giggled at his phone screen.
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly and didn’t say anything.
When it came to jealousy, he simply blinked and forgot to be jealous. It could be because at
this point in their relationship, with everything he felt when he was with Gu Fei, there
simply wasn’t room for jealousy.
But once he remembered it, he felt like he might as well not let the jelly go to waste.
Even though it wasn’t a couple thing, it was still a unique connection between Gu Fei and
Ding Zhuxin. When he thought of it that way, Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little peeved in
the same manner as “even Lao-Xu knew you drink tea but I don’t”.
A couple thing.
It was frankly kind of childish. He’d always thought these things were silly and only
enjoyed by people in grade school. But now…… he peeked at Gu Fei. He felt a strong urge to
leave his mark somewhere on Gu Fei’s body.
Tsk tsk.
By an overachiever’s logical analysis, what he was feeling at the moment was known as the
intense possessiveness that arose as a result of liking someone too much.
Footnotes:
nil. (:3∠) but this is relevant:
READ SAYE FOR THIS CUTENESS #saye #撒野
pic.twitter.com/rDh269EPeZ
— moved (@godxieIian) June 27, 2020
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6353
TL word count: 4090
TL time: 5:59:28

Edit: 1:06:20
Curse words: 9x fucks, 6x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes
HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!
░M░e░r░r░y░ ░C░h░r░i░s░t░m░a░s░

First posted: December 24, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 66
Jiang Cheng had this quality, Gu Fei thought. But he himself might not.
For several consecutive days, the attention of everyone in the Liberal Arts building of
Fourth High was focused on Gu Fei’s head. But the only reason it was the Liberal Arts
building, was because that was about the extent of Jiang Cheng’s radius of activity. He only
ever left the building to go to the washroom, so he rarely passed by anywhere else. [1]
There was a lot of commotion on the forum as well, it was bustling with all sorts of showing
off of sneakily taken photos. However, aside from the other day when someone snuck a
photo of Gu Fei when Lao-Xu forcibly took off his hat to inspect, since then nobody else had
gotten a shot of the full view of Gu Fei’s head.
Only Jiang Cheng got to appreciate the full view. Not only could he observe, but he could
observe in detail. Not only could he observe in detail, he could even reach out and touch it
whenever he had a chance.
“I just want to know if you’re ever going to continue your homework?” Gu Fei was sitting at
the edge of the bed, looking at Jiang Cheng with his right hand around a pencil writing, and
his left hand on Gu Fei’s head. “Didn’t you say we’re going out to get snacks after you’re
done.”
“Relax,” Jiang Cheng said. “As long as you don’t disturb me, I’ll be done in a jiffy. These
homework assignments from the Fourth High, it’s just about hard enough to shoo away a
beggar.”
“Don’t you still have to write the other set from the old Affiliated High.” Gu Fei said.
“I can work on that tonight, and during the self-study period.” Jiang Cheng kept stroking Gu
Fei’s head with his fingers. “Hey it’s only been two, maybe three days, and it’s already
prickly.”
“What did you think,” Gu Fei didn’t bother resisting further, and put his head down to play
with his phone. “It’ll grow faster if you stop touching it all the time, I’m starting to worry
you’re gonna make me bald.”
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng turned to him. “Do you hate it when people touch your head?”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei said. “Nobody really dares to touch my head, other than you and Gu Er-
Miao.”
“I’m the boyfriend after all, gotta have certain special privileges.” Jiang Cheng smiled, then
turned around, held Gu Fei’s head, and planted a kiss on the very top. “Too bad you don’t
take off your hat, otherwise I’d chomp out a teeth mark on here for sure.”
“The one on my waist just faded.” Gu Fei said.
“The one on my neck also just faced.” Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue.
A couples teeth mark…… Jiang Cheng had given it more than a little thought.
He even considered getting matching teeth mark tattoos, but never spoke it out loud to Gu
Fei. He figured it was a little silly, and too much like a teenage girl antic.
Not to mention the thing occupying his mind even more at the moment, was his upcoming
birthday.
He wondered how he should spend his birthday. Both he and Gu Fei’s birthdays are during
Summer break, one at the beginning and one near the end. They could combine the two and
celebrate it together, to force the born on the same day of the same month of the same year
trope.
Ever since he was little, his birthdays had been rather joyless. He was always forced to stay
home on the day of, and his classmates were never invited to his home, because it would be
too rowdy. If he wanted to go out with friends, it could only be before or after his birthday.
But even though his parents insisted on celebrating it at home, there was never anything
special either. It was always just a family gathering to have a bowl of noodles. They
wouldn’t even buy a cake, because these kinds of sweet foods were not good for you.
After that would be all sorts of reflecting on the past and looking to the future.
Mom and dad would point out all the insufficiencies of the past year, and bring up
expectations for the next. Even job reviews would have a segment for positive affirmations,
but even on his birthday, Jiang Cheng had never once received any kind of affirmation.
There was always something inadequate, insufficient, and improper; he always needed to
improve, needed to progress, needed to work harder…… Every time, he felt like he had to
repress his emotions. Every year on his birthday he would feel irritation in every cell of his
body, and feel annoyed by anything and everything. Almost every year, he would have a
giant fight with his family on his birthday.
He wondered if there were anyone else like him, who through the process of being
continuously put down, developed a whole body of thorns.
This was the very first birthday ever that he could decide for himself. It was the first time
he could confront this day head-on with such ease and lightness.
Despite the very direct connection it now had with Li Baoguo, he didn’t mind.
Only, he still felt a little down whenever he thought about Li Baoguo.
He wasn’t very aware of the situation on Li Baoguo’s side, only that since leaving the
hospital that day, Li Baoguo never went back to the hospital again.
Instead, he’d gone twice to the community clinic to pick up some cough medicine.
It wasn’t until half a month later that Jiang Cheng finally got a call from Li Baoguo again.
“Your brother and your sister are both coming over tonight,” Li Baoguo said.
“Didn’t you say to call them here.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng stood on the walkway, looking at the students on the field.
“I’ll come over after school.”
“Eat something before you come, I haven’t made any food.” Li Baoguo said.
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng replied. When Li Baoguo spoke, his voice was still very loud, but it
clearly didn’t boom as it once did.
Jiang Cheng felt a little lost after he hung up the phone, like he was floating in mid-air with
nothing to grab onto.
There was no love lost between him and Li Baoguo, much less any father-son sentiments.
But seeing this person growing quickly and noticeably weaker in the last half year, and
knowing that he might very soon disappear entirely, still made him oddly unsettled.
“That was Li Baoguo?” Gu Fei came to stand next to him, and they looked out onto the field
together.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng pocketed his phone. “He said Li Hui and Li Qian are coming over
tonight, told me to drop by.”
“Don’t get into any conflicts with Li Hui, just state your stance, that’s all. You don’t have to
worry about what he wants to do,” Gu Fei said. “People like him, they’re somewhat of a
local specialty unique to these parts, just all kinds of unsavoury.”
“Got it,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “The way you worry, how unlike a 17 year-old.”
“I’ve fully ripened a long time ago.” Gu Fei said.
“Really?” Jiang Cheng peered at him sideways.
“Uh huh,” After thinking about it for a moment, Gu Fei also smiled. “Just think of yourself as
the magical de-aging pill.”
“Ay……” Jiang Cheng stared at him for a long while, before saying quietly.
“Sometimes I really want to just grab you and knead you, and ruffle you up.
Sometimes I even want to grab a random person off the street and tell them, you know Gu
Fei? Did you know that he’s not what he seems? Ha, ha, ha, ha, I’m the only one who really
sees!”
Gu Fei looked back at him, and after a pause, bowed his head and started laughing.
“What the hell you laughing at?” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“To be honest, I kinda wanna do that too.” Gu Fei turned to him and said while laughing.
“Nobody knows what the top of the grade is like in private, only I know.”
“And at the same time I…… can’t really explain it, I’m just a little bothered that other people
only know you as some badass head honcho, when you’re clearly so excellent…… Am I
being kind of childish?” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I really wasn’t like this before, you must
remember that.”
Clearly so excellent.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else.
It must be similar to the pride Gu Fei felt whenever he saw something extraordinary in
Jiang Cheng. Jiang Cheng likely felt the same for him, even though Jiang Cheng didn’t know
that he wasn’t keen about letting other people in on it.
He couldn’t let Jiang Cheng understand what he was thinking, but he could sympathize with
how Jiang Cheng felt.
This handsome overachiever whose smugness was so through the roof that he saw
everyone else as dumbasses: Only I know what he’s truly like beneath this facade. The real
him was so clean that it was silly. A quick temper yes, but as long as you smoothed out his
feathers there would be no temper at all……
But at times, he didn’t want to think too much into it. The more he saw, the more he felt, the
more he could feel the distance grow.
And the more he felt that a person like this shouldn’t be relegated to glowing in the mud. He
shouldn’t have been in the mud in the first place.
Gu Fei watched the smile that played at the corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth and in his eyes.
Only when he was looking at this smile could he briefly toss aside those other thoughts.
He should be more like Jiang Cheng, he thought, and stop worrying so much. I like you. I
want to be with you. That should be enough. And as to what happens
after, well, after is not here yet.
If ever comes a day, when ‘after’ becomes the ‘now’, still I will have nothing to fear. As long as I
keep walking forward, there is nothing that can stop me.
Jiang Cheng had this quality, Gu Fei thought. But he himself might not.
In spite of all that, he was still willing to jump in, and live like Jiang Cheng for a while.
Perhaps when that day comes, and Jiang Cheng leaves, everything would slowly fade away.
But at least he wouldn’t feel regret, that he didn’t hold on tightly to Jiang Cheng’s hand once
upon a time.
“I’ll give him 2000 today, to start.” Jiang Cheng said as they retrieved their bikes after
school. “I won’t bring up the hospital or the treatment anymore either, just say that it’s
spending money for him.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Treat me to a bowl of cold noodles,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “I have a craving.”
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei got on his bike.
The weather was growing warmer day by day. Even though the real Summer had not yet
arrived, it was already the season when any casual movement would be enough to generate
sweat. Cold noodles would be most satisfying at this time.
“Tomorrow afternoon,” Jiang Cheng said. “Let’s go play a game with He Zhou.”
“He hasn’t given up on dragging you into the school team?” Gu Fei sighed.
“He gave up,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “This time it’s a rehearsal game with the technical college.
He Zhou’s always wanted to team up with us for a game, he’s brought it up countless
times.”
“You go ahead then,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll…… sit out.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him. “If you’re not gonna play, there’s no point of me
going by myself.”
“I’ll go watch you, I really don’t want to play.” Gu Fei smiled.
He never used to participate in school events, the last basketball tournament was already
an exception. He didn’t actually wish to integrate into the student body, he had his own
established rhythm and way of living. Letting Jiang Cheng into his life was already a
completely unforeseen change.
However, certain resolves must be kept utterly unchanged, bound, and in deep slumber, in
order to stay resolute.
Jiang Cheng didn’t mention playing basketball with him again. His mind was probably still
occupied with Li Baoguo’s problem, and not really in the mood.
Gu Fei went with him to withdraw money and watched as he put it in an envelope. They
then went together to have some cold noodles.
As they walked to the intersection together, Jiang Cheng looked at him, “Will you be at the
store tonight or will you be home?”
“I’m going home today,” Gu Fei said. “I have to work on Gu Miao before Summer break
starts, gotta get her to agree to the therapy.”
“She’s not willing to go to therapy?” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“It’s not that she doesn’t want therapy, more like she doesn’t understand what it is.” Gu Fei
said. “She’s just reluctant to go to places she’s not familiar with, I have to communicate with
her in advance.”
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I’ll come with.”
“What,” Gu Fei looked at him. “To experience life?”
“I just want to see.” Jiang Cheng said.
I don’t even know her as well as Li Yan.
Gu Fei felt like laughing when he remembered those words. Jiang Cheng really was
adorable when he was like that.
“Then I’ll bring you along.” He said.
“Also……” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a second, then waved his hand.
“Nothing. I’m going to Li Baoguo’s now. I’ll call you when it’s done.”
Jiang Cheng walked for a stretch toward Li Baoguo’s street, then turned around.
Gu Fei was still on his bike with one foot on the ground, looking this way. To show that he
wasn’t reluctantly seeing him home, Gu Fei even pulled out a cigarette to put in his mouth
as Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“Dumbass.” Jiang Cheng giggled. He wasn’t watching the road as he tripped on who-knows-
what on the ground, and stumbled as he tried to keep from falling.
He tsked. “Everyone must’ve realized by now, that recently, contestant Jiang Cheng’s has
been acting a little different…… His effortless poise hasn’t been very well maintained. Even
though he shouldn’t have any idol’s baggage to begin with……”
Before he finished, when he was still more than 10 meters away from the stairwell to Li
Baoguo’s place, he already heard the loud bellowing of Li Baoguo’s voice.
Li Baoguo had sounded weak on the phone that afternoon, therefore at this moment, it
must’ve been the sighting of the long absent Li Hui that stimulated him to a sudden burst of
energy.
Jiang Cheng sucked in a breath, and slowed his pace as he adjusted his mindset.
He tried hard to reassure himself. Do not argue. Do not get angry. Do not get annoyed. Just
give the money, that’s all.
“Oyy, that youngest son of his is back too……” An auntie said excitedly out of a second floor
kitchen window.
This kind of people who took pleasure in gawking at other people’s business and saw it as
their main form of leisurely activity, was a bizarre phenomenon in and of itself.
And despite the fact that both were ‘watching from the sidelines’, even without the
boyfriend-tinted lenses…… Gu Fei watched with such airy nonchalance, while these people
watched in such crude ways.
“If you’re done filling up your stomach then go pick your teeth,” Jiang Cheng said to the
second floor window. “Finish chewing those leftover scraps in your mouth first before you
get all up in other people’s business.”
The auntie on the second floor froze for a few seconds, before letting out an
“OYY——”
After that she must’ve been at a loss for words again, and didn’t continue making any other
sounds.
Jiang Cheng didn’t bother waiting around to see what else came out, and walked into the
stairwell.
The door to Li Baoguo’s unit was open. No wonder he could hear him from far away. He
was about to close the door after he walked in, but after getting a whiff of the smells in the
apartment, he hesitated.
Smoke filled the room. Li Baoguo and Li Hui both had cigarettes in their mouths. Judging by
their stance, they had already finished who knew how many smokes. Jiang Cheng was a
smoker himself, but even breathing the smell at this moment made him want to rage.
“With your health like this, at least try to smoke a little less.” Jiang Cheng glanced at Li
Baoguo. “Doesn’t it feel bad when you cough?”
“I’m not even afraid of death, you think I’m afraid of some discomfort?” Li Baoguo started
laughing, then accompanied the laughter with coughs.
“Let’s talk about the issue at hand.” Li Hui sat on the side, looking at him with an expression
of annoyance. “Now, don’t you have a big face, one word and we
all have to gather at your behest.”
“Right now……” Jiang Cheng looked at Li Baoguo. He couldn’t bring himself to properly
address Li Baoguo out loud, so he mumbled over it. “His condition, he’s unwilling to go to
the hospital……”
“I told you!” Li Baoguo cut him off. “I said I’m not going to the hospital! If you guys have any
conscience at all, you’ll give me the money you were going to give the hospital!”
“And let you use it on gambling?” Li Hui smirked.
“You shut it with your wise-assery,” Li Baoguo glared at him. “You didn’t spend a single cent
when I was in the hospital! It was all paid for by your sister!”
“Then go admit yourself to the hospital right now!” Li Hui said.
“I’ll go if you put up the money.” It was Li Baoguo’s turn to smirk. “You swam out of your
old man’s dick, I watched you grow up. You think I don’t know what brand of shit you are?”
Li Hui threw his half finished cigarette on the ground and started walking toward Li
Baoguo.
Li Qian had been sitting silently on the side, but now she immediately stood up as well,
“Ge……”
“You can stop fucking pretending to be a do-gooder,” Li Hui shoved her to the side and
jabbed a finger at her. “You put up the money if you have so much of it!”
Li Hui was about to continue forward, when Jiang Cheng stood in front of him.
“What do you want!” Li Hui glowered at him. “Wanna throw hands with me?
How many days have you been in this home, how fucking dare you?”
Jiang Cheng felt like his temper had improved a lot in these last few months, nor was he
covered in thorns all the time as he once was. Perhaps it was like Lao-Yuan said, in a new
environment, his temper was no longer “completely uninhibited”. Plus, without the
constant put-down, he was no longer anxious and unsettled all the time.
But now, when he was here with his real ‘family’, when he was face to face with the older
brother who was connected to him by blood, he felt the self that had been long absent
stirring once again.
The look on Jiang Cheng’s face and the look in his eyes must not have been cordial by any
measure. After Li Hui maintained eye contact with him for two seconds, his fighting spirit
was very clearly diminished.
“I don’t throw hands with just anyone,” Jiang Cheng’s voice was cold. “You’re not even
remotely within reach.”
“I’m within reach,” Li Baoguo suddenly started laughing behind him. He coughed more as
he laughed. “We even fought.”
“I’m just stating my intent,” Jiang Cheng didn’t pay attention to Li Baoguo as he continued
staring at Li Hui. “I don’t care whether or not he wants to go to the hospital anymore. I
called you here today only to say that……”
If he keeps living like this, he won’t be living for very much longer. Before he dies, he can do
whatever the hell he wants. Whether it be gambling or whatever else, it’s only a matter of
months.
Jiang Cheng very much wanted to be blunt with his words, but at the end, he couldn’t
manage to get it out. All he did was take out the envelope, and reached back to hand it to Li
Baoguo, “There’s 2000 yuan in here, take this for now. If you want to get some medicine
with this then go, and if not, that’s also up to you.”
“Oyy!” Li Baoguo opened the envelope and peered inside, then pulled the bills out. He
waved the stack in his hands as it ruffled. “Looky here! Look at this!”
“Try to control yourself too,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “It’s not like I can just
spontaneously come up with the money at any point.”
“Look at this! Look!” Li Baoguo didn’t stop repeating the words, as though he couldn’t hear
him.
“Then I’ll also……” Li Qian understood his intention, and counted out some bills from her
bag, handing them to Li Baoguo. “Dad, you can take this first, but it’s still better if you go to
the hospital……”
“Look at this! Look at this!” Li Baoguo was still repeating loudly.
“What are you sticking up for?!” Li Hui suddenly roared at Li Qian. “What the hell are you
pretending to be a hotshot for! You’re the only high and mighty one, huh!”
Li Qian shuddered at his sudden yelling, cowered a little to the side, and didn’t make
another sound.
“If you got so much money why don’t you buy a house for your dad!” Li Hui continued to
yell. “If you got so much money why don’t you fix your own daughter’s squinty eyes!”
“But nobody is forcing you to put up the money if you don’t want to!” Li Qian said with a
tremor in her voice.
Before Jiang Cheng had time to react, with a wave of his hand Li Hui suddenly landed a slap
on Li Qian’s face, “DID I FUCKING SAY YOU CAN TALK!”
Gu Fei had reminded him before, and Jiang Cheng himself also wanted to bear it down and
leave immediately after he handed over the money. But never did he imagine that Li Hui
could do something like this.
After the initial shock wore off, all Jiang Cheng could feel was the rage rising all the way
from the bottom of his feet. All the repression and resignation he’d felt toward this family
exploded in a single instant.
He swung a fist straight toward Li Hui’s face, it landed right on the bridge of his nose.
Li Hui stumbled back and sat down on a nearby stool, then swayed again, almost falling to
the ground.
Jiang Cheng watched him without a word.
Just as Li Hui covered his nose and stood up, Li Qian rushed over and pushed Jiang Cheng
toward the door, “Why don’t you go now, Xiao-Cheng, go on.”
Jiang Cheng turned around and walked out with big strides.
Li Qian followed and ran after him. He turned around to look at Li Qian.
“Where did you get the money?” Li Qian said. “Your old family gave it to you right?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
Li Qian took out her wallet, “You’re still a student, and not making any money.
Let me make it up, you don’t have to put up money. Dad…… isn’t able to spend very much
anyway, I’ll just give him some.”
“No, it’s not necessary.” Jiang Cheng was suddenly bewildered as he backed up.
“Don’t……”
“It’s alright,” Li Qian smiled. “I never even thought you’d be able to come up with anything.
You’re still in school, it’s not appropriate for you to put up money.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what he should say. As soon as the breath he was holding had
been released, he suddenly descended into awkwardness. At the end, all he could do was
turn and run away.
He didn’t hear what else Li Qian said behind him, just ran all the way to the intersection.
After catching his breath, he pulled out his phone to call Gu Fei.
He heard a whistle behind him as soon he unlocked the screen.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng turned around. “I’m feeling pretty shocked and honoured right
now, were you waiting for me again?”
“Stop being shocked,” Gu Fei slowly glided over on his bike with a smile on his face. “I was
coming out to wait for Li Yan. He’s bringing Er-Miao some snacks on his way home.”
“Why wouldn’t you wait for me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei opened his mouth, but no words came out.
“It’s enough that you weren’t waiting for me, but you came out here to wait for Li Yan?”
Jiang Cheng continued.
“I…… fuck,” Gu Fei looked at him, a little speechless. “This is some next level overachiever
logic huh?”
Jiang Cheng glowered at him for a while, then giggled, “Do you yield.”
“How about I just kneel down.” Gu Fei laughed and said.
Jiang Cheng held onto the handlebar, and looked at Gu Fei. Seeing Gu Fei’s face after that
clusterfuck of nonsense, he suddenly felt his mind empty, and his whole body felt lighter.
Never had anyone given him this kind of feeling before. He felt high.
“Let’s go get a tattoo.” Jiang Cheng said out of nowhere.
“What?” Gu Fei blanked.
“As in, I make a teeth mark, and you make a teeth mark. Then we’ll make a tattoo of it, one
each.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei didn’t speak for a long time, like he didn’t understand what Jiang Cheng said, but
also like he was spacing out. Just as Jiang Cheng was about to open his mouth again to
explain, Gu Fei finally nodded, “Alright.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him and frowned, “Do you…… not want to?”
Footnotes:
[1]: Most high school students in China are sorted into two main streams: Liberal Arts, and
Sciences. Once you’re sorted, all of your classes are spent

pretty much in the same building, with the same people nearby. It’s never been mentioned
explicitly, but clearly Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei are in the Liberal Arts stream (which is also
considered the easier stream). ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6045
TL word count: 4318
TL time: ?
Edit: 0:50:30
Curse words: ?
TL’s Notes
░H a p p y N e w Y e a r ! ! ! ░

First posted: December 31, 2020

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 67
We overachievers are unreasonable like that.
“Nah.” Gu Fei quickly answered.
He wasn’t unwilling, despite thinking that the act of leaving a teeth-mark on the other’s
skin and getting a tattoo of it doesn’t sound like something Jiang Cheng would do. But if
Jiang Cheng wanted to, he had no problem with it.
It’s just that…… Tattoos aren’t like other things, it’s leaving someone else’s mark on one’s
own body. Even if it can be removed in the future, it won’t be completely without a trace.
Perhaps Jiang Cheng simply never considered this point: if there comes a day that they are
separated, and no longer a couple, what should be done about this mark.
That a brief period of time that only existed in your past would leave a permanent mark on
your body. Perhaps Jiang Cheng never thought about this kind of thing.
“Then how come you had to mull over it for so long?” Jiang Cheng looked fixedly at him.
“I’m just thinking……” Gu Fei hesitated for a moment. “If it might be a little silly.”
“It’s not like I’m going to bite your face, it’ll be somewhere other people can’t see,
somewhere only we can……” Jiang Cheng stopped halfway through,
knitted his brows and thought for a long time, then laughed. “It does seem a little silly.”
Gu Fei laughed and didn’t reply.
“Oh well, if it’s silly then so be it.” Jiang Cheng waved his hand. “Frankly I would never do
something like this in the past, it’s just…… being with you, the dumbassery must be
contagious.”
“You got the guts to say that, me, contagious?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Of course,” Jiang Cheng stuffed his hands in his pocket. “Forget it, let’s think of something
else, something that’s not so silly. The teeth-mark idea was just a whim.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“I just wanted to leave something of myself on you, as a mark.” Jiang Cheng said.
“How about you just pee on my leg.” Gu Fei said.
“……Get out!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
Someone sounded a car horn across the street. Jiang Cheng followed the sound with his
eyes, a motorcycle made a u-turn and stopped beside them.
After the helmet came off, he realized this person was Li Yan.
“Last time Er-Miao seemed to be digging into these cookies, I guessed she must like them.”
Li Yan handed Gu Fei a bag that was hanging from the handlebar.
“There’s some other stuff too, if she doesn’t like it then you two can eat it.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei accepted the bag and peeked inside. “That’s a lot.”
“There are two boxes of durian puffs in there, one for each of you.” Li Yan looked at Jiang
Cheng. “You probably never had it before, it’s super-duper-inimitably-sommersaulting-
backflipping-cartwheeling delicious.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng almost didn’t understand what he said.
“It’s just this store’s way too far, I have to mentally prepare a few days in advance every
time I make a trip out there. But every time I go, I bring some back for them,” Li Yan said.
“So this time I brought it for you too, give it a try.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng felt a little hungry all of a sudden, so he took the box out of the
bag and ate one right then.
“How is it?” Li Yan asked immediately.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. It was indeed delicious. He felt the layers flaking off as soon as
it entered his mouth, it was soft and delectable. “It’s spinning-gliding-Thomas-salto-
floorwork good.”
Li Yan left after a brief chat, saying he had plans to go out drinking. He even added before
he left, “You two continue.”
Jiang Cheng searched his brain for a long time as he munched, before recalling what they
were talking about before this.
The teeth-mark tattoos.
He didn’t continue that topic of conversation. On one hand it really was a bit silly,
furthermore…… He consumed three durian puffs in a row, then slowly calmed down.
He felt like his brain had been a mess ever since entering Li Baoguo’s home.
Upon coming out and suddenly seeing Gu Fei, his whole being was immersed in an overly
gleeful state, so much so that it made him a little dizzy.
He was only now coming back to his senses, and paused to reflect on Gu Fei’s reaction.
Gu Fei’s reaction…… Gu Fei was clearly dumbfounded, and not at all like he claimed. Too
silly? If he had really thought it was too silly he would’ve directly rebuked it, instead of
spacing out.
“Do you still want to eat?” Gu Fei said. “A bowl of cold noodles can’t be enough, let’s eat
more?”
“At this point, I’m not exactly full enough that I don’t want to eat anything, but at the same
time not so hungry that I feel like going out.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“How about……” Gu Fei considered for a moment. “Come to the store, I’ll make you
something.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng answered.
He truly didn’t know what he wanted to eat right now. On Li Baoguo’s matter, he didn’t feel
the sense of relief that comes with having solved a problem. He had no appetite.
It was the thought of being with Gu Fei for a little while that made him feel much better,
only…… Gu Fei’s reaction just now, it was a while later, but it still made him feel a little
uneasy.
When they got to the store, Gu Fei walked to the kitchen in the courtyard to prepare the
food. Only then did he follow behind and ask, “You were
actually……”
Gu Fei looked at him with eggs in his hands, “What?”
“You were actually thinking that if we ever separate, it won’t be appropriate having my
teeth-mark on your body,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Right?”
Gu Fei blinked, “I wasn’t.”
“You can remove the stuff,” Jiang Cheng said. “You don’t have to worry about that……
Nevermind, forget I said anything. It was a silly idea anyway.”
Jiang Cheng turned to go back into the store. He sat down behind the counter, pulled out his
phone, and swiped at it absentmindedly.
“I’ve never thought that.” Gu Fei also walked over, eggs still in his hands, then placed the
eggs one by one on the counter.
“Never thought what?” Jiang Cheng peered at him. “Never thought that it’s silly?”
“I did think it was silly,” Gu Fei said. “But I never thought about the thing with breaking up
and how appropriate or not appropriate it would be to leave your teeth-mark on me.”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue. “Are you under the impression that I’m……”
“Let’s go get teeth-mark tattoos,” Gu Fei interrupted him. “Li Yan knows a really good tattoo
artist.”
“There’s no need,” Jiang Cheng frowned, he felt like an unreasonable child who needed Gu
Fei to soothe him. “It was just a random suggestion.”
“I’ll give him a call, ask him to help arrange a time.” Gu Fei said.
“What the shit,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “I said it’s not necessary. There’s no point
anyway, it’s not like I really want to force you to do it, it was only a……”
“I said, let’s go get teeth-mark tattoos!” Gu Fei slammed his hands down on the counter,
leaned forward, and closed in on Jiang Cheng’s face. He lowered his voice and practically
growled. “Right now it’s me forcing you.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was startled into bewilderment by his imposing presence.
“Teeth-mark.” Gu Fei looked fixedly at him.
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng stared. “What about it?”
“What’s an appropriate location for it?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng looked at him for a long while without speaking, then eventually couldn’t keep
a straight face anymore and burst out laughing, “What the fucking hell Gu Fei, is there
something wrong with you?”
“Do you want it or not?” Gu Fei asked again.
“I do.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“I’ll give Li Yan a call later,” Gu Fei straightened up, and arranged the eggs on the counter
into a row. “One, two, three, four, five, is that enough?”
“I can’t eat five,” Jiang Cheng looked at the eggs. “I’ll overdose on protein.”
“Mine’s in there too.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng looked at the eggs, looked at him, then lastly glanced at his
crotch, before picking up two similarly sized eggs in his hands. “You mean these two?” [1]
Gu Fei paused for a beat, then when realization hit, he narrowed his eyes in a smile, “These
aren’t the same size as mine though. Fess up Cheng-ge, are you mixing me up with someone
else?”
“Fuck off!” Jiang Cheng admonished him, then added as Gu Fei walked back to the kitchen
with the eggs. “You wanna bet I’ll leave a teeth-mark on your eggs!”
“That’s fine,” Gu Fei turned around. “If you don’t mind someone else cradling my eggs when
we get the tattoo……”
“Let’s fight it out.” Jiang Cheng tossed his phone on the counter and stood up.
“Can’t get over this today if we don’t fight it out.”
Gu Fei laughed as he closed the back door behind him and went into the kitchen.
Jiang Cheng didn’t have much appetite before, but after Gu Fei suddenly
‘forced’ him to get a tattoo, he started to feel hungry again.
Frankly, it wasn’t that he had to get a teeth-mark tattoo or else. The only reason he thought
of a tattoo was because he’d always been prohibited from doing things like this. Nevermind
a tattoo, even when Pan Zhi gifted him a little stone pendant, Shen Yiqing had forbade him
from wearing it around his neck, and almost made him return it to Pan Zhi.
Of course he was very happy that Gu Fei was willing to get this stupid whimsical thing with
him, but what really stimulated his appetite were the words
“I’ve never thought that”.
People are strange like that sometimes, so easy to satisfy, with no need for any supporting
evidence, and no need for any logic. All that’s necessary is a single sentence from the other
person, even empty words are enough to bring delight.
Gu Fei quickly finished making the food: five fried eggs and a small tub of jiuniang
tangyuan. It smelled delicious. [2]
“Here, these are my eggs,” Gu Fei picked out two of the fried eggs out of the ones that were
stuck together, and placed it in Jiang Cheng’s bowl. “For you to eat.”
“Alright then,” Jiang Cheng also picked up two eggs and put them in Gu Fei’s bowl. “These
are my eggs, take your time and eat it slowly.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei grinned.
“Then whose egg is this?” Jiang Cheng pointed at the one left over.
“That would be the chicken’s.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng blanked for a second, then laughed so hard he had trouble holding the bowl,
“Hey Gu Fei you really are adorable sometimes.”
“Just sometimes?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“It’s already a miracle that I’d use the word “adorable” to describe you,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Be content with what you get, understand?”
“Understand.” Gu Fei nodded earnestly.
Gu Fei decided to stop thinking about the teeth-mark thing. He even decided to not think
too deeply into anything that Jiang Cheng didn’t want to think too much into.
If Jiang Cheng wanted to get a teeth-mark tattoo, then they’ll get one. And as to whether it
will be removed in the future, or whether it can be removed……
Whatever happens will happen. At least Jiang Cheng wasn’t thinking about that at the
moment, so he will follow suit.
It’s a wonder that Jiang Cheng said dumbassery is contagious, but who is infecting whom is
the real question.
When he called Li Yan to make an appointment with the tattoo artist, Li Yan’s reaction was
surprisingly calm, “You? Who else?”
“Jiang Cheng.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Li Yan replied. “Your illnesses sound quite serious.”
“You can stop diagnosing us,” Gu Fei said. “Just give me the contact.”
“You’ve never been there before huh, should I take you guys there?” Li Yan asked.
“No.” Gu Fei answered adamantly.
“Will it be in an indecent spot?” Li Yan asked again.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Then I’ll see if I can get a look in the future,” Li Yan tsked. “It’s going to be Summer soon
anyway.”
This tattoo artist Li Yan recommended seemed to be someone sophisticated. He had a
studio that wasn’t open to receive the public, most of his clients are referrals. Li Yan got a
corgi butt tattoo on his lower back from here, Gu Fei had seen it. It looked pretty good, the
tattoo even managed to capture the essential
jiggle of a corgi butt.
When it came to the locations of these silly teeth-mark tattoos, Gu Fei had no opinion on
the matter. Or rather, Jiang Cheng had said in the beginning that it was to be somewhere
visible only to themselves, but as soon as he started to think about the location, he couldn’t
help but let his thoughts wander. It wasn’t good for his health to have such frequent rises
and falls like that.
However, Jiang Cheng had already made up his mind. In the bus on the way to the studio,
Jiang Cheng leaned close to his ears and told him quietly.
“On the thigh,” Jiang Cheng shook his leg. “The inner side.”
“The fuck?” Gu Fei laughed out loud. “Doesn’t that mean I’ll have to get down on your
crotch……”
“Yell, yell louder.” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “You haven’t completed your mission until the
whole bus hears you.”
“But the pose I have to get in to bite you isn’t very civilized.” Gu Fei said with a lowered
voice.
“If I can reach it myself then I wouldn’t need you.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei turned away and laughed for a while at the window, then turned back and asked in a
small voice, “Then where do you plan to bite me? Would you have to get down to my
crotch?”
“Collarbone,” Jiang Cheng looked around them. They were sitting at the very back, and no
one was paying any attention. He tugged away Gu Fei’s collar with his finger, and tapped
gently on his left collarbone. “Right here.”
Gu Fei grabbed Jiang Cheng’s hand with his own and pressed it down on his leg,
“Try to restrain yourself.”
“Fuck, who are you acting this out for,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Is there a place on your body I
haven’t touched?”
“Alright, come on then, come on,” Still holding onto Jiang Cheng’s hand, Gu Fei moved it
toward his own crotch, and said quietly. “You’re here every day anyw……”
Jiang Cheng was startled, he yanked his hand away in a flash, “Fuck off!”
The studio was situated in a rather neat looking residential area in the most lavish new
division of the shitty little city. The elevator took them right up to the ninth floor, where
there was a black wooden board hanging on the door, with nothing but three white dots on
it.
“Is this studio called ‘three pies’?” Jiang Cheng asked. [3]
“Dunno, I just know the owner’s surname is Lu.” Gu Fei held back his laughter and pressed
the doorbell. “Let’s ask.”
The door opened quickly, the owner himself opened it for them. He looked much sunnier
than his studio, which was decked out in all black.
“Li Yan said I have to do this for you guys myself,” Mr. Lu poured a cup of tea for each of
them. “So I didn’t ask my assistant to come. Though if I’m to do it by myself, it’ll take a little
longer.”
“That’s alright,” Jiang Cheng said. “As long as it looks good.”
“You don’t have to worry about that, I’ve been doing tattoos for years.” Mr. Lu said,
suddenly walking in front of them, and with a flourish, pulled off his t-shirt.
“See.”
“Aiyoo.” Jiang Cheng was startled into jumping back in his seat, before he saw the guy was
trying to show off his body that was covered from top to bottom with tattoos, there was not
an inch of yellow skin to be found.
“Very cool.” Gu Fei expressed his genuine praise.
Even though it made him look a little like a weirdo, the designs all looked exquisite, and
rather artistic.
Mr. Lu put his shirt on again, “The ones on the back were done by my assistant, but I did all
the ones I can reach. So relax, just a little design like the one you guys want, it’s no problem
at all…… Have you decided what kind of graphic you want? And where?”
“……Teeth-mark.” Jiang Cheng replied, then paused. He suddenly realized he didn’t know
how to verbalize his idea of obtaining the teeth-marks from actual bites. “Just……”
“From you two biting each other?” Mr. Lu asked directly.
Jiang Cheng instantly felt unable to answer.
“That’s right,” Gu Fei replied. “I’ll go first, can you do it on the collarbone?”
“I can, but it’ll hurt a little, the skin is thinner there.” Mr. Lu reached out and tugged down
Gu Fei’s collar, then turned back to look at Jiang Cheng. “Where do you want it?”
“……Here.” Jiang Cheng felt an urge to slap his hand away, but considering it was a
necessary part of the guy’s job, he could only clench his teeth and point.
“Then when you bite down,” Mr. Lu also pointed at Gu Fei’s collarbone. “Try to make it
closer to the shoulder, otherwise the mark won’t be whole, his clavicle is fairly prominent.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Mr. Lu must’ve seen it all, that he had no reaction whatsoever to the fact that two guys
wanted to bite teeth-marks on each other, as though there were people doing the exact
same thing every day out on the streets.
He was even considerate enough to let the two of them use the smaller workroom to
prepare.
“Strip.” Jiang Cheng stood in front of Gu Fei and folded his arms.
“……This air.” Gu Fei chuckled, and took off his shirt.
“I’m going to bite now?” Jiang Cheng held onto Gu Fei’s shoulder, leaning left and right
trying to find a good angle. “Right here.”
“You can bite down hard, get it done in one go, if you have to do it twice it won’t look clean.”
Gu Fei leaned his head back a little.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Alright, bite me.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng grabbed his shoulder and bit down viciously on the collarbone.
“AH——” Gu Fei yelped. The sound was loud and clear, very sincere, without a trace of
exaggerated effect; it was entirely the audible result of pain.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng let go, and said quietly beside his ear. “I know what you’re thinking.
Even if we’re not together in the future, I still want to leave a mark on your body. Whoever
sees it will have to know that it’s mine. We overachievers are unreasonable like that.”
Footnotes:
[1]: In Chinese, eggs [蛋蛋] is a euphemism for testicles, just like balls. ↩

[2]: Jiuniang Tangyuan is a dessert/treat type dish. Jiuniang is sweet fermented rice, which
can be used in liquid to make other dishes. Tangyuan is glutinous rice balls that may or may
not have a sweet filling inside. ↩
[3]: Three pies, or sanbing [三饼] is a mahjong tile. The face of it is three dots arranged in a
row, diagonally across the rectangular tile surface. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 4879
TL word count: 3175
TL time: 2:33:19
Edit: 1:15:04
Curse words: 6 x fucks, 2 x shits, 2 x asses
TL’s Notes
Eggs, eggs everywhere

First posted: January 7, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 68
Well when I do get lewd it’s also on an overachiever tier.
Even though the overachiever Jiang Cheng’s guess was the exact opposite of his actual
thoughts, Gu Fei didn’t mind. After all, he wouldn’t be able to explain himself to Jiang Cheng,
and didn’t want Jiang Cheng to feel unmoored by his thoughts.
He decided to cooperate, and nodded earnestly, lest the overachiever gave him another
bite.
Not to mention, Jiang Cheng sounded extremely alluring as he said these words.
Gu Fei stared at him, and felt an urge to throw him onto the reclining chair on the side, as
various inappropriate imagery filled his mind: dentist chair play, train cot play; all of these
scenarios were running rampant in his mind.
Good thing it was a very wholehearted bite, so much so that it was a little vicious, almost as
painful as when he was swiped with the knuckledusters a while back. The pain chased
away the images in his mind as quickly as they appeared, and in due time he returned to
the state of being a good wholesome youth.
“This should be enough.” Jiang Cheng backed up a step and studied the teeth-mark. “Look
how round it is, I just realized, I have pretty great teeth.”
“Yes,” Gu Fei touched his collarbone. “After all, these teeth are capable of biting off a zipper
pull.”
“That’s right,” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes and peered at him. “So you better behave
yourself, or else you bet your ass that I’ll chew you up and leave no bits behind.”
“Got it.” Gu Fei answered very earnestly.
Mr. Lu had finished preparing the tools and came in to check out the teeth-mark,
“That’s good. Did you want a more cartoonish one, or something that looks a little more
3D?”
“What’s the difference?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“You can go through some photos.” Mr. Lu opened a notebook and pulled out a few
pictures. “Something more 3D would look like this……”
Jiang Cheng was shocked. Turns out there were quite a few people who’d done something
dumb like tattooing teeth-marks onto their body. Under the cover of
these other dumbasses, he and Gu Fei suddenly didn’t seem so silly anymore.
However, this 3D looking teeth-mark…… just one glance left him slightly shell shocked. It
was a black teeth-mark, with a visual effect that made it look red and puffy, the result was
more than a little eerie.
“This won’t do, right?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei. “Looks like the toxin is about to take
effect or something.”
“You’re so toxic, you’re toxic, you’re to-o-o-oxic……” Gu Fei sang quietly while leaning
beside him. “What do cartoon ones look like?” [1]
“Those ones have more of a flat look, with less shadows, and don’t look as realistic.” Mr. Lu
showed them two more pictures. “Basically it’s just using the bite mark you left to create a
flat design, these ones are cuter.”
“Then let’s get this kind,” Jiang Cheng looked at the photos. In comparison, the cartoon ones
might be named as such, but in reality they looked much more normal than the 3D
versions, it didn’t have the intense subculture dumbass vibe.
“Can we not use black?”
“Any colour is fine, if you want I can even make it a rainbow one.” Mr. Lu said.
“But my personal recommendation is to use a darker colour, it’ll look better.”
If it wasn’t for the consideration that once carved on, it wasn’t something that could be
immediately removed, Jiang Cheng would’ve wanted him to go for something like pastel
blue or pink. After all, he was Good Little Bunny.
At the end, they chose black: a lowkey dumbassery with a tinge of cool.
After Gu Fei lay down on the recliner, Mr. Lu put on his gloves and started to one by one
demonstrate the disposable tools he would be using for the procedure: it was all needle
this and tube that…… Jiang Cheng watched and thought that getting a tattoo was not much
different than torture.
Next was disinfection, then drawing the design.
After he finished drawing on the line art, Mr. Lu even asked Jiang Cheng to check if it looked
OK, then grabbed a mirror to show Gu Fei, “That’s pretty much it, if there’s no problem I’m
going to start outlining.”
According to Mr. Lu, outlining was simply carving out the outline of the design, but the
word “carve” made Jiang Cheng feel a mysterious ache on his own inner thigh. He frowned,
“Don’t you need topical anaesthetics or something?
“This area isn’t very large, it’s best to just power through.” Mr. Lu said. “Good ointments
don’t necessarily affect the colouring, but it does affect the suppleness of the skin, and has
an impact on the shape of the design.”
“Then…… try to power through it?” Jiang Cheng stuck his head out above Gu Fei’s face and
looked at him.
“”Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng tried to control his urge of planting a kiss on Gu Fei, and sat back down in his
seat. He watched as Mr. Lu picked up a tool that looked somewhat like a pen, and started to
work on Gu Fei’s collar bone, poking or cutting or prodding at it.
Gu Fei didn’t react very much. He must’ve been able to tolerate this kind of pain.
Only, it took such a long time. Mr. Lu had his head down and half a face exposed above his
mask, working away hard. Carving the outline alone took a good forty minutes of
meticulous crafting.
“It’s time to fill in the colour,” Mr. Lu said as he changed up the tools. “It probably doesn’t
hurt very much right now, but it’ll start hurting later when I do the colour fill. Although, the
pain is coupled with anticipation, right? It’s still an enjoyable process.”
Jiang Cheng sat there rubbing his leg, and quietly asked Gu Fei, “Does it hurt?”
“It’s fine for now, I’m not feeling it too much.” Gu Fei turned and smiled at him.
“Probably because the skin isn’t as sensitive here, so it doesn’t feel very painful, if it was the
inner thigh……”
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng cut him off.
“Inner thigh is not too bad, it’s actually not as painful as the collarbone. There’s fatty tissue
on the thigh, so relatively speaking it doesn’t hurt as much.” Mr. Lu glanced at Jiang Cheng.
“Is your teeth-mark going to be on the inner thigh then?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng folded his legs awkwardly. “You can start filling in now.”
The colour-filling process was a boring one. Jiang Cheng watched from the side as Mr. Lu
leaned over Gu Fei with an instrument that resembled something a dentist used to clean
teeth, and worked on it bit by bit. Even visually it resembled a teeth cleaning session, every
once in a while he had to dab away at the drops of blood that seeped out.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t afraid of blood, but when he imagined the same thing on himself, it still
made him want to squirm.
He took out his phone and snapped a couple photos of Gu Fei, then started to play with a
photo editor app. After poking around for a while, Gu Fei said, “If you’re bored, why not
beat that Aixiaochu level for me. I’ve been struggling to
pass that level, it’s been days since I last played.”
“……Alrighty.” Jiang Cheng reached a hand into Gu Fei’s pant pocket and squeezed his thigh,
before pulling out the phone.
Gu Fei clucked his tongue audibly.
“Does it hurt?” Mr. Lu asked immediately.
“No,” Gu Fei said. “I’m already numb to the pain, can’t feel it anymore.”
“It’s about done,” Mr. Lu wiped at the drops of blood. “You have nice collarbones, it’ll look
great when it’s done.”
Jiang Cheng leaned over to take a look, there was already half a teeth-mark visible. The skin
was still red and puffy, but he could already see how it would look, it was indeed much
better than the 3D versions. And coupled with Gu Fei’s nicely shaped collarbones, it really
did look rather sexy.
…… He could forgive the back and forth touching of Mr. Lu’s hands all over Gu Fei’s
shoulder and clavicle.
Jiang Cheng grabbed Gu Fei’s finger to unlock the phone, and started working on beating
the level.
As soon as he pulled up the Aixiaochu screen, he saw that Gu Fei had more than 300 little
red hearts, “Fucking, this many lives?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei smiled. “Accumulated over the last few days of not playing.”
“I wouldn’t be able to collect this much even if I don’t play for half a month.”
Jiang Cheng tapped open his friends list to take a look, but almost wasn’t able to scroll to
the end. “The number of friends you got here is a little overwhelming eh.”
“They’re all classmates and such,” Gu Fei said. “To get extra hearts. Even with all these
people, if I play all the time it still won’t be able to keep up.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t comprehend this behaviour from Gu Fei at all: someone who was
normally like a flower atop a high cliff would go to such lengths to play a game, that he
would add a bunch of people he couldn’t even recognize, let alone speak to normally. An
academic slacker could throw aside the aloof persona he cultivated for more than a decade,
all for an idiotic game…… What line of thinking could this possibly be.
Li Yan had already passed the level Gu Fei was stuck on. Jiang Cheng glanced at the ranking,
Li Yan was only one level away from finishing. Your competitor is about to reach the top
and send over a taunting message, while you are stuck on an especially disgusting level
with the least number of allowable steps. It was
indeed maddening.
Jiang Cheng put his head down and started to chip away at the game. If the tattoo session
lasted long enough, he might be able to get through a few more levels.
Something them overachievers were especially good at, was the ability to quickly gather
their concentration, even if it was only an idiotic game, he could still devote his attention to
it wholeheartedly. A half-assed slacker like Gu Fei cannot possibly compare to his brain
efficiency and time management.
Jiang Cheng used up six hearts to get past this level, then continued to soar past two more,
and ended up only two levels below Li Yan. He was about to stretch out his slightly stiff
neck and keep going, when beside him, Mr. Lu’s pseudo-dental machinery came to a stop.
“It’s done,” Mr. Lu said. “Come see how it looks, it’s still swollen right now, once the
swelling goes down it’ll look different.”
“Let me see!” Jiang Cheng bounded up immediately, and leaned close over the reclining
chair.
This was his teeth-mark, it was a mark he was leaving on Gu Fei’s body. After going through
such a long wait, it was worth it after all.
Gu Fei’s collarbone and shoulder was a little red and puffy, but he could already see how
good the black teeth-mark looked on it. Of course, it also had something to do with his own
teeths being neat, well-aligned, and dashing.
All in all, the teeth-mark looked much better than Jiang Cheng had expected. He grabbed
the mirror and looked at Gu Fei in the reflection, “I think it looks pretty good, what do you
think?”
“Your teeth are so neat.” Gu Fei looked in the mirror and chuckled.
“No shit, it’s not just my teeth that are neat, I am overall a very neat person.”
Jiang Cheng said.
Mr. Lu needed to take a half hour break, so Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei went downstairs to
stroll around. They found a small cafe, ordered something to eat, and sat down.
“Open your collar, let me take a look.” Jiang Cheng stared at Gu Fei’s shoulder.
“You just saw it,” Gu Fei pulled down his collar. “You’ll see what it really looks like in a
couple days when the swelling goes down.”
“Did it hurt?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“It burned,” Gu Fei frowned. “I was keeping it in and didn’t say it out loud, but it really does
hurt quite a bit. I thought after I grew numb to the pain it’ll stop hurting, but it ended up
being a staccato of pain amidst a sea of pain.”
“Oh fuck,” At his words, Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little anxious. Gu Fei was someone with
a high pain tolerance, if it was himself, who knew what the scene would be like. “Did he say
just now that there’s more fat on the legs so it wouldn’t be as painful?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei looked at him. “If you’re worried about the pain, I saw that he also sells stick-
on tattoos at his place, they look great, way more high-end than the for-fun ones you can
buy for a couple bucks, it even comes in custom……”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Jiang Cheng interrupted him.
Gu Fei wanted very much to sit down with Jiang Cheng and have a serious chat regarding
the matter of who infected whom with the dumbassery. Before he knew Jiang Cheng, he
would never say one wrong thing after another like this, especially when it was something
he had already deliberated about.
“Aren’t you afraid of the pain.” Gu Fei had no choice but to explain it away.
“The guy even said it doesn’t hurt as much in fattier areas,” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Besides, whether I’m afraid of the pain and whether I can tolerate the pain are two
different things, alright? I haven’t even tried and see for myself whether it’s painful.”
“What if you tried and found that it hurts a lot, will you be left with just a half-assed teeth-
mark?” Gu Fei smiled and said. “How about you change the location to your butt, there’s
even more fatty tissue there.”
“No way,” Jiang Cheng tsked. “It has to be the inner thigh.”
“Why?” Gu Fei thought about it for a moment. “So salacious, doesn’t seem to match your
overachiever style.”
“Is it salacious?” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes and thought about it too. “Well when I do
get lewd it’s also on an overachiever tier.”
Gu Fei laughed and didn’t say any more. The really nice thing about Jiang Cheng was that
his attention could be easily diverted. Most of the time he was a sensitive and conscientious
person, but his heart was also large enough to store several gigabytes of torrent materials.
“I’ll tell you,” Jiang Cheng picked up a piece of cake and nibbled on it slowly.
“Why I have to put the teeth-mark there.”
“Mhm, why?” Gu Fei asked.
“If I put it there, when I’m helping myself and see it I’ll think, hey that’s my boyfriend’s
teeth-mark.” Jiang Cheng’s eyes curved as he smiled. “It’ll be as though you’re blowing me.”
“…… Fuck.” Gu Fei gazed at him for a long time, speechless.
“So?” Jiang Cheng continued to look at him with his smiling eyes.
“No, I mean,” Gu Fei started laughing. “If you really want me to blow you just give me a call,
I’ll be right there. Or you can just come to me……”
“Go away,” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “Just run with the bit why don’t you, and pretty fast
too.”
“I’m serious.” Gu Fei added.
“You wanna fight?” Jiang Cheng took a bite of the cake violently.
After having gone through this obscene, indecent, and filthy conversation, when they went
back to Mr. Lu’s studio, Jiang Cheng kept feeling as though he gave Gu Fei money, then took
him into a little dark room to do things that Gu Fei could call the cops for.
“Go and get ready,” Mr. Lu repeated the same set of instructions. “I’ll go prepare the tools.
They all have to be changed.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei walked into the side room.
When Jiang Cheng followed him inside, Gu Fei was standing beside the recliner, rubbing his
hands together and smiling at him.
“If you dare to strike and retaliate,” Jiang Cheng pointed at him. “I’ll smack you.”
“Hurry up and take it off.” Gu Fei continued to rub his hands together.
“Take what…… off?” Jiang Cheng all of a sudden couldn’t comprehend.
“Your pants,” Gu Fei said. “I thought you wanted me to blow you.”
“The fuck,” Jiang Cheng quickly turned to peer outside. “Can you fucking rein it in a little!
Your face is so thick it’s enough to fill a three story underground parking lot!”
To be honest, it was only then that Jiang Cheng came face to face with the fact that he was
getting a tattoo in this location. It wasn’t a big deal that Gu Fei had to get down there to bite
him, the problem was Mr. Lu also had to get down and hover around that area, for a pretty
long time too.
“Do you want to change the location?” Gu Fei asked while chuckling.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He leaned against the wall and pondered over it for a long time,
then clenched his jaw and took his pants off, “No.”
“Ay!” Gu Fei was startled by his abrupt movement, and instinctively came over to block him
from view. “What are you doing?”
“Come bite me,” Jiang Cheng tossed his pants to one side, and sat down on the recliner,
raising a shoeless left leg onto the ledge. “Come on young man.”
Gu Fei glanced outside, then cleared his throat.
“Hurry up,” Jiang Cheng was worried about Mr. Lu walking in on them mid-bite, with him
still in this pose. “What are you clearing your throat for, dost thou need to perform a song
first?”
“Coming.” Gu Fei looked at him, and suddenly strode over in two steps, shoved him
backward, then pressing his knee to one side, bent down and bit him.
Jiang Cheng was frightened by this brand new speed. Plus, with Gu Fei burying his head
between his legs like this, he felt like his whole being was in this instant submerged in dirty
little videos. His entire mind was filled with 18+ scenes and the hundreds of thousands of
relevant imaginary scenarios.
After blanking out for at least five seconds, he finally collected his thoughts amidst a surge
of pain.
“Oh fuck, ow ow ow ow OW……” He hastened to push away Gu Fei’s head.
Gu Fei’s teeth were still clamped down on his thigh with no intention of letting go.
“Fucking hell Gu Fei! Does it taste good!” Jiang Cheng lightly slapped Gu Fei’s head again,
and said in a suppressed voice. “Would you like some sauce with it too, sir!”
Still Gu Fei didn’t let go, just lifted a hand and grabbed a handful of Jiang Cheng’s waist.
Several more seconds passed before he finally lifted his head.
“Ah fuck,” Jiang Cheng lay back on the recliner and let out a breath of relief.
“Gu Fei you’re done for, I’m noting down this incident from today, I’m telling you, unless
you seriously get me off good I’m……”
“Did you know, that some people,” Gu Fei bent down and said gently beside his ear. “Will
remain in your memories in a number of ways, whether you want them to or not. Like me,
for example.”
“Writing poems are we?” Jiang Cheng chuckled.

“Just wanted to be casually sappy.” Gu Fei quickly turned and stole a glance outside, then
planted a firm kiss on Jiang Cheng’s lips.
Footnotes:
[1]: Song: You’re So Toxic by Zhang Xueyou ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 4727
TL word count: 3275
TL time: 4:55:22
Edit: 0:34:15
Curse words: 8 x fucks, 1 x shits, 7 x asses
TL’s Notes
The song is now stuck in my head……

First posted: January 16, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 69
Can you…… carry me down, I can’t move.
See here for content warnings for this chapter and the next, pls proceed at your own
comfort level
By the time Mr. Lu came back with a new set of tools, Gu Fei was leaning against the wall
playing with his phone, and Jiang Cheng was sitting on the recliner, spacing out.
Mr. Lu probably didn’t imagine that, of the two of them at this moment, one was tapping
away at nothing on his phone, and one was trying hard to work up the energy to suppress
his Spring awakening.
“Are you done with the bite mark?” Mr. Lu asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng was a little worried about his state of mind at first, but as soon as Mr.
Lu opened his mouth, his Spring awakening was startled into retreat before it even got a
chance to advance. He breathed out a sigh of relief, but still felt a little awkward when he
looked down. “This…… spot, will it be tough to do?”
“What, the inner thigh?” Mr. Lu gave him a look. “No problem, I’ve done all sorts of locations
for my clients, this is one of the easier ones in comparison.”
“Is it round enough?” Gu Fei asked beside him. “If it’s not round enough I can bite him again
on the other side.”
“It’s good enough,” Mr. Lu looked at Jiang Cheng’s thigh. “You…… have prominent fangs
huh? Matches pretty well too. How about I made these two fang indents into heart shapes?”
“…… That’s not a bad idea.” Jiang Cheng actually hadn’t checked out the teeth-mark himself.
After Gu Fei bit him, they’ve been in such a state that if there wasn’t anyone else around,
they would’ve jerked each other off right then and there. It wasn’t until this moment that
Jiang Cheng peered down to take a look.
“Actually that just might work.”
Gu Fei’s teeth-mark was also very neat, but the two indents from his fangs were very
prominent, they stuck out just a little bit. If he were to make them into little hearts it would
look…… pretty good.
“I can use red to fill in the hearts.” Mr. Lu said. “It’ll look very nice. Why don’t you lie down
on your side, this way the design can lay flat, and it’ll be easier for me to work on it.”
Gu Fei watched Jiang Cheng lay down on his side, with his left leg pulled up and right leg
stretched out…… It was indeed a position that seemed uninhibited with a touch of
wantonness. When Mr. Lu hunched over Jiang Cheng’s legs to start doing the outline, he
almost went to fling the guy off out of sheer instinct.
This location was unlike the shoulder…… He pulled up a stool and sat down by the recliner
facing Jiang Cheng’s back, and leaned in, gazing between the thighs at Mr. Lu.
“It doesn’t seem to hurt.” Jiang Cheng said.
“The outline doesn’t hurt very much,” Mr. Lu lifted his eyes and gave Gu Fei a look. “It’ll
hurt more later when I’m filling in the colour, but it’s much better than the collarbone, the
collarbone hurts more.”
“My shoulder is hurting now.” Gu Fei nodded.
“It’ll be fine by tomorrow.” Mr. Lu continued to carve out the outline.
At the sound of Gu Fei’s voice, Jiang Cheng cranked his neck around and glanced at him, “Oh
fuck, how come you’re sitting there?”
“Where?” Gu Fei also glanced at him, then looked at where he was sitting. It was only about
20 centimeters away from Jiang Cheng’s butt. “I can see more clearly from here.”
“Whatever you want,” Jiang Cheng used his arm as a pillow. “I beat that level for you just
now, don’t you want to play for a bit?”
“No.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything after that.
Gu Fei continued to hover over the edge of the recliner, watching Mr. Lu carve out the
outline.
Frankly, the visual of Jiang Cheng lying on the cot right now in his underwear was quite
torturous to him. Jiang Cheng had very nice skin, it was taut and satiny; his shirt had shifted
up in such a way that it was possible to see a strip of his waist and lower back from this
angle…… If it wasn’t for the fear that Jiang Cheng’s reflexes would suddenly awaken, he’d
love to covertly reach out and caress his back.
Jiang Cheng started out with his eyes open, but after a while he closed them. It was way too
awkward, looking down and seeing Mr. Lu hovering over his crotch area with a solemn
expression on half of his face.
However, not only two seconds later, he opened them again. With a position like this, if he
closed his eyes, it might give the impression that he was enjoying it or
something, which would be even more awkward.
With his eyes open, since he couldn’t look at Mr. Lu…… he wanted to look at Gu Fei instead.
But when he turned around to look at Gu Fei, he saw Gu Fei hovering behind his butt,
staring face to face between the gap of his thighs at Mr.
Lu. It was somehow an even freakier visual.
He sighed softly, “Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered.
“You have movies on your phone, right?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Why don’t you pick one out
for me to watch.”
“Sure,” Gu Fei took out his phone. “I’ll find one for you.”
The skin on the leg is relatively smooth and flat, Mr. Lu was faster at carving out the outline
than before. After he let the two of them check the line work, he started to fill it in.
While watching the movie, Jiang Cheng was reflecting on how intricate-looking the little
hearts of the fang indents were, but soon after, he started to feel the pain.
Normally, one or two instances of this kind of surface level pain from the skin could hardly
be felt, there was usually no feeling, let alone pain. However, to have that feeling repeatedly
drilled against the same spot, that sensation was not so good.
Mr. Lu was very meticulous. Jiang Cheng felt that time did not fly by at all, it had practically
frozen in place. He felt like the poking had gone on for ages, but glancing at the time, it
hadn’t been very long. The muscle he instinctively clenched from the pain, plus the left leg
he had to consciously hold up lest it fall it and smack Mr. Lu on the head, both made him
feel exhausted after only an hour. He couldn’t even concentrate on the movie.
“Gu Fei.” He called out.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei stood up and looked at him.
“Can you…… hold my leg up for me,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “My leg is sore.”
Gu Fei laughed, and braced a hand against his left knee, “Is this OK?”
“Ah shit,” Jiang Cheng relaxed instantly. “I was dying.”
“Not much longer now,” Mr. Lu said. “We’re past the halfway point.”
“You’ve worked hard sir.” Jiang Cheng exclaimed.
After Gu Fei started holding his knee, he felt like the two inches of skin on his leg didn’t
even hurt that much anymore. Though after a while, it seemed like it was also tiring for Gu
Fei to stand there holding back his knee. Jiang Cheng watched him reach back and grab a
length of rope from a table nearby.
“What are you doing?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I want to sit down,” Gu Fei wound the rope around his leg once, then held on to the ends as
it pulled Jiang Cheng’s leg back, and sat back down on the stool.
“This way I don’t have to keep standing.”
“Very innovative.” Jiang Cheng said.
After this exchange, neither of them said anything more. When the movie was over, Jiang
Cheng glanced down at his leg. The rope Gu Fei had wrapped around his leg was black.
Good thing he only circled it once around the knee, if it was wrapped around his ankle
or…… tied around Gu Fei’s leg……
Jiang Cheng killed his thoughts deep in his belly before they were able to fly free, then took
in a deep breath, “I want water.”
“There’s a water dispenser outside.” Mr. Lu paused his hands.
Gu Fei went out and poured him a cup of water, then when Mr. Lu stood up to stretch his
arms and also get a drink, he quickly reached out and hooked a finger on Jiang Cheng’s chin.
Itching for a smack? Jiang Cheng stared at him and said soundlessly.
Gu Fei chuckled without a word, then walked around behind Jiang Cheng, and pulled gently
on the rope.
Jiang Cheng’s legs opened a little wider.
“You’re dead.” He pointed at Gu Fei. Fortunately, at this moment the scorching pain on his
inner thigh suddenly surged up all at once. It felt hot and painful, he had no attention to
spare to the feelings of Spring amidst the pain.
“Hurts, huh?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng peered at him.
Gu Fei laughed and looked at his unfinished leg, “Won’t be able to do anything for the next
few days, it can’t come in contact with water.”
“What did you want to do?” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes. “Is your mind……”
Mr. Lu walked back in before he could finish, so he forcefully changed the second half of the
sentence, “Capable of thinking…… of the final exams?”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei held back a laugh as he nodded.
Despite having two extra little hearts on it, Jiang Cheng’s teeth-mark took a little less time
than the one on Gu Fei’s shoulder. When the instrument in Mr. Lu’s hand finally stopped
whirring, Jiang Cheng let out a long breath of relief. Not only because the feeling of a
staccato of pain amidst a sea of pain had finally stopped, but also because Mr. Lu had finally
left the general vicinity of his crotch.
“Done,” Mr. Lu looked over it with satisfaction. “It’s just perfect. The skin on the thigh tends
to be paler, makes for a very cool contrast.”
“Let me see.” Gu Fei leaned over to check out the teeth-mark, and took the chance to stroke
Jiang Cheng’s buttcheek.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t even bother to retaliate. He sat up and looked down at the tattoo as
well. Compared to the one on Gu Fei’s collarbone, this one was sexy with a tinge of cute,
courtesy of the two little red hearts.
Mmn, not bad.
Jiang Cheng quickly imagined a scenario of Gu Fei participating in an unchaste activity in
that area.
When they walked out of the building, Jiang Cheng figured he had made a wise decision to
wear loose track pants that day. But even so, he couldn’t help the urge to walk like a crab.
“I’m not taking the bus,” He tugged at the hem of his pants. “Let’s take a taxi back, I don’t
want to walk.”
Gu Fei laughed as he flagged down a taxi, “What about class tomorrow?”
“I’ll just wear a large boxer,” Jiang Cheng got in the car. “Didn’t Mr. Lu say I won’t feel it
much after one night, just can’t let it touch water.”
“Mhm, boxer sounds good.” Gu Fei said quietly beside him. “And I can look at it whenever I
want.”
Jiang Cheng’s phone rang in his pocket. He said as he pulled it out, “Wait till my leg is better,
I’ll take care of you……”
But when he saw the name on the call display, he suddenly didn’t feel like talking anymore.
If it wasn’t for his good mood today, he probably would’ve lost his appetite as well.
“Hello.” He answered reluctantly.
“Xiao-Cheng?” It wasn’t Li Baoguo’s voice on the other end, it was a woman.
She continued anxiously before he could reply. “I’m Li Qian.”
“Li Qian?” Jiang Cheng froze.
Li Qian had called him on Li Baoguo’s cell phone. His first instinct was that Li Baoguo’s
condition…… had worsened? Was he almost gone? Or?
“Do you have time right now?” Li Qian said. “Do you have time to come over?
It’s dad, he’s…… kicking up a fuss, we can’t talk him down, the police station already sent
some guys over, but…… Do you think you can come over and talk to him?”
“What’s he up to?” Jiang Cheng felt uneasy.
“He’s on the roof,” When Li Qian spoke he could hear noise and yelling in the background.
“Said he wants to kill himself.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was so shocked his voice went off key, Li Baoguo is threatening
suicide?
After he ended the call, Jiang Cheng turned and looked at Gu Fei, speechless, and had no
idea where to even start.
Gu Fei knew about his family, and knew about what kind of person Li Baoguo was—
perhaps even better than himself—but he still didn’t want to time and again let Gu Fei
watch as this man who was related to him keep stirring up all sorts of commotion. He didn’t
want Gu Fei to have to every once a while see the various troubles related to this man.
Despite the fact that every time he ran into a problem, he’d feel much more grounded after
seeing Gu Fei, but he wondered how Gu Fei felt having a boyfriend who was constantly
surrounded by these annoyances.
“Is it Li Baoguo?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered, then patted the driver’s seat. “Shifu please drive a little
faster.”
“Was that Li Qian calling?” Gu Fei asked again.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng was quiet for a while, then said quietly. “Said that Li Baoguo is……
threatening suicide, on the roof.”
Gu Fei blanked, “Right now?”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng knitted his brows. “The cops even showed up.”
Gu Fei squeezed his hand, “It’s alright, they’ll be able to talk him down soon…… Li Hui didn’t
show up, did he?”
“Dunno,” Jiang Cheng pressed on the space between his brows and rubbed it. “I didn’t ask.”
“He’s just putting it on for Li Hui to see, if Li Hui went, he’d come down in no time.” Gu Fei
said. “It happened once before, said he’s gonna slit his own throat, then ran onto the street
with a knife and wanted to slash anyone he could get a hold of.”
“What does that have to do with Li Hui?” Jiang Cheng was incredulous, and more than a
little stunned. Li Baoguo had tried to slit his own throat and slash people up before?
“Probably just acting out, you’ve seen how they fight whenever they see each other. Li Hui
probably doesn’t want anything to do with this father of his,” Gu Fei grabbed Jiang Cheng’s
hand, set it atop his own leg, and gently massaged it.
“But Li Baoguo still cares a lot about him. He’s the eldest son after all, different from his
other children, that’s why he acts out. It’s just that the way people act out is different from
person to person.”
“Is that so.” Jiang Cheng frowned and sighed softly, his mind was a mess. He knew that Li
Baoguo wouldn’t actually jump, but as soon as he thought about the chaotic scene he was
about to face, the neighbours gathered to watch, and the idlers who loved to chime in with
their snide remarks, he felt an intense headache. Even more painful than his inner thigh.
The outside of Li Baoguo’s building was more bustling than Jiang Cheng had imagined. It
was just about the time after people got off work and bought groceries, even people from
the next street over where Gu Fei’s store was had come over, never mind the residents of
this street. There were about one or two hundred people gathered downstairs, and even
some on the roof. The police officers were in the process of herding them down.
Jiang Cheng looked up toward the roof. Li Baoguo was squatting at the edge of the furthest
corner of the rooftop, smoking. From time to time he would turn around and yell at the
cops behind him.
“Ayy he’s here, he’s here,” An auntie started shouting. “This is Li Baoguo’s youngest son, his
youngest son is here.”
“Youngest son? When did he get a youngest son?” Someone immediately
followed up.
“You didn’t know, huh, gave him away when he was little……”
“Gave away? Why don’t I believe that, sold away is more like it.”
Jiang Cheng just felt annoyed. He was about to ask Gu Fei how to get to the roof in these
old-school apartment buildings, when a guy yelled beside him, “Go
ahead and jump! Hurry up! What are you dithering for! Jump!”
Immediately after, more people joined in the racket. Amidst a sea of whistles, several more
people started shouting: “Jump!” “Jump!” “Jump!”
Gu Fei was a few steps away from Jiang Cheng. When Jiang Cheng turned to look at those
people, he quickly stepped up and followed him close. Under these circumstances, he could
guess what kind of emotional reaction Jiang Cheng would have. If anyone said any more
cruel and banal things like this, with Jiang Cheng’s temper, he might not be able to keep it
in.
Just as Gu Fei walked up behind him, Jiang Cheng already landed a punch on the man’s
nose.
He had to admit, Jiang Cheng’s fist was still pretty impressive, it was about as powerful as
his sling. The guy was knocked right off his feet, before falling to the ground.
The man pushed himself up, then struggled to stand after kicking his feet a few times. He
glowered at Jiang Cheng, and was about to lunge, when Gu Fei gave Jiang Cheng a push,
“Don’t worry about this.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered, then turned and walked into the stairwell.
Gu Fei scanned each of the faces in front of him, “What?”
“Fuck! I fucking only said a few words and he just started in!” The man who just had his
face smashed cursed loudly. “Motherfucker where did this dumb little fucking shit come
from! I’m gonna fucking wait for him to come down!”
“Then you can wait.” Gu Fei looked at him. The guy looked a little familiar, but he didn’t
know him. After all, all three generations of the hooligans around the Steel Works look a
little familiar to him.
“The fuck?” The guy looked at him, and reached a hand into his pocket.
If it was before, normally no one would dare go up against him face on. These people pretty
much all recognized him, but in front of a whole crowd of people, and with the rumours
that “Monkey had already taken Gu Fei down a peg”, the guy was probably planning on
making a move.
Gu Fei’s rule of thumb was always: if he had to fight, it better be quick, and not give his
opponent the chance to react.
Just as the guy took a step toward him, before he had a chance to pull his hand out of his
pocket, along with the weapon, Gu Fei reached out his left hand and cupped the back of the
guy’s head, while smacking his forehead hard with the heel of his right hand.
It wasn’t a particularly powerful strike, but it was enough to make him dizzy for a few
seconds.
When Gu Fei drew his hands back, only then did the guy sway a little, and held onto
someone nearby for balance.
“Whenever you manage to get on speaking terms with Monkey,” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Then you can come pick a fight with me.”
The rest of his group fell silent, and Gu Fei didn’t bother to continue with them.
He looked up in the direction of the rooftop.
Li Baoguo was still squatting at the edge. At the moment he was looking back at something,
but soon turned to face forward again, and screamed down, “DON’T
YOU BOTHER WITH ME! I’M GOING TO JUMP RIGHT NOW! I’M NOT
GONNA BE ALIVE FOR MUCH FUCKING LONGER ANYWAYS, IT’S
JUST A MATTER OF TIME! IF YOU WANT TO JOIN ME, COME RIGHT
ON!”
Gu Fei frowned, then shoved the crowd aside and ran into the stairwell, charging upstairs.
He thought Jiang Cheng would try to call up to Li Baoguo from downstairs first, but judging
by Li Baoguo’s words, Jiang Cheng was already on the roof. Even though this old apartment
building wasn’t built very tall, to the acrophobic contestant Jiang Cheng, who would puke
after standing on a five-story high rooftop, this height might just cause him to puke on the
spot.
“What are you doing up here, Gu Fei!” An old cop stopped him on the third floor.
“Uncle,” Gu Fei recognized this officer. He was the first on the scene back then, when his
dad’s accident happened. “My friend just went up there, let me go to him. He’s afraid of
heights. I’m worried that nothing will happen to Li Baoguo but he might keel over first.”
The old cop fixed his eyes on him for a beat, “Go on, don’t get close to Li Baoguo.”
“I know.” Gu Fei sprinted up the stairs.
When he got to the roof, he could see there were a lot of people up there already.
There were constables, and a few grandmas and aunties from the neighbourhood
committee. Li Qian was standing in the middle, with her head down wiping away tears. Li
Baoguo was coughing and cursing at the same time, at Li Qian, but also at Jiang Cheng, in
the foulest language. Gu Fei grew up here, and had heard all sorts of boundary-pushing
vocabulary, but Li Baoguo’s hysterical insults to Li Qian and Jiang Cheng, which involved
the reproductive systems and
rutting periods of all living beings in the known universe, still made one want to rush over
and push him off the building.
Jiang Cheng was crouching behind her, closer to the stairwell. With his back to him, Gu Fei
couldn’t tell how he was faring.
“Jiang Cheng.” Gu Fei couldn’t approach, so he called out from his spot.
Jiang Cheng turned around, hesitated for a few seconds, then crawled over to him on all
fours. He furrowed his brows as he got closer, “I want to go down. I don’t give a crap
anymore. I want to go down……”
Gu Fei took two steps forward and reached out his hand. Jiang Cheng grabbed it, after
which his whole body slackened and dropped. Gu Fei had no choice but to half carry and
half drag him back to the stairs.
“I don’t give a crap anymore, I don’t ever want to hear anything about him ever again.”
Jiang Cheng said quietly. “Let’s go down.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered.
“It’s just,” There was a slight tremor in Jiang Cheng’s voice. “Can you……
carry me down, I can’t move.”
TL’s Notes
Well that was a little heavy… buuuuut: SA YE MANHUA BREATHED! IT’LL BE
ON KUAIKAN STARTING IN MARCH AND UPDATING EVERY MONDAY!!!
LOOK AT THISSSS:
look at these two beautiful soft idiot boys uwuuu
And also, I thought you guys should have a visual aid for the tattoo scene XD
Only the second time around did I realize this is what the tattoo scene looked like
pic.twitter.com/HbhgagD2Ub
— ami 我是如此有钱 (@StrawberryMuMa) January 21, 2021

First posted: January 22, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 70
Everyone lived like this, but not everyone died like that.
See here for content warnings for this chapter, pls proceed at your own comfort level
Jiang Cheng’s voice was very low, like he didn’t want people around them to hear. Gu Fei
nodded and made a sound of acknowledgement. However, if he were to piggyback carry
Jiang Cheng down, the commotion of which would be enough that Li Baoguo would see
them from across the roof, not to mention the nearby aunties and police officers.
Besides…… The tattoo on Jiang Cheng’s inner thigh was freshly engraved, and was at the
moment still red and swollen. Gu Fei couldn’t possibly carry him on his back. He hesitated
for a beat, then said also in a quiet voice, “Carrying you on my back might rub against the
tattoo, how about I…… carry you down in my arms?”
“No roundaboutfucking way.” Jiang Cheng’s voice was still quiet, but his refusal was firm.
“Alright then.” Gu Fei sighed, then grabbed Jiang Cheng’s arms and slung them around his
own shoulders, reached around to hold his waist in place, and pushed off sideways with
some effort; Jiang Cheng’s feet were just barely lifted off the ground. He half-dragged Jiang
Cheng and started making his way down the stairs.
It wouldn’t be too big of a problem going down normal stairs this way, but the stairs that
led to the rooftop on this old building was a metal framed one. It wouldn’t be an issue to
properly carry someone down piggyback style, but with only one arm around Jiang Cheng
like this, it was more than a little difficult.
He could feel that Jiang Cheng’s whole body had gone slack. It was probably not due
entirely to the height, he figured some portion of it was from an overwhelming
disappointment in Li Baoguo.
Gu Fei had to keep one hand clutching the railing, and one hand on Jiang Cheng, which
meant he basically got them down this flight of stairs using only the strength of one arm
and one leg. His arm was starting to ache from the strain when they reached the last step,
and he almost threw Jiang Cheng down on the landing.
After he let go, Jiang Cheng leaned himself against a wall, and slowly lowered himself into a
crouch.
Li Baoguo was still cursing away on the roof, his tirade was interspersed with sounds of Li
Qian’s crying, and the pacifying attempts of the police officers. Gu Fei couldn’t hear the
specific words, but he could make out hints of annoyance and efforts at suppressing it.
“Shall we go down?” Gu Fei bent down with his hands braced on his knees, and studied
Jiang Cheng.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng took in a couple of deep breaths with his brows furrowed, then stood
up, pressing a hand against his abdomen. “Fuck, I want to vomit.”
“Go ahead.” Gu Fei said.
“Try to be civil, Steel Works is my home, ” Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
“Responsibility is my own.” [1]
Gu Fei laughed and squeezed his shoulder, “Then let’s go down and find a trash can for
you.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He kept his eyes closed and took a little longer to focus his mind,
but the chaos on the rooftop wouldn’t allow him to succeed. He sighed, and started walking
down the stairs while holding on to the railing.
Gu Fei followed behind him, and the noise from the roof slowly faded.
They only made it down two floors, when a furious roar boomed from the street outside,
“IF YOU WANT TO DIE THEN DIE! WHO ARE YOU TRYING TO
SCARE, CROUCHING THERE LIKE THAT! YOU’RE FUCKING SICK!”
Jiang Cheng stopped. One of the units on the fifth floor had their door open, and everyone
inside were crowded around the window watching the drama unfold.
As soon as they heard those words, this family immediately started getting excited, “Their
oldest kid is here, this is gonna be good!”
Gu Fei pushed him gently from behind, “Let’s go.”
Jiang Cheng turned and continued his way down. He walked slowly, perhaps from the
knowledge that once downstairs, he would run into Li Hui. The people he didn’t wish to see
were taking turns appearing in front of him.
“Let’s go get something to eat.” Behind him, Gu Fei tried to distract him with food. “How
about we go to Jiuri’s place for their meat pies? It’s been a while.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered. “But they’re probably out of donkey meat at this hour, I
quite liked that filling.”
“You can have…… the tenderloin one,” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng’s back.
“Didn’t you say last time the tenderloin filling is pretty good too? Why don’t you have that.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
The closer they got to ground level, the louder Li Hui’s voice became. Gu Fei felt that in all
the years he’d known Li Hui, his voice had never been so full of life. The energy with which
he faced off with Li Baoguo was like yelling at a sworn enemy of many years. Even Li
Baoguo had become re-energized: he stopped coughing, stopped wheezing, and was yelling
with an especially loud voice that reverberated back and forth inside the stairwell; it was
tough to make out the content of his tirade.
The officers and people of the neighbourhood committee must’ve regretted calling him
here, but wanting to see Li Hui was Li Baoguo’s own request.
Without him here, Li Baoguo hurled abuse and refused to come down. Now that he had
seen Li Hui, he was still hurling abuse, and who knew when he would finally come down.
Either way it was a dilemma.
The only ones in a good mood were probably the gathered onlookers.
The people of this place, their lives were limited to the few lines of a Go board that
endlessly intersected with each other, where like a pool of stagnant water, every
intersection would eventually lead them back where they started. Year after year,
generation after generation might’ve all been repeating the same paths. They could follow
these repeating paths all the way to its natural end, without even needing to lift their heads
up to look forward.
The people downstairs with their heads tilted back to look up, the people upstairs with
their heads stuck out of their windows looking down, and the ones who had their doors
closed but were listening with ears perked. For most of them, the word “hope” had long
been absent from their hearts, or perhaps had never been there in the first place, nor was it
a necessary thing to think about. The only joy in their lives was probably watching the mess
and pain that existed around them.
Seeing someone else whose life was even more of a mess than their own, seeing someone
else in even more pain than themselves, that was their greatest source of joy.
Gu Fei wondered how this mess was going to end, Li Hui had taken a tougher stance than
ever before. Last time when Li Baoguo went at people with a knife, Li Hui had run up and
snatched the knife away, all the while cursing at Li Baoguo, and even hit him. However, Li
Hui was showing no sign of holding back today. Their argument across a distance of several
floors was still going as strong as ever, like a spectacular poetry recital.
Perhaps it was because this time, Li Baoguo’s tantrum had to do with his illness, which
meant it had to do with money. And to these native products of the Steel Works, that was a
life and death issue.
Well worth having an epic fight over.
“I truly don’t understand.” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “How they can live in this manner for
decades, for their whole lives.”
“You don’t need to understand.” Gu Fei said. “You don’t have to live like this, just live your
own life. There are so many people on this earth, gotta maintain variance within the species
somehow.”
Jiang Cheng turned around and gave him a look, “You illiterate.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled. “I am one of the variations too, and so are you.”
“I rather like someone like you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I rather like someone like you too.” Gu Fei said. “Plus, to me, you’re like a rare species that
I never thought I’d find.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, and his footsteps seemed to become a little lighter.
However, when Jiang Cheng reached the door to Li Baoguo’s place on the first floor, he still
paused, because Li Hui was standing right in the doorway of the building entrance. His
curses rang throughout the stairwell, the sound of it reverberating inside the building made
even Gu Fei’s eardrums hurt.
“‘ELDERY YET DISRESPECTED’ IS A PHRASE MADE JUST FOR YOU!
AND DON’T CALL ME IMPERTINENT EITHER, IT’S NOT YOUR
FUCKING PLACE!” Li Hui pointed a finger upstairs and roared. “AND DON’T
FUCKING TALK ABOUT HOW I TREAT YOU! HOWEVER I TREAT YOU,
IS EXACTLY WHAT YOU DESERVE!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t continue forward, so Gu Fei also stopped behind him and leaned against
the railing, listening to Li Hui’s angry diatribe outside. The people around Li Hui were also
trying to pacify him halfheartedly, but their words were like air to him, of which one or two
sentences might even further incite his rage.
The crowd that originally gathered to watch the show were now slowly starting to break
out of the immersion. Both Li Hui and Li Baoguo’s emotions were getting a little too over
the top, the situation appeared to be quickly spiralling out of control.
“Li Hui, give it a rest won’t you,” An auntie tugged on Li Hui’s arm. “This sounds bad but
how much longer is your father going to live, even if he wants to yell at you it won’t be for
much longer, why bother……”
“He better die right now!” Li Hui flung his arm out and pointed up at the roof.
“MY WHOLE LIFE I’VE WATCHED YOU EMBARRASS YOURSELF, RUN
YOUR MOUTH AND HIT PEOPLE! WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO FUCKING
LIVE FOR!”
“STOP IT—— DON’T SAY ANY MORE! Enough already!” Li Qian’s hoarse
screams sounded from the roof, shrill and desperate. “What exactly do you guys want!”
“HE WANTS ME TO DIE!” Li Baoguo’s voice boomed, like a sudden clap of thunder.
Before Li Hui and Li Qian got another word out, a sudden burst of horrified screams
erupted from above and below at the same time.
Immediately after that, Gu Fei heard a “thud” outside the corridor that sounded like a bag of
cement dropping to the ground, dull but loud. It made whoever heard it feel like their
breathing and heartbeat had stopped for a moment.
At the same time as this shocking sound, a small dark shape flew past the ground floor
entrance. Only when it landed on the ground, did Gu Fei realize that it was a single shoe.
Nonstop screams and disordered yelling were all around them, on top of which were the
cries of extreme horror from women and children. In a span of mere seconds, these sounds
seemed to have filled all the spaces around them, leaving one with nowhere to run, and
nowhere to hide.
After a brief moment of blanking out, Gu Fei made a dash forward and put his arms around
Jiang Cheng, covering Jiang Cheng’s eyes with his hand.
Jiang Cheng’s whole body had stiffened, but he was surprisingly compliant, like a robot
with its power cut off. As Gu Fei half pushed and half carried Jiang Cheng out of the
corridor, Jiang Cheng went along with the motions, without a sound or struggle.
The situation outside had descended into chaos. Gu Fei didn’t look in the direction of Li
Baoguo’s last jump. He had watched in silence as the people here lived their suffocating
lives, but did not wish to witness another life come to its end.
It was enough to have experienced it once, he never wanted to witness it a second time.
In the ensuing chaos, nobody noticed him taking Jiang Cheng away from the scene. Outside,
Li Hui had gone quiet, but Li Qian’s howling cries, filled with an unspeakable intensity,
could still be heard from the rooftop, bursting out one after another.
As though it was a song dedicated to the bravest moment of Li Baoguo’s life.
Gu Fei didn’t know where he should take Jiang Cheng. Everywhere they could possibly go
belonged to ‘here’, and everywhere was filled with a Li Baoguo-like aura.
He wasn’t sure of Jiang Cheng’s state of mind at this moment, and couldn’t predict how
Jiang Cheng would react in a few minutes when he snapped out of it. At the end, all he could
do was pull Jiang Cheng into the convenience store.
Along the way, they saw quite a few people running toward Li Baoguo’s place, throwing
them curious and excitement-filled looks as they ran past, the whole time not breaking
from their long and fast strides. After all, a living person was not as entertaining as the
dead.
Everyone lived like this, but not everyone died like that.
Gu Fei pushed Jiang Cheng into the inner room inside the store, then went back and closed
the shop door. His mom was supposed to be watching the store today, but at the moment it
was empty. She might’ve also gone to watch the show, or was simply out on a date with her
new lover.
Gu Fei turned around after closing the door, just as Jiang Cheng dashed out of the small
room and toward the back courtyard.
By the time Gu Fei followed him out, Jiang Cheng was already in the bathroom with his
hand braced on the wall, puking his guts out. Even two meters away, Gu Fei could see Jiang
Cheng’s hand shaking on the wall.
Gu Fei went inside to grab two bottles of water. When he came back to the bathroom, Jiang
Cheng was still vomiting, but nothing was coming out, at this point he was just dry heaving.
He stood silently behind Jiang Cheng, until Jiang Cheng stopped going through the heaving
motions, before finally speaking up, “Want some water?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, only reached back with his hand.
Gu Fei twisted open the cap and handed the bottle to him.
“Wait for me outside,” Jiang Cheng tilted his head back and gargled two mouthfuls of water,
then spit it out. “I’m fine.”
“I’ll leave the other bottle here.” Gu Fei loosened the cap of the second bottle and placed it
next to the sink.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng continued to pour water into his mouth.
Gu Fei went back out to the courtyard, stood there blankly for a minute, then lit up a
cigarette to keep in his mouth.
Halfway through the cigarette, he finally started to feel a little calmer.
Regardless of the kind of person Li Baoguo was, or what he had done, ending his life in this
manner was ultimately a hard to digest blow to everyone, including the onlookers who
were simply there for a show.
It was only then that Gu Fei started to feel the stinging pain on his collarbone again.
He wondered whether the pain on Jiang Cheng’s inner thigh had come back yet.
Just now when Jiang Cheng was vomiting, he was standing with his legs apart…… Of course,
people didn’t normally stand with their legs clamped together when vomiting……
Incredulously, Gu Fei felt like laughing. With the cigarette still in his mouth, he threw his
head back and laughed soundlessly for a good while.
After his cigarette was done, Jiang Cheng walked out of the bathroom. His gait was a little
wobbly, but the look on his face was calm.
“Feeling a little better?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’m even throwing up stomach acid,” Jiang Cheng frowned, bent a little, and clutched his
abdomen. “I don’t feel good.”
“Go inside and lie down for a bit?” Gu Fei asked.
“Can’t lie down,” Jiang Cheng straightened up and walked into the store, hooked a little
plank stool over with his foot and sat down. “Right now I just want to sit balled up like this.”
“Then let’s do that.” Gu Fei also pulled up a little plank stool and sat down facing him.
With his arms resting on his knees, Jiang Cheng stared blankly into space for a while, “Li
Baoguo jumped off a building, didn’t he?”
“…… Yes.” Gu Fei hesitated for two seconds before answering.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, just reached a hand out to Gu Fei.
“You want water?” Gu Fei looked at his hand. Still, after asking, he reached out and stroked
Jiang Cheng’s palm. “Or something to eat?”
“Smoke.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “Where’s our tacit understanding?”
“It got lost from the fright.” Gu Fei got out the pack from his pocket, pulled one out, and
placed it in Jiang Cheng’s hand, along with a lighter.
“So Li Baoguo jumped off a building.” Jiang Cheng lit a cigarette and took in a couple of hard
drags, then stared at the glowing tip.
“Yes.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“I…… don’t feel so good.” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows and bit his lip.
“It’s not only you,” Gu Fei sighed. “I don’t feel too great myself.”
“Do you think,” Jiang Cheng lifted his eyes and looked at him. “He saw it, when I left?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. Faced with this abnormally calm Jiang Cheng, he was suddenly a little
afraid of saying the wrong thing.
“I said I don’t want to hear anything about him ever again.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Could he have heard me?”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei shifted his stool forward. “This has nothing to do with you.”
“Mhm, I know.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I know, but these are still my first reactions. Was it
something I did, something I said……”
“No, not at all.” Gu Fei cut him off.
“You know,” Jiang Cheng paused for a bit, his brows in a knot. “That’s just how people are. I
only asked you all this so I can have someone tell me, this outcome was not of my making.
Just to pick myself out from this disaster situation.”
“It’s not the same.” Gu Fei held his gaze. “You know well enough, there’s no need for other
people to tell you. You know that it’s not because of you.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him, then after a long time, let out a little smile, “Yeah.”
“Eat something,” Gu Fei said. “Or go to sleep, pick one?”
“Eat something first, then sleep.” Jiang Cheng said. “You have instant noodles here right?
Can you make a bowl for me.”
“Alright, want eggs in it?” Gu Fei asked.
“One egg then.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei stood up, got the noodles, and went into the kitchen. Normally when he ate instant
noodles, he would just steep them in boiling water and be done with it. Sometimes if he got
lazy, he’d just nibble at the dry noodles.
But right now, even if Jiang Cheng wanted him to go buy meat pies from Wang Xu’s place,
he would do it.
Boil water, add noodles, add egg. After a few seconds he started to feel uncertain, so he
walked to the door and asked, “Do you want the egg fully cooked, soft yolk, or scrambled?”
Jiang Cheng was still sitting in the same position on the little stool as before. He didn’t
answer, and seemed to not hear what Gu Fei said.
Only when Gu Fei turned to go back to the kitchen, did Jiang Cheng’s voice slowly carry
over, “Soft.”
Gu Fei sprinted back to the kitchen and poked the egg with chopsticks. It wasn’t fully
cooked, but the yolk was definitely not soft anymore. He had no choice but to crack another
egg in, watching it carefully, and made a soft poached egg.
If Jiang Cheng didn’t want to eat the fully cooked one, he could.
He went back in, set up the little table, and placed the bowl of noodles in front of Jiang
Cheng. Just as he was about to go get another set of chopsticks to eat the fully cooked egg,
Jiang Cheng picked up his chopsticks and split the fully cooked egg in half, studied it, then
put half of it in his mouth.
“…… Didn’t you say you wanted soft yolk?” Gu Fei blinked.
“Did I?” Jiang Cheng gave him a look as he chewed. “I never eat soft yolk, it’s like runny
shit.”
Gu Fei was just thinking that he would eat the soft poached one himself, but hearing this,
immediately gave up and sat down at the table.
“Aren’t you going to eat something?” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m not hungry.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng said as he ate slowly. First he ate the other half of the fully cooked egg,
then not touching the noodles, he ate the other soft poached egg as well.
“…… Didn’t you say it’s like runny shit?” Gu Fei was astonished.
“Did I?” Jiang Cheng pushed the bowl to Gu Fei. “I might have said that. I ate the shit for you,
you can have the noodles.”
“Fuck,” Gu Fei laughed. “You done eating?”
“I didn’t really want to eat anyway,” Jiang Cheng pinched the area between his brows. “I just
wanted to listen to you being busy doing something, it makes me feel a little more
grounded.”
“Then will watching me eat noodles make you feel even more grounded?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei put his head down and dug into the noodles. It tasted pretty good.

Footnotes:
[1]: A made up slogan XD China always has a lot of slogans hung around cities, towns, and
even villages. Their messages range anything from protecting the environment and
conserving energy, to political propaganda. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5085
TL word count: 3606
TL time: 5:59:10
Edit: 0:40:26
Curse words: 7 x fucks, 3 x shits
TL’s Notes
RIP

First posted: January 30, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 71
Mr. Policeman sir! That’s the guy! It’s me!
To Gu Fei, this bowl of noodles was as uninteresting as it gets. Their original plan to go get
meat pies at Wang Xu’s place was put to the side. Compared to the lofty meat pies, these
instant noodles were particularly dull.
Especially as he looked up occasionally and saw Jiang Cheng sitting across from him,
spacing out in his own mind, these noodles became even more dull.
Gu Fei was a little worried. Jiang Cheng’s current mental state really didn’t seem like the
calm after he collected himself, more like he was still in a daze, having not completely
recovered from the shock.
He didn’t want to leave Jiang Cheng alone by himself tonight, but he was also afraid to open
his mouth and suggest that he stay with Jiang Cheng for the night, or that Jiang Cheng could
just stay here. He was afraid that at this point any one sentence or trigger could cause Jiang
Cheng to explode.
After he finished the noodles and washed the bowl, Gu Fei walked back into the store to
find that Jiang Cheng hadn’t moved from his spot.
He folded the table back up and set it to the side, then stood next to Jiang Cheng.
“That room in the steel works factories,” Jiang Cheng finally said after a long time. “Will
there be anyone staying there tonight?”
“No.” Gu Fei answered.
“Can you keep me company there then.” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t want to spend the night
in a familiar place.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
He stood for a while longer, but still Jiang Cheng didn’t move. Gu Fei didn’t rush him. He
went and sat down behind the cash register, and took out his phone.
His Friend Circle had practically been bursting until this point. The word on the street was
someone had jumped off a building nearby, and everyone was trying to get some details, a
few spoke with such authority as though they had been downstairs at the time ready to
catch Li Baoguo themselves.
Gu Fei exited from the Friend Circle, and was just about to play a round of game to give his
mind a break, when he got a message from Wang Xu.
– I heard the one who jumped is from the street next to yours?
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
Wang Xu sent him another message.
– Somebody said it’s Jiang Cheng’s dad, he lives on the next street over right?
Gu Fei frowned. In this modern era filled with various tools of instantaneous
communication, the rumour mill within neighbouring communities was even quicker than
before, scarily so.
– If I hear this being spread around tomorrow, I won’t let you off easy!
– I wasn’t spreading it around! Did I not come ask you about it first thing? I didn’t even ask
Jiang Cheng
– Doesn’t matter, if I see anyone talking about it, I’ll come for you!
– Fack! Fine fine fine, I’ll go give them a warning okkk?
Gu Fei didn’t respond, just turned off the screen. He didn’t feel like playing Aixiaochu
anymore.
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“A little past 8, 8:26.” Gu Fei glanced at him. “You……”
“Let’s sit for a little longer.” Jiang Cheng said. “Right now, I just don’t feel like moving for
some reason. I want to just sit here and blank out for a while.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered, picked up his phone again, and opened Aixiaochu.
He very much understood Jiang Cheng’s current state of mind. Him not wanting to move
was not only a physical need, but mental as well. He needed to sit and blank out like that, as
though any sort of movement would pull him back to reality, afraid that with the slightest
movement, all those fears and anxiety he was afraid to face would come rushing back like
the tide.
In the period after Gu Fei watched his father die in the lake, he lost count of how many
nights he spent sitting and staring off into space like this.
He wouldn’t find it strange even if Jiang Cheng spent a whole day and night sitting on that
little stool.
But to him, these were things that Jiang Cheng was never supposed to face, and experience,
and carry. Only for some unfathomable reason, he was sent back here.
Jiang Cheng wants to leave. Even if he was born here, even if his parents were
all native products of this place, he still didn’t belong here. Gu Fei sometimes felt afraid,
afraid that Jiang Cheng would sink.
Fortunately, that bit of pride in Jiang Cheng’s bones had always been there to prop him up.
No matter where he was, he stood tall.
In this convenience store, there was a little clock. Every time the hour hand moves forward
a block, it would make a little click sound.
After the third click, Jiang Cheng knew that it was 11 o’clock.
He felt sleepy, very sleepy, like he could close his eyes and fall asleep right away. But when
he did close his eyes, even if he pressed his eyelids together until they were sore, he still
couldn’t sleep.
It was torturous.
He didn’t directly bear witness to Li Baoguo’s last jump, but the sound of him hitting the
ground, as well as the shoe that flew across his field of vision, were like scenes from a
dream he couldn’t shake off, moving in front his eyes with a somewhat realistic but blurry
filter. In his daze, he had trouble separating what he dreamed from his actual lived
experience.
The days were getting warmer, he had sweated that afternoon during the tattoo session.
But at the moment, his hands felt cold. In fact, his whole body felt cold, waves of
goosebumps washed over him.
The only scalding hot place left on his body were his eyes, it felt as though they had been
burned in a fire. He had no urge to shed tears, even though his tear ducts had been getting
quite a workout since he came here. He knew he didn’t want to shed tears for Li Baoguo’s
death, they didn’t have that kind of relationship. It was only that his eyes felt hot, and if it
continued feeling hot like this, he would surely get a headache. He had no choice but to
keep a hand pressed against his eyes in order to make himself feel better.
At long last, Jiang Cheng let out a breath and stood up. When he looked back at Gu Fei, he
saw that Gu Fei had also just stood up, stuffing his phone back in his pocket.
“Did you pass that level?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yep.” Gu Fei said.
“Bull-fucking-shit.” Jiang Cheng said. “This whole time I didn’t hear the levelling up sound, it
was all sounds of failure. You didn’t even finish this round.”
Gu Fei started laughing, “Good ears, I’ve even lowered the volume to one block.”
“Give it to me.” Jiang Cheng reached out. “I’ll play for a bit.”
Gu Fei handed his phone to him. Indeed, he hadn’t passed the level on the screen, but even
though there were only seven steps left, there was much hope.
Jiang Cheng looked down at the screen, “Let’s head over to the room.”
When Gu Fei pulled open the grates and glanced out, he could see that all the streetlamps
had come on, and the shops on the street were closed. The entire street was deserted, the
hustle and bustle of earlier were all wiped away by the dark of night.
In that instant, he had a strange feeling. It felt like any supposed scary or shocking thing,
whatever got the people of several streets screaming and yelling in a frenzy, had all
disappeared in a matter of hours.
It had all turned into meal accompaniments for each of these households, to be chewed on
over and over under the glow of their lights. Give it a few months, or years, and it would
evolve into an unrecognizable local tale, much like the way Gu Fei ‘killed’ his own father.
How bizarre, and how scary.
Jiang Cheng stared down at the game on the phone screen, and drew back his peripheral
vision. This way, he could feel like he was a little egg yolk surrounded by its shell.
As they headed in the direction of the steel works factories, Gu Fei walked by his side with
one hand pushing against his back. Whenever there was an obstacle in front of them, he
would give Jiang Cheng a little tug, and Jiang Cheng would go along with the motion to
avoid whatever rocks, bricks, or holes on the ground.
When Gu Fei opened the door to their room in the factories, Jiang Cheng dropped down on
the sofa, and finally let out a breath of relief. He glanced up and around them, then handed
the game back to Gu Fei, having already shot past two levels.
“Badass huh.” Gu Fei said. “I should change my display name to ‘Someone’s Carrying Me’.”
“Do it.” Jiang Cheng leaned back on the sofa and smiled.
Both the fabric cover and blanket on the sofa had been changed to a soft linen type
material. It felt cool and fresh against his skin, he started feeling insanely sleepy again.
“Can you…… get up first.” Gu Fei lifted the sofa, trying to drag it out into a bed. “It’s gonna
break if I drag this with you still on it.”
Jiang Cheng stood up and slowly took a couple steps forward, thought for a second, then
sighed, “Should’ve showered first before coming, at least brush my teeth or something.”
“We got stuff here.” Gu Fei pulled the sofa out and pushed the back down. “Go look in that
bin in the bathroom, Li Yan should’ve left some disposable toothbrush, towels, and what
not in there. Just do a wipe, your leg can’t touch water anyway.”
Jiang Cheng went into the bathroom and looked. There was practically nothing in the
bathroom, though the plastic bin in the corner was fairly well equipped.
However, all the toiletry sets were printed with names of various hotel chains.
“Where did he get all these hotel stuff?” Jiang Cheng asked as he walked out of the
bathroom while brushing his teeth.
“It’s his mom’s company, he’s got plenty at home. He brought these over a while ago, it’s
been cold so nobody’s used it.” Gu Fei said. “These guys aren’t very particular anyways.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
Chatting idly about nothing with Gu Fei was the only way he could hold a conversation at
the moment. This kind of chatter eased his mind, and didn’t evoke any sort of unpleasant
emotions.
They both did a simple washing up, then laid down on the sofa. After the lights were off, the
only brightness left in the room was the moonlight seeping in from outside, the later it was
the brighter it got. Hanging outside the curtainless window, it made one feel strangely
unsettled.
Jiang Cheng turned around to face Gu Fei’s profile.
“Want me to hold you?” Gu Fei turned to him and asked.
“Go away.” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s hot.”
“This way then.” Gu Fei grabbed his hand and held it. “Hurry up and go to sleep, there’s
class tomorrow.”
“Good night.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Good night.” Gu Fei squeezed his palm.
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes, and Gu Fei’s fingers continued to squeeze his palm
rhythmically. This method of soothing as if he was coaxing a child might be a little amusing,
but it still made him feel grounded.
Only, Gu Fei clearly fell asleep before him. The rhythm of his squeezes slowed
down little by little, and eventually stopped. Jiang Cheng smiled, and listening to Gu Fei’s
steady and slowed breathing, breathed along with him. He fell asleep soon after.
When he woke up in the morning, Gu Fei had already gotten up. Jiang Cheng could smell the
aroma of beef noodle soup.
“You’re up?” Gu Fei asked from behind him.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng turned around, and saw two bowls of beef noodle soup takeout set on
top of the little rickety table by the sofa. He sat up and rubbed his face.
Throughout the whole night’s sleep, he surprisingly did not jolt awake, but the dreams
never stopped. As a result, when he woke up just now, he never had the chance to
experience a process of remembering the previous day’s events, re-experiencing the shock,
then getting used to it again.
Li Baoguo had died. In front of his three kids and a crowd of neighbours. A jump from the
top of the building, to conclude a life that might or might not have had any meaning.
These were the images that flashed through his dreams for the whole night. Now that he
was awake, it only made the images clearer.
“Nobody’s called me.” Jiang Cheng grabbed his phone and glanced at it. “Do I not need to
be…… involved in dealing with Li Baoguo’s affairs?”
“They’ll call you when they need the money.” Gu Fei said. “And when they’re splitting up
the assets.”
“Does Li Baoguo have any assets?” Jiang Cheng swiped at his phone
absentmindedly.
“Dunno.” Gu Fei held up a loaded toothbrush in front of him. “Gotta have something, maybe
a few thousand.”
“If he really has a few thousand, he wouldn’t go around asking for money.”
Jiang Cheng took the toothbrush and stuffed it in his mouth. “But it doesn’t matter, even if
he has a million bucks it wouldn’t have anything to do with me, I don’t want a single
penny.”
“Just put something in for the funeral, and don’t worry about the rest.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered, and slowly brushed his teeth.
Theoretically, with the death of his biological father, it was entirely within reason for him
to take a few days off from school. But Jiang Cheng couldn’t
think of any need for him to take time off, or what he should do with the time if he did.
Just as he entered the school, he happened to run into Lao-Xu, who must’ve been on gate
duty this week.
“Morning, Xu-zong.” Jiang Cheng called out to him.
“Ah Jiang Cheng…… morning morning morning.” Lao-Xu seemed to want to
say something, but must’ve decided against it. “Go on in, take care in your studies.”
“Morning, Xu-zong.” Gu Fei also called out behind him.
“Good kid! You’re not late today!” Lao-Xu clapped his shoulder happily. “If you can listen to
the lecture in class later then that’ll be even better!”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei answered.
It might be him being a little sensitive, but as Jiang Cheng walked upstairs to the classroom,
he could feel all the eyes on him, but didn’t hear any hushed whispers. Of course, with the
way he usually carried himself, nobody would dare to come up and ask him either. It was
slightly uncomfortable, but he preferred it this way, it allowed his tightly wound nerves a
chance to relax for a bit.
“Jiang Cheng,” He entered the classroom, and was just about to sit, when Wang Xu pushed
Zhou Jing aside and dropped himself down in the seat. “Are you coming to my place for
lunch today? I told my mom to put aside some donkey filling for us.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng paused.
“Are you coming or not?” Wang Xu asked. “You guys haven’t been there for ages, my mom
even asked about it last week, she thought I must’ve had conflict with my classmates again.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile. “Will there be lamb soup?”
“That’s a must! As many meat pies and lamb soup as you can eat.” Wang Xu said. “It’s
decided then, we’ll head to lunch together.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then glanced again at Gu Fei.
“Da-Fei will definitely come too,” Wang Xu stood up and walked back to his own seat. “If
you’re coming, how can he not?”
“Fuck,” Gu Fei watched Wang Xu’s retreating back, and said quietly. “I wish I can say I’m not
going.”
Jiang Cheng started laughing, he bowed his head and giggled at his desk drawer,
“Then don’t go.”
“How is that possible,” Gu Fei sighed. “You’re going, and I’m the free part of the buy one and
get one free.”
“Then……” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “When I said I’m going to play ball with He Zhou,
why wasn’t it buy one and get one free then?”
“That’s different.” Gu Fei said.
That’s different. Jiang Cheng didn’t know exactly what was different about it, but wasn’t in
the mood to dig deeper.
Gu Fei reached out a hand in front him, and placed a milk candy on his desk.
“Just one piece?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“There’s only one left, I saved it from my own mouth.” Gu Fei rummaged through his
pockets. “Winter jackets have larger pockets that hold more, these days I can only carry less
than 20 at a time, and I forgot to refill yesterday.”
“And what if Er-Miao comes to you for candy today?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’ll just go buy her a lollipop at the concession stand later, those 50 cents ones.”
Gu Fei said.
“So easy to please.” Jiang Cheng smiled, unwrapped the milk candy, and put it in his mouth.
“She just likes having a sweet hardcandy to chew on, doesn’t matter if it tastes good.” Gu Fei
pulled out his phone and opened the idiotic Aixiaochu. “Fuck, did Li Yan pay for a power
leveler or something?”
“Who the hell pays for a power leveler on a stupid mobile game.” Jiang Cheng said.
“How is he ranking way above me again, wasn’t I just one level away
yesterday?” Gu Fei was unwilling to concede. “Can you catch up for me at lunch?”
“Call me ge.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng-cheng gege,” Gu Fei said in a low voice. “Help me catch up please.”
“Alrighty.” Jiang Cheng laughed and nodded.
Jiang Cheng maintained that he hadn’t been very affected. He didn’t have much of a
relationship with Li Baoguo, so no matter how he looked at it, he shouldn’t
be feeling too upset over Li Baoguo’s death.
However, reality has proven — Jiang Cheng slumped on the desk with his eyes closed —
that it wasn’t entirely true. Li Baoguo ended his life in such a way that would leave a
permanent mark in a person’s mind, no matter who it was. That kind of mental stimulation
isn’t something one can just get over with words like
“we don’t have anything to do with each other so I don’t give a crap”.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t sad, nor was he in pain, but it was also true that his energy remained
low throughout the whole morning. During Lao-Lu’s class, when his thunderous yelling
shook the ceiling so much that it caused the drywall to flake off, and the whole class
erupted in hysterical laughter, Jiang Cheng couldn’t even bother to open his eyes.
This was the scariest way to be, mentally. It was a state of mind wherein he couldn’t gather
up the energy to care about anything.
He was most afraid of his emotions sinking to rock bottom like this; if he lost control, it
would swell up and overwhelm him. After a while, it would be hard to get it back up even if
he wants to.
The last period was Lao-Lu’s class again. He spent the whole class resetting his emotions
amidst Lao-Lu’s thunderous roars, and continued to pump himself up.
By the time the bell rang, he was no longer slumped over the desk. He straightened and
leaned back in his chair, took in a few deep breaths, then slowly let it out.
It’s no big deal. Since the day he arrived in this place, there had been all sorts of irritating
things and irritating people, and didn’t he resolve them all one by one?
It’s no big deal. A person’s potential cannot be predicted by themself, as long as he made a
start to solve the problem, then it’s no big deal at all.
He continued to breathe in deep, and just as he took in a big breath and about to let it out,
Wang Xu walked past and slammed a hand against his desk, “Let’s go go go!”
Jiang Cheng almost ejected his pent-up breath out through his eyes. He choked and couldn’t
stop coughing, “Ah fuck.”
When they walked out the school gates, Jiang Cheng felt like his mood had at least
improved quite a bit on the surface. When his phone rang, he felt a sudden tightening in his
guts, but still took it out calmly and answered this call from an unknown number.
He never saved this number, but he could guess without even using his brain that the call
was from Li Hui. As he answered the phone, he had the urge to thank him for not calling
during class.
“Jiang Cheng,” Li Hui’s voice was a little hoarse, but still as aggressive as ever, as if Jiang
Cheng owed him money. Going by this tone of voice alone, it was at least ten thousand
yuan. “You’ve been rather carefree huh. Dad’s dead, and you haven’t come by even once?
Not even to take a look?”
“Get to the point.” Jiang Cheng’s voice had also cooled down.
“Oyy, the point, is it? Straight to the point, huh?! You don’t have anything to do with this
family anyways, so you don’t need to know anything else, right?!” Li Hui blasted out in
succession.
“If you don’t talk, then I’m hanging up.” Jiang Cheng refused to take his lead.
“Don’t you fucking act tough with me!” Li Hui was infuriated. “Did you think just because I
didn’t get you back last time that I’m afraid of you? You wanna bet I’ll get some guys to fuck
you up today!?”
“I just want to know what you’re calling me for, if you’re not gonna say it, then I’m hanging
up. And if in the future you feel like telling me again, I won’t be here to listen.” Jiang Cheng’s
voice was still cold. “I’ll be waiting for you to come for me, and if you can’t, you better wait
for me to come for you.”
“Fucking! You motherfuck……” Li Hui must’ve briefly run out of words to say, he erupted
with a stream of profanities after that, which altogether might even be enough for an 800
characters essay.
Jiang Cheng listened for a while to collect some vocabulary, then just as he was about to
hang up, Li Hui’s voice got quieter on the other end, and a female voice carried over, “Ah,
Jiang Cheng? It’s your sister-in-law, don’t listen to your brother ramble on, he’s in a bad
mood.”
Sister-in-law? Jiang Cheng had absolutely no impression of this sister-in-law, so he simply
made a sound of acknowledgment.
“So here’s the thing, your dad’s gone, we’re all very upset over it, and you……
we can understand too. But now there’s all these matters to deal with, and all these things
that need to be paid for, if you are to remove yourself from everything…… that’s not very
reasonable, right?” His sister-in-law said.
“Sis,” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei, who was dragging Wang Xu along in front of him, and
slowed down his steps. “Let me say that first of all, I’m a student. I don’t have a job, or a
source of income. Normally, if any family needs someone to shell out money, they’re not
gonna come ask someone who’s still in high school, right? That’s just as unreasonable.”
“Ayy buuut that’s not quite how it works……” At his words, his sis sister-in-law felt a little
embarrassed, but also grew more anxious at the same time.
“Here’s how it works with me,” Jiang Cheng cut her off. “I can pay three
thousand. I was going to give it to Li Baoguo before, but didn’t have a chance to; now it can
be used on his funeral affairs. However, you have to write me a receipt clearly stating how
much money was received. I’m not going to ask where you’ll spend it, but this is once and
done, nothing more.”
“Ah, three thousand……” His sister-in-law hesitated, probably thinking that it was too little.
“Whether Li Baoguo has any assets, or how much, has nothing to do with me. I won’t ask
about that either.” Jiang Cheng said. “But I’m saying this right now, don’t anybody dare
come bother me, you people might not be able to handle me when I’m at my worst. Once
you have the receipt ready, come to my school and give me a call.”
Jiang Cheng finished saying his part, and immediately hung up without waiting to hear the
response from the other side.
The moment he put the phone back in his pocket, he let out a long breath.
In front of him, Gu Fei was also talking to someone on the phone. When he turned and
noticed Jiang Cheng had finished with his call, he pointed at Wang Xu, then came walking
back toward Jiang Cheng.
“No but,” Wang Xu stood on the spot unhappily. “If you two have something to discuss can
it at least wait till after we eat? I’m the one paying and you keep pushing me off to the side,
what has this world come to!”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei.
“I have to ask him first, I can’t guarantee he’ll agree to this one, no but……
don’t they usually look for girls to be lip models? You want this big fella to put lipstick on
and pose for photos…… I understand contrast, but the point is he’s not like Li Yan, he
doesn’t look feminine, he’s just…… fine fine fine I’ll ask him first.” Gu Fei hung up the phone
and looked at him.
“What the heck is a lip model?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“It’s uh, for displaying lip care products, and lipsticks and stuff.” Gu Fei said quietly. “Ding
Zhuxin’s friend saw your photos, and thought your lips looked…… pretty.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was shook as he stared at Gu Fei’s lips.
He never really paid attention to what his own lips looked like, usually when he looked in
the mirror to admire his own dashing handsome face, he liked to look at the whole
picture…… But he did always think that Gu Fei’s lips were very sexy, every time he saw
them he wanted to give it a kiss or a lick or maybe a bite……

It could be the side effect from the recent spar with Li Hui, but his mood was a little all over
the place at the moment. While staring at Gu Fei’s lips, he could hardly hear what Gu Fei
was saying, the only thing in his head was the kind of content one could call the cops for.
Mr. Policeman sir! That’s the guy! It’s me!
“I want to do something big for our birthdays.” Jiang Cheng said.
“So what they’re looking for is the visual impact, but if you don’t want to……”
Gu Fei paused in the middle of his sentence, and blinked. “What?”
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng said. “Lip model? I’ll even be an ass model as long as you’re the one
shooting.”
“What?” Gu Fei was once again stunned.
“Oh, it’s not ass model, it’s tush model.” Jiang Cheng said.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6465
TL word count: 4585
TL time:
Edit: 0:49:26
Curse words: 9 x fucks, 1 x shits, 3x asses
TL’s Notes
Work’s been busy sorry for late orz

First posted: February 9, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 72
Gu Fei put down the camera and went to the washroom.
Jiang Cheng was rather surprised when Gu Fei brought up the lip modeling. It seemed to
him that Ding Zhuxin and her friends were all weirdos. Ding Zhuxin designed a bunch of
hobo uniforms, the product images of which actually turned out looking really high-end; he
saw the end products of Gu Fei’s photo editing, they were paired with all sorts of
pretentious or hipster captions. Meanwhile, her friend wanted to put lipstick on a dude and
take photos of it……
Although, apparently it paid well. Even for an inexperienced noob like him, doing a
photoshoot for just a few days would more than patch up the hole left by the money he
gave to and was about to give for Li Baoguo.
Jiang Cheng didn’t mind whether or not he had to put lipstick on. After all, he had already
worn the ‘deranged caveman’ look from before. After after all, he was a handsome guy with
a good face and hot body who wasn’t afraid of any kind of weirdo outfits. He figured it
wouldn’t look half bad even if he was to put on lipstick.
“I was going to postpone it to the summer break,” Gu Fei said. “But they’re in a hurry and
can’t wait. I checked their schedule, the time is set for one week before the final exams,
would that affect you?”
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then what about your revision?” Gu Fei asked.
“Fragmented time, plus going to sleep one hour later.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Watch
and learn, slacker.”
“The most I do with fragmented time is catch a nap.” Gu Fei chuckled.
After they finished eating meat pies at Wang Xu’s place, everything seemed to have gone
back to the way it was.
Normally, when faced with something that troubled him that he couldn’t solve, Jiang Cheng
had two ways of dealing with it. The first was to keep thinking about it, turning it over and
backward in his mind nonstop until eventually, the problem lost its original power, when
he felt only a numbness whenever he recalled it. Those words of affirmation he could never
obtain, for example. After getting used to it, he no longer had much emotional reaction to it.
The other solution was to bury it and never touch it again, purposely avoiding it, and
perhaps forgetting it for real at some point in the future. Those calm and never-ending
criticisms, for example.
For Li Baoguo, Jiang Cheng chose the latter. An overly gruesome end such as this wasn’t
meant to be brooded on and replayed over and over. He buried these details into his mind,
and tried not to touch it ever again.
On Li Hui’s end, he never volunteered any information to Jiang Cheng. When Li Hui and his
wife came to meet him at the school a few days later with a receipt for 3000 yuan, they
didn’t even tell him when Li Baoguo was to be cremated.
“Hold on, let me see.” Standing outside the school gates, Jiang Cheng looked over the receipt
carefully, trying to decipher meaning out of the dog-shit handwriting. Fortunately, he had
years of experience with his own handwriting.
Then he took a square of archival ink out of his pocket, this he borrowed from Lao-Xu’s
office before he came out. “Do a fingerprint, put it on top of your name.”
“Get over yourself!” Li Hui was enraged. “Print my ass! It’s only three fucking thousand,
you’d think you were giving three million!”
“Mhm, it’s only three thousand, yet you both came to get it together.” Jiang Cheng smirked.
“Are you doing it or not, I’m not giving you this money without a fingerprint. What happens
if you decide to come around one day and claim that I faked your signature?”
Li Hui glared at him and was about to close in, when Wang Xu’s sudden roar boomed from
behind them, “What’s taking so long! Are you done yet! Do you need these guys’ help?”
A few people stood behind the gate: Gu Fei, Wang Xu, Lu Xiaobin, and Guo Xu.
Among these people, only Gu Fei knew what was happening, Wang Xu knew a little, while
Lu Xiaobin and Guo Xu were called here by Wang Xu to look more imposing. Standing there
with their bitch faces as though they’d push over the gates and come rushing out to fight at
any time, even the security guard looked a little nervous, never mind Li Hui, who quickly
quieted down.
“Fucking hell.” Li Hui snatched up the square of ink, brushed his thumb on it, and pressed a
thumb to the receipt.
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng looked at the thumb print, which was pretty clear, then took an
envelope out of his pocket and handed it to Li Hui. “You can give it a count.”
Li Hui opened the envelope and took a cursory glance while suppressing his fury, then
walked away without counting, his expression dark.
Jiang Cheng watched their silhouettes recede, and let out a long breath of relief.
When he turned to head back into the school, Gu Fei curled the corners of his mouth up and
gave him a smile, and so he gave one back.
Along with the relief, he also felt a little listless. It seemed that Li Hui didn’t feel very much
at all regarding Li Baoguo’s death, such that he was able to so boldly ask for money without
so much as a flinch. What kind of mentality that was, Jiang Cheng could never understand.
After Li Baoguo’s matter came to a close, it felt like everything was finally tied up and done.
Jiang Cheng buried this into the depth of his mind, and didn’t even tell Pan Zhi. If Pan Zhi
never brings this person up again, he’ll probably never voluntarily bring up this event.
Life and death, it was strange indeed.
A person had disappeared just like that, changing from one kind of rumour material, to a
different kind of rumour material. And if one steps out of this Steel Works neighbourhood,
nobody would even know someone like that had existed, nor would they know that he
chose to leave in this manner.
How he lived and how he died, it would only be stored in the distant memories of a sad
handful of people.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like he was frighteningly miniscule. Where he came from, how he
lived, the way he struggled and strived, and where he would eventually end up; his story
would be just as unknown to everyone else.
He himself was the only one who knew. Whether he was headed up or down, there was
only himself.
Lao-Xu the hen waited a whole week before tracking Jiang Cheng down for a talk, the
subject of which was surprisingly not about Li Baoguo, but regarding the final exam that
was coming up in a week.
Jiang Cheng looked across at Lao-Xu, and thought the man’s emotional
intelligence had somehow risen mysteriously.
“How’s the revision going?” Lao-Xu asked as he handed him a large manila envelope. “These
are some question bank sets I got for you, see if you have time to work on them?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng accepted the envelope. “It’s going alright. I have to take a couple of
afternoons off this week…… just so you know in advance.”
“Time off?” Lao-Xu looked at him. “What for?”
“It’s…… personal.” Jiang Cheng said, uh I gotta put lipstick on and make money, Xu-zong.
“Can you tell me about it?” Lao-Xu continued to ask.
“I cannot.” Jiang Cheng refused point-blank.
“Kiddo……” Lao-Xu sighed, then after some contemplation, gave him another warm smile as
he asked. “Are you under financial strain? I can help you apply……”
“No, that’s not necessary, I’m not under strain.” Jiang Cheng quickly answered.
“No need to trouble you, the school, or the state.”
“Ah you really are a good kid.” Lao-Xu said, then had another thought. “How about we
organize a donation drive within our class only……”
“Xu-zong please!” It would seem that Lao-Xu’s emotional intelligence couldn’t stand to be
praised even in his mind, even as they spoke he was witnessing it’s sliding descent. He
gazed at Lao-Xu with such earnesty he almost cried. “I don’t need money, I have money,
really! Please, please don’t worry about this on my behalf, I’m begging you!”
“Ok ok ok,” Lao-Xu nodded, then quickly added again. “You must tell me if you’re in any
kind of trouble.”
“I will.” Jiang Cheng also nodded vehemently.
Lao-Xu didn’t keep pressing Jiang Cheng about the reason for his absence, though he did
give his blessing for the time off. However……
Inside the taxi, Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei sitting beside him, “Are you skipping class or
did you request time off?”
“Skipping.” Gu Fei had his head down playing the idiotic Aixiaochu. “How could Lao-Xu
possibly agree to me taking time off.”
“Does he know we’re going somewhere together then?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Are you worried that he’ll find out?” Gu Fei said. “It’s fine, you’re only taking the afternoon
off tomorrow, right? I’ll just skip the whole day.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng frowned. “I’m not worried about him knowing we’re out together, I’m
worried that he’ll find out and go talk to you about it again.”
“Got it,” Gu Fei smiled, and bumped his leg gently against Jiang Cheng’s. “I have a hundred
different answers ready.”
Jiang Cheng sighed, “Then don’t skip class tomorrow morning.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say any more, just watched Gu Fei’s profile out of the corner of his eyes.
He wanted to say something, but at the same time felt like there’s not much to say. There
was something off about the way Gu Fei kept his distance from the school and his peers, but
he couldn’t figure out what exactly it was.
He wanted Gu Fei to be like other students, but it was clearly impossible. He wished for the
people around them to see that Gu Fei was not only a delinquent and slacker who skipped
classes all the time, but it seemed that Gu Fei was never interested in letting other people
see his virtues.
This feeling of being untethered on both ends sometimes made him feel uneasy.
He reached a hand behind Gu Fei’s back and squeezed his waist.
This friend of Ding Zhuxin’s who wanted a male lip model was a plump middle-aged
woman. Despite her lofty figure, there was an elegant air about her. The glasses on her face
alone set her apart from others her age who rushed at gold accessory sales in the mall and
did square dances while sightseeing abroad.
“Boys these days,” The plump jiejie briefly looked him over. “Certainly are getting more and
more handsome. I didn’t meet a single one when I was younger, but these days I see them
all the time.”
“Thanks, jie.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Thank you for your hard work,” The plump jiejie said. “Go on in then, I’m going out to have
a stroll around…… Gu Fei, thank you for your hard work.”
“Don’t mention it.” Gu Fei answered while assembling his camera lenses.
“How about you also pose for a set next time?” The plump jiejie asked.
“Nope.” Gu Fei said.
“Ay, this response, I can’t even continue the conversation.” The plump jiejie chuckled.
“Alright you guys continue, I’ll be going.”
A designer and a makeup artist remained on set after the plump jiejie left, they both
seemed to be very familiar with Gu Fei already. The makeup artist girl would also help out
as Gu Fei’s photography assistant later.
“Isn’t it just lipstick,” Jiang Cheng leaned back in the chair and felt the makeup artist slather
layers upon layers of stuff on his face. “Why do I need such a thick layer on my face too?
“Well, they can’t just take photos of the lips only,” The makeup artist smiled and said. “We
actually don’t need such detailed makeup if it’s just a clothing shoot, but these are close-
ups, so try to hang on.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered, then stretched his legs out and closed his eyes.
He thought they only needed to do a white base coat on his face, then paint some lipstick on
and call it a day. But the base coat alone took such a long time, then after the base coat she
moved on to fiddling with his eyelids. Jiang Cheng was
already a little tired from staying up revising for final exams for the last few days, and now
with these brushes going back and forth across his eyelids, he felt like he was on the verge
of shedding tears.
“Your eyes are so pretty,” The makeup artist said. “It looks way nicer than those surgical
bottom extensions.”
“What’s a bottom extension?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Oh you know, puppy eyes.” The makeup artist laughed.
“…… What’s puppy eyes?” Jiang Cheng was baffled.
“His doesn’t really count as puppy eyes, it’s got more of a smug bad-boy vibe, it’s not the
cutesy kind.” The designer said beside them. “It’s pretty striking.”
“You’re right,” The makeup artist nodded. “I don’t even have to do much work on his eyes.”
Jiang Cheng decided to give up on any further questions, because the makeup artist was
starting to line his eyes, and he could hardly stand it anymore, “Wait wait wait wait……“
“Are you unwell?” The makeup artist paused.
“I can probably film a crying scene right this moment,” Jiang Cheng turned his face away
and looked to Gu Fei. “Got a tissue?”
Gu Fei had been sitting beside him fiddling with his camera settings, he hadn’t been paying
much attention to how the makeup was going. Now that Jiang Cheng suddenly turned to
face him, he swept his eyes over Jiang Cheng’s face as he handed him a tissue, and almost
dropped his camera on the floor.
Jiang Cheng with makeup on looked very unfamiliar to him. His lips were still bare at the
moment, but this only made his eyes stand out more, and immediately captured Gu Fei’s
attention.
The eye makeup was pretty intense. If he’d seen this look out on the street, he’d find it a
little extreme even if it was on a girl. But on Jiang Cheng’s face, he didn’t find it out of place
at all.
Perhaps it was his ginormous boyfriend filter at work, but seeing Jiang Cheng like this
made his heart suddenly beat faster. After Jiang Cheng took the tissue, he poured himself a
glass of water and hastily took two big gulps to settle his heart back down.
The makeup artist continued working on Jiang Cheng’s face. Meanwhile, Gu Fei was no
longer in a mood to fiddle with his camera settings. He aimed the camera at Jiang Cheng
instead and focused all his attention on his face.
Gu Fei had known this makeup artist for some time, they’d run into each other all the time
during other photoshoots. She was a freelancer who normally worked at a TV station, and
was highly skilled at her job.
Gu Fei never noticed when she put makeup on other people, only with Jiang Cheng did he
notice that she had meticulously accentuated all the good qualities of Jiang Cheng’s
features: his eyes, the curve of his nose, the face shape.
And lips.
On any given day, Jiang Cheng’s lips looked…… normal. But now, even with the most basic
lining, he was already starting to see the beauty in it.
“What, are we shooting behind the scenes this time?” The makeup artist paused her work,
and glanced at his camera.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered, still staring at Jiang Cheng through the lens. “For myself.”
“Don’t mess around,” Jiang Cheng opened one eye and looked at him. “It’s not even
done……”
Gu Fei pressed the shutter. The way Jiang Cheng looked with one eye open was very
alluring.
“Your great uncle,” Jiang Cheng cursed, then asked after a pause. “What’s it look like?”
“Can’t remember.” Gu Fei said.
“What do you mean can’t remember?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“What my great uncle looked like.” Gu Fei said.
“…… Fucking,” Jiang Cheng cursed again. “I’m asking you how I look!”
The makeup artist stood there with a little brush in her hand and couldn’t stop laughing.
“Drop dead gorgeous.” Gu Fei answered solemnly.
Because it needed to match the whole look, this lip makeup took a whole hour before it was
finally finished. According to the makeup artist, it was actually much faster than usual, but
Jiang Cheng didn’t know whether or not to believe her.
“Done,” She swept the brush over his face a couple more times as though sweeping the
floor, then stood up. “We can start shooting now.”
“Awesome job,” The designer stared at Jiang Cheng’s face for a while. “That’s exactly the
vibe I’m looking for.”
“Can I look in the mirror?” Jiang Cheng asked.
The designer moved to the side. Jiang Cheng never did look in the mirror throughout the
whole process, and now after a single glance, he almost jumped from surprise.
“The fuck!” He turned and stared at the other three, he figured his expression right then
must’ve been a mix of horror and surprise. “What the hell is this!”
“I guess you’re not used to it,” The designer smiled and said. “It looks really good, and not
girly at all. It’s a very manly sort of sexy.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t comprehend the mentality of a manly man sporting a mouthful of
bright lipstick, but Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up when he looked over, and his mind was
suddenly at peace again.
Despite the fact that he felt Gu Fei would give him a thumbs up even if his makeup looked
like a pile of wet shit, regardless, a positive affirmation from Gu Fei still put him at ease.
“Let’s start,” Jiang Cheng said. “After this I still have to…… do homework and revise.”
His words probably came as a total surprise for both the makeup artist and the designer. It
wasn’t until he was already stationed in front of the lights, that they managed to blurt out
an “Oh!”
Gu Fei could feel a primitive urge reawakening within him. He had shot tons of handsome
guys before, even ‘ass models’. But it was only when looking at Jiang Cheng’s face, did those
desires residing deep within his heart creep out little by little, slithering beneath his skin
along the channels and veins, expanding its reach.
Click.
A gently raised face.
Click.
The corner of the mouth slightly curled up, with a hint of conceit.
Click.
The look of disdain in his eyes.
Click.
Jiang Cheng’s signature brand of arrogant smirk.
The sound of the shutters was like the beat to his desire, every still frame of Jiang Cheng’s
face pushed him closer in the direction of the washroom.
After they finished shooting the first set, as Jiang Cheng was getting ready to change to a
different makeup look, Gu Fei put down the camera and went to the washroom.
Immediately after he walked in, when Gu Fei still had his hands braced on the wall facing
the urinal, before he even began to calm himself down, he heard the sound of footsteps,
followed by a figure appearing beside him.
“Did you come to rub one out,” Jiang Cheng said in a low voice as he crossed his arms and
leaned against the door. “Or to lower the flag?”
“Fuck,” Gu Fei turned to look at him. “Did you come to watch the show, or to help out?”
“Well obviously to watch the show.” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes and laughed out
gleefully.
“Do you have even an ounce of humanity?” Gu Fei walked over and pushed him against the
wall.
“Young man,” Jiang Cheng jabbed a finger at Gu Fei’s chin. “If you kiss me right now,
everyone out there would know about it.”
Gu Fei thought about it for a moment, then planted a kiss on the side of Jiang Cheng’s neck.
“I’m warning you,” Jiang Cheng put his arms around Gu Fei. “If you dare to bite down, then
I’ll dare to smack you.”
Gu Fei laughed and lifted his eyes, “Young man, for someone with leverage all over you, you
dare to come in and provoke me?”
“I only came in to soothe you.” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei lowered his voice. “I’ve got a question for you.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You said you want to do something big for your birthday,” Gu Fei gazed into his eyes. “How
big?”
Some Stats

Raw character count: 5027

TL word count: 3446
TL time: 5:02:47
Edit: 0:48:42
Curse words: 5 x fucks, 3 x shits, 2x asses
TL’s Notes
Welcome to the new home! I haven’t finished renovating yet so pls don’t look around lol

First posted: February 15, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 73
Can you try not to appear so thirsty, please!
As big as me topping you.
Or as big as you topping me.
On: The Post-Awakening Development of Juvenile and Adolescent Sexual Awareness.
Cut off the sinful thoughts in your heart.
Study hard and improve everyday.
Help: Will long-term abstinence impact physical development.
……
Turn the rolling commentary on/off？
Off.
“How big do you think?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei.
“Where?” Gu Fei lowered his gaze and swept it over his lower half. “About the same as me,
probably.”
“Control yourself.” Jiang Cheng tsked audibly.
Gu Fei smiled and backed away a few steps, returned to the urinal, and unzipped his fly,
“Are you joining me?”
“I’m just saying,” Jiang Cheng walked to stand at the urinal next to him, and they stood
facing the wall together. “You must’ve taken photos of so many hot men and women
before……”
“No.” Gu Fei answered immediately.
“What do you mean no, do you mean to tell me your past works had all been ugly themed?”
Jiang Cheng said.
“When I take photos of other people, I’ve never……“ Gu Fei glanced at the washroom door.
“Gotten hard.”
“Shit, why do I find that so hard to believe. From what I’ve seen, every time you take photos
of me……” Jiang Cheng also glanced at the door. “You get hard.
The way this is going you’ve gotta be one of those people who would raise a flag if the bus
gets even a little crowded.”
Gu Fei laughed at the wall for a good while, “It’s not like that, I need a specific target. My
boyfriend, for example.”
“Yell a little louder why don’t you.” Jiang Cheng finished peeing and zipped up, then looked
sideways at Gu Fei. “Dost thou have a prostate problem or something? You’ve been
standing here for forever and still haven’t gone.”
“I didn’t come in for that in the first place,” Gu Fei said. “I might as well go while I’m here,
but don’t I still have to wait till this goes down?”
“…… I can’t continue this conversation with you.” Jiang Cheng turned the tap on to wash his
hands.
“Don’t wait for me, you’ll need to change into another look, you should go get ready.” Gu Fei
said.
“I didn’t say I’d wait for you.” Jiang Cheng gave him another look, then walked out.
Before leaving the washroom, Gu Fei faced the mirror and gave himself a warning: this is
work, there should be a limit to your shamelessness, it’d be bad if this affected your money
making.
Jiang Cheng half leaned against the back of the chair, allowing the makeup artist to go to
work on his face, and said weakly, “Isn’t it just changing the lipstick colour, why do we have
to redo the eye makeup too……”
“Of course you need a different backdrop for a different style.” She explained while smiling.
“Ah……” Jiang Cheng sighed.
Gu Fei readjusted the lighting and walked to Jiang Cheng’s side with his camera.
“I’ll smack you if you keep sneaking impromptu snaps.” Jiang Cheng said with his eyes
closed.
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him through the viewfinder. “You know I’m here?”
“No shit, I felt a little breeze.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Remember yesterday, that summer, the moment the breeze blew past……” Gu Fei sang a line
out loud, and clicked the shutter. [1]
Jiang Cheng tsked.
“It’s not of you,” Gu Fei said. “I was taking a picture of Nini.”
“Nini?” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes a slit.
“Me,” The makeup artist smiled. “He sometimes takes some working photos of me, so I can
post them on my Friend Circle.”
“Why aren’t you taking photos of me?” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes all the way and looked
at Gu Fei.
“…… Coming.” Gu Fei pointed the camera at him and clicked the shutter again.
The lipstick featured in the second set was a bright red. Jiang Cheng turned to glance in the
mirror before going on set, and once again froze, “My god, what the hell is this?”
“This is our newest colorway,” The designer laughed. “It’s cold, glamorous, and sexy, with a
touch of seduction.”
“No offense but,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Are you trying to make these concepts and
descriptions incomprehensible? I definitely don’t get it, but I guess I’ll try to find the vibe
on my own.”
The others all laughed. Nini pointed at Gu Fei, “He gets it.”
“You do?” Jiang Cheng looked to him.
“I can make a pretty good guess, ” Gu Fei raised the camera at him. “Turn your head a little
to the right…… and we need a little more light on that side……”
Nini immediately went to adjust the lighting.
“Look at me, don’t look at the camera.” Gu Fei said. “Put your finger by your jaw
somewhere, find a pose you’re comfortable with.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered, and tilted his face slightly to the left. “Where should I be
looking?”
Gu Fei lowered his voice, “At your teeth-mark.”
Jiang Cheng paused, then curved his lips up in a smile and snuck a glance at his collarbone.
Gu Fei quickly pressed the shutter.
The shape and contour of Jiang Cheng’s face were especially suited for high-contrast light
and shadows. The lines were clean and the shapes well defined, but at the same time it
didn’t lack a certain gentleness. The red was particularly eye-catching when juxtaposed in
the middle of the black and white, giving it a somewhat mysterious vibe.
His fingers were very attractive as well. Jiang Cheng followed Gu Fei’s directions and tried
to find a good place to rest his fingers near his jaw and lips, but Gu Fei didn’t wait for him to
finish settling down the finger before snapping a photo. Jiang Cheng’s fingers shifted, drew
close, and moved away; the whole time Gu Fei pressed away at the shutter.
“Give the lipstick a wipe.” After a round of clicking sounds, the designer chimed in and said.
“Wipe…… how?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand.
“Just put your finger on your lips,” The designer demonstrated on her own face.
“Then drag it down or to the side……”
Jiang Cheng looked at her, then a few seconds later turned his face away and burst out
laughing. It took him forever to finally stop, and throughout this time Gu Fei kept clicking
away with his camera.
“Don’t laugh,” The designer couldn’t help but be infected by his laughter.
“Anyways, just like that, you get? Just don’t be like me and look like a dumbass while doing
it.”
“Got it,” Jiang Cheng nodded while still laughing. “You didn’t look that dumb.”
“Can I deduct your pay?” The designer said.
“Don’t,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’re very beautiful.”
Jiang Cheng understood what the designer meant. Frankly, it wasn’t anything too
innovative, easily half of all editorial photos purporting to champion individualism tend to
feature some imagery of messily wiped lipstick.
But when Jiang Cheng put a finger on his lower lip and gently tugged down, Gu Fei still
thought at the moment, the Jiang Cheng in his frame had a
handsomeness that was entirely different from those dolled up wannabes. To be perfectly
honest, it wasn’t the seductive vibe the designer was looking for, it was a little more feral
instead.
The innate energy Jiang Cheng exuded could not be quashed by any outfit or makeup. His
pride shone through the mess of scarlet, and the look in his eyes was as untamed as ever.
“Wipe it again with the back of your hand.” Said the designer. Jiang Cheng could tell from
her voice that it wasn’t what she had envisioned, but she was still satisfied with the
outcome.
“Back of my hand?” Jiang Cheng glanced down, hesitated for a moment, then lifted his hand
and dragged it across his mouth in one smooth motion.
Gu Fei figured Jiang Cheng was probably manifesting the spirit of a napkin-less ill-
mannered person wiping their mouth with their hand after a meal. However, the frames he
managed to capture of the moments immediately after, as Jiang Cheng’s hand was just
barely away from his lips, were surprisingly stunning.
“Let’s do a full body shot,” The designer said. “The guard dog position will do.”
“What dog?” Jiang Cheng was once again baffled.
“Are those clothes ok?” Gu Fei asked. They were shooting close-ups of the face today, so
Jiang Cheng was wearing his own clothes, a black t-shirt and a pair of brown pants.
“It’s fine,” The designer nodded. “It’s good contrast.”
“You’ve done these before, just stand straight with your arms down, no need to do any
poses.” Gu Fei said as he changed lenses. “That, is the guard dog position.
“…… I thought I’ll have to squat down.” Jiang Cheng dropped his arms.
“If you want to squat that’s fine too,” Gu Fei laughed. “Stick out your tongue while you’re at
it.”
“Go away.” Jiang Cheng said.
“No need to tilt your head. Relax your shoulders.” Gu Fei finished changing the lens and
held up the camera again, then took a few shots.
A young man and his unbridled stubbornness.
Very good.
Shooting took two afternoons in total. Jiang Cheng realized that it wasn’t easy being a
model; it was only two afternoons, but he felt like his lips were almost cracking from the
overuse.
When he was putting on the last look, Gu Fei went out and bought him a chapstick.
“You can put this on once we finish here.” Gu Fei said.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng took it and turned it over in his hand. “Is it tinted?”
“…… What colour do you want? I’ll go buy it for you.” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng pointed at him.
Gu Fei laughed, and was about to respond, when the door to the studio opened.
Jiang Cheng glanced over. The plump jiejie had come by only two times over the last two
days, the only other people who sometimes came in were staff members.
However, the person standing at the door right then wasn’t the plump jiejie, and based on
his clothes, nor did he look like a staff member.
In the doorway stood a man of about 27 or 28 years old. He was dressed in tailored slacks
and a button-up shirt with his sleeves rolled up, looking casual but not that casual.
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei with one of his eyes. He was hoping to see if Gu Fei would
introduce the newcomer to him, but he found that Gu Fei’s face had already become
overcast.
It’d been a long time since he saw this disgruntled expression on Gu Fei’s face.
“What a coincidence.” The young man nodded at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei acknowledged him halfheartedly. If he wasn’t standing so close, Jiang Cheng
wouldn’t have been able to tell whether Gu Fei made a sound with his mouth or simply
huffed out some air.
“I ran into Tang-jie yesterday while having tea, and she said you’re going to be here for a
couple of days.” The man didn’t seem to mind Gu Fei’s attitude. “I happened to pass by
today, so I dropped by for a look.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei sat down on a nearby chair with his camera, and started playing with his
lenses, showing no interest in speaking to him any further.
The man stood at the door for a while, and after also greeting the designer and Nini, went
to sit down next to Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng only heard Nini call the man Lin-ge, and nothing else. After that, Lin-ge sat
down beside Gu Fei, which was a little too far away for him to hear if they’d said anything
else.
Jiang Cheng perked up his ears and listened intently for a while, but still couldn’t catch a
single word. He could only see that Gu Fei had his head down the whole time working on
his camera, showing no desire to engage in conversation. Linge said a few more sentences
here and there, then kept quiet as he leaned back in the chair and looked in this direction.
Jiang Cheng had to draw his gaze back.
Of Gu Fei’s friends, he only knew Li Yan and the others, plus Ding Zhuxin. He had never
even heard Gu Fei bring up this Lin-ge before, therefore he wasn’t likely to be a close
acquaintance.
However, the change in Gu Fei’s attitude when he saw him was clear as day, it didn’t seem
like the appropriate reaction to someone he didn’t know very well.
Jiang Cheng felt a weird pang in his stomach all of a sudden.
Who the fuck is this!
What the fuck is his connection to Gu Fei!
Why did he just sit down and refused to fucking leave!
What the fuck is he looking at!
If Jiang Cheng’s past jellies were mostly forcefully consumed for funsies, then this time the
sour taste he was feeling in his guts couldn’t be more real.
It was like he’d just tattooed a fire torch onto his butt, the flames of which made him unable
to sit still. He felt an overwhelming urge to go over there and demand an answer.
However, when they started shooting, Lin-ge only watched for a few minutes, and then left.
Jiang Cheng stared at Gu Fei and scrutinized him for a while. That weird all-over uneasy
feeling from earlier was gone from the moment Gu Fei picked up the camera and pointed it
at him.
After a long time of scrutiny, he still couldn’t make out anything.
“Xiao-Jiang’s attitude here is great,” The designer praised. “That look of……
annoyance? Or maybe……”
“Anger.” Gu Fei said.
“Right, just really irritated.” The designer nodded. “That’s exactly it.”
Jiang Cheng turned his face and swept a glance over Gu Fei.
Asshole, so you can tell.
“What did Lin-ge come over for?” Gu Fei asked the designer. “Is Tang-jie collaborating with
him?”
“I think so, Tang-jie wanted him to help organize a small launch event.” Said the designer.
“They’re still discussing it.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng held his gaze for a moment, aware that the question was asked for his benefit,
it was to let him know that this Lin-ge was closer with the plump jiejie than with Gu Fei.
And yet.
That didn’t explain the change in Gu Fei’s demeanor when he saw this person.
Little dude, can’t hide anything from us overachievers. Not to mention this one’s not near-
sighted!
After the photoshoot was over, Nini helped Jiang Cheng wash off the makeup, as Gu Fei
exited the studio.
By the time Jiang Cheng finished with everything and walked out the door while
aggressively applying the chapstick to his lips, he found Gu Fei leaning against the wall
outside, with a cigarette between his lips.
“All done?” Gu Fei asked when he noticed him come out.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“The remaining half of the payment should be coming in tomorrow morning.”
Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng stuffed the chapstick in his pocket. He felt pretty tired, so much so that
he couldn’t even tell if he was hungry.
Gu Fei didn’t mention Lin-ge. Jiang Cheng wanted very much to ask, but hesitated between
whether or not he should. Gu Fei was clearly unhappy to see the guy, if he asked, it might
make him even more unhappy.
But if he didn’t ask, it might seem too intentional.
“Wanna get cold noodles?” Gu Fei asked.
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng answered.
They took a cab there. As they got out of the car Jiang Cheng still had to ask,
“Was that Lin-ge, a friend of yours?”
“Not quite,” Gu Fei didn’t hesitate at all in his reply. “An acquaintance.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure how to continue this line of questioning.
“We…… knew each other from before,” Gu Fei frowned. “When I played in the band.”
“Ah is that so,” Jiang Cheng looked at his furrowed brows. “That’s a pretty long time ago
then.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded. “I don’t really have much contact with him, but he has a studio and
sometimes I’d use his models during photoshoots, so we run into each other from time to
time.”
“Got it.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his nose, suddenly a little embarrassed. This out of
nowhere onset of jealousy was a little childish, he thought.
Even though he didn’t know why Gu Fei had such an attitude for someone he was merely
acquainted with, he didn’t much feel like getting to the bottom of it anymore. It seemed that
Gu Fei didn’t want to get into the details, and there was no point for him to continue
probing, except to make both of them unhappy. Not to mention, Gu Fei already said there
was no other connection between them.
For an open and considerate overachiever such as him, it’d be unseemly to keep pursuing
the matter.
After all, when it comes to boyfriends, trust is a very fundamental element.
After they finished the cold noodles, Gu Fei was about to follow him to the apartment and
keep him company in revision, but halfway back he got a call from his mom, who said that
Gu Miao was throwing a temper tantrum at home, and she couldn’t calm her down.
“You should go back,” Jiang Cheng said. “Is she maybe unhappy that you haven’t been eating
at home these last couple of days?”
“No,” Gu Fei sighed. “She has a little blanket that she has to hold every night.
It’s all smelly so I washed it yesterday……”
“Can’t you just give it back to her after it dries?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“But the smell is different, it has the smell of laundry detergent.” Gu Fei said.
“She’s already thrown a fit this morning, but probably remembered it again just now.”
“Hurry up and go then,” Jiang Cheng felt anxious at the very thought of Gu Miao’s
screaming. “Comfort her properly, otherwise just…… wrap it around yourself and go for a
run, or do some pushups or pullups or something, sweat it out and make it stinky again.”
Gu Fei chuckled, “Alright, I’ll try.”
After bidding goodnight to Gu Fei at the intersection, Jiang Cheng stood on the spot and
watched Gu Fei’s silhouette. Probably out of worry for Gu Miao, Gu Fei didn’t turn around
today, but instead strode briskly in the direction of their home.
Jiang Cheng had originally thought to take a few perfunctory glances before heading back.
He still had homework to do, and a bunch of practice questions he wanted to get through.
But serious words like running, pushups, and pullups, all became dirty little yellow words
in his mind as he stood there and watched Gu Fei’s receding silhouette.
Sweat, muscle, lines, rising and falling, tightening, relaxing……
Jiang Cheng quickly crossed his eyes and stared at the tip of his nose. As a top student, he
knew long ago that “eyes to the nose, nose to the heart” wasn’t actually commanding
people to stare at their own nose, but the dumb
misunderstandings formed in one’s childhood often accompanied one throughout their
whole life…… [2]
Just as he crossed his eyes, he noticed in his peripheral vision that Gu Fei had turned
around.
He immediately uncrossed his eyes again and looked forward. Gu Fei raised his arms and
mimicked a sniper, tilting his head and taking aim.
“Dumbass.” Jiang Cheng said as he quickly moved his right foot back, and raised up his arms
as if he was drawing back a bow.
After their dumb and dumber goodbye ceremony, Gu Fei turned and jogged away. Jiang
Cheng lifted his arms up to stretch, then slowly sauntered back to his apartment.
The final exams were coming up. When the midterm results came out, Jiang Cheng had
made the bold claim that he’d pass the second place by more than 100 points. Even though
words like that belonged in the category of bullshit boasting, it was still based in reality. He
didn’t have a habit of making unrealistic claims; if he said it out loud, he’d try his best to
achieve it.
After finishing the homework, he took a shower with thoughts of Gu Fei’s body still on his
mind, then sat on the bed in his pyjamas with his practice questions, and began to work
through them.
This way he could fall asleep and wake up readily and easily, he was used to being in this
state when revising for tests. He’d never be like other top students and say that he spent
the whole night before a test playing video games. If anyone marveled at his grades, he
would tell them honestly, “I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in two weeks.”
The reason I got good grades is simply because I churned harder than you did.
That was the greatest feeling of all.
Tsk tsk tsk.
Jiang Cheng grinned down at the questions, grabbed a notebook for scrap notes, picked up
the pen Pan Zhi had gifted him, and started to revise.
Even though it was impossible for ‘drowsiness’ to manifest while his brain was turning the
whole time, it was still possible to fall asleep.
In the past he had also fallen asleep while revising, but would usually wake up again after
about 20 minutes. Today was no different, except for the manner in which he woke up.
He was jolted awake by a nightmare.
“HE WANTS ME TO DIE!” Screamed Li Baoguo.
The instant Jiang Cheng woke up he felt like even his breathing was in shambles, and his
heartbeat a little out of whack. He stared at the pen in his hand and took a long time to
finally calm down.
He thought he’d already successfully sealed away Li Baoguo and his death, that it would no
longer disturb his life. These days he had indeed gone back to his old way of life, but didn’t
expect to face this scene again in such an unguarded state.
He closed his eyes and gently pinched between his brows with the fingers of his left hand,
while spinning the pen rapidly in his right. After what seemed like forever, he finally let out
a long breath, and switched subjects to revise for English.
It wasn’t until he got up the next morning that he discovered his pillows, duvet, and
pyjamas were all covered in splotches of ink, as a result of his fervent pen spinning the
night before.
“Fuck,” He leapt off the bed and into the bathroom, and stared into the mirror at the ink
splotches on his face. After a while of staring he hopped a few times on the spot while
clapping his hands and said in a high-pitched voice, “Aiya so handsome!”
Then he started brushing his teeth.
The night of dreamless slumber put him in a very good mood. At this moment it wouldn’t
matter even if he’d poured a whole bottle of ink onto the bed, let alone a tiny bit of splatter.
“Looks like contestant Jiang Cheng is in good spirits this morning,” He finished washing his
face, then said as he changed. “Yes, it doesn’t look at all like he stayed up studying the night
before…… but if a slingshot athlete is out of practice for a long time, will it impact his
performance? Rumours has it that he even gave away his prized slingshot to his mystery
boyfriend?”
Jiang Cheng sent a message to Gu Fei: you up yet?
Mystery boyfriend messaged back a whole five minutes later.
– Sleepy
– Sleep then, i’m off to school
– Noon
– Mhm
By “noon”, what mystery boyfriend meant was that they will have lunch together at noon.
He often devolved to using these ultra-minimalistic expressions when he was extremely
sleepy.
“Any skill needs to be honed, but for a prodigal contestant such as this,” Jiang Cheng put on
his shoes, slung his backpack over his shoulder, and went out the door. As he walked down
the stairs, he continued quietly, “There is no need to worry.”
Going from his apartment to the school took him past Gu Fei’s convenience store, but it
wasn’t yet open at this hour. He glanced at the locked door when he rolled by on his bike,
and out of nowhere felt a fluffy warmth in his heart.
It was a magical feeling. When you like somebody, the mere sight of anything related to him
will become a ball of fluff in your eyes.
He was already very familiar with this path, even with his eyes closed he could tell what he
was passing along the way. There were various businesses: some old and rundown, some
newly renovated, some decked out in a tacky punk style, some purporting to be high-end
indie, others still were styled as back to the roots. They were all still closed at the moment,
giving off a sense of strange familiarity.
Interesting. Jiang Cheng made a turn against the wind.
After riding forward for a while, an old signage flitted by the corner of his eyes.
He couldn’t stop his brow from arching uncontrollably, as he quickly turned and stole a
glance before turning back again to direct his eyes forward.
Adult.
Toys.
Fuck! How did I not notice the presence of a shop like this before?
He whipped his head around again, then immediately turned back to stare straight ahead.
Fuck! It wasn’t a trick of the light!
Humans were like that sometimes, when they were thinking of something, they’d start
seeing it everywhere…… And as a youth with a newly grown yellow mind……
How big was he thinking?
How big?
Probably big enough to warrant a stroll around that shop.
But…… Jiang Cheng looked back again, damn if this shop didn’t look a little too rundown! It
didn’t seem like a serious business at all, it gave off the vibe that every condom in the store
had been punctured by the owner.
“Watch it!” Somebody yelled nearby.
“Ay!” Jiang Cheng turned around in time to see an uncle about to cross the street a few
meters ahead of him, and squeezed the brakes right away. “Sorry about that.”
“What were you staring at anyway, you’re gonna crash into a tree like this.” The uncle said.
What were you staring at!
Contestant Jiang Cheng, what were you staring at!
Can you try not to appear so thirsty, please!
Footnotes:
[1] Gu Fei was singing the first lines of this song ↩
[2] “Eyes to the nose, nose to the heart” is an often repeated mantra for meditation and
general centering of one’s mind ↩

Some Stats
Raw character count: 6265
TL word count: 4400
TL time: 5:54:58
Edit time: 1:21:13
Curse words: 8x fucks, 3x shits, 3x asses
TL’s Notes:
Don’t mind the mess, i’m fumbling around still :3
First posted: February 21, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 74
Come on down, Cheng-ge’s taking you out for your birthday.
There was an adult toy store right around the corner.
Compared to the dilemma of whether he should go in and have a look around, or why the
shop looked so shady as though it was a salon at a train station, Jiang Cheng was more
surprised by the fact that he never noticed its presence before.
Though he was too embarrassed to discuss this with Gu Fei. If it was another shop he’d
speak up about it for sure, hey look there’s a steamed bun place here, how come I never
noticed with my 20/20 super sharp overachiever vision?
But this was an adult toy store, which made it not so appropriate to launch a discussion
about, since the conversation would inevitably veer into a dirty novel territory. Even
though he was super keen about it, and certain ideas were also growing strong in his
body…… Still, at the end of the day he was young, and however much he wanted to do a
little something with his boyfriend, he couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud.
Not to mention, there was still the gauntlet he threw down of beating the second place by
100 points, he couldn’t afford to be distracted.
Jiang Cheng spent the whole morning listening to the teachers of various subjects
preaching earnestly with their whole beings, and set the dirty little shop aside for now.
Without Gu Fei beside him, his attention wasn’t as easily diverted to staring at the guy’s
face, so he was much more focused on the lecture.
At about ten minutes before the end of the last class of the morning, Gu Fei’s yawning figure
flashed lazily by the front door, then leisurely strolled in through the back door and into the
classroom.
It was a geography class, the teacher glared angrily but resignedly at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei gave the teacher a bow, then sat down.
“Some students,” The geography teacher knocked on the lectern. “Only see the bliss
immediately before them, and never stop to think about what to do for their future. By the
time you start to regret……”
“Did you not sleep yesterday?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly. Gu Fei looked like he didn’t get
enough sleep, he never used to look like this even when he was on time.
“Not really,” Gu Fei yawned again. The teacher was still passive aggressively
droning on at the front, so he didn’t immediately flop down on his desk, and instead
lowered his head as though he was listening intently. “Er-Miao was fussing all night.”
“All that over a blanket?” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“Dunno, she was probably in a bad mood.” Gu Fei sighed. “Though it’s been a while since
she acted up like this, I had to slap her out of it.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng turned to him. “You hit her?”
“Just once on her butt,” Gu Fei said. The teacher started giving out homework, so he
slumped down on the desk. “Really lightly. Even to her…… it’s really hard for me to always
keep my temper.”
“Wouldn’t she get upset again if you hit her?” Jiang Cheng was a little worried.
“Nah,” Gu Fei said. “I talked to her for a long time after that, I told her that kids get hit if
they don’t behave, no exceptions. Ah I’m so exhausted.”
“Why don’t you take the time to sleep this afternoon, you can ask to be excused?” Jiang
Cheng wasn’t sure what else to say.
“Excuse my ass, the finals are the day after tomorrow, how can Lao-Xu possibly allow it, I’m
not you after all.” Gu Fei smiled. “I’ll just sleep in class this afternoon.”
A new pizza place had opened near the school, and the decor looked pretty legit.
The students of Fourth High seemed to have found a way of distinguishing themselves, and
all flocked to sit in there to eat pizza elegantly. [1]
“Let’s go get pizza.” Gu Fei said.
“The one just outside?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Let’s try it, I’ve never tried it myself, if it’s good I’ll take some back
for Er-Miao.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He didn’t have any expectations for this place, but since Gu Fei hadn’t tried it before, it
wouldn’t hurt to give it a try, what if there was a miracle?
But when they walked in and checked out the price, he figured there probably wouldn’t be
any miracle. A seven inch was only 22 yuan, at least it was a great value.
There were a lot of people in the restaurant, most of them students at Fourth High, so Gu
Fei asked for it to go and walked out with the box.
“Where should we go?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“To the bridge?” Gu Fei looked at him. “Get some sun, spend some time with my
boyfriend…… let’s get a couple of cokes too, we’ll have a picnic.”
Jiang Cheng thought it was a little silly, actually nothing was sillier than this.
Two big fellas sitting by the bridge, facing a crappy practically dry river, eating a 22 yuan
pizza together, and drinking coke.
But though that was what he was thinking, he still quickly nodded as soon as Gu Fei
finished talking.
Silly, yes. But it was also kind of fun. It was very…… he couldn’t articulate it, it was an
indescribable feeling, perhaps even if he had to go clean the toilets with Gu Fei it would still
be…… wait no, nevermind that.
There weren’t many people around the area at lunch time. They sat down on a long bench
on a trail near the bridge, a few benches away was someone with earphones on loudly
practicing their verbal English.
Jiang Cheng found it an odd sight, to see someone practicing English in the most rundown
Steel Works area of this crappy little city, at noon no less. He couldn’t help but reminisce on
this out of place yet familiar scene he hadn’t seen for a long time.
“This tastes so bad.” Gu Fei picked up a slice and took a bite.
“It’s pretty good when it’s done well.” Jiang Cheng also took a bite out of a slice.
Indeed it wasn’t very good, not at all comparable with the meat pies at Wang Xu’s place.
“How about we take Gu Miao to Pizza Hut after the finals?”
“We don’t have a Pizza Hut here.” Gu Fei said.
“……Ah,” Jiang Cheng paused for a second. “Ok, then we’ll find a nicer place to get pizza?”
“Why not just go to Wang Er’s Meat Pies instead,” Gu Fei said. “It’s cheap, and when his
mom’s in a sunny mood she’ll even make it on the house.”
Jiang Cheng took a sip of the coke and laughed for a good while, “Then shall we have meat
pies there on our birthdays too?”
“We don’t have to go that far.” Gu Fei considered for a second. “How do you want to spend
your birthday? Invite some old classmates over?”
“That’s…… not necessary.” Jiang Cheng said. “I was thinking, our birthdays aren’t that far
apart, let’s choose a day in between and celebrate it together, how’s that?”
“Then let’s just pick the date of your birthday,” Gu Fei said. “Otherwise it’ll leave a vacancy
on both our birthdays.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng laughed, he thought the way Gu Fei described it as vacancy was kind of
cute. “How about the lunar calendar?”
“Check what your lunar calendar birthday is then, see if it overlaps with my Gregorian
calendar date?” Gu Fei said.
“It’s probably not likely,” Jiang Cheng said as he pulled out his phone, but as soon as the
screen lit up he turned it off again and put the phone away. “No no, let’s just go with my
date, yours is too late.”
“Sure,” Gu Fei smiled. “What’s your hurry?”
Jiang Cheng bit on a slice of pizza and froze, then glanced at Gu Fei’s smile……
it could just be a very normal smile? But with his heavenly eye Jiang Cheng was still able to
read a different kind of meaning out of this smile. He mumbled around the pizza in his
mouth and cursed, “Your great uncle.”
Gu Fei kept grinning wordlessly.
“I’ll smack you if you keep grinning like that.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei put away his grin and turned to Jiang Cheng solemnly with one arm on the back of
the bench, “Cheng-ge, we’ll go with your birthday, it absolutely has to be that date. I’m in a
big hurry to spend it with you.”
Jiang Cheng glared at him, then after a long time finally patted his shoulder,
“Fine.”
The day before the final exams, someone started a bet in the Fourth High forums. At first
they wanted to bet on who would take the first place among the juniors, but that was
quickly overturned due to the total lack of suspense. Next, someone suggested they bet on
the highest score in the school, but it was also overturned for the same reason.
At last after much discussion, they decided to bet on how big the difference would be
between the first and second place.
“I placed a bet,” On the way home from school, Gu Fei slowly peddled as he played on his
phone. “I bet eight cucumbers.”
“What the hell, you must be way too bored.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say, he did
see the posts, but hadn’t clicked on them to see the details.
“What do you think? Will 118 points be a challenge?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Why didn’t you bet on the first place getting full marks.” Jiang Cheng said.
“That’s unrealistic,” Gu Fei laughed. “I would if your handwriting is half as good as mine,
but there’s no way you’d get full marks with that handwriting of yours.”
“Get out.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Really Cheng-ge, practice your handwriting please,” Gu Fei said. “What if you get docked
aesthetic marks on the university entrance exams.”
“I’ve been practicing, I’ve been writing my homework every day stroke by careful stroke.”
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly.
“Then are you able to get over 118 points difference?” Gu Fei asked.
“Dunno, 100 points difference isn’t a problem, but you think 18 points is that easy?” Jiang
Cheng said. “No offence, but you guys won’t even dare to go bigger? If it’s cucumbers you
could at least bet on truckfuls at a time.”
Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing, then said, “Some users revealed their true identities before.
Last year when they bet on the rankings of Game Day, people actually brought cucumbers
to school.”
“…… They certainly know how to have fun.” Jiang Cheng commended
earnestly. “Do seniors get a Game Day?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei said. “There’s even a celebration concert at the end, all the seniors would
attend, since the seniors have nothing in the way of school events after that.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little trepidatious. After this summer was the last year of
high school, it was less than a year away. If it were his old school, they wouldn’t get a
summer at all. The parents would riot if the teachers didn’t hold supplementary classes,
they’d cry and beg for the school to not go easy on the poor seniors.
But Fourth High seniors had an entire half a summer, and a Game Day, and even a concert.
“Will you not participate in Game Day either?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Then what about the celebration concert?” Jiang Cheng continued to ask.
“I’ll at least go and watch.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng smiled too.
Jiang Cheng usually didn’t feel very much pressure for final exams. Even if he
gave himself the goal of passing second place by 100 points, it wouldn’t be a big deal as
long as he pushed himself a little. But for some reason, he inexplicably felt nervous as soon
as he thought of the eight cucumbers from
freestyle_handsome.
Even though nobody knew who freestyle_handsome was, he still gave himself pressure
from out of nowhere called “can’t let freestyle_handsome lose cucumbers”.
The exam didn’t go very differently from the midterms. The people to his front, left, and
back, all looked to him for answers, only Gu Fei to his right was sitting there calmly rolling
the dice on every question.
The final exam questions were clearly more difficult than the ones on the midterm. For the
sake of freestyle_handsome’s cucumbers, Jiang Cheng didn’t turn in his papers early, and
instead stayed in his seat until the last minute for every subject.
When he walked out of the class after finishing the last subject, Gu Fei was just about to
approach to talk to him, but got cut in by Lao-Xu who squeezed him to the side, “How do
you feel about this afternoon?”
“It’s alright.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Why does it seem like you’re not in very high spirits?” Lao-Xu studied his face with care.
“Are you unsatisfied with one of the subjects?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m like this even when I get full marks.”
“Ok ok ok,” Lao-Xu nodded in relief. “That’s a good mentality to have. Take some days off
and rest well, then we’ll be starting supplementary classes, gotta get in the mindset for
senior year!”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Just like that the semester was over, they had two days off before their grades were out,
and everyone seized the opportunity to have fun while they could.
Jiang Cheng was planning to think about what to get Gu Fei for his birthday, but Wang Xu
got a hold of him and kept them busy for the whole two days.
Other than Guo Xu and the others, Wang Xu also invited the girls. Frankly, everyone knew
what he was trying to do, clearly he just wanted a chance to bring Yi Jing out.
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to go, but Wang Xu had forcefully dragged Gu Fei and Gu Miao
along, so he had no choice but to follow.
Only, on this rare get-together, their activities of choice was to go shopping downtown, eat
and drink, then head to the arcade for a while. Jiang Cheng
wanted to tell Wang Xu that it’d be a miracle if he ever managed to get with Yi Jing this way.
In the two whole days of wandering aimlessly about, the most exciting part was when they
ran into a group of young people skateboarding in the square. Gu Miao played with them
for a while on her skateboard, which attracted a large crowd of people who all pulled out
their phones to take pictures and videos.
At the end of it, their leader, a young man extended an invitation to Gu Miao,
“Hey little sis, will you be interested in joining our club to skate with us?”
Gu Miao looked back at him blankly, then kicked her skateboard up to her hands, and
walked away.
“Bye for now then little sis! We’ll be here the first weekend of every month!
Come by if you have time!” The young man called out behind her.
From a distance, Jiang Cheng watched as Gu Miao walked closer and doubled up in
laughter, “Ayy, this swag.”
“No manners at all,” Gu Fei smiled, then bent down and gestured at the approaching Gu
Miao. “Er-Miao, thank those geges, they spent so much time playing with you.”
Gu Miao gave him a look, then turned around and gave a bow to the young people who
were still waving at her.
“Actually…… that club, if it’s possible, it wouldn’t be a bad idea for Gu Miao to join and play
with them, huh?” Jiang Cheng said after some thought.
“But I’ll have to be with her the whole time. She doesn’t know how to communicate with
other people, and they don’t know what her triggers are either.” Gu Fei sighed. “And where
do I get the time? I already have
photography sessions booked, and next week I have to take her to do rehab……
So we’ll just have to see.”
Jiang Cheng reached out and squeezed his back gently, not knowing what to say.
Gu Fei’s holiday schedule was very tightly packed. He had to mind the convenience store,
do photography work, and take Gu Miao for treatment……
Every single one of these had nothing to do with whether or not he was willing, or whether
or not he could squeeze it into his schedule, they were all things he had no choice but to do.
It was this sense of resignation Gu Fei occasionally let out, that made Jiang Cheng a little
glum. Sometimes when he looked at Gu Fei it was like looking at an eagle tied to a tightrope
with a chain; it was already difficult to stay standing, and what was worse, his wings
weren’t for flying but merely to maintain balance.
But perhaps Gu Fei had already gotten used to it. Other than the occasional sigh, Jiang
Cheng almost never heard him make any kind of complaint. After their grades were out, he
even went out in very high spirits and purchased eight cucumbers.
“Here, you can have four.” Gu Fei handed him the bag with cucumbers inside.
Jiang Cheng was in a pretty good mood too. The second place was still Yi Jing, and though
he didn’t manage to achieve a difference of 118 this time, he did make good on the promise
he made to Lao-Xu.
Although when he accepted Gu Fei’s bag of…… cucumbers, he still felt an ever so subtle bit
of shame.
“We’re young people in a new era,” Jiang Cheng watched as Gu Fei happily started
chomping on a cucumber right in front of the supermarket. “Can we celebrate in a slightly
more elegant way?”
“Even on your birthday you……” Gu Fei stopped halfway, took another bite of the cucumber,
and started laughing.
“I really really want to meet your great uncle, Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
Though he did feel embarrassed, Jiang Cheng still placed a lot of importance on their
birthdays, and not just for the sake of…… a couple of cucumbers.
This was the first time he could spend his birthday the way he wanted to, and the first time
he would spend it with Gu Fei.
As for Gu Fei’s birthday present, he sat cross legged on his bed and pondered for three
hours as if he was meditating, then finally jumped off and took a taxi directly to the
shopping center.
He didn’t want to just buy something, there was no meaning in that. But to make it himself,
he had no such skills. So he picked the middle way, and decided to buy premade materials
and put it together himself.
Last time when he came here with Wang Xu and the others, he saw a lot of people doing
crafts in one of the stores, Yi Jing even went in to look around, and reported back that they
were making things with Perler Beads.
Jiang Cheng decided to make a Perler Bead keychain for Gu Fei.
He received a call from Gu Fei just as he stepped into the store, “Ah the days are growing
longer boyfriend, I’m done shooting here, aren’t you gonna come out and playyyy,
boyfriend…… Are you outside?”
“Mhm, I…… have an errand to run.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What errand?” Asked Gu Fei, but he didn’t wait for Jiang Cheng’s answer before he started
laughing. “Is it to buy a present for me?”
“Don’t overthink it,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the bookstore sign nearby. “I’m at the
bookstore.”
“To buy study materials?” Gu Fei asked. “Want me to come join you?”
“Nah, I’ll be long gone by the time you get here.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Alrighty then, I’ll take Er-Miao out to play.” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng hung up and walked into the Perler store again.
The shopkeeper was very friendly, and gave Jiang Cheng a thorough
explanation, “This isn’t hard at all, you just have to be detail oriented. You’ll get the hang of
it after a few simple patterns.”
“Do you have patterns here?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yep, what kind are you looking for?” The shopkeeper asked.
“Like…… chibi figures,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the people crafting around him. “I want to
make a keychain.
“We have that,” The shopkeeper clicked a few times on his computer and pulled up a pair of
chibis, a boy and a girl. “Do you like something like this?”
“Um, you got any that are of……” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, and could hardly open his
mouth. “Two boys?”
“We have those too,” The shopkeeper smiled. “Let me take a look, you can also send me
images you like and I can turn them into pixel art for you.”
The shopkeeper very keenly started searching, and found more than a dozen different chibi
images. When he pulled them up one by one, Jiang Cheng even saw a few where the figures
were stacked together in a most unseemly position.
He felt a surge of embarrassment, “That’s…… not necessary.”
The shopkeeper started laughing and showed him a few more. Even though he’d said he
didn’t want the unseemly images, he still ended up picking one of two figures kissing in an
embrace.
As Jiang Cheng walked out of the store with a bag of Perler materials and a hot iron, he
could almost feel his sweat dripping down. There was a bubble tea shop right next door,
but he didn’t go in. He felt like the shopkeeper of the Perler store was still standing there
watching him.
When he finally left the shopping center and bought a bubble tea from a street
side shop, he chugged away the whole thing in one breath.
As he was standing there waiting for the bus, Pan Zhi called, “Cheng-er! I’m going to visit
and celebrate your birthday!”
“You can come over after my birthday.” Jiang Cheng said.
“…… Fucking hell,” Pan Zhi was shook. “You’re planning to spend it with Gu Fei?”
“Uh…huh.” Jiang Cheng looked down at the bag in his hand.
“Grandpa, how could you treat me this way?” Pan Zhi was distraught. “Can’t we all
celebrate it together? Everyone eat and drink and be merry, in honour of your long-awaited
birthday?”
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Shit, how did my ranking drop so quickly?” Pan Zhi was very unwilling. “How long has it
been! Did you not struggle at all between lust and friendship? Was it such an easy choice?”
“Will you please be considerate of your elders.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Fine then, but you gotta promise me this,” Pan Zhi said. “When I come visit I still get to stay
at your place, don’t make me stay in a hotel.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I’ve got your present already, you’ll love it for sure.” Pan Zhi said.
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng immediately asked.
“My little wittle heart.” Pan Zhi said.
“…… Don’t want it. You’ve given away your little wittle heart away to fifty people already, if
not a hundred.” Jiang Cheng tsked. “You probably put it through a shredder and gave it
away one piece at a time.”
“Damn it,” Pan Zhi couldn’t stop laughing. “You just wait, I’ll send you my train info after I
buy the ticket, you come and pick me up.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Gu Fei felt like the overachiever was pretty good at holding it in. Jiang Cheng had been busy
for the last few days, doing who knows what. Every time Gu Fei asked him to come out, he
would answer that he had no time. But he never did see what was keeping Jiang Cheng busy
whenever he dropped by the apartment.
And as for the birthday present and how they were going to spend the day, Jiang
Cheng hadn’t revealed a single thing, just told him to wait.
Gu Fei sat in front of the computer, and glanced at the time as he continued editing photos.
In another five minutes would be Jiang Cheng’s birthday. He picked up his phone and got
ready to make the call as soon as the clock striked zero.
Time passed one second at a time, he watched the clock on his phone, and found himself a
little excited, even his fingers trembled ever so slightly.
23:59:55.
He counted in his mind: 56, 57, 5……
The image on his cell phone screen changed abruptly, and a picture of Jiang Cheng’s face
jumped out at him. The sudden ringtone sound almost startled him into dropping the
phone on the floor.
“Happy birthday,” He picked up the phone and said before the other side was able to speak.
“Cheng-ge.”
“Happy birthday.” Jiang Cheng said with a smile. “Were you counting the seconds?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei chuckled then sighed. “Couldn’t beat you, you’re early.”
“Us overachievers are good at planning, you would’ve picked up right on the dot.” Jiang
Cheng said. “Now that you’re forcefully 18, how do you feel?”
“Ay…… old age beckons.” Gu Fei said, then suddenly noticed the sound of wind through the
receiver. Confused, he asked, “Where are you?”
“Downstairs.” Jiang Cheng said. “Come on down, Cheng-ge’s taking you out for your
birthday.”
Footnotes:
[1] In China (and probably Asia) pizza is not the cheap fastfood that it is in some other
places, because it’s foreign (white), ppl see it as more high brow. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6171
TL word count: 4222
TL time: 3:58:54
Edit time: 1:16:14

Curse words: 2x fucks, 1x shit, 1x ass

TL’s Notes:
So um ……. guess I’ve moved completely lol, I’ve been too busy to work on the site further,
but at least where the chapters live are ok and usable and at the very least not any worse
than what it was like before. Let me know if you run into any problems <3
First posted: February 28, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 75
Happy birthday.
“Bring the slingshot too.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Alright.” Gu Fei answered.
After hanging up, Jiang Cheng leaned back against the lamp post and let out a soft breath.
He was in a good mood.
These last few days was an experience like none other for him, standing outside Gu Fei’s
building now, he still felt like he hadn’t quite recovered from it.
Not only because this was the first birthday he would spend together with Gu Fei, but also
for the things he did in preparation for this birthday that he never thought he would do.
The thing called Perler Beads was known as a puzzle for children, but Jiang Cheng felt like
no child could have the patience to finish an entire picture, nor would any child’s hands be
steady enough that they could place each grain of
‘bean’ into the mold so precisely.
Of course, it also had to do with the fact that he never really did any crafts growing up.
Anything he did with his hands in elementary school was ready-made, all he had to do was
go by the images, snip snip, paste paste, and it was done.
Regardless, as he was placing the beads one by one into the mold with a tweezer, he felt
like his hand was growing out of someone else’s body; every time he set one down, he’d
knock over the two next to it. The shopkeeper told him that because he picked a smaller
design with simple colours, it would be very quick to make, even beginners can do it in a
couple of hours.
Couple of hours my ass!
He shook and tremored his way through the first try, which took him almost two hours on
its own. To cap it off, he overapplied the heat at the end and melted all the beads into one
flat pancake.
The second one also took him more than an hour, at least three times throughout the
process he wanted to sweep it all to the ground, beads and all.
On the third try, since he had a little more experience, he was able to get through it much
faster, but it was only after the heat stage that he realized he missed an eye on one of the
chibi figures.
“We cannot possibly fathom contestant Jiang Cheng’s emotion at this very moment, but he
must be feeling anxious and resigned.” He stared at the blind little figure. “The distance
between professions is truly a world apart, to a contestant who’s never attempted such a
meticulous challenge…… He’s capable of hitting two objects less than a centimeter apart
separately, yet he…… ah fuck it I give up.”
That’s what he said, but the gift still needed to be made. Their birthdays were on the
horizon, and he must get this done. There were other preparations he had to do after this.
And so he took two hours, and spent all of the patience he had accumulated in his entire 18
years of life on this little flat surface filled with beads.
At last, he completed a ‘bean patty’ with the right colours and all the necessary facial
features.
The only imperfection was when he applied the heat at the end, he was so excited and
satisfied with his masterpiece that he grabbed the hot iron with his bare hand, and burned
two blisters on his right thumb and forefinger.
He stuck his hand in cold water to cool down for a bit, wrapped two bandaids on his
fingers, then pushed through and installed the final piece, the key ring.
He put the gift in a tin box with a transparent black lid that he found after going through
three different gift shops. Because he didn’t have a suitable sponge material as insulation,
he got a bunch of kraft wrapping paper, wrinkled it, and pressed it into the box, then put
the keychain inside. After closing the lid, he sat back and admired it for a good while, then
took more than a dozen photos from different angles before finally declaring the job done.
Next, he should be heading out the door to do something embarrassing.
There was no way he would go to that shady little shop around the corner. In the last three
days he ‘passed by’ its front door eight times. He couldn’t see what exactly they sold in
there, but based on his non-nearsighted overachiever vision, he could see that other than
the standard condoms and ‘stairway to heaven’
drugs, there were also quite a few product packagings that made one’s mind wander in all
sorts of lewd directions.
Even if he planned to do something on this birthday…… But to a young man whose entire
knowledge base came from dirty little videos, he did not need such high-end tools.
Therefore with his overachiever wisdom, he decided to go to an open shelf drugstore.
Condoms… lube… after he spent 18 years of patience on the Perler beads, he proceeded to
give away 18 years worth of his face in the drugstore.
When he placed the items on the counter he felt an utmost gratitude, for the cashier’s stoic
expression as though she couldn’t read, and for her putting his purchases in a white non-
see-through bag.
In the days before his birthday, he only saw Gu Fei a couple of times. They had a meal
together, chatted for a while, and once Gu Fei left, he started to work on his preparations
again.
Sometimes he wondered if he was being a little neurotic. It was only a birthday, the way he
was acting one would think he was plotting to blow up the earth.
While waiting for Gu Fei to come downstairs, he mentally went over again what he was
going to do, and after confirming that there was nothing amiss, he took out a cigarette and
lit it.
Gu Fei came down pretty quickly. Jiang Cheng just about made out a figure appearing in the
corridor, when Gu Fei was already in front of him. He lifted a hand and took away the
cigarette in Jiang Cheng’s mouth, and leaned in to kiss him, “Happy birthday Cheng-ge.”
There was nobody around at this hour, almost all the lights had gone out upstairs, but Jiang
Cheng felt like he didn’t give a damn at this moment even if someone happened to pass by.
He reached out and wrapped his arms tightly around Gu Fei, and planted a loud smack on
his cheek, “Happy birthday.”
“Are you taking me to celebrate now?” Gu Fei smiled and asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng released him and beckoned. “Let’s go.”
“Where to?” Gu Fei asked.
“A place.” Jiang Cheng said, then glanced at him. “Uh, Gu Miao’s already asleep right?”
“She’s long asleep.” A smile quirked at the corner of Gu Fei’s mouth. “I’ll stay over at your
place tonight.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
They both acted serious, as natural as though they were only talking about spending some
time at Jiang Cheng’s place as usual, when in reality…… Jiang Cheng used his peripheral
vision to sweep over Gu Fei, this guy was probably thinking the same thing he was.
Indecorous to the extreme!
“Is that for me?” Jiang Cheng saw the paper bag Gu Fei was holding in his hand, it looked
heavy.
“Yes,” Gu Fei smiled. “I’ll give it to you later.”
“Are you only going to give it to me after I give you your gift?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Uh huh, I gotta trade.” Gu Fei said.
“Sure thing,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Cheng-ge’s gonna take you to get your gift right now,
then we’ll go back to my place for cake.”
“You bought a cake too?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm, I was planning on going to make one myself, but I’m not very familiar with these
parts and didn’t find a DIY place, so I just bought a small one.” Jiang Cheng said. “Why, did
you also buy one?”
“I…… made one, it’s in the fridge at the store.” Gu Fei said.
“Where did you go to make one?” Jiang Cheng arched a brow.
“There’s a bakery workshop on the street behind Wang Er’s Meat Pie,” Gu Fei said, then
sighed. “I used to take Er-Miao there to play, but she threw a tantrum and smashed their
weight. I had to pay them 50 yuan, a whole finished cake is only 20 yuan.”
Hearing that made Jiang Cheng feel a little pang in his heart, but he also wanted to laugh.
“I……” He tried holding it in for a while, then turned to look at Gu Fei. “Really want to laugh,
do you mind?”
“…… I don’t mind, go ahead.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng burst out laughing at the ground. Gu Fei followed beside him and giggled along
stupidly for a while, before realizing the road they were on didn’t lead back to Jiang Cheng’s
apartment.
“Where are we going?” Gu Fei asked. “Are you lost?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng pointed up ahead. “Go straight. I circled this area a bunch of times over
the last couple days until I finally found a place like this: flat, no trash, and mostly
deserted.”
Gu Fei looked in the direction he was pointing.
After the steel factories shut down, there were a lot of empty lots and abandoned buildings
around here. But going this way, to their left was the market, and to the right was a factory-
affiliated kindergarten, there really weren’t any flat deserted lots.
Jiang Cheng led him forward with confidence, in the process of which they turned once to
the right, twice to the left, and after they came back to the road they were on before,
continued to walk forward.
Gu Fei held back and kept quiet as he followed along for almost half an hour. He was pretty
sure that Jiang Cheng was lost, but this guy’s way of being lost was also a little peculiar.
Every time he took a turn out, he could always keep turning until he was back on the main
road, then continue on.
At last, when they came to the totally empty but still smelly market, Jiang Cheng finally
stopped. He stuck his hands into the back pocket of his pants, then froze for about 10
seconds before asking, “Isn’t this the fucking food market?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “If you didn’t make all those random turns we would’ve gotten here
ten minutes ago.”
“Hey what the,” Jiang Cheng looked around, and turned around on the spot a few times.
“Fuck?”
“You’re lost, aren’t you?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “All because you jinxed me.”
“So it’s my fault?” Gu Fei held back his laughter.
“What else can it be?” Jiang Cheng glared at him, then after a few seconds of glaring started
fretting as well. “Ah fuck I really forgot how I got there, your present is still hidden there!
Fuck me a compass……”
“What kind of place is it?” Gu Fei sighed. “Describe it to me.”
Jiang Cheng gave him a brief summary with his brows still furrowed. It was a large sandy
lot, with some broken down exercise equipment and a half torn down concrete children’s
slide……
Jiang Cheng might be bad at directions, but fortunately he was observant. Gu Fei knew
exactly where he was talking about, it wasn’t far, but they were indeed going the wrong
way. The Steel Works of old had two kindergartens, one was right up ahead, while the other
was taken down since there was no one left in the factories, that was the place Jiang Cheng
had found.
“Come on, I got it,” Gu Fei put an arm around his shoulder. “Better let me lead the way next
time we’re going anywhere, hm?”
“Shut up and walk.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Though it’s impressive that you even managed to find that place,” Gu Fei said.
“It’s been a few years since I’ve last been there.”
“To be honest,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I just came from there before I went to your place. I’m
pretty impressed with myself really, my skill at getting lost is probably also overachiever
tier.”
Gu Fei laughed without a word.
After walking for more than ten minutes, the buildings on either side started getting more
sparse, then eventually even the streetlights had disappeared. There was only the reflected
light of the moon around them.
“Close your eyes.” Jiang Cheng said suddenly.
“Hm?” Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, then closed his eyes.
“Come.” Jiang Cheng took his hand and led him forward.
Gu Fei followed along for about 100 meters, when Jiang Cheng stopped and said, “Where’s
the sling-shot? Don’t open your eyes.”
With his eyes still closed, Gu Fei took Jiang Cheng’s sling-shot from the paper bag. Jiang
Cheng took it and let go of his hand, his voice moved a little ways away, “Alright, open your
eyes now.”
Gu Fei opened his eyes.
It took him a second to adjust, but when he saw the colourful blobs of light in front of him,
he first blinked, then rubbed his eyes, and finally clearly made out the overlapping glows.
“This is……” Gu Fei stared at the two rows of luminous blobs on the ground more than 10
meters away, that extended out and curved in on itself in a figure 8.
Each of the glowing blobs was in a rectangular shape, they were in turns red, yellow, blue,
and green.
“Slacker, if I don’t say, you probably can’t tell that this is the symbol for infinity.” Beside
him, Jiang Cheng pulled back on the sling-shot and took aim.
“Follow the light, go get your present.”
Jiang Cheng let go of the sling band with a pop, and up ahead, a yellow glowing blob toppled
over.
Next, the two rows of colourful lights started toppling over one by one like a simultaneous
wave, and slowly connected as they extended forward.
Even though Gu Fei could already tell how these lights were going to change, when it really
appeared in front of his eyes, he was still entranced.
The light spots glimmered as they moved forward, from a point to a line. In that
moment, the sight moved him to his core.
In the dark of night, in the slightly cool breeze, the person beside him had painted him a
vibrant picture.
The glimmering lights slowly blurred together and filled up his vision, all he could see was
the luminous glows all around him.
He didn’t walk forward. Jiang Cheng didn’t move either. The two of them just stood there in
the dark night, watching the glowing colours, until the lines stopped in front of them, and
the infinity symbol was quietly laid out at their feet.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng spoke up.
“Ah?” The sound of his voice pulled Gu Fei back to reality. “Cheng-ge, you really……”
“That’s not right!” Jiang Cheng tsked. “It’s not done!”
“What’s not done?” Gu Fei blinked.
“The show…… Ah fuck, let me go see, you stand here and wait.” Jiang Cheng started running
ahead, turning to point at him as he did so. “Stand there and watch!”
“Oh.” Gu Fei answered and stayed where he was.
Jiang Cheng ran to the other end and bent over to look. He reached out and righted one of
the fallen over green light blobs, then pushed it over again with force. As the light topped
over, a small spark erupted from its side, then started growing into a flare.
Jiang Cheng took a step back. After the spark fizzled, it sounded like something went off
beside it with a small bang, and a circle of small flames started lighting up.
“CAN YOU HEAR IT——” Jiang Cheng yelled from the other side.
“HEAR WHAT?” Gu Fei yelled back.
“BIRTHDAY SONG! CAN’T YOU HEAR IT!” Jiang Cheng continued to yell.
Gu Fei started walking forward, after a few steps he could hear a quiet tinkle sound as it
drifted to him in the night wind. He took a minute and finally recognized it as the happy
birthday song.
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you~
He also finally saw that it was an automatic birthday firecracker on the ground at the other
side, that sparked when ignited, and would start playing the birthday song as the
candlelight danced.
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you.
“CAN YOU HEAR IT!” Yelled Jiang Cheng.
“I hear it!” Gu Fei grinned and bobbed his head up and down.
“Come here!” Jiang Cheng beckoned.
Gu Fei walked toward him, as he walked he whistled along with the amusing melody from
the candles that sounded very much like the chirping of crickets.
Happy birthday Cheng-ge.
May you always be this happy.
Happy birthday Cheng-ge.
May you always smile like a ray of sunshine.
Happy birthday Cheng-ge.
May you be free of regrets when you think back on these days.
Happy birthday.
“This is for you.” Jiang Cheng crouched down and pointed at a small box next to the candles.
“I made it, see if you like it…… if not then keep it to yourself.”
Gu Fei crouched down as well and picked up the box on the ground. He could see at a
glance through the glass on the lid the contents inside, it was two little kissing figures.
“I like it,” He chuckled, opened the lid, and saw a very delicate looking keychain inside.
“How did you make it?”
“Perler beads.” Jiang Cheng took the keychain out and placed it in Gu Fei’s hands. “Have you
ever tried?”
“What’s wrong with your hand?” Gu Fei grabbed his fingers.
“Got two blisters from a burn,” Jiang Cheng tsked. “Shit, you have no idea how annoying
these little things are to make, and they call it children’s cognitive development toys, what
kind of child plays with a hot iron!”
Gu Fei started laughing. He held Jiang Cheng’s fingers to his lips and gave it a kiss, “Thank
you.”
“Know how to use it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Of course,” Gu Fei took his own keys out of his pocket and attached it to the keychain. “Just
so happens that I don’t have a keychain.”
“So where’s my present?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“So this present……” Gu Fei set the paper bag down in front of him. “Is also handmade, but
it’s not as delicate as yours. Mine’s got more of a primal vibe.”
Jiang Cheng could feel his heart beating a little too hard, his hands were shaking even more
diligently than when he was working with the Perler beads. When he reached into the bag
for his gift, he almost couldn’t hold on to the thing.
“Shit, why is it so heavy?” He was surprised. “What is it?”
“So delicate,” Gu Fei said. “Weren’t you pretty strong when you were scoring those 3-
pointers?”
“Geez,” Jiang Cheng laughed and took out the content of the paper bag, it was a flat box
shaped like a pizza box. He opened it and blanked out for about 10
seconds, then stared at it for a long time before looking up. “A maze?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. He pulled out a quail egg sized glistening silver ball from his pocket
and placed it inside, it made a small jingling sound. “This is me.”
“What about me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“There.” Gu Fei pointed at one corner of the maze.
It was a maze composed of welded together metal pieces. Its base was a square-foot sized
metal board, and on it were tunnels shaped out of long and short slats of welded metal.
Jiang Cheng never would have imagined that Gu Fei had this hidden talent as he looked at
this heavy maze in his hands. Behind the rough and grungy was a keen attention to detail.
Every turn and every connecting point had been treated until they were smooth and
polished, it must’ve been meticulously sanded and buffed after completion.
The little steel ‘Gu Fei’ ball was mobile, but the little steel ‘Jiang Cheng’ ball was fixed
somehow to the exit of the maze. When the little ‘Gu Fei’ ball gets to the exit, it would run
into the little ‘Jiang Cheng’ ball.
“What the shit, Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “You know how to do this?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei smiled. “I’ve been thinking a long time about what to give you,
and finally thought why not make something myself. Where we are, it’s really easy to find
materials and tools like these……”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng braced a hand on Gu Fei’s knee and leaned in to kiss him.
Gu Fei responded without the slightest hesitation.
Even though Jiang Cheng should really close his eyes at this time and enjoy the brief
moment of quiet, he couldn’t bring himself to. The luminous rainbow lights still played at
the corner of his eyes, and immediately before him was Gu Fei’s face, lined with the glowing
lights, and his shaded lashes…… Jiang Cheng tried to pull his eyes apart, but it was clearly
impossible at this distance, so he gave up and stared cross-eyed at Gu Fei.
“Were those bricks?” Gu Fei asked when they were walking back together.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded as he played with the maze. The little steel balls were hollow
on the inside, he didn’t know what it was made of, but it let out a very pleasant jingling
sound as it rolled. “You know how they’re building houses behind the steel factories there, I
went and bought some from them.”
“And covered them with phosphorescent powder?” Gu Fei asked while smiling, and reached
out a hand behind his back to guide him.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng followed him with his head down. “Bought those premade ones. I was
planning to buy it online, but was afraid it wouldn’t get here in time.
I looked for days before I found a shop that sells this stuff. What do you think, looked good
huh?”
“Looked great, it was really creative.” Gu Fei said.
“How many paths does the maze have?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“One.” Gu Fei answered. “It should be pretty easy for you, overachiever.”
“Yep,” Jiang Cheng held up the maze in front of Gu Fei’s eyes, tilted it slightly, and the ‘Gu
Fei’ ball rolled around two corners and collided with the ‘Jiang Cheng’ ball with a “clink”.
“Muah!”
Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing, “Ay, at first I picked a more advanced maze, but I didn’t have
enough space for it.”
“I like this one.” Jiang Cheng said.
It was already past 2 am when they got back to the apartment. Jiang Cheng glanced at his
phone, usually around this time he would already be asleep, but he didn’t feel at all tired
today. He was bright-eyed and bursting with energy.
As soon as they went inside and set down their things, he lunged and threw his arms
around Gu Fei, then pushed him into the bedroom in between a storm of kisses and
touches.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei asked with a smile after being shoved onto the bed. “What kind of ideas
do you have?”
“Wicked ideas,” Jiang Cheng nuzzled the area between his neck and shoulder.
“Obscene ideas…… A lot of them, violent waves of……”
“What a coincidence,” Gu Fei reached a hand into his shirt and gently caressed his back.
“Mine are also wicked and obscene, and the waves just as violent.”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng bit his neck gently, then tugged away his collar and licked the teeth-
mark tattoo on his collarbone. “I figure, I gotta do something a little different with you, for
my own peace of mind. Otherwise I’d get jealous.”
“Then let’s……” Gu Fei’s hand slid down to Jiang Cheng’s leg. “Do
something.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng chuckled, then struggled for a while before opening his mouth again.
“It’s just, I never did ask you…… So about this, did you want to…… like that, or…… or like……
that?”
“Like what and what?” Gu Fei started laughing.
“Like…… don’t you fucking laugh.” Jiang Cheng pinched Gu Fei on the waist and propped
himself up to look him in the eyes. “Do you want to fuck me?”
What the fuck!
Contestant Jiang Cheng!
Contestant Jiang Cheng has cultivated his face into a new tier of thickness!
That he can so easily say out loud!
Such a shameless sentence as that!
Immediately after he said those words, Jiang Cheng felt like a fire had raged from the soles
of his feet all the way to the top of his scalp, his whole body was burning from his own
shamelessness. Fortunately his room was only lit by a single dim yellow bulb, and he was
facing away from it, Gu Fei probably couldn’t see the colour on his face.
Gu Fei was visibly stunned for several seconds, then when he snapped out of it, he quirked
the corner of his mouth and said, “Were you looking forward to fucking me?”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng answered, then quickly added. “I mean, it doesn’t really matter to me,
whatever…… whatever you want is, uh, fine.”
“Really?” Gu Fei rested his head on an arm and looked at him, his finger traced a line across
Jiang Cheng’s abdomen over his shirt. “If you want, I really can let you……”
The words were like a ball of fire, going straight for Jiang Cheng’s cheeks. His breath
hitched, and he gasped for several seconds before speaking again, “I’m just afraid of hurting
you, just……”
He reached back and felt around underneath his pillow, and pulled out a piece of paper,
“After all, we’ve been taught since we were little to respect the elderly and cherish the
young, so I uh, I did some research.”
“What?” Gu Fei was stunned.
Gu Fei’s reaction made Jiang Cheng a little indignant, like he was some kind of thirsty old
pervert, “What don’t you understand slacker boy, I fucking went online and did research on
how exactly to do it so it won’t hurt as much!”
After his initial pause, Gu Fei froze for another few seconds, then turned his head away and
started laughing. He laughed so hard it was getting a little out of control, “Please don’t be
like this Cheng-ge, if you’re like this now I’m gonna make myself soft from laughing.”
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng took Gu Fei’s chin between his fingers and pulled his head back to
face himself. “Fine, if you don’t wanna look at it then don’t, just do it however you want.”
“Can we please not act like such mutually courteous spouses?” Gu Fei put away his smile
and looked Jiang Cheng in the eyes. “You want to cherish the young, while I’m here ready to
respect the elderly.”
Jiang Cheng stared back at him without a word.
“Want it?” Gu Fei lifted an arm and hooked it around Jiang Cheng’s neck.
Jiang Cheng stilled for two seconds, and with one movement pulled off his own shirt and
pressed down on Gu Fei, then grabbed his waistband and yanked it down.
Some Stats
Raw character count: ?
TL word count: 4610

TL time: 5:03:56
Edit time: 1:01:35
Curse words: 12x fucks, 3x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Ahem, uh. Sorry but that’s where the chapter cuts off hahaha… I’m going by the uncensored
version, but don’t expect explicit car since I can only translate what the author wrote, the
next chapter I would rate at an ‘M’ on the AO3 scale, so make of that what you will ;;_;;
First posted: March 7, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 76
The night is long, and sleep is far.
The folded piece of paper Jiang Cheng pulled from underneath his pillow was his notes.
As though composing an essay, he had spent two whole nights perusing various gay forums
and ‘instructional’ articles, and drew conclusions on how best to do it to maximize pleasure
and minimize pain. And keeping in mind that the would-be recipient of this information
was a power-slacker among slackers who got through homework by copying, and who
didn’t even bother copying during exams, he lived up to his overachiever title and went so
far as to write down a summary of the key points.
Jiang Cheng had planned to let the power-slacker do some last minute cramming before
going on stage, but didn’t expect the Mini Tyrant of the Steel Works to suddenly go all
‘respecting the elderly’, and cede this opportunity to him.
Of course, Jiang Cheng also didn’t expect that after all the mental buildup he did, after so
much time spent imagining the scenario of lying down and taking it, that it only took a few
simple words from Gu Fei to make him jump on him without the slightest pause.
Impatient pervert.
…….This is probably how they behaved.
Even further out of his expectations was that the techniques and methods already
committed to memory by his overachiever brain, would be so easily blown into pieces
under the force of these two words from Gu Fei.
Want it?
The explosion gave off a blast of golden light.
After which, not even a single particle was left in his brain.
Gu Fei’s body, and the smooth taut skin, with what almost felt like an electric current
running beneath it. He had run his fingers and lips over it countless times.
The neck, collarbone, chest, abdomen, and waist.
He thought he was already very familiar with Gu Fei’s body, but when he touched it again
on this day, it was suddenly an entirely different sensation. It
was as if he went back to the moment of that first time they touched each other intimately.
Fluttering, quivering, anticipating……
The content on that folded piece of paper, the stuff he had long committed to his memory,
there was absolutely no way he could make use of it now, even if it hadn’t already gone up
in fireworks. Jiang Cheng firmly believed that if he went by the notes, he would break the
floodgates wide open before he even got half way.
An experienced driver’s summary was indeed only suitable for experienced drivers.
People like him who had just gotten their licenses had no other choice than to lunge and
nibble, kiss and nibble, then after nibbling take a little lick, then after that just grab onto
whatever was there. Every gasp sounded like war drums in his ears, reverberating so
loudly it made him dizzy. Every sense organ had been put in hyperdrive.
He could hear panting, but couldn’t tell who it belonged to; could hear heartbeats, but
couldn’t tell who it belonged to. He could see the toned skin reflecting a soft glow under the
light, that belonged to Gu Fei; could feel breaths sweeping over his ears, that also belonged
to Gu Fei. He could even feel a fine electric current as muscle rubbed against muscle, in
their bodies, in all the moments of contact, crackling with life.
He couldn’t bother with experience, couldn’t remember any summary. As a wanton youth
holding a grenade with a sparkling fuse, it was enough hassle for him to stop and put on a
condom and squeeze out some lube.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng pressed tightly against Gu Fei’s back, and nibbled gently on his
earlobe; his hands grabbed onto Gu Fei’s sides and legs and kneaded hard.
“I……”
Gu Fei didn’t say a word, just turned and pecked at the corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth, and
ran the tip of his tongue gently over his lips.
Jiang Cheng felt a mist come over his vision, and suddenly nothing else remained in his eyes
or heart.
He straightened up and roughly pushed Gu Fei’s shoulder back. Everything thereafter he
did entirely on impulse. He might be a new driver, but instinct is not something one has to
learn. The desire from deep within him anxiously overcame all sorts of planned foreplay, as
he went straight for the main course.
”Mnnn ah……”
Gu Fei let out a repressed moan as Jiang Cheng entered, a sound he never before heard
from Gu Fei’s mouth, it was sultry and enticing. He couldn’t even bear to
give Gu Fei a moment to breathe and get used to the sensation, before driving straight in,
the tightness inside was making him lose control.
The palms of his hands burned on Gu Fei’s hips, as did Gu Fei’s body around him.
The night is long, and sleep is far.
All was quiet inside and outside the room, so quiet that Jiang Cheng worried about the
walls having ears as he listened to both of their panting. Though at this very moment, even
if someone were to hide under the bed…… no, even if someone were to stand next to the
bed glaring at them, he wouldn’t care.
Sure enough, lust grants one courage.
His arms were wrapped around Gu Fei in a tight embrace.
“Loosen your arms a little,” Gu Fei said. “I need to catch my breath.”
“Catch your breath later.” Jiang Cheng had his eyes closed while nuzzling the tip of his nose
gently against the back of Gu Fei’s neck. At last he was in this spooning position, and didn’t
want to let go.
He couldn’t remember where he had seen it from, something about how people are
attracted to each other because of their smells; certain smells you can’t consciously detect,
but your nose will be able to capture. There will always be someone whose smell entices
you.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know if he was attracted to Gu Fei because of this, but he did very much
like the way Gu Fei smelled. He couldn’t say what exactly it was, but he could distinguish it
from others…… though it wasn’t as if he had smelled anyone else this way.
“Hey,” His heart rate slowly went back to normal after a while of lying there with his arms
around Gu Fei…… He only realized today that it took longer for his heart rate to recover
after doing this than after running several kilometers.
“Um, Gu Fei?”
There was no sound nor movement from Gu Fei.
“Gu Fei?” He called again.
Still, no reaction.
“Did you fall asleep?” He propped himself up to look down at Gu Fei’s face.
“Gu Fei?”
“I’ve suffocated to death.” Gu Fei said with his eyes closed.
“Damnit,” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “I let go already.”
“Which is why I can talk now.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng leaned down and gave him a firm kiss on the cheek, “Shower?”
“Mmn,” Gu Fei opened his eyes, and turned to look at him. “What time is it?”
“Dunno,” Jiang Cheng sat up as his eyes swept over the used tissues on the floor, and felt a
little embarrassed. He turned around and saw another clump of tissue at the foot of the
bed, and suddenly felt a wave of self-consciousness out of nowhere. He swiftly kicked the
tissue to the floor. “Are you going to take Gu Miao to that treatment thing tomorrow?”
“Today.” Gu Fei corrected him.
“Today,” Jiang Cheng pinched Gu Fei’s waist. “It’s in the afternoon, right? I’ll go too.”
“It’s at 2 o’clock in the afternoon.” Gu Fei flipped over to lie flat on his back.
“I’ll take you two there.”
“You mean we are taking Gu Miao there.” Jiang Cheng got off the bed, then glanced at him,
and finally asked after a second of hesitation. “I’ll go shower first?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled, and reached over to grab his phone to play Aixiaochu.
Jiang Cheng took the opportunity while Gu Fei was staring at his phone to quickly bend
down and throw the tissues into the nearby trash can. He only realized when he
straightened up that there wasn’t a single thread of clothing on his body, and instantly felt a
little shy. He grabbed a change of clothes to block the crotch area, and half-ran into the
bathroom.
It wasn’t the first time he and Gu Fei faced each other so starkly like this, but today was
different. He didn’t even have the face to ask Gu Fei if he’d hurt him, let alone take a shower
together.
It was only when Jiang Cheng was standing in the shower letting the hot water wash over
him, that he began to slowly recover from the nerves, awkwardness, embarrassment, and
all the other emotions that overwhelmed him before.
He didn’t take very long in the shower, he didn’t want to leave Gu Fei on the bed by himself
to play with his phone. Rinse, lather, rinse again, brush teeth, and wash face; all of this took
less than ten minutes, then he dashed out of the bathroom.
When he came back to the bedroom, Gu Fei was flopped belly down on the bed, playing on
his phone. He was surprised to see Jiang Cheng walk in, “So fast?”
“Was I?” As soon as Jiang Cheng saw Gu Fei in this position, he was immediately worried,
such that he couldn’t even bother feeling embarrassed about his question. “Are you……
uncomfortable?”
“Hm?” Gu Fei blinked, then laughed. “Nah, just don’t want the phone to fall on my face.”
Now that he made a head start, Jiang Cheng threw all the awkward or otherwise feelings to
the wind, “You really don’t feel any discomfort? Any pain? Or……”
“A little…… you know,” Gu Fei sat up. “But it’s not that bad.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Then you wanna go wash up?”
“Pass this level for me,” Gu Fei handed the phone to him, and walked over to the wardrobe.
“I’m taking your clothes okay?”
“Mmn go ahead, take whatever you want.” Jiang Cheng said, and Gu Fei walked out with the
change of clothes.
Jiang Cheng cradled the phone in his hands, but all of his attention was on Gu Fei’s naked
body in his peripheral vision.
Gu Fei took a couple steps toward the door, then turned and came back to his side, reaching
a hand out in front of his face.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng immediately lifted his head to look at him.
“The screen went dark.” Gu Fei pressed his finger to the screen, and said with a hint of a
smile.
“Ah! Right! It did!” Jiang Cheng yelled half-heartedly like a person forcefully disrupted from
sleep but hadn’t quite woken up.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else, just smiled as he turned to walk out.
Jiang Cheng stood by the bed and zoned out for a long time before collapsing onto the bed
with the phone, “Ah……”
Ah how embarrassing, contestant Jiang Cheng!
That smile on Gu Fei’s face as he walked out was pure mockery!
“Ah……” Jiang Cheng flipped over and looked at the phone, the screen was dark again. “Ah
fuck.”
By the time Gu Fei came back from his shower, Jiang Cheng was still leaning against the
headboard, holding the phone and staring into space.
“Did you beat the level?” Gu Fei asked.
“……It locked again.” Jiang Cheng handed the phone back to him.
“Oh,” Gu Fei took it and shot a glance at him. “Then are you gonna keep playing for me?”
“Ay… Unlock it.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
Gu Fei unlocked the phone and handed it back to him. As he started in on the game, he
could hear Gu Fei laughing. Jiang Cheng was going to ignore him, but Gu Fei couldn’t stop
laughing, so he had no choice but to look up with a glare,
“What are you laughing at?”
“You, of course.” Gu Fei said as he giggled.
“You wanna bet I’ll……” Jiang Cheng continued to glare at him, then after a while started
laughing himself. “Shit.”
“Hurry up and play,” Gu Fei laid down on the bed beside him. “Or else Li Yan is going to
pass me again.”
“Why does he have so much free time,” Jiang Cheng tsked audibly and put his head down to
concentrate on the game. “Is it because he doesn’t have a boyfriend!”
“I’ll make sure to ask him tomorrow.” Gu Fei said, then turned away to laugh again.
“Are you done yet,” Jiang Cheng glared at him sideways. “The way you’re fucking going on
you’d think I came early or something.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei kept it in for a while, then started cackling again. “No you didn’t actually.”
“…… Ay!” Jiang Cheng yelled out a sigh, and didn’t speak again. He trained his eyes on the
phone screen, at the heads of the little animals.
However, what he just experienced was indeed like nothing else, even his best study trick
of one-second mind focus wasn’t working. He stared for a while at the animal heads, and
couldn’t find a single row to clear.
He tried to push through, but after wasting two hearts, he tossed the phone to the side and
wiggled down onto the pillow, “Forget it, I’m just wasting turns.”
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei turned over and wrapped his arms around him.
“A million thoughts.” Jiang Cheng reached out and flipped off the light. As darkness
enveloped them, Gu Fei’s warm breath by his ear gave him a sense of comfort one only
experienced after the exhaustion of excitement.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, just gently rubbed Jiang Cheng’s belly.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng took his hand, turned to face him, and asked quietly. “It uh…… really
didn’t hurt?”
“Didn’t I say,” Gu Fei smiled at him. “It’s not that bad.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng took a long pause, trying to figure out how to phrase his next question so
as to not sound like a pervert, but ended up just throwing it out directly. “Then did it……
feel good?”
“Geez,” Gu Fei chuckled. “So blunt.”
“I couldn’t find a more roundabout way of asking.” Jiang Cheng also smiled.
“It felt pretty good.” Gu Fei said.
“For real?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell whether Gu Fei was telling the truth or just trying to
console him.
He was pretty out of it for the entire process, and felt like his head was spinning the whole
time. Gu Fei filled up his vision, his hearing; everything he saw, heard, touched, and felt,
was all heightened exhilaration
But he couldn’t be sure if Gu Fei really felt good. Theoretically, there was not much good to
be felt, they were both new drivers on the road after all. If one was in a wheelchair day in
and day out, and suddenly decided to join a road race, their techniques would probably not
pass the test, and their bodies probably wouldn’t be used to it either.
“You can try it yourself.” Gu Fei said.
“Hah?” Jiang Cheng was a little out of it.
“Then you’ll know if it’s for real or not.” Gu Fei said.
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little embarrassed. “I was originally planning to……
try.”
This made both of them laugh, they faced each other and giggled for a long time, breathing
all over the other person’s face.
Bliss.
When he woke up the next morning…… no, the afternoon, Jiang Cheng reached beside him
but didn’t feel Gu Fei’s presence. This woke him up instantly, he yelled out with widened
eyes, “Gu Fei!”
“Ay,” Gu Fei appeared in the doorway a few seconds later with a cigarette
between his lips. “Here.”
“Whatcha doin’?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Having an ‘after’ smoke by the window all by my lonesome self.” Gu Fei said.
“The fuck,” Jiang Cheng sat up. “You may continue then.”
Gu Fei gave him a smile, then turned and walked out.
Jiang Cheng yawned as he stood up and tugged his pants up. He walked to the bedroom
window, lifted the curtains, and looked outside.
Every year around summer break, everything from the air to the scenery would be
suddenly filled with the flavours of summer. The greenery outside filled one’s vision, the
sun dazzled, the air was warm with a touch of dry heat, even this ramshackle building was
showing some signs of life under the sunlight.
Jiang Cheng slept very well the night before, all the embarrassing awkwardness and the
excitement, mingled with a struggle for appropriate emotional reaction, were all gone.
When he walked out of the bedroom and saw Gu Fei’s back lit up against the window in the
living room, he was only left with a head full of joy.
“Let’s eat out for lunch?” He went over and put his arms around Gu Fei, resting his chin on
his shoulder. He even squeezed Gu Fei’s sides a couple of times for good measure.
“We can, or we can eat the cake?” Gu Fei put out his cigarette.
“Oh right, there’s a cake. We’ll have that then,” Jiang Cheng mused. “There’s another one at
your place too.”
“We can eat that one tonight,” Gu Fei pulled out his phone. “Let’s also order some noodles
for later, otherwise it’s too much sweets.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I want a large bowl of gravy noodles, with an order of meat
sauce on top.”
“Anything to drink?” Gu Fei asked. “They have freshly squeezed juice here too.”
“What kind of juice?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Just two kinds, cucumber…… juice,” Gu Fei’s voice was suddenly tinged with laughter. “And
‘cheng-cheng’ juice.” [1]
It took Jiang Cheng a few seconds to make the connection, “Fucking hell.”
“Why don’t you get the cucumber juice, and I’ll have the ‘cheng-cheng’ juice.”
Gu Fei said.
“Hold on,” Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue. “Can we talk like normal people please?”
“Sure, Jiang Cheng-cheng.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Your great uncle,” Jiang Cheng shoved him. “Gu Fei-fei.”
“I’m ordering now,” Gu Fei said. “After we eat and rest for a bit it’ll be time to take Gu Miao
out.”
Jiang Cheng wasn’t too hung up on the concept of a birthday cake. He was never allowed to
have it in the past, so as time went on, he gradually lost interest.
Besides, he was never that keen on sweet foods to begin with, he couldn’t even remember if
he had cake during other people’s birthdays, he only had the dumb youthful memories of
smashing it into people’s faces.
He was rather looking forward to the cake Gu Fei made, since there was nothing unique
about the one he bought. Although, this was the first birthday he got to plan on his own and
the first time he was able to eat cake for his birthday, which in itself made it all the more
meaningful.
And so he and Gu Fei brought the cake out, intending to complete the birthday rite.
“Let’s close the curtains? It’s too bright.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mn.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng pulled the curtains shut, but it was still too bright, so he went and closed the
doors to the bedroom and washroom. The living room dimmed.
He got back to the table just as Gu Fei was sticking eight candles onto the cake.
“Why only 8?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Because we’re both 8 years old.” Gu Fei lit up the candles one by one.
“Don’t play cute.” Jiang Cheng tsked audibly.
“Because they only gave you a total of 12 candles for free,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “If you
want to light 18 candles…… I’ll go out and buy another pack?”
“No no, no need,” Jiang Cheng paused. “I don’t have any expectations for this, I never used
to have cake on my birthdays.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei’s hand paused for a second, then finished lighting the rest of the candles.
“Do we blow them out now?” Jiang Cheng leaned against the table.
“Wait,” Gu Fei thought for a moment, then quickly pulled the candles out and set them back
in new positions, and added the remaining ones from the pack as well, forming them into
the shape of “18”. “Now we’re 18 years old.”
Jiang Cheng started laughing, “Now can we blow them out?”
“Mhm, do you wanna make a wish?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’ve been doing that this whole time,” Jiang Cheng said. “Already done.”
“Go ahead then,” Gu Fei said. “On one, two, three.”
The two of them huffed and puffed at the candles until they were all
extinguished, knocking a few over in the process.
“Ayyy…” Jiang Cheng sat down in the chair. “I just realized, I only asked them to write
happy birthday, without any names. When they asked me what I wanted to write on it I just
thought, you need to ask?”
“I wrote it on mine,” Gu Fei brought a knife, and said as he cut the cake. “I’ll go get it
tonight.”
“What did you write?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I wrote,” Gu Fei looked at him solemnly, and after a pause, suddenly waved his arm and
yelled. “CHENG-GE CHENG-GE, NO ONE’S PRETTIER!”
“What the,” Jiang Cheng was startled and shifted back, then a second later started giggling.
“Such shameless words, did anyone see you write it?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei said. “The people at the baking shop.”
“Did you really write that?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “I don’t believe that one bit.”
“You’ll see tonight.” Gu Fei cut a slice of cake and handed it to him, and put the chocolate
medallion with the happy birthday writing on top of the slice.
Jiang Cheng took a bite. He had to admit, the cake tasted fairly mediocre, but there were
probably no good bakeries around this area.
However, it was a rather wondrous feeling to be sitting here across from Gu Fei, with a slice
of cake each.
He didn’t want to speak or move. He only wished to stay like this forever, taking one bite
after another.
The rehabilitation place Gu Fei took Gu Miao to was likely not cheap. The teachers led the
kids in all sorts of games and activities, Jiang Cheng thought
they seemed very professional and patient. He didn’t enter the room, only observed from
the window. Compared to the other kids, Gu Miao seemed to be a little better off, at least
she was able to do some limited communication. It was the kids who had no reaction at all
when hailed that really made one hurt with feelings of hopelessness.
The activities didn’t last very long, probably taking into consideration the limited attention
spans of these kids, they usually ended before the kids became restless.
Gu Miao looked to be in a pretty good mood when she came out at the end, still holding her
skateboard. Gu Fei was still inside talking with the teacher, so Jiang Cheng took her out to
the sidewalk and skated around while waiting for Gu Fei.
He sighed softly as he watched Gu Miao flit back and forth in front of him, with little beads
of sweat on the tip of her little nose.
When Gu Fei came out, Jiang Cheng was crouching beside a bed of flowers by the sidewalk
clapping for Gu Miao, and didn’t even realize when he was standing behind him.
Gu Fei reached out and gently poked his shoulder, Jiang Cheng barely gave him any time to
react before he reached back with his elbow and jabbed him on the leg.
“Hey!” Gu Fei rubbed his leg. “Still so nimble aren’t we?”
“Geez,” Jiang Cheng turned around. “Why didn’t you call out to me first, if I aimed any
higher you’ll have to keep lying down tonight……”
Jiang Cheng broke off halfway, and quickly glanced around.
“Tonight?” Gu Fei bent down and asked quietly by his ears with a smile.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng stood up, and looked at him with an expression as though they were
discussing an academic problem. “That’s not something we need to talk about in the open
on the street.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei nodded solemnly and pulled out a folded piece of paper from his pocket.
“Then I’ll just……”
Jiang Cheng swept his eyes over the piece of paper and his eyeballs practically dropped out
of his head, “What the fuck! What are you carrying this thing around for? Is your brain
stuffed up with cake?! Do you need me to help you cough it up?”
“It’s my boyfriend’s secret handbook,” Gu Fei said. “Of course I have to keep it with me and
study wherever I go.”
“Hurry up and put it away,” Jiang Cheng said in a hushed voice. “Before
someone sees!”
“Relax,” Gu Fei laughed. “With handwriting like yours, I can’t even read it without conjuring
up some qi first. If you were to show other people, they might not even recognize it as
writing.”
“Quit bullshitting,” That made Jiang Cheng laugh. “Is it that bad?”
“It really is,” Gu Fei flicked the page. “Didn’t you say you’ve been writing things one stroke
at a time now, how come I can’t tell at all.”
“No shit, do I look like I’m so thickskinned as to write dirty memos like these one careful
stroke at a time!” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “Put it away.”
“Alrighty.” Gu Fei folded the paper and tucked it back in his pocket, then whistled in Gu
Miao’s direction.
Frankly, regarding whether it was going to be tonight, and whether he was going to be lying
down or kneeling, Gu Fei hadn’t thought very much about it. But looking at Jiang Cheng’s
silhouette in front him now, slowly strolling along with Gu Miao in tow, he suddenly
realized that if he were to think about, there was quite a lot to think about.
Especially when Gu Miao reached out to tug on Jiang Cheng’s shirt, and the smooth lines of
his waist and back became clear under the tightly stretched fabric……
Ah.
Gu Fei quickly looked up and stared at the sun, then sneezed two times to ruthlessly
suppress the flag raising ceremony before it had a chance to begin.
Footnotes
[1] cheng [橙] = orange; cheng-cheng = Gu Fei being cute ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: ?
TL word count: 4466
TL time: 5:20:24
Edit time: 1:42:50
Curse words: 5x fucks, 4x shits
TL’s Notes:
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
First posted: March 14, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 77
You’re pretty flexible though.
With Gu Miao’s presence, this birthday celebration began going in a more wholesome
direction starting in the afternoon. In the convenience store, Jiang Cheng was sitting down
with a face full of earnestness, attempting to explain their special day to Gu Miao, “Your
brother and I, we are celebrating our birthdays together today.”
Gu Miao was in a pretty good mood, so she was looking at him intently, but without much
understanding.
“My birthday is today, and your brother’s, uh, is still a month away. But to save time, and
money,” Jiang Cheng continued to explain. “We’re celebrating it together, get it? Nod if you
understand.”
Gu Miao looked at him, and did not nod. A moment later, she suddenly
beckoned at him, grabbed her skateboard, and turned to run outside. Gu Fei rapped his
knuckle on the counter, “Gu Miao!”
Gu Miao paused at the door, face still facing outward without turning.
“Let’s eat first,” Gu Fei went to crouch in front of Gu Miao, and looked into her eyes. “After
dinner we’ll rest for half an hour, then you can go play, okay?”
Gu Miao looked back at him for a while, then nodded.
“She nodded,” Jiang Cheng watched on the side. “That means she didn’t understand what I
said just now, right?”
“Mhm, she didn’t understand.” Gu Fei smiled. “Usually for these mundane things that she
does all the time, she can understand. But things like what you said just now, you gotta
explain for at least half an hour, and only if she has the patience to listen. Normally her
attention would wander after just a few minutes.”
“That place we went to today, will it help?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“It helps somewhat. I saw a kid at the hospital once in a similar state, and he’s seeing some
improvements now.” Gu Fei said.
“How long did it take him?” Jiang Cheng continued to ask.
“Seven years.” Gu Fei glanced at him. The overachiever was certainly living up to his name,
he immediately spotted the key point in the problem. The key right
now, was time.
Gu Miao’s situation wasn’t the worst. Even though she couldn’t control her emotions very
well, and wasn’t able to properly sense and empathize with other people’s emotions, and
on top of that was occasionally aggressive, but as long as there was an abundance of
patience and the correct approach, she could carry out simple communication, and rarely
got herself hurt.
But if they wanted further progress beyond that, it would take a very long time, much
longer than Gu Fei dared to even think about.
Jiang Cheng opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.
“Let’s order something to eat?” Gu Fei changed the subject and pulled out his phone. “We
can get some grand dishes to try, do you have anything in particular you really want to eat?
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng said. “Chicken, duck, fish, or meat, is all fine to me. I just really want to
eat meat right now……ah, pork belly.”
“Let me see, or we can just get them to deliver some grilling meats here, we can use the pan
to……” Gu Fei dragged a chair over and sat down. He was speaking and wasn’t paying much
attention, so when he dropped his butt down on the chair, the discomfort radiating from a
certain spot made him want to sing the rest of the sentence out loud, the high note of which
would surely be on point. “Grill.
The. Meat.”
He made himself finish the rest of the sentence with poise, through clenched teeth.
“Great,” Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers happily at the suggestion and walked down the
aisles. “Come on Gu Miao, let’s see if we can find some barbeque sauces? You know a lot of
words now, right? Can you point it out to me?”
“Yeah, they’re right……there.” Gu Fei shifted his body and leaned his weight on an elbow
propped against the counter, to take some pressure off his butt.
Did it feel good? Jiang Cheng had asked him.
Frankly it didn’t feel all that great, but it also didn’t hurt very much either, it was more that
he wasn’t used to the sensation. And as to Jiang Cheng’s question, he very much wanted to
ask back, to the overachiever who’d done so much research on the topic, who would feel
good after doing it for the first time? Not to mention, this boyfriend of his had gone through
all the trouble to shamelessly write down a whole dirty memo but didn’t end up following
the steps.
But he didn’t say it out loud, because he didn’t want Jiang Cheng to feel pressured. They
were all just young newbs after all, they couldn’t help but be led by instincts on these
matters, it was a feat to be celebrated that he didn’t drop out
halfway.
By the time the grilling ingredients arrived, Jiang Cheng had finished picking out the
various sauces from the shelves with Gu Miao, and set them down in a row on the table.
“Now we will scoop the sauces out into the bowls, alright?” Jiang Cheng brought over some
bowls and plates, as well as Gu Miao.
Gu Fei watched them as he played with his phone. The teachers at the
rehabilitation facility had led Gu Miao in a similar activity that afternoon as Jiang Cheng
watched through the window, with only half his face showing. He didn’t think Jiang Cheng
would remember it so well.
Gu Miao grabbed a spoon and started to scoop sauces into the plates and bowls, and looked
like she was concentrating hard.
But after scooping three different jars of sauces, she started to grow impatient.
The oil from the sauce would occasionally drip onto the table, and the thicker sauces would
sometimes stick to the spoon.
“Let’s switch to a different spoon, you like the……” Jiang Cheng was about to get up and
grab another spoon, but Gu Miao already threw her spoon onto the floor. Jiang Cheng bent
to pick up the spoon, when she flipped a plate onto the floor as well, then started spacing
off at the table. Jiang Cheng looked at her and sighed. “Oy, this volatile temper huh.”
Gu Fei tugged at the corner of his mouth, but kept his smile in. He was used to this kind of
behaviour from Gu Miao. She wasn’t like this all the time, but it never truly stopped either.
He faced these just like he would occasional tantrums from other people’s kids, and was
already used to it.
“Gu Er-Miao I’m telling you,” Jiang Cheng picked up the plate and got a napkin to clean up
the sauce on the ground. “It’s only because you’re pretty. If you were someone uglier I
would’ve picked you up and taken you outside by now.”
“Do you think I’m handsome?” Jiang Cheng tossed the napkin in the trash, then put himself
in front of Gu Miao again. “Hmm?”
Gu Miao looked at him, and stared for upwards of ten seconds, before nodding.
Jiang Cheng lit up in excitement, he turned around with a proud expression on his face,
“Hear that? Your sister said I’m handsome.”
“You are handsome.” Gu Fei said.
When Jiang Cheng turned back to look at Gu Miao, she reached out and cupped his face in
her hands, then yanking on his ears to pull him closer, planted a kiss on his forehead.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng was stunned, then after a spell, whipped his head back around to Gu
Fei. “Did you see that?!”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei was also surprised. Gu Miao very rarely was able to express her likes and
dislikes accurately. She quite liked Li Yan, but would always give him a cold face, and at
most let Li Yan play with her favourite toys. The way she expressed her liking for Jiang
Cheng was something he’d never seen before.
“Thank you Er-Miao.” Jiang Cheng turned back and gave her a smile, and was just about to
return a kiss to her forehead when Gu Fei stood up.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei halted him. “Don’t.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng paused, then immediately seemed to understand. “Oh, got it.”
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei crouched down in front of Gu Miao, and waved his fingers before her face.
“Look at me.”
Gu Miao looked at him.
“You shouldn’t kiss boys, and you shouldn’t let boys kiss you either.” Gu Fei clearly
enunciated each word for her. “Gege hasn’t kissed you since you were six, right? Because
you’ve grown up, and I shouldn’t kiss you anymore.”
Gu Miao looked at him intently.
“I’ve told you before, do you remember?” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Let’s try a different way, alright?” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao turned and stared at Jiang Cheng for a long time, like she was thinking hard. At
last, she extended a hand and snapped her fingers at Jiang Cheng, followed by a thumbs up.
“Ay!” Jiang Cheng quickly snapped back at her and returned the thumbs up.
“You’re the handsomest.”
Gu Miao smiled, then shifted her eyes back to the sauces on the table.
“Why don’t you finish it for her, that’s about the limit of her patience and attention span.”
Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng started scooping out the sauce from the remaining two jars, as Gu Miao
watched intently.
“We can eat now.” Gu Fei grabbed the portable burner and pan and set them on
the table. “Should I go get the cake?”
“Nah, not yet.” Jiang Cheng insisted on not seeing the cake yet. “Wait till we’re done eating,
and get it out when it’s dark outside. The cake has to come out in the right atmosphere,
after all, it’s the first time in my life that I get to eat a cake handmade by my boy……desk-
mate. It has to stay a surprise.”
“Boy desk-mate,” Gu Fei clucked his tongue. “So have girl deskmates made them for you
before?”
“Don’t push me.” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
Gu Fei laughed as he turned on the portable burner, and brushed a layer of oil into the pan,
“Let’s start grilling then, boy desk-mate.”
Before Jiang Cheng even moved, Gu Miao quickly picked up a slice of meat with her
chopsticks and put it in the pan, then immediately started stirring it around.
“A little girl,” Jiang Cheng sighed, and also put a slice of meat into the pan, stirring it with
her. “Hungering for meat like this, what will you do if you get fat.”
“It’s fine, she’s very active.” Gu Fei said. “If you don’t stop her, she’ll play on her skateboard
for a whole day outside.”
“That board,” Jiang Cheng said. “I took a look today, it’s about time to change the wheels
huh, they’ve practically been worn smooth.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Gotta change it when she’s asleep though, she’ll throw a fit if she
sees.”
“Will she check her wheels?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“She usually just stares at the board, it’s all good as long as the board doesn’t change.” Gu
Fei reached in with his chopsticks and flipped over the slice of meat that Gu Miao had been
prodding.
Eating in like this was definitely much more comfortable than eating out, they could do
whatever they want and be at complete ease.
But occasionally there’d be an interruption that broke through the ease, for example when
someone came in the store in the middle of their meal to buy something.
“Ah you’re having dinner huh?” Auntie Lü who lived upstairs started by greeting Gu Fei,
then paused and stared when she saw Jiang Cheng. “Isn’t this……Jiang Cheng? Old Li’s……”
Jiang Cheng turned and shot her a look without a word.
Auntie Lü was about to open her mouth, when Gu Fei cut in, “Auntie, you came to get oil
right?”
“Aye, to get oil.” Auntie Lü nodded, then took a couple more glances at Jiang Cheng. “Hey,
you……”
“I’ll go get it for you,” Gu Fei stood up and walked to the shelves and brought over a jug of
oil. “It’s this soybean oil you got last time right?”
“Oh yeah, yeah.” Auntie Lü said. “Ah you got a good memory, Da-Fei.”
“I only remember y’all who come in all the time.” Gu Fei walked behind the register, rang
up the price, then stood there as though waiting for her to pay.
“You must be in a rush to get back to cooking huh?”
“Isn’t that right,” Auntie Lü handed him the money. “I already got the wok on the stove
when I realized I forgot to buy more oil.”
Gu Fei quickly made change for her, and placed the jug of oil into her hands,
“Better hurry then, or your grandson’s gonna start crying for food.”
“He’s already started,” Auntie Lü was made all the more anxious by his words, and
immediately started out the door with the jug of oil. “That kid will have my life!”
When Gu Fei returned to his seat at the table, he heard Jiang Cheng let out a soft sigh.
“They’re gonna be talking about it for a year at least, to your face and behind your back.” Gu
Fei picked up a slice of meat and placed it in Jiang Cheng’s bowl. “If you’re pissed you can
snap right back at them.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile. “They’ll add some flavouring too right?”
“Of course they will,” Gu Fei said. “The way life is around here, if you don’t add some extra
spices for yourself and some flavouring for others, it would be too dreary to live. Do you
want me to ask around and see how the rumour mill is churning it these days?”
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng let out a tsk. “I can guess as much. I couldn’t even imagine it before, but I
kinda have an idea now.”
“Just look at it as an experience,” Gu Fei said. “You’re bound to go through a lot of different
experiences in your lifetime, these are all proofs of your existence.”
“There you go writing poems again,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “You also count as a
proof of my existence, right?”
“I’m proof of your affection.” The corners of Gu Fei’s mouth turned up. “And proof that
you’ve gotten laid.”
“What the shit!” Jiang Cheng quickly glanced at Gu Miao.
Though compared to Gu Fei’s words, clearly his “what the shit” was better at grabbing Gu
Miao’s attention. She didn’t react at all to what Gu Fei said, but did look up at Jiang Cheng
when he spoke.
“Cussing is wrong.” Jiang Cheng said immediately.
Gu Miao nodded, then reached out a hand to snap her fingers and gave him a thumbs up.
“You can snap with your left hand too?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei in surprise. “She used
her right hand before, right?”
“Mhm, but she’s rarely like this, normally she likes to whistle.” Gu Fei said with a smile.
Gu Miao set down her chopsticks and snapped her fingers with both hands simultaneously,
then reached out and gave him two thumbs up.
“Ay, I can’t do it with my left hand.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “You’re too awesome, cool-Miao.”
After dinner they lounged around for a while. Gu Fei wanted to take Gu Miao home to sleep,
since he wanted to split the cake between Jiang Cheng and him only. But because he
promised Gu Miao earlier that she could play on her skateboard half an hour after dinner,
he had no choice but to squat at the door and watch as Jiang Cheng and Gu Miao hopped on
and off the skateboard across the two streets.
There was time. He checked his phone. Play for a while, take Gu Miao home, come back to
the store for cake, then…… The next day his mom would come watch the store in the
morning, they could sleep in until noon like they did today, then take Gu Miao for her
therapy in the afternoon.
The day after that wouldn’t be as relaxing. He would have to start working on the jobs he
took, and the photoshoot he got for Jiang Cheng would start that day as well. This summer
break was much shorter than usual…… so busy……
Gu Fei was a little bummed when he realized his thoughts had transitioned seamlessly from
thinking about the naughty activities of the night to the money making activities of the
summer. He tsked audibly and brought his thoughts back around. And took out Jiang
Cheng’s page of notes from his pocket.
……Such ugly handwriting.
“Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng yelled as he flew by on the skateboard. He likely noticed the paper in
Gu Fei’s hand, when Gu Fei looked over, Jiang Cheng gave him a middle finger.
Gu Fei gave him a long drawn-out whistle.
There was actually something useful to be gleaned from the page of summary notes. If he
disregarded the atrocious handwriting, the overachiever’s summarizing ability was top
notch. It was very clear and concise, one look and you’d understand, one lesson and you’d
get it, guaranteed to treat a hundred ailments, guaranteed to do a hundred Cheng……
Gu Fei cleared his throat, and made an effort to keep his raging thoughts under control.
But when Jiang Cheng glided past him a second time, all his previous efforts were rendered
moot when the wind lifted the hem of Jiang Cheng’s shirt and revealed a strip of waist.
It was…… just as well. He stood and turned back into the store, walked into the inner room
and shut the door.
Gu Fei usually used the cot in this room to take midday naps, he’d never rubbed one out
here before, so today would be a fast-breaking of sorts.
He tapped open a folder on his phone, and pulled up a……video of Jiang Cheng.
It was a video he recorded in secret, the content of which could not be more normal, or
mundane. It was a clip of Jiang Cheng flopped over a desk after falling asleep halfway
through studying.
But Jiang Cheng looked really good while sleeping, especially whenever he fell asleep
halfway through studying, it was like he was in a rush to get some rest so he could get up
and continue revising, he looked very intent in his sleep, very sexy.
By the time Jiang Cheng brought Gu Miao back in, he had already finished cleaning up the
scene, washed the dishes, and tidied up the table.
“Wait here for me,” Gu Fei wiped the sweat from Gu Miao’s face with a towel.
“I’ll take her home and come right back.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng sat down on a chair and stretched out his legs. “Mannn that wore me
out, her endurance is no joke.”
“No need to envy her,” Gu Fei smiled. “She doesn’t even know what tired feels like.”
Normally when Gu Fei took Gu Miao home, he would walk while Gu Miao rode her
skateboard. To save time today, he put Gu Miao on the back of his bike.
Peddling Gu Miao back home, reminding his mom to watch her bathe, then peddling back to
the store, the whole process took less than 30 minutes in total.
Jiang Cheng had already fallen asleep in the chair, with his head tilted back and legs
stretched out long.
“Cheng-ge?” Gu Fei tiptoed over and quietly called out to him. Jiang Cheng didn’t stir.
He stood behind Jiang Cheng and took a quick glance outside to make sure no one was
passing by, then bent over and gently bit Jiang Cheng’s lips, while at the same time holding
his arms down.
This reflex of Jiang Cheng’s, once refined, could be used for assasination. As Gu Fei ended
the kiss and moved his lips away, Jiang Cheng’s arms might be held down, but the height of
his kick was still impressive.
“The fuck!” Jiang Cheng realized it was him, then slouched back onto the chair in
resignation. “Gu Fei, when are you going to stop with these silly games……”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei laughed as he let go of Jiang Cheng’s arms, then leaned down again and
whispered in his ears. “You’re pretty flexible though.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng paused. “What the fuck, you certainly are a virtuous youth of a new
era.”
“Cake?” Gu Fei asked.
“Quit changing the subject!” Jiang Cheng said.
“I won’t change the subject then,” Gu Fei walked over to the fridge and gave him a look. “We
can continue discussing your flexibility?”
“Cake.” Jiang Cheng pointed at the fridge.
Gu Fei’s cake was not quite a pound in weight, it was a little smaller than the one he bought
yesterday, but it was beautiful, and chocolate flavoured.
The entire exterior was made of a white chocolate shell, and adorned with frosting shaped
like roses covering the whole cake, with two cherries in the center.
A simple base colour with a not-so-simple design, plus two striking dots of red.
“Damn great workmanship Gu Feifei!” Jiang Cheng marvelled sincerely. “I thought at best
you’d squeeze out some swirly swirls, but you actually did
roses?”
“I told you, I used to take Gu Miao there.” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
“Where’s the writing?” Jiang Cheng asked as he looked at the flowers on the cake. “Didn’t
you say there’s writing, doesn’t look like there’s space for it.”
“Here.” Gu Fei turned the cake half a rotation to show him.
Jiang Cheng noticed a space on the side of the cake unadorned by roses, where there was a
line of text.
It was a line Jiang Cheng had seen before, and to this day still remembered.
It was in the message Gu Fei had sent him. ↩
– I want, one look, to last a lifetime……
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a warmth overcoming his eyes.
He’d read that message many times over. He saw it every time he went through their old
messages, but never once did he feel like this, he suddenly couldn’t keep his emotions in
check.
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei asked.
”Nothing,” Jiang Cheng breathed in deep, then tsked after a short pause. “You wrote that
yourself?”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei answered.
“It’s……pretty good.” Jiang Cheng stared at the line. “Your handwriting’s……
better than mine.”
“Is that a compliment?” Gu Fei asked.
“Is that not a compliment?” Jiang Cheng lifted his eyes and shot him a look.
“Better than your handwriting,” Gu Fei also peered at him. “Is a compliment?”
“Get lost, I’m finally realizing now that you’re just itching for a beating, sooner or later I’m
gonna get you to behave.” Jiang Cheng took out his phone. “Hold up the cake, I want to take
a picture.”
Gu Fei laughed as he held the cake up by his face, “Like this?”
“Give me a smile.” Jiang Cheng looked at the Gu Fei on his screen.
Gu Fei bared his teeth.

“Can you give a more gentle smile?” Jiang Cheng frowned.

Gu Fei smiled again.
Jiang Cheng snapped a picture. Gu Fei was about to set the cake down, when Jiang Cheng
waved at him, “Hold on, I want to take a clip too.”
Gu Fei renewed his hold on the cake.
“Start talking.” Jiang Cheng pressed record.
“About what?” Gu Fei asked. “Happy birthday Cheng-ge.”
“Say,” Jiang Cheng zoomed in. “Do you like Cheng-ge?”
“I do,” Gu Fei chuckled and said. “I really, really do.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5704
TL word count: 3910
TL time: 3:25:22
Edit time: 0:50:07
Curse words: 2x fucks, 3x shits
TL’s Notes:
I’m dying of sugar overdose, also, SAYE MANHUA MARCH 27TH~~~~~
First posted: March 21, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 78
You dog-fucker!
They stayed in the store until past 9 o’clock. When people stopped coming in to buy things,
Gu Fei closed up, and the two of them slowly strolled down the street.
They didn’t eat very much today. Despite being a carnivore, Jiang Cheng was in too good a
mood, so he only took a few bites before feeling full; he didn’t even eat as much as Gu Miao.
Gu Fei ate even less, since he was in charge of grilling and keeping an eye on the heat the
whole time.
“Do you want anything else to eat?” Gu Fei asked.
“Dude, in that case we can just go back and eat the extra meat we put away in the fridge.”
Jiang Cheng rubbed his belly. It was actually a very pleasant feeling to be only half-full, he
felt very light. Especially at a time like this, when the moon had just risen, and the night
breeze was gently blowing through the streets, as he sauntered leisurely forward with his
boyfriend along a deserted street with no destination in mind.
And he didn’t need a destination. In fact, a lot of times, you don’t really need a destination,
don’t need to think too much. As long as that person is by your side, you can keep walking
forever.
It had been a while since Jiang Cheng first arrived here, but there were still quite a few
places in the Steel Works area he hadn’t been to. He had always thought of this place as
dilapidated and grim, the people here living in a bleak stupor, this was an impression that
had stuck with him even now. However…… he glanced at Gu Fei.
But it was different with Gu Fei here. Even if he only caught a glimpse of him in the midst of
a crowd, he’d feel a gentle tug on his heartstring, like his surroundings all of a sudden
brightened. Everything he took in with his eyes, everything he felt in his heart, all of that
changed as well.
It would sound a little too dramatic if he spoke it aloud, but Gu Fei really was his comfort
pill in this hopeless environment, his most important support when facing any and all
unhappiness.
Jiang Cheng’s phone chimed with an incoming message.
He pulled it out to take a look, it was from Pan Zhi.
– On how romantic love defeated friendship and the generational bond between
grandpa and grandson: An Essay.
“The shit?” Jiang Cheng stared, then swiped up on the screen, only then realizing that Pan
Zhi had sent him a message at 1 AM that morning to wish him a happy birthday, and he
completely missed it.
He chuckled as he sent a reply back.
– You might as well send it at 3am, that way it’ll be even more unlikely for me to see it
– Don’t you make excuses, the way things are right now, you’re not gonna fcking see no
matter what time it is
– I’m seeing it now aren’t I
– I’m telling you gramps, all good things in moderation
A wave of nervous embarrassment suddenly washed over Jiang Cheng as he read this
message. He thought of what happened last night, then thought about what probably would
happen later tonight…… He swept a glance over in Gu Fei’s direction.
– I am experiencing the rage of a single af person
– whatsmoreawkwardthanasilence.jpg
– Do you have something to say, if not I’m just gonna go
– Where is our bond gramps!? Where is our bond developed over late night chats until
3am?
– Good night
– I’ll be there the day after tomorrow, the same train as last time, same time
– Bringing anyone with you?
– No one to bring, we don’t even get the summer off, everyone’s in cram school, I only got 2
days break with the death of my fourth grandpa
– You have a fourth grandpa?
– No, if I did would I dare to kill him! Where’s your brain? I guess you really are in love
– Got it you may take your leave now
– Yes gramps, good night gramps
“Is that Pan Zhi?” Gu Fei asked beside him.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng was lost in thought. The students at Fourth High were at this moment
frolicking all over the world while complaining that more than half of their summer was cut
off, but on the other side in his old school, they didn’t even get to have a summer at all. This
disparity. “He’s taking a couple days off to come visit.”
“Just two days?” Gu Fei was surprised. “I thought he’d come over for a week at least.”
“Our old school doesn’t even have summer break,” Jiang Cheng chuckled. “He made some
stuff up and asked for 2 days absence.”
“Then……” Gu Fei looked at him. “Do you also have to start working more intensively?
Revise according to their progress or something? Maybe I planned a few too many
photoshoots, should I cancel a couple for you?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng shook his head. “I can always find the time to revise if I want to, who am
I, after all.”
“You’re a super overachiever.” Gu Fei smiled.
“That’s right.” Jiang Cheng took out his phone again to send Pan Zhi a message, asking him
to get some question banks and study materials from the teachers for him.
– Already did, we singletons have excellent memory
Jiang Cheng smiled. As he put the phone back in his pocket, he noticed his feet, slowly
striding forward one step after the other. Beside them were Gu Fei’s feet, also moving
forward at a leisurely pace.
Amused, he took his phone out again and started recording a video of their steps.
“Shall we guess……” Jiang Cheng started narrating to himself out of habit, then stopped
halfway and shot Gu Fei a look. Gu Fei was walking with both hands in his pockets, very
much at ease. “Pretend you can’t hear me.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“Shall we guess to whom do these four legs……these two pairs of legs, belong to?” Jiang
Cheng held the phone between the two of them as he recorded.
“Contestant Jiang Cheng is in the middle of his post-meal one hundred steps with his……
boyfriend. It should be pretty easy for everyone to guess, after all, contestant Jiang Cheng’s
legs are very long and slim. And as for his boyfriend’s legs……”
Gu Fei suddenly quickened his pace and walked in front of him, then stopped
and turned while sticking his leg straight out.
“Alrighty,” Jiang Cheng giggled and couldn’t stop. “The boyfriend’s legs are very long.
Contestant Jiang Cheng did say when they first met that this guy has very long legs.”
Hearing that, Gu Fei drew his leg back and continued walking forward. As Jiang Cheng
tucked his phone away, Gu Fei asked, “You were looking at my legs when we first met?”
“I always look at a person’s legs first.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Where would you look next?” Gu Fei asked
“If the legs look good then I’ll look at the face, if the legs don’t look good I’ll just look at my
phone.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei laughed for a long time.
After walking around for more than an hour in these grid-like roads of the Steel Works,
they returned to Jiang Cheng’s apartment building.
It was a very enjoyable walk. Gu Fei rarely had a chance to take walks like this, he didn’t
usually have the time, or if he did it would be spent playing with Gu Miao. If he was with Gu
Miao, then it would be impossible to walk at a leisurely pace. Gu Miao was like a perpetual
motion machine, with an extra powerful motor to boot. One simply could not keep up with
her pace and still maintain a walk.
Neither of them spoke when they arrived outside the building. They moved directly into
the corridor and up the stairs.
Gu Fei watched Jiang Cheng’s back as he walked……back, waist, butt, and legs.
He gently cleared his throat and said quietly, “I’m going to touch you.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng whipped his head around and glared at Gu Fei, and said with a hushed
voice. “Do you have to say this kind of thing out loud?”
“I’m just afraid you’ll slap me on the face out of reflex.” Gu Fei said quietly.
“And you have to do it now?” Jiang Cheng continued in his hushed voice.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei answered.
“……Then do you need me to answer you with an ‘okay’?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei laughed and reached out to stroke Jiang Cheng’s waist, then trailed his hand to his
legs.
“Holy shit!” Jiang Cheng yelled quietly, and bolted away up the stairs.
Gu Fei immediately chased after him, then grabbed a handful of his butt.
“Ah fuck!” Jiang Cheng jumped up, and didn’t even have time to shoot Gu Fei another glare
as he continued running up the stairs.
“I have long legs.” Gu Fei laughed as he chased him.
“I’m warning you Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng got to the door, and pointed at Gu Fei as he fumbled
around for the keys. “You……”
Gu Fei went over and gave him a peck on the lips, then pinched his waist.
“I……” Jiang Cheng had no more words. He quickly unlocked the door, then yelled in a quiet
voice after Gu Fei closed the door behind him. “Are you in heat or something?”
“I’m done.” Gu Fei fell back onto the sofa and gave him a smile.
Jiang Cheng stood in the middle of the room and stared at him for ten seconds, then turned
into the bedroom, “I’m gonna take a shower, I’m all sweaty from the walk.”
“I want to shower too.” Gu Fei said while lying on the sofa.
“Get in line.” Jiang Cheng answered without thinking. He fetched a change of clothes and
took a few steps toward the bathroom before pausing to glance at Gu Fei. “Did you want to
go together?”
Gu Fei collapsed in laughter, “Never mind, you go first.”
Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue and went into the bathroom.
Gu Fei heard the sound of running water a few seconds later. He stretched his legs out,
leaned his head against his arms, and sighed. Then he picked up the remote and tuned to a
random tv channel to watch.
He and Jiang Cheng really were quite innocent. All this time going from mutual handies to
actually doing it, and they’d never even taken a shower
together…… tsk tsk.
Although at this moment he wasn’t thinking about crowding into the shower. For the first
time, Gu Fei felt a respect for the power of the overachiever. That silly dirty memo of Jiang
Cheng’s was currently spinning round and round in his brain, the lines of ugly writing
playing like a slideshow in his mind.
His whole life up until now, he’d never had such crystal clear memory for
‘learning’, especially when the target of which was such ugly handwriting.
It also filled him with a drive to apply the theories practically, he even stood up to compare
the height of the table against himself before Jiang Cheng came out of the shower.
It was……pretty suitable. Gu Fei braced his hands against the table and indulged his
imagination for a second, and suddenly it was like a floodgate had been opened. By the time
Jiang Cheng came out, he was no longer facing the table in an air-humping pose, but it was
all he could do to lie on the sofa and pretend to watch TV. No amount of deep breathing was
effective in calming himself
‘down’.
Gu Fei always thought of himself as composed, one of those people with good self-
discipline. But reality proved that he was still too naive.
“I had the temperature turned pretty high just now,” Jiang Cheng walked past him into the
bedroom as he dried his hair with a towel. “Remember to change it before you shower.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei laid unmoving on the sofa. “Grab some clothes for me will you.”
Jiang Cheng turned to shoot him a glance, “Rather high and mighty now aren’t you?”
“Yep.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng went into the room to get him a set of pyjamas and underwear, “I don’t have
any more new underwear, is mine okay?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei reached out his hand.
“Lord Gu.” Jiang Cheng threw the clothes on him, then turned to face the TV so he could
watch as he dried his hair haphazardly with the towel.
The way he stood was incredibly brazen, blocking off Gu Fei’s entire line of sight to the
television. From Gu Fei’s angle, all he could see was Jiang Cheng’s back.
Jiang Cheng was topless with only a pair of sweatpants hanging loosely on his hips, like it
could be flung off with a single gentle tug.
Gu Fei was planning to make him move, but now he kept quiet. After staring for a good
while, he picked up the clothes and stood up. When he walked by Jiang Cheng, he suddenly
bent down and put his arm around his waist, and bit down.
Jiang Cheng’s superhuman reflex reached the peak of its career in this very moment, before
he even formed words, he first landed a slap on Gu Fei’s head.
Then came the bellow: “AH!”
“Hey,” Gu Fei let go and took a few steps back while holding his head. “Sooner or later
you’re gonna slap me stupid.”
“Fuck off!” Jiang Cheng glared at him and rubbed his waist hard. “You dog-fucker! Why
would you chomp down so hard!”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei suddenly burst out laughing, and continued on to the bathroom as he
nodded. “That’s right, I’m a dog-fucker……”
He managed to close the bathroom door and lock it from the inside just as Jiang Cheng
started charging over.
“Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng banged on the door. “You’re done for!”
“What?” Gu Fei laughed and asked as he undressed.
“Come out and fight!” Jiang Cheng banged on the door again.
“It’s not like you can beat me.” Gu Fei said.
“Bullshit,” Jiang Cheng said. “I should’ve recorded your whining yesterday!”
“Thanks for the reminder.” Gu Fei put a hand on the wall to keep from doubling up in
laughter.
“You’re done for!” Jiang Cheng said. Then two seconds later banged the door again. “You’re
done!”
Gu Fei adjusted the water heater, then turned on the tap to shower, still laughing as he did.
He was already a little calmer after the shenanigans, but Jiang Cheng had to end with a
mention of a recording, and suddenly he wasn’t so calm again.
When it comes to salacious activities, it really does take two to tango……
When he came out from the shower, Jiang Cheng was sitting cross-legged on the sofa,
playing with his phone. He only shot a brief glance toward Gu Fei when he heard him come
out, his fingers continued to tap away on the screen.
“Rhythm Master?” Gu Fei noticed the jingle. “And here I thought you’d be playing non-
idiotic games.”
“I play at a level idiots like you can never hope to reach.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei chuckled and didn’t answer, just watched as he leaned against the table.
Jiang Cheng’s fingers were nimble and swift, in the light of the screen they even left behind
an afterimage……gorgeous.
Of course, it was also possible that this optical illusion was due to his 0.70 D
astigmatism.
“Such a happy birthday,” After a while he went and sat down beside Jiang Cheng. “And
you’re spending it like this?”
“How else should I be spending it,” The corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth turned up in a smirk.
“Go to bed and let you record me? Hold it in and dream on.”
“I won’t record you,” Gu Fei pressed up against Jiang Cheng and put his arms around his
waist, then kissed his shoulder. “Cheng-ge……”
“Cheng-ge what?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Don’t make me get rough.” Gu Fei said.
“The shit?” Jiang Cheng turned around in shock, but didn’t manage to keep the smile from
breaking out on his face. “This young man got some guts?”
Gu Fei didn’t respond. He snatched away Jiang Cheng’s phone and tossed it onto the coffee
table, then before Jiang Cheng could react, bore down and pushed him back onto the sofa.
“You dare to mutiny,” Jiang Cheng landed a slap on his back. “You really should record the
way you are right now, like a dog fighting for……”
“Shit?” Gu Fei continued.
“I’m not talking to you anymore,” Jiang Cheng let out a long drawn-out sigh. “I only feel a
profound helplessness.”
“You don’t need to help today.” Said Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng paused, then: “You ass, I’m not talking anymore.”
Gu Fei kissed his ear and chuckled.
Jiang Cheng clenched his teeth and tried but failed to hold it in, then burst out laughing with
him. Eventually he stroked Gu Fei’s back, “Hey, laughing didn’t get you down?”
“……Mhmm,” Gu Fei answered. “You can feel it?”
“No shit, it’s not like you’re wearing thick pants.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei planted a very earnest kiss on Jiang Cheng’s lips, starting with a gentle peck, then he
withdrew and stared into Jiang Cheng’s eyes. Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes and asked, “Is
your bouche amused?”
“Mmm.” Gu Fei swept the tip of his tongue between Jiang Cheng’s lips.
Jiang Cheng immediately bit it.
He smiled, and deepened the kiss, reaching past Jiang Cheng’s teeth. When Jiang Cheng
returned the kiss, he also bit back gently, and Jiang Cheng retaliated again.
This kind of bite for a bite, not at all serious makeout behaviour was pretty immature, and
did nothing for a romantic atmosphere compared to experienced drivers, nor was it a good
representation of the poise of a new age thirsty youth.
But Gu Fei enjoyed it a lot.
He enjoyed this feeling, the feeling of lingering in and around Jiang Cheng’s lips, reaching
and retreating, slowly going deeper and becoming more
intertwined. It was exciting.
Very exciting, in fact it was the kind of excitement that made him feel like his pants had
gotten a size smaller.
He released Jiang Cheng’s lips and bit his chin, then took another bite on his throat. By then
he could feel Jiang Cheng’s breaths quicken. As he trailed kisses all the way down to Jiang
Cheng’s belly, the breaths came even faster.
He pulled Jiang Cheng’s pants down.
“Are we not……going inside?” Jiang Cheng asked.
With one swift motion, Gu Fei flung the pants to the floor. He held Jiang Cheng’s ankle
against the backrest with one hand, and with the other hand traced a path from the ankle
up to the tattoo, then with a flick of his fingers, brushed down the leg again.
“There’s no time,” He felt like his hand holding Jiang Cheng’s ankle was like holding a car
door open, and couldn’t help finish the line. “Get in the car.”
“You weirdo.” Jiang Cheng was already panting lightly as he spoke, but at this he started
giggling again.
“Stop laughing.” Gu Fei bent down and traced his tongue around the teeth-mark tattoo as
he reached a hand into Jiang Cheng’s underwear.
Jiang Cheng’s whole body suddenly stiffened. He tilted his head back and drew in a sharp
breath.
This reaction also made Gu Fei’s breathing a little difficult. But fortunately, here was the
benefit of having already rubbed one out beforehand……though at this very moment he was
still having a really hard time holding back.
Compared to the straight forward head-first approach of Jiang Cheng, Gu Fei thought, he
himself was practically the most virtuous thug of the new age. When faced with an enticing
picture such as this, he actually had the self-control to not jump right in and start biting.
Even though the memory of the so-called tips in the dirty little summary was a little faded
at the moment, still it persisted in playing over and over in his mind like a broken record.
Gu Fei didn’t act out the summary word by word, it was enough to understand the basic
steps. Everything else, he improvised in reaction to Jiang Cheng’s live feedback.
Jiang Cheng’s panting was low and rushed. The light in the living room was brighter than in
the bedroom, so he lifted an arm to cover his eyes.
It was a very seductive gesture. Gu Fei reached out and felt around the sofa cushions for the
bottle of lube, and squeezed some out in his hand, the whole time keeping his eyes glued to
Jiang Cheng’s face.
Jiang Cheng had a very nice face shape, it was sculpted without being severe.
With his eyes covered, Gu Fei could still see his straight nose, slightly parted lips, and his
pretty chin……
Jiang Cheng moved his arm slightly from his eyes when he felt Gu Fei’s fingers draw close.
He shot a glance at Gu Fei and mumbled, “Fucking hell, when did you get that?”
“When you were showering.” Gu Fei braced a hand beside his head and went in for a kiss, as
he continued moving his other hand.
Jiang Cheng frowned and let out a very small moan.
It was probably the most useful tip in the entire dirty little summary: first, second, and
then; pay attention to the pace, slow down……
Gu Fei had no idea how he managed to get through this process, there were no less than ten
instances when the thought “fuck the notes and let’s just go” flashed through his mind.
The expression on Jiang Cheng’s face changed from “that doesn’t feel very fucking good” to
“I’ll kill you if your finger moves another inch”, and then “ok this is tolerable”, to finally
“you can start now”.
Gu Fei felt like every single pore in his body had been conscripted to capture Jiang Cheng’s
reaction, it was the first time in almost 18 years he’d been so completely focused on one
task, and it was all for this shameless activity.
He no longer needed the guidance of the dirty little memo at this point. He could already
hear Jiang Cheng’s heartbeat within his own, could hear Jiang Cheng’s breaths within his
own panting, and could understand Jiang Cheng’s impulse from his own impulse.
He jumped off the sofa, pulling Jiang Cheng up with him.
“What are you doing?” Jiang Cheng was a little confused by the sudden turn of events.
It was only then that Gu Fei thought to glance at the living room window. Fuck!
Good thing they closed the curtains to light the candles this morning and hadn’t opened
them yet!
With this drastic tensing and relaxing of his mood, his desire also shot straight up from the
stimulation.
“You.” Gu Fei answered, then tugged on Jiang Cheng’s arm and pushed him down on the
table.
With Jiang Cheng’s arms pulled back behind him, the muscles on his back and sides were
taut as they contracted from the effort. Gu Fei’s vision was suddenly a little blurry from all
the blood rushing up in excitement.
He leaned down and bit Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
Jiang Cheng’s breath hitched, but he didn’t make any sound. Gu Fei’s fingers trailed down
his back and across his waist, then pulled his underwear down.
Jiang Cheng turned his head to the side.
As Gu Fei traced his fingers back around his inner thigh, and slid in with the coolness of the
lube, Jiang Cheng’s breathing suddenly got a lot heavier, and accompanied by a very low
sound. Like a moan, or perhaps just a sigh.
Gu Fei pressed up against his back and clutched his waist tight, then licked the back of his
ear gently, tracing a line to the back of his neck. Along the way he could feel Jiang Cheng’s
surging pulse and the tensed skin wherever he went.
He stuck a knee between Jiang Cheng’s legs and pushed them apart. This image that he
went over countless times in his mind was all of a sudden before him.
At this point, it was impossible to follow the dirty little memo and carefully observe the
other person’s reactions, Gu Fei could practically hear the cries from within his own
panting.
Get in the car!
Start the engine!
Some Stats
Raw character count: ????
TL word count: 4061

TL time: 5:45:40
Edit time: 1:09:03
Curse words: 8x fucks, 7x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
That’s it for this car, I suffered a lot for it, I hope you enjoy (ﾉ/////) Also, the manhua is
OUTTTT! GO CHECK IT!
First posted: March 28, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 79
“Good morning, Cheng-ge.”
Author: Wu Zhe, Translated by Yuka XD
Jiang Cheng lay on the bed, hugging the pillow with his head to one side. His eyes were half
closed. Gu Fei was lying next to him in the same position, head also to the side, but he was
hugging a small, fuzzy blanket.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Mmm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Let’s go buy another pillow?” Gu Fei asked.
“Why?” Jiang Cheng asked, then a corner of his mouth quirked up after a brief
consideration. “So Pan Zhi can use it when he comes?”
“Nice one, overachiever,” Gu Fei tsked audibly. “You still haven’t been fucked into
behaving?”
“How about we battle for another 300 rounds to determine the winner?” Jiang Cheng also
tsked, and turned his head to face the wall.
“Does it hurt?” Gu Fei reached out and stroked his back.
“……..It’s alright.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes, feeling his answer.
To be honest, there wasn’t a limit to how thick a person’s face can be. Thinking about it, in
just the last 24 hours, he and Gu Fei had become shameless enough to talk candidly about
such topics.
“Do you need me to piggyback you to the shower?” Gu Fei asked, laughing.
“Do you realize you’re going to be taken care of if you continue being so brazen?” Jiang
Cheng lay there without moving. “I won’t go easy on you next time…… Hey Gu Fei.”
Jiang Cheng turned to look at him, “I’m going to ask you a question, and you have to answer
it honestly.”
“Hm? Ask away.” Gu Fei squeezed closer to him, so they were arm to arm.
Jiang Cheng touched the tip of his nose, “It wasn’t your first fucking time, was it?”
“Mnn?” Gu Fei stared in confusion.
“Be good and tell the truth, I’m not going to make a fuss.” Jiang Cheng smiled affably with
his teeth bared.
“Wait,” Gu Fei chuckled after collecting himself. “What is the basis for this question of
yours?”
“You lasted longer than me,” Jiang Cheng stared at him, still smiling with his teeth bared.
“Even with new tricks, you could hold it. Do you want to take me through your mental
process?”
“Shit,” Gu Fei looked at him and laughed for a long time. “I’m a typical virgin alright?”
“No, I am.” Jiang Cheng said.
“See, I never doubted you,” Gu Fei said.
“No shit, the way I was, if you doubted me, where’s the justice?” Jiang Cheng realized now
that he wasn’t even embarrassed at all about admitting his inexperience. As expected, his
face was already a mile thick.
“Those notes of yours,” Gu Fei turned, pushing the little blanket a little further up,
cushioning his head. “Did you even look at it yourself?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng also laughed. “Fuck, stop mentioning it.”
“Do you even remember the contents?” Gu Fei continued, his hand caressing Jiang Cheng’s
back.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng felt a little resigned. “I don’t need to try, I remember all the contents of
the notes I’ve taken.”
That’s right, he remembered everything.
It’s just, some things tend to deviate from the plan during actual execution.
Things would be affected by one’s mood, the state of their bodies etc, as well as…… Fuck it,
in truth he just couldn’t hold back.
“Right, you’re an overachiever after all. Even a slacky slacker such as myself had it
memorized after a few times, how could an overachiever not?” Gu Fei said, smiling. “But
what can we do when the overachiever is so worked up, the way you looked it’s like you
wanted to pin me down and cum all over my face……”
“Shut up.” Jiang Cheng pointed at him. “Gu Feifei, you shut up.”
Gu Fei slid down a little, flipped over, pinning down half of Jiang Cheng’s body,
and kissed him.
With this kiss, they were both very earnest. Even though there was no desire in this kiss, it
had a lot of other things, firmness, ease, comfort, leisure……
“Are you going to shower?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“If you’re uncomfortable you can wash first,” Gu Fei sat up while he felt towards the desk to
the side. He grabbed the pack Jiang Cheng had thrown there, took a cigarette out, and put it
in his mouth. “I’ll wait a bit.”
“Enough already, “Jiang Cheng grabbed the cigarette in his mouth. “Why do you always
have an ‘after smoke’, regardless if you’re on the top or bottom?”
“I’m just smoking,” Gu Fei said. “There’s no significance, it’s just a normal cigarette.”
“You’re quitting smoking tonight,” Jiang Cheng got up and got off the bed directly, and
noticed there weren’t any embarrassing tissues on the floor. Gu Fei had cleaned it up at
some point. “I’m going showering.”
“Why do you always shower first, regardless if you’re on the top or bottom?” Gu Fei asked.
“Because I’m older than you by a month.” Jiang Cheng grabbed a change of clothes, stepped
into his slippers, and left.
While passing through the living room to get to the bathroom, he was suddenly shocked
into a cold sweat. He whipped his head towards the window, his neck nearly turning 200
degrees.
He let out a breath of relief at the sight of the tightly shut curtains, and held onto the
bathroom door frame for a second.
Remembering such an important detail only half an hour after the deed, it was truly a
classic display of all blood rushing down south leaving nothing for his brain……
In the bathroom, with the hot water running over his body, who knew if it was because all
his blood was rushing back, or because he remembered the details, he felt a chaotic mess in
his brain. All the details from before came rushing back, including being pressed into the
table by Gu Fei and then dragged onto the bed…… What a show!
What a headache it was to have such a well functioning brain. Whether it was miniscule
feelings of his mind or his body, he didn’t forget anything. Now it was all flooding back and
spreading out before his eyes. Even with his newly thickened skin, he still couldn’t bear it.
When the hot water flowed over his face, his face felt even hotter than the water.
This feeling.
Speaking of feeling… He suddenly felt a little apologetic. He felt bad for Gu Fei.
Today, even with all the preparations Gu Fei had made like an old pervert, he still felt a
little discomfort even now. With all that he did yesterday like a conqueror forcing the bow,
how did Gu Fei feel?
And he had even asked if it felt good?
How shameless!
How could it have possibly felt good!
Ah fuck.
The two of them returned to bed after showering. Jiang Cheng checked the time on his
phone, and was shocked. It didn’t feel like they did much, it was only a little something, plus
some chatting on the bed, and it was already midnight.
Making merry every night, no wonder a king could not attend his morning courts.
“Let’s sleep,” Gu Fei turned off the light, and returned to bed, holding Jiang Cheng. He
hooked one leg over his body. “There’s a photoshoot in the morning, and Er-Miao’s therapy
in the afternoon.”
“So busy.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
“Also gotta make time to go buy a pillow,” Gu Fei was probably not content with the rolled
up blanket under his head, he had actually still remembered the pillow. “Let’s buy a two
person pillow, one of those long ones.”
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Once Pan Zhi comes, you won’t have time for photoshoots, right? I’ll tell them to adjust the
schedule for those few days?” Gu Fei asked.
“No need,” Jiang Cheng really liked the feeling of Gu Fei talking softly by his ear. It put him
at ease, like an electric current was passing through, and made him a little dazed. “We’ve
got nowhere to go, we can bring him along to watch.”
“Ok,” Gu Fei kissed him on his earlobe. “I calculated the timing that day, they’ll pretty much
be done before cram school starts, it’ll be a good sum of money too.”
“If I hadn’t met you,” Jiang Cheng leaned in and rubbed against the tip of Gu Fei’s nose. “I’d
probably be cutting back on food and clothing, lest I accidentally die of hunger.”
“Not necessarily,” Gu Fei smiled. “Part-time work is still pretty easy to find, it just might not
pay as well.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
After that, Gu Fei said something, then he said something, but he couldn’t remember
anymore. He listened dazedly to the sound of Gu Fei’s voice, and drifted off peacefully to
sleep amidst waves of drowsiness.
Perhaps a little too peacefully.
When Gu Fei’s phone rang, they were both still sleeping as if passed out. Only when Gu Fei
got up to get his phone, did Jiang Cheng realize that the asshole was using his arm as a
pillow. Now, his entire arm was numb.
“Hello?” Gu Fei answered the phone. “I am……ah, what time is it now? Ten-thirty? Fuck……I
overslept, sorry……Mhm, I can be there in half an hour. The model……the model probably
overslept also……”
Gu Fei glanced over at him and Jiang Cheng realized it was a call from the photoshoot,
seeing as no one showed up. He sat up hurriedly. As soon as he moved, his inner thigh felt
as sore as if he had run 10km. He almost couldn’t hold in his yell.
“Alright, sorry, Luo-zong.” Gu Fei hung up. “Holy shit, it’s already 10:30, your overachiever
biological clock……”
Before Gu Fei finished speaking, Jiang Cheng moaned as he fell back onto his pillow,
“Ahh……my leg.”
“What is it?” Gu Fei startled, and yanked the blanket off of him. He examined Jiang Cheng
but didn’t find anything wrong, and looked at him with a perplexed expression. “Did my
fucking break your leg?”
“Fuck off!” Jiang Cheng glared at him, then thought about it and giggled for a while as he
rubbed his leg. “Holy shit, why is it so sore here?”
“Because,” Gu Fei reached over to rub his inner thigh. “That uh……that position.”
“I fucking know it’s because of that position!” The image of him whining on the bed from
the night before immediately drifted before Jiang Cheng’s eyes, and he felt a sudden wave
of embarrassment. “I’m saying why would it be sore? Even if I play three basketball games
in a day, my legs still wouldn’t be sore.”
Gu Fei looked at him, not speaking.
“Why are you looking at me? If you have something to say, then say it.” Jiang Cheng looked
back at him.
“Because you wouldn’t constantly be using the muscles in your inner thigh when playing
basketball.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng opened his mouth then closed it again, truly not knowing how to continue the
conversation.
“After all, you were kneeling with your legs apart……” Gu Fei continued.
“There’s a lot of weight on the inner thigh, and later on I even pressed down……”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng extended an Er-Kang hand. “Alright, you don’t need to explain and
describe anymore, I got it.”
Gu Fei got off the bed, and started laughing as he put on his pants, all the while looking at
him.
“Hold on,” Jiang Cheng pointed at him. “Gu Fei, come here.”
“I was wrong.” Gu Fei backed up two steps. “Cheng-ge, I was wrong, I won’t laugh
anymore.”
“Too late,” Jiang Cheng said. “Come here and fight.”
“Let’s fight when your legs aren’t sore anymore,” Gu Fei held in his laughter.
“Even if I don’t use my arms and legs, you still wouldn’t be able to beat me.”
At that Jiang Cheng also laughed, “Do you have any shame? If you don’t use your arms and
legs, what are you going to……”
“This.” Gu Fei cut him off before he was done, and thrusted hip at him, then ran out like a
wisp of smoke.
“Gu Fei, do you want to get fucked!” Jiang Cheng yelled.
“Come fuck me.” Gu Fei answered from the bathroom.
“You dog-fucker……” Jiang Cheng stopped himself, then after some thought, found it
amusing. He got up and put on his clothes while giggling to himself the whole time.
When he walked into the bathroom, Gu Fei was facing the mirror, brushing his teeth.
“Young man.” Jiang Cheng stood behind him and held his waist, as they faced the mirror
together.
“Good morning, Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei mumbled.
“I’ve noticed you really do act like you need a good beating.” Jiang Cheng lifted
a hand, pulling on the stubbly hair on top of Gu Fei’s head.
“Only to you,” Gu Fei spat out the toothpaste. “Cheng-ge we need to be quick, we have to be
there in half an hour.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng picked up his tooth brush and noticed the toothpaste had already been
squeezed onto it. He smiled, and backed up a step as he brushed his teeth, and swiped at Gu
Fei’s butt. “Hey, Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered while bent over washing his face.
Jiang Cheng tugged his pants down a little, then walked up and pressed himself against him,
and thrusted gently. “Do you……still feel discomfort?”
“It’s better now,” Gu Fei turned back to look at him. “You’re not looking to go another round
now, are you sir? We don’t have time, Cheng-ge.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he pulled his pants back, “No, I just wanted to make a reservation,
once you feel better.”
“Are you wanting to make it up to me?” Gu Fei wiped his face, turned around, and stood
facing Jiang Cheng while holding his waist. “Do it again according to your notes?”
“Would you stop mentioning the notes!” Jiang Cheng said, mouth full of foam.
“Where did you put it? Hurry up and throw it out, no actually, burn it.”
“Why burn it, it’s not like you wrote your name on it.” Gu Fei laughed.
“The main thing is, my handwriting,” Jiang Cheng leaned against Gu Fei, and reached over
his shoulder to spit out the foam in his mouth. “Is uniquely ugly.
Sometimes I think, there will never be anyone else whose writing will be as ugly as this. I
keep thinking anyone can recognize my handwriting.”
“Alrighty,” Gu Fei was laughing uncontrollably. “Then let’s burn it.”
“Mhm, good boy,” Jiang Cheng held him and rubbed his back. “Move, your ge needs to wash
his face.”
Gu Fei moved to the side and watched him while leaning against the wall.
“What are we shooting today?” Jiang Cheng asked while washing his face.
“How come some boss called to rush us himself?”
“I call everyone boss. Today’s shoot is outdoors, at a pretty big tennis club.
They’re opening a branch over here so they want to do some marketing. The person just
now was in charge of all this. Although there’s not much you have to do today, and no need
to put on makeup.” Gu Fei said.
“Mmn,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Is it okay if I don’t know how to play tennis?”
“Why wouldn’t it be? You just need to make a few poses, it’s not like we’re filming a video,
it’s fine.” Gu Fei chuckled as he said.
“Then what if the students come and say, oho that the coach in the photos is real handsome,
I want him to teach me,” Jiang Cheng said. “What then?”
“That coach is at the main branch, it’s too far so he can’t come.” Gu Fei said.
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng laughed, shook the water off, and dragged a towel over to wipe his
face. “Okay then, let’s go.”
When they arrived at the tennis club, Jiang Cheng glanced at the sign, “Fly High? They had a
location near where I used to live, there were even a few people from my old school who
trained there.”
“Really?” Gu Fei smiled.
“They’re even opening branches here.” Jiang Cheng sighed. Suddenly seeing a once familiar
sight here, he felt an emotion he couldn’t quite name.
The club wasn’t open yet, but there were many people on the courts. He couldn’t tell if they
were instructors or students. There were two courts where people were taking photos.
“They’ve already started,” Jiang Cheng froze. “Did they switch photographer because you’re
late?”
“No way.” Gu Fei smiled, pulling out his phone and dialling a number as he said.
“There’s a lot to film, there’s no way I’m the only photographer. I think they’re also filming
a promotional video.”
After Gu Fei finished his call, someone walked out from the office at the back,
“Xiao-Gu, right?”
“Yes,” Gu Fei turned around. “Luo-zong?”
“Luo Yiyang,” The person shook hands with both of them. “You can just call me by my name,
no need to be so courteous. Thank you for your hard work today, I’ll get someone to follow
you guys around, she’ll tell you about the specifics of the photoshoot.”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
“This is the model, right?” Luo Yiyang looked at Jiang Cheng. “Pretty handsome, yes,
certainly a sporty type…… To be honest, we could take photos of our own coaches, but
they’re not handsome enough. The handsome one is our head coach, but I couldn’t sway
him to come here…… Xiao-Tang! Come here
for a second!”
The girl named Xiao-Tang ran over. Luo Yiyang explained everything to her, then left.
While Xiao-Tang explained the exact requirements to Gu Fei, Jiang Cheng walked to the
promotion window to take a look. Inside were all kinds of achievements, awards, photos,
and introductions of the coaches.
Head coach: Bian Nan.
Jiang Cheng took a closer look. This was probably the person Luo-zong was talking about,
not bad, pretty handsome.
“Let’s go,” Gu Fei walked over. “Go change. First, we’ll take a set of photos of you playing in
the court, and then we’ll take another set of you acting cool with the racket, and that’s all.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“You……if there are larger movements later, are you going to be okay?” Gu Fei leaned in
beside his ear and asked quietly.
“……Fuck,” Jiang Cheng almost wanted to reach for his own butt reflexively.
“I’m fine, just don’t ask me to run.”
After following Xiao-Tang to an empty court, Jiang Cheng grabbed a set of the club’s clothes
to change into, while Gu Fei prepared his equipment outside. His occasional assistant Nini
wasn’t late leaving the house today, but she was stuck in traffic, and probably wouldn’t
arrive for another 10 minutes.
He didn’t have a permanent assistant. Normally, when he couldn’t find anyone, he’d ask
Nini to come help. Plus, she could also do makeup.
Although there wasn’t any need for makeup today. All Jiang Cheng needed to do was to
change into a few of the club’s uniforms… Gu Fei’s hands stopped. What did the shorts on a
tennis outfit look like?
He turned back to look at the people who were currently playing on the courts behind him.
The shorts were alright. Although they weren’t as loose as basketball shorts, they at least
wouldn’t reveal the tattoo on Jiang Cheng’s thigh.
He was just about to turn back around and continue fiddling with his camera, when he saw
Tan Lin walking over from the side of the court.
Gu Fei furrowed his brows, and continued brushing his lens with his head down, not
bothering to greet him.
“Gu Fei.” Tan Lin called from behind him.
“Lin-ge.” He didn’t turn around, and just continued to brush another lens.
“I didn’t come here on purpose, I’m watching over a model today. I just came over to say
hi.” Tan Lin said.
“Mn.” Gu Fei answered.
“Are you with your classmate again today?” Tan Lin sat down on a chair next to him.
“I thought you just came to say hi?” Gu Fei turned to look at him.
“I mean,” Tan Lin sighed. “We’re just chatting here, you don’t need to be so annoyed, right?”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything.
“Gu Fei,” Tan Lin looked at him. “Let me formally apologize again, I really didn’t know……”
“There’s no need, Lin-ge,” Gu Fei interrupted him. “I’m very busy today.”
Tan Lin sighed, and didn’t say any more.
“Also, you don’t need to apologize. It wasn’t because of you,” Gu Fei looked at him, “But you
and Xiao-Bing, I’ve lumped you two together. You know how I feel toward him. Even
though you might not be the same, I still have nothing to say to you. So next time you see
me, there’s no need to come say hi.”
“Don’t you think I’m also a victim here?” Tan Lin stood up. “I really did like you at that time,
I wasn’t thinking of anything else, I didn’t know he would……”
“You have 10 seconds.” Gu Fei looked at him, his voice cold.
Tan Lin paused and looked back at him. When Gu Fei counted to eight in his head, he
turned to leave.
Gu Fei frowned and put down his camera.
Seeing Tan Lin wouldn’t affect his mood too much, but the things he
remembered whenever he saw Tan Lin, those were not pleasant memories.
A long time had passed, and when Gu Fei thought of it now, he no longer felt the same
intense disgust he had felt at first. Although the helplessness and panic he felt when
suddenly being cut open while totally unprepared, he still
remembered……
Jiang Cheng finished changing and walked out, waving at him.
Gu Fei smiled. He didn’t know what Jiang Cheng felt everytime he looked at him, but the
moment he saw Jiang Cheng every time, all his unhappiness and blues would immediately
vanish.
Jiang Cheng’s smile—he picked up his camera, and quickly took a few shots—
no matter how many he collected, it wasn’t enough.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5663+
TL word count: 3645
TL time: ???
Edit time: 2:05:05
Curse words: 16x fucks, 3x shits, 2x asses
TL’s Notes:
If you got this far you should know by now that this wasn’t a prank chapter XD
This chapter was done as an April Fool’s exchange by Yuka <3 (the confusion was mainly
for the twitter followers, but hey, check out ami’s April Fool’s chapter of Lantern: Reflection
of the Peach Blossom too!
Disclaimer: the chapter was done ‘blind’ as in without any prev. context, there will be light
edits after today to make the terms consistent with everything else.
Comments are disabled on this chap, if you want you can leave them in the prev chap or
under the update here.
Update: edited by Ami on April 5th.
First posted: April 1, 2021
Support the novel
Chapter 80
For the first time ever, Jiang Cheng knew what it felt like to be overwhelmed with jealousy.
Gu Fei gave Jiang Cheng a smile. When they were with other people, Gu Fei’s smile was
usually not as obvious, but Jiang Cheng felt that he could get lost in even a small quirk of the
mouth all the same.
Only……Jiang Cheng felt like this smile was not like his usual one. If it was anyone else, they
definitely wouldn’t have noticed. After all, Gu Fei was still upholding his persona as Mini
Tyrant of the Steel Works, not many people had even seen Gu Fei smile.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng walked over and asked.
“Hm?” Gu Fei had his head down as he started to assemble his lenses. “What?”
“Never mind.” Jiang Cheng caught sight of a figure in his peripheral vision, and at first
thought it was the makeup artist doubling as a photography assistant from last time, but
when he zoned in on the person, he realized it was a man. Even though it was only the back,
he still recognized him as the Lin-ge he saw at the lipstick photoshoot. He quickly withdrew
his gaze. “I’m ready to start.”
It wasn’t strange running into Lin-ge here. It was normal that he would bring his models
here for the shoot, and it was also very normal that he would come say hi when he saw Gu
Fei here.
What wasn’t normal was Gu Fei’s mood. Every time they ran into this guy, he could feel the
shift in Gu Fei’s mood. It wasn’t very obvious, and he couldn’t tell if it was anger,
displeasure, irritation, or something else…… Nevertheless Gu Fei seemed rather averse to
the guy’s presence, like right now for example, even his smile looked reluctant.
Of course Jiang Cheng could see that Gu Fei didn’t wish to bring up this person again, and
he wasn’t so annoying that he had to keep asking about it, not to mention that they were
working at this moment.
But still, he felt a little down. Even at this stage of their relationship, even though Gu Fei had
said he would tell him anything about his past, there were still people and things he would
rather not mention.
The day’s shoot was fairly simple. For someone like Jiang Cheng who played a lot of
basketball, he might not know how to play tennis, but striking a few poses was easy
enough.
“There’s just two of them we have to retake,” Gu Fei flipped through the photos with his
head bowed. “The spiking one, your face was covered by the shadow of your arm.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered and picked up the racket again.
“I thought this one’s pretty good?” Nini said. “A little bit of shadow shouldn’t be an issue?”
“You’re underestimating his handsomeness,” Gu Fei held up the camera and pointed it at
Jiang Cheng again. “You’ll see in a bit. Also, you can have shadows, but not like this.”
“Ah, I’m here to learn.” Nini said with a smile.
After they retook the shots, the work had wrapped up for the day. Nini leaned close to look
at the photos, then looked at Jiang Cheng, “Hey Jiang Cheng I’m serious, have you thought
about being an editorial model? You’re so good in front of a camera, your facial features too
are so……”
“No way,” Gu Fei cut her off. “Do you know what kind of grades he gets?”
“Is it really good?” Nini asked in surprise.
“More than just good.” Gu Fei said.
With Nini’s shocked gaze on him, Jiang Cheng was a little unsure of what to say in response,
so he just smiled.
An overachiever like him would always go all in with his best efforts in order to show off
and look down on everyone else, but whenever anyone praised him, he wouldn’t think too
much of it either.
It’s all deserved!
However, when the praise was coming out of Gu Fei’s mouth, that was different.
Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Fei as he gathered up the equipment. Only Gu Fei’s praise
would make him feel a joy growing out of the bottom of his heart and blooming at the very
top of his head.
Fly High paid for the shoot on the day of, they’d only need to go to the office, sign for it, then
they could leave.
“Xiao-Gu,” Luo Yiyang was sitting in his office, watching the accounting staff process their
payment, looking bored out of his mind. “Do you play tennis?”
“Nope.” Gu Fei said.
“What about Xiao-Jiang?” Luo Yiyang turned to Jiang Cheng.
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“What a shame to not play tennis at the prime of your life, you two look so suitable for
tennis, I thought that when I first saw you.” Luo Yiyang dug two business cards out of his
pocket and handed it to them. “If you want to play just come here, you’ll get discounts with
my name.”
Jiang Cheng took the card and glanced at it, “Bian Nan?”
“Sorry, that’s the wrong one.” Luo Yiyang quickly pulled another one out, confirmed it was
his own, and handed it over. “Luo Yiyang.”
“Qiu Yi?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Ay!” Luo Yiyang continued to rummage in his pocket and finally found his own card. “Been
a busy couple of days, and everything was pushed onto me, I have at least five people’s
cards here…… Come play sometime!”
By the time they got back to the Steel Works, ate, and walked back to Jiang Cheng’s
building, there was no time to rest. It was time for little Gu Miao to go to the rehabilitation
centre.
“Ha, tennis,” Gu Fei glanced at his phone. “Where would I find the time.”
“Shall we go?” Jiang Cheng also checked the time, there was just enough to pick up Gu Miao
and head over.
“You don’t have to come with,” Gu Fei took a glance around, then reached out and gently
squeezed Jiang Cheng’s waist. “Why don’t you take a nap, you still have to go pick up Pan
Zhi tomorrow.”
“I……” Jiang Cheng was pretty sleepy. He was tired from fooling around and staying up late
the night before. The shoot today took several hours, if he went to stand outside the centre
for another couple hours this afternoon……and stayed up again tonight, then after the
hours of photoshoot tomorrow, he might just keel over right in front of his grandson. But at
the moment, if he didn’t go……he was still reluctant. “I don’t know, I want to go.”
“You still have a clothing shoot tomorrow morning,” Gu Fei smiled. “It’ll take hours, what if
you can’t get through it? Don’t you want to stagger work and rest so you can get back at me
once Pan Zhi leaves?”
“Shit,” That made Jiang Cheng laugh. “Weirdo.”
“If you really have nothing to do this afternoon, why not go buy a pillow.” Gu Fei said.
“Ayy! Okay okay okay, I’ll buy a pillow.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Do you have OCD or
something? It’s just one pillow, how many times have you brought it up
already?”
“A double pillow,” Gu Fei gestured with his hands. “Those really long ones.”
“……I got it!” Jiang Cheng answered in exasperation.
Jiang Cheng went back to his room and had a brief nap before waking up naturally, it was
only about an hour in total. It was difficult to go into a deep sleep once he missed the
window for a noon nap, but even dozing off for a while made him feel much better.
He got up and washed his face, then sat down in front of his desk.
The summer break might have been cut in half, but there was still summer homework.
Usually, he’d finish writing the homework every day, then get some revising in, but these
last couple of days he’d been indulging in more carnal desires and didn’t get anything done.
Time to rein back. He opened a book and spun a pencil in his hand. Now that he’d done
what he wanted to do, it was time to put his mind at peace and focus on studying.
Speaking of peace of mind——not two pages into the homework, he frowned at the image
of Lin-ge’s back that flashed through his mind. Tsk. What exactly was going on between that
guy and Gu Fei?
Gu Fei clearly didn’t want to talk to the guy, but he always persisted in chatting with Gu Fei
every time.
If he doesn’t owe Gu Fei money or had done something else to owe Gu Fei in the past, then he
must be pursuing Gu Fei.
Tsk tsk tsk, my god.
A rival!
Jiang Cheng quickly wrote down three “tsk”s in a row on a piece of scrap paper, then took a
breath in, calmed his emotions, and started in on his homework again.
He quickly finished the rest of the homework without another stray thought in his mind,
then headed to the market to buy a long pillow as per Gu Fei’s request.
After a long search, he finally managed to find a long pillow at the shop where he bought a
pillow last time, and it was scary expensive too.
“It’s latex!” The shopkeeper woman patted the pillow. “I’m telling you lad, this isn’t one of
those average pillows. It’s not going to get out of shape, it’s breathable and durable!”
“It’s too expensive, do you have any that will get out of shape, not breathable, and not
durable?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“No!” The shopkeeper looked him over. “A strapping young lad like you, don’t be so cheap!
Last time when I told you to get two, you cheaped out and won’t do it, see now you’re back
here again. Now you think this long one is expensive, I’m telling you, even if you bought one
that will get misshapen, not breathable, and not durable, you’ll still be back after two
months to switch to this one! It’s becoming a pattern now!”
“……Ma’am, you have such a good memory.” Jiang Cheng never would have
thought that after all this time, the shopkeeper still remembered him. All of a sudden, he
realized what a great idea it was to come by himself today.
“Just get this one. I’m telling you, these kind of latex ones, even if you search the whole city,
I’m the only one who sells these long ones. Everyone else only has those smaller single
ones! And those aren’t even regular shapes like this one……” The shopkeeper said
adamantly. “If you don’t believe me you can look for yourself, you might be able to find one
online, but definitely not at this price!”
Jiang Cheng sighed. He wasn’t very good at haggling, and after this round of attack, he
didn’t know what else to say. The problem was, while expensive, this really was the only
long pillow he could find, there were no cheaper alternatives.
To keep his boyfriend who had been running around all day from
disappointment, he shelled out the money and bought the pillow.
“Do you want to check out these blankets? There are larger ones too, the doubles size is
two meters……” The shopkeeper jumped at the chance to upsale.
Jiang Cheng didn’t dare to continue the conversation, he clutched the pillow and ran out of
the store like someone was after his life.
However, the pillow didn’t get to fulfil its destiny during its first night home. Gu Fei had
come over after eating dinner with Gu Miao, and only laid down on it for an hour while
Jiang Cheng revised, before Gu Miao’s message came.
– Return
“Ah……” Jiang Cheng slumped over his desk. “I really don’t want to fight Gu Miao for her
brother, but you see, hm……her brother is also my boyfriend……”
Gu Fei sent a reply to Gu Miao, then glanced at him, “I told her half an hour, is there
something you want to do, Cheng-ge?”
Jiang Cheng tossed his book down, and turned to jump onto the bed.
Just as he kneeled on the edge of the bed, before his hand even touched Gu Fei,
he yelped out a cry and collapsed with his teeth bared. His face landed right on Gu Fei’s
belly.
“I……” Gu Fei had to hold his breath lest it got knocked out of him. “Is your head made of
iron, why is it so heavy?”
“Us overachievers have denser brain matter,” Jiang Cheng lay on the bed, and said in a
muffled voice against Gu Fei’s belly. “It’s got more mass, and tends to be heavier than the
brains of slacky slackers.”
Gu Fei laughed and stroked his head, “What’s wrong?”
“Legs sore.” Jiang Cheng turned his head and knitted his brows. “I stopped feeling it after
walking around today, but after sitting still just now, it’s feeling sore again.”
“Then it would seem that they’re unable to do anything at the moment.” Gu Fei said.
“Should I do a little something then.”
“What the shit?” Jiang Cheng’s eyes widened instantly.
“Try to be a little more wholesome please, I was going to massage your legs.”
Gu Fei glanced at him. “Do you want it or not?”
“Come on.” Jiang Cheng flipped over and flattened himself out, and put his legs on top of Gu
Fei’s.
Gu Fei’s leg massaging skill had no actual technique to speak of, but his pressure was just
right, and was spot on with the points that needed it the most, so it felt pretty good.
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and let out a long breath.
Ah yes.
“Say something.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Say what?” Gu Fei asked.
“Anything,” The corners of Jiang Cheng’s mouth quirked up. “I like listening to the sound of
your voice.”
“Alright, then I’ll talk at random. Let me think uh……” Gu Fei kneaded Jiang Cheng’s legs,
then after thinking for a moment, cleared his throat. “There once was an old man Ding, who
owed me two little bits, I said pay it back in three days, he said make it four……”
With his eyes closed, Jiang Cheng started laughing.
“It’s raining, it’s pouring, the turtle’s donned his straw hat,” Gu Fei rubbed Jiang Cheng’s
legs. “Although with these things, it’s best to go to Li Yan. Ever since he was young his
grandma would hold him and recite these all day long, he could come up with a whole
bunch on the spot.” [1]
Jiang Cheng quirked his mouth and stayed quiet. He didn’t want to say anything, only
wanted to keep listening like this. No matter what Gu Fei said, he enjoyed it.
Gu Fei continued to recite several more nursery rhymes, which actually included quite a
few that were meant as insults, so they were mixed in with his explanations as he laughed.
Slowly, his voice became out of focus in Jiang Cheng’s ears. Gu Fei’s voice drifted to him
from a great distance away, and gently swept past his ears.
When Jiang Cheng opened his eyes again, he was a little disoriented. He stared up at the
ceiling for a long time before he realized he was still lying on his bed, with the pillow under
his head.
“Gu Fei?” He lifted up his head and looked around, there was no one else in the room.
He got up and looked in the living room and bathroom, but didn’t find Gu Fei.
He ran back to the bedroom to call Gu Fei on his cell phone, when he saw the note under his
phone.
You were so dead asleep that I couldn’t wake you up at all, I’m going back for now to keep Gu
Miao company, message me when you’re up, muackmuack.
It was signed “Gu Fei whose handwriting is 80+ times better than yours”.
Jiang Cheng held the note in his hand and couldn’t stop laughing. Gu Fei’s handwriting
really was pretty good, he thought, and not at all compatible with his slacker identity.
He’d been asleep for a good while, it was almost 11 o’clock at this point. He sent a message
to Gu Fei.
– I’m up
Two minutes later, Gu Fei responded.
– Good, go back to sleep
– Whatcha up to?
– Slep
– Did I wake you?
– Nah, I kept a nerve on for you
Jiang Cheng smiled and sat down in front of his desk, he was planning to study for another
two hours.
– Then you can relax that nerve now, goodnight
– Night
Because they didn’t sleep together, the next day neither the photographer nor the model
was late. They met up and had breakfast together, then arrived in the studio right on time.
There were quite a few people present, it was the first time Jiang Cheng had to pair up with
a female model for a shoot.
The other model was also young, and very pretty, with a rather outgoing personality. Jiang
Cheng felt it from the get go when she came over to say hello.
“You can call me Xiao-Zhen, the name’s a little country bumpkin but I like it.”
Xiao-Zhen extended a hand. “May we work well together.”
“Jiang Cheng,” Jiang Cheng paused for a beat before taking her hand. “Here’s to that.”
“You’re the handsomest male model I’ve met this whole half year,” Xiao-Zhen said. “Are you
in want of a girlfriend? If so we can exchange contact details?”
“……I’m not.” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s alright,” Xiao-Zhen smiled. “This probably isn’t the only time we’ll work together, you
can still reach out to me if you ever do in the future.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
After Xiao-Zhen left to do makeup, he let out a breath of relief, and glanced at Gu Fei who
had long escaped to a distance to fiddle with his camera. Gu Fei looked up and quirked a
smile at him.
He was just about to walk over, when Nini clapped her hands at him, “Jiang Cheng, come do
your makeup, hurry up!”
“Mhm.” He had no choice but to go sit down.
Xiao-Zhen got there early, so not long after he sat down, Xiao-Zhen finished her makeup
and started shooting her singles.
It was the first time Jiang Cheng got to witness what Gu Fei was like when he shot other
people. He was……pretty cold. Even though Gu Fei wasn’t full on
scowling, there was no expression on his face. From time to time he would open his mouth
to give a short direction, but it would be in an impassive voice.
Jiang Cheng figured that if Gu Fei had been like that the whole time while taking photos of
him, he’d probably be under a lot of pressure, as though he was too ugly and the poor
photographer had to clench his teeth to endure through the shoot just to make money.
Although Xiao-Zhen clearly felt no such pressure. She smiled and turned as she should, and
even joked occasionally with Nini.
Nini was doubling over in laughter, while Gu Fei was still wearing an expression of “just
think of me as a deaf man”.
In fact, seeing Gu Fei like this, it was a weird kind of allure. When Jiang Cheng was waiting
at the side after he finished his makeup and changed into the clothes, he stared at Gu Fei
the whole time. The way he looked so serious and cold, the way he wouldn’t even give you a
direct look; it made Jiang Cheng want to charge over, hurl him to the ground, and take him
right then and there.
Jiang Cheng pinched his thigh.
Tsk.
Tsk tsk.
“Lin-ge.” Someone beside him said toward the door.
Fuck!
Jiang Cheng felt a rush of annoyance at the sound of this name. He turned around just in
time to see Lin-ge walk in with a girl in tow.
Lin-ge nodded and introduced the girl to the person who greeted him, she was a model for
a photoshoot later.
Jiang Cheng drew back his gaze and continued watching Gu Fei. He was a little worried. Gu
Fei hadn’t noticed, he very much did not wish to see Gu Fei’s mood suddenly change again.
Hurry up and leave!
Are you done with the intro?
Then go on!
You don’t need to stay for the whole time if you’re just bringing your model here!
Go then!
This kind of prayer was as damn useless as slackers going to pray at the feet of the ‘exam
passing gods’ right before a test. Jiang Cheng didn’t even have time to repeat the words in
his head, before Lin-ge grabbed a chair and actually sat down right beside him.
The fuck??
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but turn and glance at him.
“Your name is Jiang Cheng, right?” Lin-ge smiled.
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng was surprised that he knew his name.
“My name is Tan Lin, I’m Gu Fei’s……friend.” He extended a hand. “They all call me Lin-ge.”
Tan Lin? Lin-ge’s last name isn’t Lin?
Then why don’t people call you Tan-ge!
Probably because Tan-ge didn’t sound very good.
For example, if Gu Fei called him Jiang-ge, he’d want to fight him.
Jiang Cheng shot a look at his hand and simply nodded but didn’t reach out with his own,
“Lin-ge.”
Tan Lin withdrew his hand and leaned back in the chair, looking in Gu Fei’s direction, “Are
you only working with Gu Fei? I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“You’re his classmate?” Tan Lin asked again.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng continued.
“He actually has such a close classmate,” Tan Lin said. “I’m surprised.”
Jiang Cheng stayed quiet.
“I know pretty much all his friends,” Tan Lin was rather chatty. “I’ve really never seen him
bring a classmate out to play before.”
Jiang Cheng wanted to correct him and say that he’s not here to play, but then after some
thought, realized that he had focused on the wrong point. The point of that sentence
should’ve been, Gu Fei said he didn’t have much contact with this person at all, and only ran
into him during photoshoots, but this guy said he
knew pretty much all of Gu Fei’s friends!
Jiang Cheng felt a stuffiness all the way up to his throat.
What is going on?
He went over Gu Fei’s past words again in his head. Perhaps because they knew each other
back when he played in the band, after which Tan Lin got to know Gu Fei’s friends?
Then why would Gu Fei say something like “not quite friends”? [2]
For the first time ever, Jiang Cheng knew what it felt like to be overwhelmed with jealousy.
It was not. At all. A wonderful feeling. He could not. Even one bit. Feel the “I like him and
that’s why I’m jealous” flavour.
Instead it was an extreme displeasure from having a question he couldn’t find the answer
to.
Gu Fei didn’t want to say. And he didn’t want to keep prodding him like an old lady.
But it was clear that what little Gu Fei had said didn’t match up with this guy’s words.
Though if he really did take this guy’s words and used it to question Gu Fei, then he would
be the biggest dumbass.
Gu Fei wouldn’t say, so he couldn’t ask.
And so he’d circled back to the original point, which was that Gu Fei didn’t want to say.
“You two really are classmates?” Tan Lin suddenly asked.
“Mhm.” A little annoyed, Jiang Cheng took a bottle of water from the case beside him, tilted
his head back, and poured in two big gulps.
“Just classmates?” Tan Lin asked again.
Jiang Cheng paused, and without a word, turned to look at Tan Lin.
“What I mean is, you’re not neighbours or something?” Tan Lin said with a smile. His eyes
drifted over to Gu Fei, then nodded in his direction with another smile.
Jiang Cheng turned as well, and saw Gu Fei’s face with an expression so dark that it was
ready to descend a whole season’s worth of rain in one storm.

Footnotes
[1] “These” are nursery rhymes, I have translated literally and half made up my own for the
rhyme. ↩
[2] Refer back to ch. 73 ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5616
TL word count: 4006
TL time: 3:41:21
Edit time: 1:32:25
Curse words: 2x fucks, 2x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Oho, some vinegar is brewing! (I also edited the previous chapter, just some slight changes
<3)
Also, the manhua is OUTTTT! GO CHECK IT!
First posted: April 5, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 81
I don’t feel bad for you at all, really.
“Jiang Cheng,” Nini clapped her hands. “You’re up, let’s go!”
Jiang Cheng set his bottle of water on the ground and stood up. Gu Fei was no longer staring
this way. Instead, he had his head down looking through the photos on his camera. From
the side view, Jiang Cheng couldn’t quite make out what expression he wore. Gu Fei’s face
didn’t look much different than how he usually was when fiddling with his camera.
For a moment, Jiang Cheng thought the stormy expression he’d glimpsed might have been
his own illusion.
“Chat with you again later.” Tan Lin added behind him.
Jiang Cheng paused for a beat, then walked away without looking back.
Chat again?
Chat your ass!
Not to mention, did that even count as a chat?
When he arrived at Gu Fei’s side, he realized the stormy expression he saw before wasn’t
an illusion, because he could see the clouds hadn’t yet dispersed. It was very obvious from
the front view, even his eyelashes were overcast.
Before Jiang Cheng could get a word out, Gu Fei fastened the camera lens with a
“click” and said, “Quit talking to him.”
His voice wasn’t very loud, but it was chillingly cold.
Jiang Cheng frowned. He was already annoyed by Tan Lin’s non-stop line of questioning, as
well as Gu Fei’s reluctance to speak on the subject; on top of which, he’d hardly said
anything to Tan Lin just now…… And most
importantly! Why is Gu Fei giving him the bitch face!
“I only ‘mhm’ed three times,” Jiang Cheng fixed his eyes on Gu Fei. “If that counts as talking,
that’s how I’ll talk to you from now on.”
Gu Fei lifted his eyes to look at him.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng stared back.
“Let’s get to work first.” Gu Fei said.
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng answered, then turned and walked to the shooting area.
They were shooting the ones with him and Xiao-Zhen at the moment, with matching tennis
outfits. After Xiao-Zhen finished changing and went to stand beside Jiang Cheng, the brand
representatives on the side nodded in satisfaction,
“These two look pretty good together, there’s a CP vibe.”
“Really?” Xiao-Zhen started laughing and glanced at Jiang Cheng. “I wouldn’t mind more of a
CP like this.”
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei held up his camera.
With the camera blocking Gu Fei’s face, Jiang Cheng couldn’t see his expression very clearly,
though he could sense the low spirits alright. Normally when taking photos of him, Gu Fei
would helpfully give him all kinds of tips and reminders: how high to raise his hand to get
the right aesthetic, what’s a good angle to tilt his face to best capture the light……
But today, Gu Fei stayed silent throughout the whole process while clicking away with his
camera, only speaking up to tell Nini to change the lighting angle.
Frankly, Jiang Cheng was a little unused to this. He isn’t a professional model, and didn’t
have very much experience. Usually he just followed Gu Fei’s instructions. But today this
asshole refused to say a word, so he had no choice but to freestyle.
Lucky for him, Xiao-Zhen already had years of modeling experience under her belt, and was
very outgoing. She was more than happy to give Jiang Cheng pointers.
“A little more intimate please, the way you look now are more like besties and not lovers.”
The brand representative said beside them.
Besties your dog-fucking-ass!
Jiang Cheng was unusually irritated. If it was anything else he would’ve walked away right
then and there. But this was a paid job, and even though he wasn’t desperate for money at
the moment……
He had no choice but to put up a lovey-dovey front with Xiao-Zhen. Although he didn’t like
to be touched by other people, compared to Gu Fei, he didn’t mind having closer
interactions with girls when he was mentally prepared like this.
Unlike some people, jumping on the bike and flying out, merely out of concern that a girl
would ride on his back seat. Like he was being hunted, as though if he was any slower he’d
be sniped on the spot.
As Jiang Cheng recalled that memory, he felt like laughing. But when his peripheral vision
swept across the cluster of storm clouds in front of him, all his
desire to laugh dissipated right away.
It was probably the most agonizing hours of modeling Jiang Cheng ever experienced since
he started doing photoshoots. When he went to the washroom to change into the next set
of clothes during the break, he shot Gu Fei several looks to indicate that he was free at the
moment: if you have anything to say, I have time now to listen.
But not once did Gu Fei acknowledge his looks.
Meanwhile on two occasions, Tan Lin smiled amiably at him. Jiang Cheng wanted to walk
over to Tan Lin and tell him to just come out and say whatever the hell he wanted to say.
Only when they finished shooting, did Gu Fei walk to his side and said, “Let’s go, I’ll wait for
you to change.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng replied.
When he finished changing and walked out, Gu Fei had already finished packing up, and
was waiting for him in the hallway. There were other models shooting in the room, and Tan
Lin was standing to the side. He smiled when he saw Jiang Cheng, “Leaving now?”
Jiang Cheng nodded, wiped the water from his face with one hand, and walked out.
When he was following Gu Fei to the elevator, Jiang Cheng couldn’t keep it in anymore, “Gu
Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei turned.
“If you have anything to say, just say it.” Jiang Cheng said. “Your face is practically dropping
to the center of the fucking earth.”
“I just meant for you to stay away from Tan Lin.” Gu Fei reached out a hand to push the
elevator button, but Jiang Cheng slapped his hand away. He turned to face Jiang Cheng.
“I don’t know who that Tan Lin is to you,” Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“But to me, he’s only a stranger. Furthermore, he’s a stranger whose relationship to you is
different than what you said before.”
Gu Fei didn’t speak. With knitted brows, he swiftly reached out a hand to press the elevator
button again. Jiang Cheng’s second slap missed.
“What can I do if he wants to talk to me? I only ‘mhm’ed three times, is that not staying far
enough away?” Jiang Cheng said. “What the hell are you bitch-facing at me for.”
The elevator door opened, and Gu Fei walked in. Jiang Cheng stood there unmoving.
“Come on,” Gu Fei said. “I only meant stay away from him, that’s all.”
“If that’s all then why’s your face eight freaking feet long? Not even the ceiling in there was
enough to contain you.” Jiang Cheng’s annoyance was at its peak.
Frankly, he didn’t mind Gu Fei’s peeved look so much, he knew that seeing Tan Lin would
get him in a bad mood. But at the moment, the grievance he felt at the thought of their
somehow unspeakable relationship made him unable to keep his composure. “Why don’t
you tell him then, to stay away from me? It’s a small world after all. If I have to stare at your
face looking like that for hours on end the next time we run into him, I’d rather go give out
flyers on the street.”
Gu Fei put a hand out to stop the elevator door from closing, then walked out.
He tossed his camera bag along with all the equipment on the ground, before walking back
in the direction they came from.
“Where are you going!” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m going to tell him to stay away from you.” Gu Fei said without looking back.
Jiang Cheng froze, he stared as Gu Fei walked inside, and for a moment didn’t regain his
senses.
It was almost 20 seconds later when he jumped with a start and bolted back inside after Gu
Fei. He took a couple of steps, then remembered Gu Fei’s equipment was still on the
ground. It was all expensive stuff, it would be difficult to replace if any of it was lost.
He had no choice but to run back to pick up the bags and carry it with him.
When he got back to the set, he couldn’t find Gu Fei anywhere in the room.
Jiang Cheng spun around on the spot, and didn’t see Tan Lin either.
“Why did you come back?” Xiao-Zhen had just finished removing her makeup.
She was sitting there with a small mirror, getting ready to put on her usual makeup. Jiang
Cheng almost didn’t recognize her with a bare face.
“Did you see Gu Fei?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Ayy……I thought you came back to ask for my contact information.” Xiao-Zhen sighed, and
pointed at a door to the side. “He’s in there with Lin-ge, probably talking.”
The door led to a storage room, it was filled with all sorts of set pieces and clothes. Jiang
Cheng went over and tried the door handle. It didn’t budge.
He pressed against the door and listened. There was music playing in the larger room, so he
couldn’t hear what was happening inside.
It wouldn’t be a big deal if Gu Fei was just going to talk with Tan Lin. But if they got
physical…… Although he wasn’t afraid of this kind of stuff, it was just a fight after all, he
didn’t want Gu Fei to do that here.
This place is not the Steel Works, nor is it some place that’s used to students getting into
fights. If they really did get into it here, it would reflect badly on Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng backed away a few steps and took out his phone to call Gu Fei.
He had just turned on the screen, and before he even opened up the interface, the door
opened, and Gu Fei walked out.
Jiang Cheng put his phone back in his pocket. He first swept a quick glance over Gu Fei’s
face; it was clean, tidy, and handsome. Then he immediately looked past him.
Tan Lin was just walking out. He also looked presentable on the outside, but Jiang Cheng
saw him looking down at the hand he’d just used to wipe his mouth.
That was far too obvious a gesture. Jiang Cheng could tell right away that Gu Fei had hit
him.
However, when Tan Lin walked out, he looked as calm as ever. He even nodded at Jiang
Cheng.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei took the bags from his hands and walked out.
Jiang Cheng followed behind him, carefully looking over Gu Fei’s clothes, and didn’t see any
sign of having been in a fight. Tan Lin must’ve received a solid punch from Gu Fei then.
Jiang Cheng was a little surprised. Tan Lin appeared courteous enough on the surface, but
didn’t seem like the kind of person to take a beating without fighting back, let alone be so
calm about it.
This time when they stood in front of the elevator, Jiang Cheng didn’t stop Gu Fei from
pushing the button again. But after they entered, he also didn’t know what to say.
They both stayed quiet on the way back. By the time they rode the taxi back to Jiang
Cheng’s apartment, and Gu Fei finally spoke to him, Jiang Cheng could no longer summon
up any energy to answer.
“Let’s get something to eat?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Where do you want to go?” Gu Fei asked again.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He didn’t have much of an appetite, no matter where they go.
“This is a long story if it’s going to be told in its entirety.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“If you want to hear it……”
“If you don’t want to talk about it then don’t,” Jiang Cheng interrupted him. “It’s not like I
have to dig up things you don’t want to talk about. But this is something you chose to not
say, so if you wanna sulk, then you better hold it well, don’t direct the fire at me. I don’t
know anything. I don’t know when I’m gonna step on your landmine, and I don’t want to
stay on guard so I can carefully avoid it either. Like I owe you or something! Aren’t we all
widdol fucking princesses!”
Gu Fei froze for a second, then turned his head to the side and started laughing.
“I’m not eating, you go ahead. I’m going to take a nap later. I still have to go pick up Pan Zhi
in the afternoon.” Jiang Cheng turned and walked into the stairwell.
He felt a little torn. When Gu Fei didn’t wish to go into it, on one hand was the thought that
he shouldn’t ask if Gu Fei didn’t want to tell. After all, everyone deserves to have some
space to themselves. And on the other hand, he thought the dog-fucker was being way too
secretive and not telling him anything.
But now that Gu Fei was willing to tell him, on one hand he wondered if he might’ve been a
little too fussy. If the guy didn’t want to talk about it then why couldn’t he just let it be, why
must he be upset over this, it was frankly a little embarrassing. And on the other hand was
the thought of oho so now you want to talk about it, well this widdol princess doesn’t feel like
listening anymore, hope you choke on it!
Jiang Cheng got to the door of his apartment, and sighed as he pulled his keys out.
Humans……just can’t help but be like this. He was still young after all, young people are not
at all level-headed when it comes to relationships. Almost as though it doesn’t count if they
don’t add a little drama. Perhaps it’s because he’s still too inexperienced, that he’s jumping
at even the slightest noise……
As he stuck the key in the lock, Jiang Cheng suddenly smelled a familiar scent.
It was the scent he loved smelling on Gu Fei.
Next, he caught sight of a figure flitting past his peripheral vision.
Even though his brain already identified this figure as Gu Fei, he still couldn’t stop himself
from springing up with surprise. He almost snapped the key in the lock.
“What’s your problem!” Jiang Cheng glared at Gu Fei and said in a quiet voice.
“Quick, there’s a wanted post on the power pole downstairs looking for someone to spy on
their homewrecker, give them a call and see if they’re still hiring!”
“I walked up the stairs normally, I wasn’t trying to sneak.” Gu Fei said.
“Then would it have killed you to call out first?” Jiang Cheng yanked on the key several
times before managing to pull it out of the lock. He glanced down at it. It was a little bent.
“I didn’t dare to.” Gu Fei said. “I was afraid if you noticed you wouldn’t let me follow you
up.”
“Now that I noticed I’ll still make you leave.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei didn’t answer, just quickly pushed the door open while squeezing him aside, then
walked inside with all his bags.
Jiang Cheng had no words as he watched Gu Fei do all this in one swift motion.
He walked in behind him and closed the door.
“You got noodles here right?” Gu Fei started for the kitchen. “We can make some noodles?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng sat down on the sofa. “There’s no use even if I do, there’s nothing else to
go along with it, I don’t even have oil, salt, or sauce. All I got’s vinegar.”
Gu Fei glanced at him and walked into the kitchen, probably to check the fridge and
cupboards. He came back out immediately, then walked directly out the apartment door.
Tsk.
Jiang Cheng laid down on the sofa. Gone with just one sentence.
Gu Fei didn’t shut the door, but Jiang Cheng was also too lazy to get up and shut it. He
figured once Gu Fei got downstairs and realized his camera equipment was still up here, he
would have to come back to get it.
However, lying on the sofa, he didn’t hear the sound of Gu Fei walking downstairs. He was
just starting to wonder, when he heard someone knocking on the unit next door. This was
followed by Gu Fei’s voice, “Auntie, I live next door.”
Amidst his shock, he listened as Gu Fei first borrowed cooking oil, salt, then green onion
and ginger. After that he went a step further and proceeded to borrow noodles, and finally
finished it off with another four eggs and two tomatoes.
Jiang Cheng sat up when Gu Fei walked back in with an armful of ingredients.
He had no words to describe how he felt just then. He even heard the auntie next door say
there’s no need to return it, and that if it’s not enough to come back for more.
“I’ll make noodles,” Gu Fei said. “Soup noodles, I like soup noodles.”
“Hold on,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “You know the people next door?”
“Nope,” Gu Fei said. “But I’ll know them eventually…… Don’t you know
them?”
“No shit, of course not. I didn’t even know if anyone lived next door.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then remember to say hi next time you run into them,” Gu Fei walked into the kitchen.
“She’s easy to recognize, this auntie has a mole between her brows.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered. Then a second later stood up again and went into the kitchen.
“Who said you can eat here? I’m still mad!”
“Before Tan Lin had his own studio,” Gu Fei set a pot of water to boil on the stove, and said
as he started beating the eggs in a bowl. “He also did music. He used to be the lead singer in
Xin-jie’s band.”
Just like that, Gu Fei started telling his story. Jiang Cheng stared blankly for several seconds
before realizing what he said, “Ah.”
The way Tan Lin looked, he doesn’t look like a lead vocalist at all.
“When I started hanging out with them, he’d already left the band, but still visited often.”
Gu Fei said as he continued beating the eggs. “So we……knew one another pretty well.”
“Didn’t you say you don’t consider him a friend?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’ll still say that.” Gu Fei looked down at the eggs, his hands not stopping. “It’s also true that
we’re not in contact anymore.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Do you still remember when it was when you realized you like guys?” Gu Fei turned back
and glanced at him.
“……I’m not sure.” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“Me neither. Though at that time I already knew what I am.” Gu Fei set the beaten eggs
aside and started washing the tomatoes. “But I was really scared.
Aside from Ding Zhuxin, I never told anyone, and didn’t plan to.”
There was a sour pang in Jiang Cheng’s heart. The feeling was actually two-fold.
Half of it was jealousy, the other half was an ache on Gu Fei’s behalf.
“So you do feel afraid,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “And here I thought you were dauntless.”
“You only become like that when you have too many things to be afraid of.” Gu Fei smiled
crookedly. “I was afraid of a lot of things, even now…… At that time, not only was I scared, I
also felt lonely.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
“Tan Lin was maybe, 10 years older than me. He was out and proud, and the longest he
stayed with any of his boyfriends was two months. He’d bring them along when he came
out, and didn’t care about what people thought.” Gu Fei turned to check the water in the
pot, and continued as he started chopping tomatoes. “At times I found his presence
comforting, because it felt like we were of the same kind.”
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly. Though even he didn’t know why he clicked his tongue.
“He must’ve……liked me,” Gu Fei’s hand paused while holding the knife.
“Though he didn’t say it directly.”
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng gritted his teeth. This time he knew exactly why he cursed.
“The keyboard in the band, Xiao-Bing was his name.” Gu Fei continued
chopping the tomatoes. “He was about the same age as me, or maybe a year or two older, I
don’t remember. All I remember is how much of a bastard he was.”
Jiang Cheng watched Gu Fei. Gu Fei’s voice was calm, like he was telling someone else’s
story from a long time ago. But the way he talked while keeping his hands busy, and not
making any eye contact from start to finish, showing Jiang Cheng only his back, it gave him
a sense of Gu Fei’s emotional state.
There’s no way he’s as calm as he appeared on the outside.
“He was pretty close with Tan Lin, they always went out together. I don’t know if there was
anything between them, but……” Gu Fei set the knife down, and swept the chopped
tomatoes onto a plate. “Tomatoes and eggs on noodles, is that okay?”
It took a while for Jiang Cheng to come around, “Yeah.”
“One day we were all at a bar, there were quite a few people there. The ones from the band,
and some friends, we all had a lot to drink.” Gu Fei didn’t continue with the ingredients. He
leaned on the counter with his hands and looked out the window. “And Tan Lin called me
outside, said he wanted to talk
to me about something.”
“A confession huh?” Jiang Cheng could practically smell the vinegar emanating from
himself. He reached out, grabbed the bottle of vinegar nearby, and put it in the fridge.
“He was drunk, said a lot of nonsense. He probably didn’t even know what he was saying,
though it sounded real sincere. I had a lot to drink too, and at the time I was actually
touched by his words.” Gu Fei suddenly started laughing, then continued after a while. “At
the end of it, he asked if I was repulsed by him.”
At that, Gu Fei stopped. Jiang Cheng waited for a long time, but he didn’t speak up again.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t bring himself to rush him either. He only leaned against the wall, and
watched Gu Fei’s back as he waited.
It was several minutes later when Gu Fei spoke again, “I said no, I’m not repulsed; I’m the
same, but that I……didn’t feel anything for him.”
With that, Gu Fei fell silent again.
Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, “Is that it?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
“There’s nothing wrong with that though. He liked you, you rejected him……”
Jiang Cheng thought about it for a moment. “Fuck. Did he tell other people?”
“No,” Gu Fei turned around and looked at him. “But Xiao-Bing had recorded it.”
Jiang Cheng’s eyes suddenly widened, “WHAT?”
“From start to finish,” Gu Fei said slowly. “He had recorded the whole thing.
And, everyone who was there, saw it.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng could hear his own voice take a weird turn, even his breathing was
a little hitched.
“When I got back to the room, everyone was laughing.” Gu Fei spoke the words out loud
with some difficulty. “I just stood there, it felt like someone had opened me up with a knife.
Every single person was laughing, like it was the funniest thing they’d ever seen.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t speak. He didn’t even dare imagine such a scenario, it was something
that only appeared in his dreams. Even in his dreams, the sense of horror was unbearable.
“Was……Tan Lin in……on it?” He asked.
“Tan Lin didn’t know. According to Xiao-Bing, he just wanted to use him to see if I was. He
said it was only a joke.” Gu Fei got a cigarette out of his pocket and held it between his lips.
“But every time I see Tan Lin, I’ll think of what happened that day. Besides, he just wouldn’t
let it go, so I was annoyed by him too.”
Jiang Cheng stared.
“I’m done.” Gu Fei took the cigarette out of his mouth. “Cheng-ge hug.”
Jiang Cheng paused, then immediately rushed over and held him tight, “I shouldn’t have
asked. Fuck. To be honest, I’m not the kind of person who just had to dig up everything
about your past, I was just…… Ayy…… I was
just……”
“You were just jelly.” Gu Fei tilted his head and rested it on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
“……Yeah.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“It’s not that I didn’t want to say. It’s just that, I’d rather not make you feel that way about
me.” Gu Fei rubbed his waist. “I don’t want you to feel bad for me.”
“No no no,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his back. “I don’t feel bad for you at all, really.”
“You certainly are great at consoling people.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Though there’s something I still have to say,” Jiang Cheng said. “From now on, don’t you
give me that 8-feet long face again. Whether you’re angry or annoyed, even if we have to
fight it out, it’s still better than giving me the cold shoulder.
For me……I’m real scared of being hung out to dry like that. In my family before, when they
couldn’t be bothered to scold me, they’d just give me the cold treatment, and nobody would
talk to me. It’s……a really, depressing feeling.”
“Got it.” Gu Fei nodded.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6041
TL word count: 4281
TL time: 4:40:29
Edit time: 0:52:56
Curse words: 8x fucks, 1x shits, 3x asses

TL’s Notes:
I’m…. a little late orz
BTW, just wanna say, I appreciate every single comment so much T__T thank you <3333
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: April 12, 2021
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Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 82
Tsk.
If Jiang Cheng hadn’t blown up, Gu Fei would probably never speak this out loud. He would
rather let it rot in his guts. Even the occasional acid regurgitation made him feel sick to his
stomach, let alone telling the whole thing like this. For Jiang Cheng to hear.
But since he started talking, there was not much he held back. Aside from unimportant
details like how Xiao-Bing and the others actually placed bets on him that day.
Gu Fei was afraid of a lot of things. Sometimes he didn’t even notice it himself.
Or rather he had been subconsciously harbouring the fear for a long time, and would
suddenly jolt awake in realization.
He was afraid that Jiang Cheng would pity him, that he would feel bad for him, that he
might form some notion of rescuing him from a miserable circumstance, or have the kind of
restrictive thought such as “I can never ever hurt him”.
Jiang Cheng was naive and impulsive. Gu Fei liked that about him, but he was also scared of
Jiang Cheng as he was: too naive, too reckless.
He came here without a care, so he should get to leave without a care.
Everything in this place was scenery that was never meant to appear along his journey.
Tomato and egg noodle soup was supposed to be Gu Fei’s foolproof recipe. It tasted alright,
but Li Yan said that these were holy grail ingredients that tasted good no matter how they
were prepared. He then added later that “occasionally for you, it didn’t work”.
Today was one of those times it didn’t work. Gu Fei wasn’t in a good place emotionally.
When he tasted for seasoning, he could hardly taste the salt. But perhaps because Jiang
Cheng was hungry from the hours of photoshoot before getting into a fit of anger, he
nevertheless happily slurped away at the noodles.
“Is it time for you to take Gu Miao to treatment?” Jiang Cheng finished his bowl, set the
chopsticks down, and asked with satisfaction on his face.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded as he got up and collected the dishes to wash. “After you get Pan Zhi
this afternoon, you guys just go ahead and eat. I have to talk with my mom tonight.”
“I’ll wash.” Jiang Cheng held down his hand. “Talk about what?”
“She hasn’t been coming back at night for the last few days,” Gu Fei said. “Who knows if
she’s found her one true love again. I have to track her down at home before she goes out.”
Jiang Cheng sighed, “Ay……momma gonna marry.” [1]
“It’d be great if she can actually get married.” Gu Fei said. “Right now I’m just thankful that
she didn’t become a homewrecker in someone else’s marriage.”
Gu Fei glanced at the time. Gu Miao must be all packed and waiting for him at home right
about now. He leaned in and kissed Jiang Cheng, “I’m going then.”
“Hurry up and get lost.” Jiang Cheng squeezed his waist. “Disappear from my sight right this
second.”
“Put the pillow away.” Gu Fei said. “If Pan Zhi sleeps on that pillow, we’re really gonna have
to schedule a fight.”
Jiang Cheng tilted his head back and laughed with his eyes closed, “Got it! For sure Pan Zhi
sleeps on the sofa. He won’t agree even if I tell him to sleep on the bed.”
“Then I’m going now.” Gu Fei kissed him again.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng replied. “Is it alright if Pan Zhi and I go watch a movie together?
Sometimes when we get really bored we’d go watch a movie.”
“Can you buy seats so that there’s another person between you?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng giggled, “Geez.”
“I’m going now then.” Gu Fei glanced at his phone.
“You’ve said it three times,” Jiang Cheng said. “Will you be able to walk out of this door
before you say it for the tenth time?”
“Of course,” Gu Fei walked over to his bags and picked it up while chuckling.
“Leaving now.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng turned and watched him.
Gu Fei walked out of the apartment, then right before the door closed he stuck his head in
again, “Really going now.”
“Damnit, hurry up and go.” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “You’re making me want to beat you
up.”
Gu Fei retreated outside, set his bags on the ground, then suddenly charged
through the door. Jiang Cheng was still leaning back in the chair. He rushed over and lifted
Jiang Cheng’s shirt, bit down on his belly, then swift as the wind charged back out again,
closing the door behind him.
As Gu Fei was running down the stairs with his bags, he heard Jiang Cheng open the door
and roar into the stairwell, “Fuck!”
Gu Fei still felt like laughing even after he got downstairs. He was just about to glance up at
the window, but as soon as he turned his head, he saw something shoot down from above,
landing precisely next to his feet before bouncing away.
He narrowed his eyes at it, and saw that it was a little white pebble.
“Shit.” He chuckled and looked up.
Jiang Cheng was leaning on his windowsill, with what looked like a handful of pebbles in his
hand, probably snatched from the flowerpot by the window just now. Just as Gu Fei looked
up, Jiang Cheng immediately waved his hand again, and another pebble pelted toward him,
still landing precisely by his feet.
“Hey!” Gu Fei backed away. He didn’t think Jiang Cheng’s throw would be so accurate even
without a slingshot.
Though after he backed away a stretch, he seemed to be out of Jiang Cheng’s reach. Jiang
Cheng mimed with his hand, but didn’t end up throwing another pebble.
Gu Fei laughed as he pulled his glasses from his pocket and put them on. He wanted to see
Jiang Cheng’s expression.
As soon as he put the glasses on, he saw Jiang Cheng had an elastic in his hand.
Jiang Cheng drew it back with two fingers, and started aiming at him.
“Fuck!” Gu Fei turned to run.
He only managed to take two steps when he felt a pebble hit his buttcheek. It wasn’t hard,
but the location was…… He turned his head as he ran.
Jiang Cheng stood at the window, and raised his arms over his head to make a heart.
Gu Fei felt like he had a smile hanging on his face the whole way home.
When he got Pan Zhi’s call, Jiang Cheng was crouching under a tree outside the train
station, sucking on a bag of frozen fruit pop.
“You’re here?”
“Soon,” Pan Zhi said. “You’ve left, right?”
“I’ve been crouching outside the exit gate for the last ten minutes.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh shit,” Pan Zhi was overflowing with sentimental feeling. “I’m so so so touched, Cheng-
er! Ain’t no mountain high enough, to keep me from getting to you……”
Jiang Cheng hung up and continued slurping on the ice.
Since he only had two days, Pan Zhi didn’t pack very much this time. He sprinted out from
the exit gate with only a backpack.
Jiang Cheng stood up and waved at him. Pan Zhi came charging over with wide open arms
and kicking legs.
He quickly turned a little and adjusted his stance, readying himself into a half-squat to
offset the momentum of Pan Zhi’s assault.
“Did ya miss me!” Pan Zhi yelled.
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I love how your mouth doesn’t match your heart.” Pan Zhi said.
“I did.” Jiang Cheng corrected himself.
“I love how you always say what you mean.” Pan Zhi immediately countered.
“Were you chatting to a pretty girl the whole way here or something,” Jiang Cheng glanced
at him. “That you’re still going on and on even now.”
“Indeed I talked the whole way, but it was an auntie, not a pretty girl. She was way too
chatty.” Pan Zhi sighed. “She sat across the aisle from me, and talked everyone on that side
to sleep, so she turned to talk to me. I was the only one in this row with my eyes still open,
and couldn’t find an opportunity to close them, so I had to keep her company…… Ayy I’m
parched, let me have a sip of that.”
Pan Zhi reached out and took away the frozen fruit pop from Jiang Cheng’s hands. He took a
giant slurp, but got nothing but air and noise, “Fucking hell grandpa do you know what it
feels like to come at this with a mouthful of hope and getting nothing at all!”
“Come on,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I’ll treat you to all you can drink.”
There was nothing especially refined in the area around the train station. Jiang Cheng
found a concession stall, bought two bottles of cola, and sat down on a bench outside with
Pan Zhi and slowly drank it.
“Ah……” Pan Zhi exclaimed contentedly after taking a few big swigs, then
stared at Jiang Cheng for a while before saying. “You’re positively glowing eh, gramps.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him and didn’t reply.
“Looking very obviously different from us single dogs now.” Pan Zhi said.
“Even when I was a single dog I was different from single dogs like you.” Jiang Cheng said as
he took a drink.
“Right, handsome overachiever single dog…… Oh yeah,” Pan Zhi extended his bottle of cola
and knocked it against Jiang Cheng’s. “Happy birthday.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“There’s something for you in my bag that I think you’d like.” Pan Zhi reached back and
patted his bag. “Wanna take a guess?”
“Condoms.” Jiang Cheng replied without thinking.
Pan Zhi had his head cranked back as he poured cola into his mouth, and choked upon
hearing this. He put his head down in a coughing fit, then wiped the soda off his face with
the tissue Jiang Cheng just handed him, before looking up again, “Holy fuck. You’re real
open these days eh, gramps.”
“It’s not that I’m open,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “It’s that I think you’ve always been very
open.”
“These days I’ve abandoned my wicked ways and decided to see the light.” Pan Zhi paused
to catch his breath. “It’s not condoms, guess again.”
“You’ve given me a tin whistle already so you probably won’t get that again.
After you abandoned your wicked ways, you gifted me a pen……” Jiang Cheng pondered for
a while, then tsked audibly. “Don’t tell me you got me a set of five-threes.” [2]
“I’m not that enlightened.” Pan Zhi said. “I’ll show you when we get to your place later.”
When they got back to his apartment, as Pan Zhi pulled the gift box out from his bag, Jiang
Cheng finally understood why he wanted to wait until they were inside to take it out.
It was a pink heart-shaped box, adorned all around with tiny red hearts glimmering with
rhinestones, and on top of which there was a gigantic bow in the center…… If Pan Zhi really
pulled this thing out in the middle of the street, he might be too embarrassed to accept it.
“What the hell is wrong with your aesthetic?” Jiang Cheng exclaimed earnestly.
“This is a protest of my loss of favour!” Pan Zhi said as he cradled the box. “A protest of you
prioritizing romance over friendship! A protest of you shunning the years long
intergenerational bond between us! A protest of……”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng interrupted, and took the box from his hands.
It was a rather large box. He shook it gently. The content of the box was very heavy, making
clunking sounds against the box as he shook it. With this noise and this weight, Jiang Cheng
had a pretty good guess of what it might be.
He opened the lid. Just as he thought, it was a slingshot.
“Damn, you could’ve at least cushioned it with something, this is not at all sincere.” Jiang
Cheng laughed. The box was completely empty aside from the slingshot, lying there all on
its lonesome.
“Thunderstrike, reverse curvature wrist support, a perfect fusion of 304 steel and a red
sandalwood handle, giving you the joy of experiencing fierce critical assault in the great
outdoor……” Pan Zhi prattled off the specs as if reciting from a textbook. “So, do you like it?”
“I do.” Jiang Cheng took out the slingshot and weighed it in his hand.
“I also bought the sling band for you. No doubt such a cool gadget needs a good quality
band.” Pan Zhi pulled a sack out of his backpack, inside it was a roll of sling band. “This is
from North Star, you said before that this brand is good, right?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng took the sack, and laughed as he peered inside. It was enough that the
heart shaped box was pink with rhinestones, but even the sling band was a flamboyant
purple. “Did you go through some especially painful yet unspeakable experience recently?”
“Well I had to pick a more unique colour when it costs so much! How would the value show
through if it’s just beige!” Pan Zhi pointed at the sack. “Now this, as soon as you pull it out,
everyone will know, OHO this guy’s a master, even his sling is a ho……”
“A homo purple huh?” Jiang Cheng leaned back on the sofa in a fit of laughter.
“Grandson, I can see that you really are getting tired of being alive.”
“No, not at all gramps, look at my very genuine eyes,” Pan Zhi sat down beside him. “The
first time I ever heard the term ‘homo purple’ was actually from you!”
Jiang Cheng smiled, and took out the sling band, giving it a little tug, “Thank you.”
“What’s with all this civility, over and over too,” Pan Zhi raised his arms up in a stretch.
“We’ve grown apart.”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m being very earnest. Also, you coming here, it makes me really
happy.”
“Really?” Pan Zhi glanced at him in satisfaction. “How many days did you take off to keep
me company?”
“No need to take days off,” Jiang Cheng said. “We’re still on summer break here.”
“Holy shit!” Pan Zhi yelled. “No cram school?”
“We still have a week before cram school starts.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Jealous?”
“Of course I’m jealous, it’s not like I’m an overachiever or anything.” Pan Zhi said, then after
thinking about it, squeezed next to him again. “But wait, does that mean you guys are
behind then?”
“For sure,” Jiang Cheng got out a pair of scissors and cut a length of sling band, and started
to slowly tie it onto the slingshot. “But I’ll just review on my own.”
“Right, I brought a bunch of question mock tests for you, and textbooks. It’s all gotten
through the school, these can’t be bought anywhere. I was originally gonna photocopy it,
but Lao-Yuan gave me a whole separate set and told me to mail it to you.” Pan Zhi dragged
his backpack over, pulled out a thick stack of study materials, and set it on Jiang Cheng’s
lap.
The pile of things on his lap was very heavy, but Jiang Cheng suddenly got a feeling like he
was standing on solid ground.
It was a kind of feeling most people probably wouldn’t be able to sympathize with. It wasn’t
just about the university entrance exams, but more so the sense of direction these things
brought with them.
Jiang Cheng had nothing planned for that evening. To be precise, he had no plans for the
entire two days that Pan Zhi would be here.
Although Pan Zhi had no special demands for ‘fun’. In the past, the two of them often
skipped class to go nowhere in particular. They would just sit down by a streetside
flowerbed and space out for a whole day.
Pan Zhi had no specific demands for food either. After thinking about it for a long time, he
ended up asking to eat the fried rice cakes from last time.
“Let’s ask Gu Fei to come with,” Pan Zhi took his phone out. “And that cute baby sister of
his?”
“He’s busy tonight, no need to call him.” Jiang Cheng said. “We’ll eat by ourselves.”
“Alrighty,” Pan Zhi put his phone away in his pocket, then said with a lowered voice. “Are
you two living together right now? Maybe I should go to the hotel later?”
“We’re not living together.” Jiang Cheng said.
“There’s no need to pretend in front of me,” Pan Zhi shot a glance at the bedroom. “Last
time I came here it was still one single pillow, and now you’ve even got a double pillow.”
It was only then that Jiang Cheng remembered that he forgot to put the pillow away like the
boyfriend requested. He thought his face was already as thick as a fortress by now, that he
didn’t even hesitate when saying “condom” out in public, but when Pan Zhi pointed it out
like this, he was suddenly a little embarrassed.
Looking at that pillow…… Even though he and Gu Fei hadn’t yet had the chance to do
anything on the alleged ultra durable pillow, but the bed alone was like the scene of crime
itself. Just one glance, and frames upon frames of lewd inappropriate moments emerged in
his mind. He sheepishly turned away and opened the front door, “Come on, let’s go eat.”
When they were sitting down eating the fried rice cakes, Jiang Cheng also ordered some
beer. After all, he and Pan Zhi hadn’t seen each other for ages……
though it probably hadn’t been very long. Either way, they were reuniting after time apart,
it called for a drink.
“Let’s drink white,” Pan Zhi said. “You’re a legal adult now.” [3]
“Why the hell would we drink white on such a hot day,” Jiang Cheng opened a bottle of beer
with his teeth, and set it down in front of Pan Zhi. “How are we supposed to talk tonight if
we’re all drunk.”
Pan Zhi smiled, “You’ve been here for so long, I thought you’d go straight for the white for
sure.”
“This short period of time isn’t enough to influence me.” Jiang Cheng opened a bottle for
himself with his teeth, and took a swig.
“That’s good, and you’ll be gone before you do get influenced.” Pan Zhi nodded.
Jiang Cheng’s hand paused ever so slightly in the air.
“What?” Pan Zhi noticed the subtle stall in his motion. “Won’t you be gone after the exams
next year?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Pan Zhi picked up a piece of rice cake and put it in his mouth. After a while, he
glanced up at Jiang Cheng again, “Cheng-er, don’t tell me you don’t want to leave anymore?”
“No way,” Jiang Cheng answered. “Of course not.”
“You better not.” Pan Zhi put his head down and took another couple of bites.
“Dating is dating, but you gotta keep at least a tiny shred of reason.”
Jiang Cheng smiled, “You think I only have a tiny shred of reason left?”
“Not theoretically,” Pan Zhi looked at him. “But I also don’t know what you’re like when
you’re really in a relationship, I’m just a little worried.”
“Relax, this isn’t something you need to worry about.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm,” Pan Zhi smiled and nodded. “Why don’t you get Gu Fei to put in a little more effort
too. There’s no chance of you two ending up in the same school, but it’d be good if you can
at least go to the same city. That way you won’t have to play out the tearful long distance
goodbye trope when the time comes.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
His chest suddenly tightened at Pan Zhi’s words. They were but ordinary words.
It wouldn’t be out of place coming from anyone, but it suddenly made him very scared.
“What’s wrong?” Pan Zhi looked at him.
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“You two aren’t having problems, are you?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng replied.
This time it was Pan Zhi’s turn to be quiet. He looked at Jiang Cheng, not sure what exactly
else to ask.
“I haven’t thought that far ahead.” Jiang Cheng said. “Well, it’s not like I haven’t thought
about it, just not in much detail.”
“Wait, gramps,” Pan Zhi was a little confused. “It’s not that far ahead, is it? It’s only a year
away.”
“Very far away.” Jiang Cheng said.
“……Oh.” Pan Zhi opened his mouth to say something, but didn’t end up
making any sounds. After a few seconds, he swung the beer bottle in his hand as he asked,
“Are you bringing me to watch you take photos tomorrow?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “It’s just a little boring.”
“Are there female models?” Pan Zhi asked.
“There are.” Jiang Cheng shot him a look. “All pretty good looking too.”
“Why would it be boring then,” Pan Zhi immediately said with a smile. “How interesting is
that, if by chance or fate I meet one that’s……”
“And then do long-distance?” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye.
“What’s wrong with long-distance. Anyways, I’m not like you,” Pan Zhi lit a cigarette, and
set the pack in front of Jiang Cheng. “No one’s expecting it to last forever. It’s just dating.”
“Fuckboy.” Jiang Cheng continued to give him the side-eye.
“……Fine fine, I’m a fuckboy.” Pan Zhi was resigned to this title. He spaced out for a while
with the cigarette in his mouth, then as though finally making up his mind, looked at Jiang
Cheng and asked, “You’re not really thinking of forever, are you? With Gu Fei.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He also pulled out a cigarette and lit it. After two puffs he tapped
it, but no ashes fell. He said, “Why not?”
“You think that’s possible?” Pan Zhi asked him back.
It was only because the person asking this was Pan Zhi that he didn’t dump a glass of beer
directly on the speaker’s face. Instead, something in his chest jolted violently at these
words.
Pan Zhi was his best friend. Normally, no one would abandon their senses to say something
like this, only Pan Zhi dared be so forthright with him.
After dinner they walked around for a while, then went back to the apartment.
They each took a shower before collapsing on the sofa, not wanting to move again. They
didn’t continue the conversation from earlier, not that there was any way of continuing it.
And so they chatted about nothing in particular. There was a lot of meaningless bullshit to
be said between them. Even just watching TV, they could talk and giggle about any specific
dumb moment for at least half an hour.
“Let’s sleep,” Jiang Cheng checked the time on his phone when he felt tired from talking,
and realized it was already past midnight. “I have a photoshoot in the morning, gotta be
there at 9 o’clock.”
“Let me use that single pillow of yours,” Pan Zhi squirmed and shifted his down and laid on
the sofa. “Don’t make me use a blanket roll as a pillow again.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he retrieved the pillow from his room, “You’re not
gonna sleep on the bed with me?”
“Nah,” Pan Zhi clicked his tongue. “How awkward would it be if Gu Fei checks up on you in
the middle of the night. A straight boy like me.”
Jiang Cheng turned to go back to his room. When he sat down at the edge of his bed, he
heard Pan Zhi say in the living room, “Cheng-er, the thing I said before, it might’ve been a
little out of line……”
“It’s not.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m just a little worried. ‘Cos you,” Pan Zhi paused for a beat. “You can’t just treat
everything like studying for tests……right.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer.
“G’night gramps.” Pan Zhi said.
Jiang Cheng stayed sitting on the edge of his bed. He was very sleepy, but felt like he
wouldn’t be able to sleep even if he laid down.
He picked up his phone and checked his messages. There was nothing from Gu Fei.
After scrolling through the entirety of their chat history, Jiang Cheng felt like he could
hardly keep his eyes open. He crashed down on his pillow, and sent Gu Fei a message.
– Have you thought about what happens after
By the time he fell asleep, Gu Fei still hadn’t replied.
I’m going to start dreaming soon. Jiang Cheng turned over in a sleepy daze.
So much for keeping a nerve on for me.
Tsk.
Footnotes
[1] “Momma gonna marry” is the second half of an old saying, the first part of which is
“Rain’s gonna fall”. It’s used to describe things that are inevitable, no matter how much
people try to prevent them from happening. ↩
[2] A very expensive set of ultimate university entrance exam study material ↩
[3] White liquor = baijiu ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5848

TL word count: 4121

TL time: 4:03:23
Edit time: 0:46:56
Curse words: 6x fucks, 4x shits
TL’s Notes:
I’m…. a little late again orz
Thank you for all your comments last week T__T
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: April 20, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 83
You once asked me, if I wanted to date you, or if I wanted to go on dates with you, right?
It was very quiet all around when he woke up in the morning. However, there was a lot
going on outside. Elementary school kids on summer break screamed and shouted with
abandon, in the midst of which were the chiding voices of old grandpas and grannies.
Jiang Cheng yawned and glanced at the time on his phone. He had just enough time to wash
up, eat breakfast, and head over to the photoshoot.
“Grandson!” He yelled toward the living room as he got up. “Time to get up!”
There was no answer from Pan Zhi in the living room. Jiang Cheng pulled on a shirt and
walked out of his bedroom, “Grand……”
There was no grandson on the living room sofa, only a folded blanket and pillow. He
paused, then took out his phone to call Pan Zhi.
“You’re awake?” Pan Zhi answered the call. It was clear he was outside, Jiang Cheng could
hear a mess of background noise from the other side.
“Where did you go?” Jiang Cheng was shocked at these sounds. “Don’t tell me you’ve
adopted a morning exercise routine now.”
“What morning exercise!” Pan Zhi said. “I’m here at the breakfast stalls. I already got food
for you and Gu Fei, so hurry up and get ready then come on down, or else it’s gonna get
cold.”
“Wait, what’s your problem?” Jiang Cheng rushed into the bathroom with the phone
cradled between his shoulder and his ear, and said as he squeezed toothpaste. “I’m gonna
be at least 20 minutes.”
“Wash your face while you piss, then brush your teeth as you shit. If you take longer than
10 minutes I’ll call you grandpa.” Pan Zhi said.
“You already call me grandpa every day,” Jiang Cheng said. “I just want to know why you’re
being so mystifying.”
“It’s all Gu Fei, he asked me this morning if you’re awake, I said no, then he asked what I
wanted to eat and that he’ll go buy it……” Pan Zhi said.
“Then let him buy it, what are you fighting him for?” Jiang Cheng mumbled incoherently as
he brushed his teeth.
“Don’t you think his actions are very much like he’s taking care of his wifey and his wifey’s
bestie?” Pan Zhi said. “As a straight boy of the new age, I simply cannot tolerate being taken
care of like that by my best friend’s boyfriend.”
“I feel like his actions are more like a fuckboy of the new age trying to hit on my bestie.”
Jiang Cheng said.
“That there, is the difference between me and a gay boy like you…… Alright hurry up and
get ready then come downstairs, I can see him walking this way.”
Pan Zhi said. “How unsuitable would it be for me to be alone with him.”
“Got it.” Jiang Cheng laughed as he ended the call.
It was only after he hung up that he noticed the problem with Pan Zhi’s expression of wifey
and wifey’s bestie.
When Gu Fei sauntered up to the breakfast stalls outside Jiang Cheng’s building, Pan Zhi
was in the middle of setting dishes on the table that was already covered with food.
“Morning.” He walked over and greeted Pan Zhi.
“Morning. If you’re hungry just have a few bites first to tide you over.” Pan Zhi said. “I also
ordered a few trays of buns, but they’re not ready yet.”
“It’s fine, I’ll wait for Jiang Cheng to come down.” Gu Fei glanced up at the building. “Is he up
yet?”
“Yeah,” Pan Zhi shot him a look. “You didn’t contact him?”
“He’s coming down soon anyway.” Gu Fei gave him a smile.
After Pan Zhi squeezed to the stall keeper’s side to rush the buns, Gu Fei sat down at the
table. He felt a little awkward at Pan Zhi’s question.
It was true he didn’t contact Jiang Cheng. From the time Jiang Cheng sent that message the
night before, he hadn’t contacted Jiang Cheng since. Even though he was longing intensely
for Jiang Cheng the whole night.
But as soon as he remembered that message he didn’t know how to respond to, Gu Fei felt a
little nervous about contacting him. He didn’t get a good night’s sleep at all, waking up and
dozing off again several times, with Jiang Cheng’s question filling up his mind.
He didn’t know how he should respond if Jiang Cheng asked it to his face.
When Jiang Cheng came out of the building and headed this way, Gu Fei waved at him.
Jiang Cheng gave him a smile, and waved back.
The smile made Gu Fei want to rush over there, grab him, and give him a big kiss.
“Are you feeding hogs?” Jiang Cheng walked to the table, grabbed a bun out of a tray Pan
Zhi just brought over, and took a bite.
“When I was little, I used to always eat breakfast at home. My mom said the food outside
isn’t sanitary. I was super envious of those other students who got to eat breakfast outside.”
Pan Zhi sat down and looked at the table of food. “So I thought, some day when I can eat
breakfast outside on my own, I’ll order every dish at the breakfast stall and fill the table.”
“Didn’t you eat outside since high school started?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah, but it’s still not enough. I was too repressed, it’ll take at least a decade for me to get
over it.” Pan Zhi chugged some soy milk.
The breakfast was a little too bountiful. Gu Fei listened to Jiang Cheng and Pan Zhi chat as
he worked hard at eating, but at the end they still had half a tray of buns left.
“Ah, it’s going to waste.” Jiang Cheng patted his stomach.
“Just take it to go. If there are any stray dogs or cats on the way we can feed it to them.” Pan
Zhi said as he put the buns in a plastic bag.
The photoshoot that day was for clothes. It was a series of collaborations between Ding
Zhuxin and another independent brand, so they planned the shoot on set in her studio. It
was a relatively easier job.
Pan Zhi’s personality was entirely different from Jiang Cheng’s. Gu Fei sometimes thought
their tight friendship stemmed from the ability to make up for what the other one lacked.
Jiang Cheng didn’t tend to converse with people he wasn’t very familiar with, unlike Pan
Zhi, who was chatting away with the two female models just minutes after arriving on set.
Even when the two girls were having their makeup done, they still dragged him over to
continue the conversation.
“Are you impressed?” Jiang Cheng was waiting on the side to get his makeup done, while
reading through the promotional pamphlet to get to know the brand better.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“How did the talk with your mom go yesterday?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“We had an argument, though it was alright I guess. It’s impossible to not argue with her.”
Gu Fei smiled a little.
“Did Gu Miao make a fuss?” Jiang Cheng continued to ask.
“Nah, she drew something herself yesterday, I’ll show you some time.” Gu Fei said.
“Sure, in the same style as your display icon?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“More or less. I think the bunny in my icon is already her best work.” Gu Fei snapped on the
camera lens, then held it up and looked through the viewfinder at his surroundings.
“When I messaged you yesterday…… why didn’t you reply?” Jiang Cheng
asked hesitantly.
“I fell asleep,” The camera was still in front of Gu Fei’s face. “Didn’t hear it.”
“Didn’t you say you’d keep a nerve on for me.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I was too tired yesterday,” Gu Fei said quietly. He turned and pointed the camera at Jiang
Cheng, and looked at his side profile through the viewfinder.
“Crashed on my pillow and slept straight through till morning…… I’ll change my notification
to something louder, that way I won’t miss it.”
“Never mind,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “You should try to get better sleep at night, I can
already see dark circles around your eyes.”
Nini waved at Jiang Cheng, indicating that it was his turn for makeup.
When Jiang Cheng stood up and walked that way, Gu Fei pressed a hand gently against
Jiang Cheng’s side.
Jiang Cheng’s body blocked Gu Fei from other’s view, so this discreet gesture wasn’t seen
by anyone else. In summer, the heat in Gu Fei’s palm was very obvious, brushing warmly
over Jiang Cheng’s waist.
Jiang Cheng was used to makeup now. He would plop right down in the chair, close his
eyes, and sometimes even catch a little snooze.
Gu Fei said he crashed on his pillow and slept straight through till morning.
Those words couldn’t be true.
Jiang Cheng was familiar with everything about Gu Fei. If Gu Fei really did sleep that
soundly, then there was no way he’d have dark circles today. Not only that, perhaps other
people wouldn’t notice, but to him, the subtle fatigue on Gu Fei’s face was plain to see.
Gu Fei didn’t sleep well last night.
And it wasn’t because of his mom and Gu Miao. If it was because of them, Gu Fei wouldn’t
keep it from him.
It had to be because of that message. The message that by the time he wanted to rescind it,
it was already too late.
He wasn’t sure whether Gu Fei had thought about what will happen after, and he wondered
whether him asking the question would be too much like he was bugging his boyfriend for
an outcome.
Or perhaps Gu Fei had thought about it. He just didn’t have an answer.
During the shoot, Gu Fei was just like usual; he would patiently instruct Jiang Cheng on his
movement and angle. Even though Jiang Cheng still felt a little uneasy and a little miffed, he
still felt comforted at the sight of Gu Fei.
Gu Fei’s every motion pleased him: the way he held the camera; the way he knelt down on
one knee; the way he bent down at the waist while looking for an angle; even the way he
put his head down while checking the photos. It was hard for Jiang Cheng to tear his eyes
away.
Occasionally when his gaze met up with Pan Zhi, Pan Zhi would give him a meaningful
smile, then continue staring at the girl nearby. Of course, Jiang Cheng would quickly give
him a meaningful smile in return.
When they finished the day’s photos and got ready to leave, he saw that Pan Zhi and one of
the female models had already added each other on WeChat. They were still giving each
other eyes and lamenting the parting even as they were leaving.
“What is this efficiency……” Jiang Cheng said.
“The kind of efficiency where both of us are idle with nothing to do.” Pan Zhi said as he
swiped at his phone. “Although I really do like the way she looks, at least it’s not an internet
famous snake spirit kind of face.” [1]
“Really,” Jiang Cheng tried to recall. “I didn’t notice.”
“Duh, even if that was a handsome guy, you sir would probably not notice in this state of
mind, let alone that it was a girl.” Pan Zhi said. “Now I know what you’re like when in a
relationship.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei walking in front of them.
What state of mind?
Even Pan Zhi missed sometimes. Certainly in Jiang Cheng’s eyes, Gu Fei today
was still so handsome it made his heart throb and want to jump him and knead him and
rub him. But inside, he still felt a little annoyed.
He had discovered a side of Gu Fei that he never realized before, which was that this guy
was very good at holding things in. No matter what it was, Gu Fei could push it down.
It might have something to do with the kind of environment Gu Fei grew up in.
He had to deal with a lot of things this way, that it already became a habit. But to Jiang
Cheng, faced with this, he only felt like he was wrapped in a thick and heavy blanket.
It felt repressive, suffocating, and difficult to breathe. It felt like he had nowhere to exert
force to struggle, and even if he did manage to struggle it was impossible to rip apart an
opening……
After the three of them had lunch, Gu Fei got ready to head back. He still had to take Gu
Miao for treatment in the afternoon.
“We’re gonna go window shopping then?” Pan Zhi said. “The two of us can walk around and
around for hours at a time.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded with a smile.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything. Only when Pan Zhi started walking off, did he glance at Gu
Fei, “Go on then.”
“Let’s meet up for dinner?” Gu Fei asked. “At Wang Er Meat Pies?”
“We’ll see.” Jiang Cheng was feeling a little down.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said, looking at him. “I……”
“You should go.” Jiang Cheng interrupted.
“Once Pan Zhi is gone,” Gu Fei glanced in Pan Zhi’s direction. “I’ll take you out for a feast.”
“Shameless. When Pan Zhi is here it’s meat pies, when Pan Zhi is gone it’s a feast.” Jiang
Cheng looked sideways at him. “Shameless.”
“Hey,” Gu Fei started laughing. “Then we’ll feast tonight, alright? Or tomorrow before he
leaves?”
“We’ll see.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Well aren’t we right back where we started then,” Gu Fei said. “Dead loop.”
“Right, feels bad doesn’t it?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Gu Fei was quiet for a while as he looked back at Jiang Cheng, then he sighed softly, “I have
thought about it. I’ve been thinking about it ever since you asked me if I ever considered
getting a boyfriend.”
Jiang Cheng froze, and stared at him without a sound.
“I might have thought about it way more than you have, but this isn’t something I can get
across with an answer of a sentence or two,” Gu Fei said in a low voice.
“Is it?”
“I guess.” Jiang Cheng was all at once having a hard time wrapping his head around this.
Only after Gu Fei left and he and Pan Zhi had been aimlessly strolling around for a long
time, did he slowly come to a realization, and frowned.
Gu Fei said he’d thought about it way more. Perhaps. It was true that Jiang Cheng hadn’t
been thinking about it since “have you considered getting a boyfriend”. In fact, it wasn’t
until Pan Zhi asked him that question this time, that he felt like it was time to think it
through.
And yet, all he wanted was an answer. It didn’t need to be detailed. All he needed was an
answer.
I have thought about after. I still want to be with you, even after. We have to be together no
matter what.
That was all.
Perhaps it was because he was still looking at the problem in a conventional way, from a
perspective entirely different from Gu Fei’s. He was asking about an outcome, but Gu Fei
wanted to talk about the process.
However, now that he thought about it, if they established the outcome, then everything in
the middle would be directed toward that outcome. But if they started with the process,
they could end up with any number of outcomes.
Jiang Cheng sighed quietly.
Gu Fei. You’ve thought about a lot. What did you think about?
He and Pan Zhi strolled all the way to the shopping center downtown, eating and drinking
as they went, then ended up on a bench in the square listening to music for almost an hour.
The shop across the street put a karaoke machine outside their door. Jiang Cheng didn’t
expect the people in this crappy little city to be so bold. The singing didn’t stop for almost
the entire time they’ve been sitting there.
Some people sang well, some people sang so quietly nobody could hear them, and some
people basically chanted the lyrics out loud, while others were so off key it made one want
to run up and cut the power.
“Cheng-er, how about you go up and sing a song.” Pan Zhi said. “Widen their horizons, let
them know what singing is supposed to be like.”
“I prefer to keep my powers hidden.” It had been a long time since Jiang Cheng sang. He
used to go singing with Pan Zhi and the others often. But in this kind of setting, he would
rather sit here and listen to other people sing off key.
“Then I’ll go sing a song.” Pan Zhi stood up and straightened his clothes.
“Record it for me, I’ll post it to my Friend Circle.”
“……Your fourth grandpa is busy passing away, can you not post such happy content.” Jiang
Cheng said.
“It’s not like I’m sending it to Lao-Yuan.” Pan Zhi paused to think. “What should I sing?”
Before Jiang Cheng could answer, he was already making his way over, saying as he went,
“Red Sun it is, let me see if they have the accelerated version.” [2]
Jiang Cheng laughed. They picked this one almost every time they went to karaoke, as the
last one before they leave. The whole bunch of them would scream it out together.
Pan Zhi was a pretty good singer, even though his Cantonese pronunciation wasn’t that
great. However, with his predecessors as comparison, he practically sounded like a
professional singer. Almost as soon as he opened his mouth, nearby pedestrians stopped to
look at him.
Jiang Cheng pointed the phone camera at him and recorded.
Pan Zhi was someone who grew more energetic the more people there was.
Since he had an audience, he started singing with even more gusto. When he got to the
accelerated part at the end, he whipped around suddenly and pointed at Jiang Cheng, “Even if
fate makes you wander and drift; even if fate twists in strange directions; even if fate scares
you and makes it tedious to be alive; don’t shed tears of sorrow, nor should you give up and
give in; I hope to, accompany you forever and always……”
Everyone immediately looked in this direction. Jiang Cheng felt like giving Pan Zhi a middle
finger.
But after a few more lines, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little twinge in his nose.
He didn’t know if it was from the earnest way Pan Zhi was looking at him, or from the
memory of his carefree days of the past.
Or perhaps only because……he thought of Gu Fei.
He stared at his phone screen. At the end when Pan Zhi finished singing, he quickly got up
with his head down, and squeezed his way out of the crowd of clapping bystanders.
By the time Pan Zhi caught up to him, he had already gone back to normal.
“So?!” Pan Zhi flung an arm around his shoulder. “Let me see the video.”
“I recorded a few clips,” Jiang Cheng tapped around on the screen. “I’ll send it to you, you
can watch it for yourself.”
“We should’ve just found somewhere to sing instead of wandering around earlier,” Pan Zhi
said. “It’s been so long. What if……next year, after the exams we’ll get a bunch of people
together and go somewhere, travel or something.
Eat, drink, sing, and play to our hearts’ content!”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I was thinking, there’s no way I can get into the same school as you, but I simply have to be
in the same city as you even if my parents have to blast the path open with money.” Pan Zhi
raised his arms up in a stretch. “I used to think, even if you’re gone, I still have lots of other
friends. Now I realize it’s not the same at all. Hanging out with you is still the best. When
you’re not there, I’d miss you……”
“Control yourself,” Jiang Cheng said. “You sir are a straight boy after all. If anyone hears
these words they’ll think you have ideas about me or something.”
“My idea about you is only that we better be best friends for life.” Pan Zhi said.
“Whatever boyfriend, spouse, or wifey, none of that compares to a best friend.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, “Uh huh, right.”
“Don’t you laugh,” Pan Zhi clicked his tongue. “It’s only that I don’t like men, otherwise it
wouldn’t be any of Gu Fei’s business.”
“Why don’t you go say that to Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s fine, it’s enough that you know.” Pan Zhi said. “I probably can’t beat him in a fight.”
After a whole afternoon idling about with Pan Zhi, by the time they were sitting in Wang
Xu’s family’s restaurant waiting for Gu Fei and Gu Miao to arrive, Jiang Cheng was in a much
better mood. Although he kept wanting to laugh while listening to Wang Xu talk out of his
ass at Pan Zhi. Wang Xu very shamelessly went on for a long time, even bringing out Yi Jing
as a prop in his boasting.
“Don’t think that just because you grew up in the big city,” Wang Xu slammed on the table
and looked at Pan Zhi. “That you’re really better at everything. Just answer me this, can you
out drink me?”
“……I can’t, I don’t even want to drink at all.” Pan Zhi looked at him, then after a while
sighed again. “Damn it why did I lower my intelligence to bullshit with you for so long?”
“Because your intelligence isn’t that high to begin with. Like that girl you posted in your
Friend Circle just now,” Wang Xu had his phone out, and said as he scrolled. “Makes me
think you not only don’t have very high intelligence, but not very good taste either.”
“Ok ok ok ok, alright, I’m low, everything about me is low.” Pan Zhi held Wang Xu’s hand
down. “That girl okay, she really can’t compare to your class leader, truly.”
“Tch, not at all sincere. In your heart you’re still not yielding, right.” Wang Xu glared at him.
“I yield, I yield so hard. I am completely yielding on all fours.” Pan Zhi said as he glanced out
the door. “Hey now, this is the real beauty.”
Wang Xu turned to take a glance, “Yes that’s right!”
Gu Miao walked into the room, hugging her skateboard, and went directly up to Jiang
Cheng. She leaned her skateboard on the chair, picked up the cup in front of him, and
chugged all the water in one go.
“Did you skate back here?” Jiang Cheng pulled out a tissue and wiped the sweat from Gu
Miao’s head.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Miaomiao, my queen?” Wang Xu nudged his cup over to her. “There’s more water here.”
Gu Miao looked at him without any expression.
“I haven’t drank it, it’s clean.” Wang Xu said.
Gu Miao still looked at him cooly with a blank expression.
Pan Zhi picked up the cup and poured the water into Jiang Cheng’s cup. Gu Miao took the
cup and chugged it again.
“Hey!” Pan Zhi couldn’t stop laughing.
“Er-Miao, thank the big bros.” Gu Fei walked over and said.
Gu Miao stood up and bowed to them, then stuck out her hand and snapped at Jiang Cheng,
and gave him a thumbs up.
Jiang Cheng immediately returned one to her.
Gu Fei also greeted the others, then left to wash his hands, “Wang Xu, can you get a pack of
wet wipes for Er-Miao.”
“Alrighty.” Wang Xu immediately found some wet wipes for Gu Miao to clean her hands.
Jiang Cheng watched her. She seemed to be in a pretty good mood, they must’ve had fun
this afternoon.
Pan Zhi, who had been sitting beside Jiang Cheng this whole time, stood up and sat down
beside Wang Xu. Wang Xu looked at him, “What, you wanna battle me in drinks?”
“……We’re just eating meat pies, why would I battle you?” Pan Zhi didn’t know what else to
say.
“Are you looking down on our meat pies? I’m telling you! In our city, ask anyone, Wang Er
Meat Pies……” Once Wang Xu got to talking about their meat pies, his energy level shot right
up. He locked his sight on Pan Zhi and started his speech, as if he was a promotional
ambassador.
Gu Fei paused when he came in and saw the newly empty seat beside Jiang Cheng, then saw
Pan Zhi with a face full of helplessness as he was held down by Wang Xu. He sighed, then
interrupted, “Captain, we’re all hungry, let’s eat.”
“Would’ve have started long ago if we weren’t waiting for you! Hold on!” Wang Xu stood up
and went into the kitchen.
Gu Fei sat down, and on the other side, Pan Zhi let out a breath of relief, “I want so much to
smack him.”
Jiang Cheng started laughing. He was still feeling a little miffed at Gu Fei, every time he
thought about it he felt all sorts of confusion and grievance. But as soon as Gu Fei sat down
beside him, when he smelled the familiar scent of Gu Fei’s presence, he immediately felt his
mood take a turn for the better.
Humans are so ridiculous when they’re conflicted.
Gu Fei dropped his arm, reached his hand under the table, and gently touched Jiang Cheng’s
leg. Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei. Gu Fei grinned at him, then grabbed his hand and gave it
a squeeze.
Pan Zhi cleared his throat.
“What?” Gu Fei chuckled and looked at him.
“Can’t stand to watch this,” Pan Zhi said. “Gu Miao, wanna go get the meat pies from the
kitchen?”
Gu Miao only looked at him with her hands around her cup.
“We’ll go get the meat pies?” Pan Zhi leaned over the table and asked again.
Gu Miao reacted this time. Probably hungry, she stood up and followed Pan Zhi to the
kitchen. She even closed the door behind her as she walked out.
The moment the door closed, Gu Fei turned and planted a kiss on Jiang Cheng’s cheek.
Jiang Cheng also very quickly leaned in and bit down on his neck.
“Is it salty?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng took a sip of tea.
“Er-Miao was very into the games today, I played along for a while, got all sweaty.” Gu Fei
smiled.
When Gu Fei was smiling like this, when Gu Fei talked quietly to him like this, Jiang Cheng
would feel like an utterly unprincipled person. At this moment, all he wanted to do was
keep staring at Gu Fei and not think or worry about anything.
Whatever unhappiness, whatever unease, whatever whatever whatever. They were all
flung to the side.
He didn’t think about those annoying questions again the entire time until the end of Pan
Zhi’s fictitious fourth grandpa’s funeral was over, and the two days long holiday came to an
end.
After seeing Pan Zhi off, and the two of them returned to his apartment and tangled around
on the bed for a while, it was only then that all the unease and unhappiness slowly came
back to the surface.
Like weeds that couldn’t be eradicated no matter what, a moment of carelessness was
enough for it to rear its head again.
After all, the root was still there.
Gu Fei was lying on his side while playing on his phone. Jiang Cheng wrapped his arms
around Gu Fei from the back, “Hey.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei stroked his arm.
“I’m gonna study for a while later, can you keep me company,” Jiang Cheng said. “And not
go back tonight?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei turned over to lie flat, and pulled Jiang Cheng’s arm to rest on his body.
“Do you want to also……study a little?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I should probably copy the homework first.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng was quiet for a long time before he asked in a quiet voice.
“Are you not planning on applying for university?”
“Even if I am, there’s only the local ones.” Gu Fei said. “Those garbage colleges.”
“Is it because of Gu Miao?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“There’s a few problems.” Gu Fei set his phone to one side. “It’s impossible for Er-Miao to
have a change of environment, and it’s impossible for me to leave her behind and go to
school somewhere else. With her and my mom, if I’m not here, it’ll be a mess.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He knew all this already. Gu Miao couldn’t even accept a
change of wheels on her skateboard. He knew these problems even if Gu Fei didn’t mention
them, and he understood too. But he still felt that something was not quite right. Though
what exactly it was, he couldn’t figure it out for the life of him.
The two of them just lay like that, each lost in their own thoughts, and neither of them
spoke for a long time.
“If after the exams I go away to school,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’re still going to stay here,
right.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“And then what?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Gu Fei frowned a little, and turned his face to look back at Jiang Cheng, “I don’t know what
it’s going to be like, some things can’t be determined just……”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jiang Cheng sat up. “Do you not have much confidence in
long distance relationships?”
“No,” Gu Fei also sat up. “That’s not what I meant, I was saying……”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng interrupted him. “You once asked me, if I wanted to date you, or if I
wanted to go on dates with you, right?”

“Mmn.” Gu Fei clutched Jiang Cheng’s hand.

“I was wondering before, why you would ask me that. Now I know. The one who wanted to
keep dating was me, and the one who only wanted to go on dates,” Jiang Cheng pulled his
hand out and pointed at him. “Was you.”
Footnotes
[1] There’s a (Chinese) stereotypical internet famous face, which is big eyes, long lashes,
and pointy chin. I do believe Fan Bingbing was the original inspiration, but don’t quote me
on that. ↩
[2] Almost all the songs referred to in this novel are ‘old’ classics. This one is no exception.
Listen to the original song here. It’s known for its fast pace. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 7080
TL word count: 5043
TL time: 4:07:37
Edit time: 0:57:23
Curse words: 1x fucks, 2x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Hi guys, I struggled over how to convey the last sentence properly, if it’s not clear, please
head over to the footnotes of ch. 60 for an explanation :-[
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: April 27, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 84
Don’t be scared.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng. After saying “it was you” while pointing at him, Jiang Cheng
had been staring directly at him without shifting his gaze.
Sometimes Gu Fei felt that aside from possessing the unique qualities and skills of an
overachiever, Jiang Cheng also possessed a special logic that other overachievers don’t
have. He could completely turn the narrative around, so that upon further reflection you
might even agree with him, as though there wasn’t anything wrong with the reasoning.
Gu Fei had experienced this special skill first hand when they got their tattoos last time, but
last time he did not explain himself, and now Jiang Cheng was demonstrating his
superpower again.
Frankly, that question Gu Fei asked back then no longer had any significance at this point in
their relationship. Whatever answer it led to, whatever the question meant, none of that
mattered anymore.
True, back then he would rather Jiang Cheng was only after a romantic fling. Go on dates
with me. It could be a new endeavour, could be a whim, or it could be a respite from
loneliness, whatever.
But Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, he seemed unable to completely and precisely separate the
two concepts. And so Gu Fei chose to dive in head first.
I will like you until you don’t need me to like you anymore.
I can do that, as long as the one you want is ‘me’, and not someone else.
Which was why when Jiang Cheng pointed at him and accused him with his own words, Gu
Fei felt a little surprised, a little angry, to the point where he felt like laughing. But at the
same time he also couldn’t find any fault with Jiang Cheng’s logic.
That’s right. The one who is willing to stop when you wish to stop, is me.
Gu Fei felt like he had to say something in this moment, but he didn’t dare open his mouth
easily.
Jiang Cheng had supernatural logic, was sensitive and impulsive, and the scariest of all, he
could tell that Jiang Cheng was insecure. The way Jiang Cheng strived to hold on tight and
feared for loss, Gu Fei could often sense that about him.
Gu Fei, every word you say right now will become evidence for Jiang Cheng to keep in his
heart.
Better proceed with caution.
It’s not that long-distance isn’t an option. However, the environment at a top tier university,
compared to the environment at the Steel Works, will cause two people in completely
different situations over a long period of time to gradually lose their commonality, and
their relationship will gradually fade away.
Perhaps even before then, we will argue and probe endlessly from exactly this kind of
difference, and at last worn out, return to our own respective worlds .
Of course, it’s also possible that miracles do happen, and we walk together until the end.
Some things can’t simply be resolved like a test question, where each problem only has one
correct answer. Whatever the process is like, all you have to do is find the path that will
lead you to the right answer. The overachievers know how to find shortcuts, while the
slackers have to circle a little further, but they all get there in the end, because there is only
one right answer. Anything besides that is considered the wrong answer.
Whereas their situation right now has infinite possibilities and infinite endings, all of which
counts as answers. It can be one two three, or it can be four five six, but no one can say for
sure which answer is right, and which is wrong.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng. Perhaps he was overly pessimistic and careful.
Perhaps he wanted too much to protect Jiang Cheng from any potential pain.
Jiang Cheng was the opposite. He was optimistic, hot-headed, direct, and sensitive. Jiang
Cheng belonged solidly in the camp of “what does this little bit of pain matter in the midst
of wind and rain”. [1]
No matter how many times Gu Fei pondered over these thoughts in his mind, he could not
say them to Jiang Cheng. Not a single word of it.
He had no way of leaving. He did not even dare to dwell too much on the word
‘leaving’, let alone try to figure a way out of here. As for Jiang Cheng, he had no reason to
stay here.
It was a stalemate that could not be solved, at least for now. If they didn’t get to where they
needed to be before some miracle happened, it was bound to be a deadend.
“I didn’t,” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng. “Do you overachievers only pick the things you
want to remember to keep in your head? So unreasonable.”
“Quit trying to change the subject.” Jiang Cheng smirked. “Gu Fei, sometimes I feel like it’s
truly offensive to call you a slacker. The way your mind turns and
reacts so quickly, it’s definitely at an overachiever level.”
“Aside from that one question, did I say anything else?” Gu Fei was still looking at him.
“What else?” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes, a look of disdain on his face. “I don’t
remember anything else, only that you were worried about getting a tattoo, worried about
having my mark still on your body after we split up.”
“You wanna bet that I’ll smack you?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’ll believe it when you do.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. He stared at Jiang Cheng for a few seconds, then suddenly lifted
his elbow and aimed it at Jiang Cheng’s face.
He really had to hand it to Jiang Cheng’s reflex. As soon as he started to lift his arm, Jiang
Cheng was already leaning back to dodge it.
Though Gu Fei was never planning on hitting his face. He leaned forward as Jiang Cheng
leaned back, and pressed his forearm down against Jiang Cheng’s throat. With his neck
trapped, he was forced to fall back onto the bed with Gu Fei on top of him.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng glared.
“You must not know me very well at all.” Gu Fei kept his arm against Jiang Cheng’s throat,
and pinned one of Jiang Cheng’s hands down with his leg. When Jiang Cheng tried to lift his
other hand, Gu Fei immediately caught it in his grasp. “How can I bear to strike your face.”
“Tsk tsk tsk.” The corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth twitched.
“I will keep liking you until you no longer need me to.” Gu Fei said as he bore down. “I said
that, didn’t I?”
“You did.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Then why did you say you don’t remember.” Gu Fei asked.
“Well I was fucking mad,” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t remember anything when I’m mad.
What, you got a problem with that? If you do, then keep it to yourself.”
Gu Fei opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
“That’s how unreasonable I am, if that’s unacceptable then keep that to yourself too.” Jiang
Cheng frowned, and was quiet for a while, then looked at Gu Fei again. “At first I thought
that line of yours was sweet talk, it sounded oh-so-charming when I first heard it, but it
doesn’t stand up to further analysis.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei took away his arm that was holding down Jiang Cheng’s neck, and leaned
down to kiss him.
“In fact, what you meant was, if I wanted to break up with you, you would just agree, right?”
Jiang Cheng said as he looked at Gu Fei. “I have the initiative.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer, just leaned down and kissed him again.
“On the surface it looks like I hold the choice, but in fact, you sir, are not the passive one at
all.” Jiang Cheng side-eyed him. “You’re able to just come and leave without a care huh.”
Gu Fei sighed, “If one day you really don’t want to be with me anymore, there’s no point for
me to keep pestering and harassing you.”
“That might be the case theoretically……” Jiang Cheng lifted his head and chomped down on
Gu Fei’s chin.
“Hey!” Gu Fei was startled, and didn’t dare move. Jiang Cheng had taken a large and hard
bite, such that Gu Fei suspected whether he had somehow gotten a chin job while
sleepwalking at some point, for it to be so easily, precisely, and viciously targeted like that.
It was more than 10 seconds later when Jiang Cheng finally let go. He dropped his head
back onto the pillow and said, “Gu Fei, I wanna talk to you about something.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Maybe my thoughts on this aren’t as fully considered as yours. I only want to go one step
at a time, dealing with whatever problems as they arise. A person’s gotta have something to
look forward to, whether it’s about relationships or about life, you gotta first have a
direction, to guide the things you do.” Jiang Cheng said. “At least that’s the way I am.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded again.
“When I set out to do something, I don’t like to preemptively label it as
‘impossible’ right off the bat, you know what I mean?” Jiang Cheng continued.
“I do.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“I don’t have anything more to say, only that you promise me one thing.” He looked fixedly
at Gu Fei.
“Go ahead.” Gu Fei gazed back at him.
“Don’t just let me go.” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t just walk away without a care as soon as I
say forget it. Pester me for a little while longer, will you? What if I
change my mind and turn around, but you’re not there anymore?”
Gu Fei suddenly felt a twinge in his nose. He sucked in a breath and forcefully suppressed
the unsettling emotions. He didn’t want to shed tears in front of Jiang Cheng.
“Alright,” He nodded. “But you also have to promise me.”
“What?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I don’t like people having to sacrifice for me, to give something up because of me,” Gu Fei
felt that this was probably the most direct he could be to Jiang Cheng. “I don’t need it. You
walk whatever path you need to, do not stop, do you understand? Pity, giving up, all of that
makes me feel pressured. It tires me out.”
“Understood.” Jiang Cheng pinched Gu Fei’s chin. “I am very resolute in my goals.”
Gu Fei smiled.
“Do you think you’re very light?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Hm?” Gu Fei was confused.
“Even if you only weigh 25 kg, have you considered how much a knee weighs when it’s
pressed against a human hand?” Jiang Cheng said. “I can calculate it for you.”
Gu Fei laughed and moved away the leg that kept Jiang Cheng’s hand pinned down this
whole time.
“I want revenge.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Sure,” Gu Fei said. “How? Pin my hand down for 5 minutes with your 25 kg leg?”
“Do you for a whole class period,” Jiang Cheng yanked on Gu Fei’s shoulder and rolled
himself on top of him. “With all 1.8 m of little Chengcheng.”
“……Do you have a ruler so I can measure if little Chengcheng really is 1.8 m?”
Gu Fei started laughing.
“Your uh, you know, has it recovered yet?” Jiang Cheng leaned in close to Gu Fei’s ear and
asked quietly.
“What?” Gu Fei asked while laughing.
“Thy ass.” Jiang Cheng tsked audibly. “What are you fucking pretending for.”
“Ah,” Gu Fei laughed even harder. “It’s recovered. Would mister like to use it?”
“Fucking hell,” Jiang Cheng straddled him and slapped his arm. “I’ve realized that you really
are itching to be screwed.”
“Hurry up and screw me,” Gu Fei thrusted his hips, trailed his finger tip down Jiang Cheng’s
abdomen and tugged on his waistband. “Do you want me to pass on some experience to
you?”
“My ability to learn,” Jiang Cheng grabbed his wrists and locked them above his head. “Has
always been very good.”
When in a romantic relationship, a lot of things can be resolved with a tumble between the
sheets.
In fact, Jiang Cheng felt like their chat today hadn’t actually resolved any real problem. The
answer he was after……what kind of answer he was actually after, he no longer
remembered. As for what kind of explanation Gu Fei gave him, he suddenly didn’t care so
much anymore.
Even though what he said and what Gu Fei said were actually contradictory on some level.
However, they also gave each other their promise, even though the other person’s request
went against their original intention.
Perhaps all he needed was to let it out this once, to show a bit of temper, psychologically
and physiologically. I have some thoughts I need you to know. I have some desires I need you
to shoulder.
Of course, Jiang Cheng knew that some things had no solution at this moment, but at least
they were together.
When Jiang Cheng walked out of the bathroom, Gu Fei was lying on his
stomach playing with his phone. He walked over and grabbed Gu Fei’s butt,
“How come you’re facing down again? Does it……hurt?”
“No,” Gu Fei turned his head. “Can you please use the observation skills on par with your
overachiever status for a second, most of the time I play with my phone I’m lying face
down.”
“Ah, really?” Jiang Cheng thought for a second, then flopped down next to him and said
quietly, “You don’t need to spare my feelings if it’s uncomfortable, I can only improve if I
know what’s lacking.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He tossed his phone aside and dissolved into laughter on the pillow.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng got off the bed and sat down in front of his desk. “My ego is fucking
bruised.”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei shifted to the edge of the bed and stroked Jiang Cheng’s leg.
“I have something honest to tell you.”
“Go ahead.” Jiang Cheng opened a textbook.
“It feels good, really.” Gu Fei said. “Cheng-ge is 2.8 m today.”
Jiang Cheng cocked his head and shot a sidelong look at him, “I’m telling you.
With this attitude, if it was anyone else I’d have beaten them to death already.
It’s only because it’s you that I tolerate this.”
“It’s the same with me,” Gu Fei said. “I can never get mad when it comes to you, I’m just
afraid of you getting mad.”
“What’s there to be afraid of. Sure I get mad, but when I’m over it I’m over it. I have a bad
temper anyways. It’ll be a miracle if I don’t get mad.” Jiang Cheng spun the pen in his hand
and bowed his head as he started to work on test questions. “And it’s not like I had to
throw a fit, I’m just……scared.”
“I know,” Gu Fei sat up and rubbed Jiang Cheng’s back. “I know.”
“Do you know, Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng said as he continued writing, his voice was a little low.
“I don’t have a home anymore. It’s just me on my own, here, with a rented apartment.
There’s nothing under my feet.”
Gu Fei looked at him.
“If I lean back, and you’re behind me, I feel reassured.” Jiang Cheng’s pen scribbled nonstop
on the page. “It’s not that I don’t want to face reality, it’s just that when I think of you not
being by my side anymore, I really will be just, stepping on thin air.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. He got up and straddled the chair, squeezing behind Jiang
Cheng, and wrapped his arms around his waist.
The room became very quiet. Gu Fei leaned his head on Jiang Cheng’s back. He could hear
the scratching of the pen against paper, could hear the steady sound of Jiang Cheng’s
breathing, and if he pressed in even closer, he could hear Jiang Cheng’s heartbeat.
It was a very pleasant feeling.
“I’m here.” Gu Fei said quietly.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng replied, his pen still moving.
Gu Fei often felt very impressed with this ability of his. On several occasions when Jiang
Cheng was working on an English essay, he wrote a huge block of text while keeping up a
conversation, and apparently made no mistakes either.
“I’m right here, behind you. I’m not going anywhere.” Gu Fei said. “Don’t be scared.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Gu Fei closed his eyes.
Let’s leave it at that. Be like Jiang Cheng, and not dwell on certain things for now. If you
don’t want to be reminded of it, then I won’t remind you. If you don’t think it’s important,
then I won’t keep thinking about it…… Such a precious memory, such a precious
experience. Perhaps it’s the only time we get to run freely in our whole lives.
Whenever you want to look back, I’m right here. Whenever you’re missing home, I’m right
here. Whenever you need me, I’m right here. I’ll be standing here for as long as I can.
The summer break at Fourth High finally came to an end. The returning students cursed
and grumbled their dissatisfactions as they went back to school, but no one was absent.
Everyone seemed to be in pretty good spirits.
On one hand they complained about the shortness of the break, and on the other hand
found it lonely not seeing all their classmates every day.
After the cram school started, it was time to make merriment out of pain.
Nope, there was definitely more merriment around.
Jiang Cheng looked around at the other students, not one of them was listening to the
lecture. The teacher was up at the lectern talking to himself, while the students below
chatted excitedly about what they were up to over the break, not even bothering to control
their volume.
“Yell! Yell a little louder! I can’t hear it clearly from where I’m standing!” Lao-Lu waved his
pointer stick around. “I’m talking about you! You, right there!
Don’t look around, you’re the most beautiful one here! Pick up a mirror and check out that
saggy laziness on your own face, and you think it’s beautiful! Oh you’re so beautiful! Come
on! Readyyyy, sing!”
“Didn’t you hear him,” Jiang Cheng was slumped over his desk taking notes, and glanced at
Gu Fei, who had been looking at him the whole time. “Get a mirror and start singing, you’re
so beautiful……” [2]
“You’re the flower bud in the chilling winter, you’re the beauty that disturbed the water of
spring, ” Gu Fei chuckled and started singing quietly. “You’re the blessing akin to an angel,
you’re my most favoured imperial……”
“GU FEI!” Lao-Lu slammed on the lectern.
Gu Fei turned to look at Lao-Lu.
“Come on up, I have a mirror here.” Lao-Lu beckoned at him. “Come look in it and sing a few
lines for me!”
“……It wasn’t me.” Gu Fei leaned back in his chair and sighed.
Jiang Cheng was certain that there was no way Lao-Lu heard Gu Fei’s singing.
Gu Fei kept his voice very quiet, Zhou Jing probably didn’t even hear him. But with Lao-Lu’s
roar, his heart still jumped to his throat and trembled for a good while.
“It wasn’t you?” Lao-Lu slammed on the lectern again. “If you weren’t singing, then get out
of here!”
“So should I sing, or shouldn’t I.” Gu Fei stood up in resignation and sauntered out of the
classroom. In the corridor outside, he leaned over the railing and looked down on the field.
Lao-Lu continued shouting for another two minutes before resuming class.
Jiang Cheng listened to the lecture as he tested just how wide his peripheral vision was, and
how clearly he could see out of the corner of his eyes. The conclusion was, if he counted the
power-up from the fact that “he liked that handsome guy outside way too much”, his
peripheral vision was shockingly powerful.
He listened to class and took notes. At the same time, he could see the back of Gu Fei’s
figure very clearly.
Black t-shirt, grey athletic shorts; a most ordinary outfit of a high school student.
Yet Jiang Cheng could still see his tall and slender figure, his toned waist, his long and
straight legs……
“JIANG CHENG!” Lao-Lu roared. “Get up here and translate this sentence!”
Jiang Cheng could sense that out in the corridor, Gu Fei turned to look inside the classroom.
He drew back his wandering thoughts, stood up, and walked to the front of the room.
After looking over the question, he picked up a piece of chalk and out of habit, snapped it
on the lectern before getting ready to write on the board. At this, Lao-Lu roared again,
“WHAT KIND OF CRAPPY HABIT IS THIS! SO
WASTEFUL!”
Jiang Cheng sighed, put the chalk back in the box, and picked out a fresh one.
This time he didn’t snap it before writing on the blackboard.
“And this isn’t wasteful?” Lao-Lu said.
“Mr. Lu, should I answer this or not?” Jiang Cheng looked to him.
“You go ahead,” Lao-Lu waved his hand. “I’m just taking this chance to educate you a little.”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng continued writing.
After he finished answering the question and went back to his seat, Jiang Cheng could see
through the window that Gu Fei had already turned around, and was now leaning back
against the railing. When their eyes met, Gu Fei quirked a smile, and Jiang Cheng narrowed
his eyes slightly. Everyone in the class was still looking at him, so he didn’t dare show any
overt communication with Gu Fei.
Though it only took the slightest upward curve of Gu Fei’s lips for Jiang Cheng to fill in at
least two gigabytes of material in his mind.
For some reason, even though they clearly went through a disagreement, and even though
nothing of substance came out of that disagreement, he still felt much lighter.
Cram school was no doubt boring to Gu Fei, but to Jiang Cheng it was an extremely busy
time.
Aside from the review material from Fourth High, Pan Zhi would send him a zip file every
couple of days containing the review and study material of various subjects from the
teachers at his old school.
Gu Fei figured Jiang Cheng was some kind of god. From cram school to the official start of
class, he reviewed double the study materials every day, and still found the time to roll
around between the sheets.
“Are you secretly on a drug or something?” Gu Fei stood at the window with a cigarette in
his mouth, and said as he looked outside.
He had snuck away after tucking Gu Miao into bed earlier, and had originally planned on
keeping Jiang Cheng company while he studied. He planned to pretend to flip through some
books so Jiang Cheng could feel a little more reassured, but they ended up going at it as
soon as he came through the door.
And now, other than a lingering desire for more, all thoughts of putting up a serious
studying facade had disappeared in action.
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng dried his hair as he sat down to do some reading. “You say that as if
you don’t feel the need.”
“No, I mean,” Gu Fei chuckled as he straddled the chair behind Jiang Cheng.
The weather was very hot at this point, but Jiang Cheng liked it when he sat like this. “I’m
just marveling at all this energy you have.”
“There are two kinds of rest, active rest and passive rest……” Jiang Cheng flipped open a
textbook.
“Mhm, so what we did counts as active rest, right?” Gu Fei said.
“Right.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Can I snooze for a bit?” Gu Fei hugged him.
“Snooze away,” Jiang Cheng stroked his hand. “I’ll wake you in half an hour.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei closed his eyes. “Did Lao-Xu call you to his office today to cheer you on
again?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng put his pen down. “I forgot to tell you, you know how there’s supposed to
be some kind of award ceremony at the end of Sports Day?”
“What,” Gu Fei looked up and frowned. “Don’t tell me he’s looking to get you for the show?”
“He said senior year students have to come up with two performances in all, one from the
boys and one from the girls.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What does he want you for?” Gu Fei asked.
“To play a song,” Jiang Cheng said. “Lao-Xu said you……can play the guitar?”
“Lots of people know how to play the guitar, even Jiuri plays.” Gu Fei suddenly felt a little
irritated. He knew now what Lao-Xu was thinking. Lao-Xu wanted the two of them to
collaborate on a performance together. Knowing that Gu Fei would refuse, Lao-Xu went to
Jiang Cheng first.
“I’m saying,” Jiang Cheng turned his head. “Didn’t you say that you don’t play the guitar?”
“I……said that?” Gu Fei asked.
“You did.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Probably ‘cause we didn’t know each other very well at the time.” Gu Fei pressed his face
against Jiang Cheng’s back and nuzzled.
“Alright, then Lao-Xu’s suggestion……what are your thoughts?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m not participating.” Gu Fei answered.
Footnotes

[1] A line from an (yet another) old song called Sailor. It’s basically about how the narrator
as a sailor will brave through the wind and rain, tears and hurt, all for the realization of a
childhood dream. ↩
[2] Beautiful – Wang Leehom. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5929
TL word count: 4218
TL time: 4:28:53
Edit time: 1:01:12
Curse words: 6x fucks, 1x shit, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
“I will like you until you don’t need me to like you anymore.” -> Ch. 55 OTL
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: May 5, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 85
“Fuck the diem as they say, we’ll do it tonight then.”
Jiang Cheng was actually a little annoyed today, which was why he didn’t tell Gu Fei the
reason Lao-Xu called him into the office earlier.
Gu Fei once said that he didn’t know how to play the guitar, so earlier today when he
suddenly heard Lao-Xu say “Gu Fei plays the guitar, why don’t you two work on a program
together”, he felt a strange urge to rush over and beat Lao-Xu up.
Why beat up Lao-Xu? Who knows. After all, he was also the one who told him last time that
Gu Fei liked to drink tea.
This dog-fucker Gu Fei lied to him.
I don’t know how to play the guitar. It sounded so real.
Although, the reason Gu Fei just gave also made sense. The two of them were nothing more
than mere desk-mates at that time. For someone like Gu Fei who never participated in any
group activities in the school, if it wasn’t for the basketball tournament last time, he would
probably speak no more than ten sentences to his classmates all semester if he could help
it. It was normal that he didn’t tell him the truth.
Only, Jiang Cheng couldn’t quite understand why Gu Fei always lingered on the fringe of his
classmates, never joining in the school events, and never really interacting with his peers
either. At most he would go have some meat pies at Wang Xu’s place.
Frankly, Jiang Cheng didn’t much like hanging around with a bunch of other students
either. Pan Zhi also said before that he was a bit of a loner. Yet unlike Gu Fei, he would still
participate in school events and occasionally go out with his peers.
When Lao-Xu was telling him about the performance, he already knew that Gu Fei wouldn’t
agree to it. And now, as expected, Gu Fei had refused, and rather decisively too.
Even though he had already guessed the outcome, he was still somewhat disappointed.
To perform a program for a Fourth High school event isn’t anything to write home about,
but if it’s the two of them collaborating, it’s a whole nother ordeal altogether. More
importantly, he wished for other people to see a different Gu
Fei, to see a different side to the quiet and aloof troublemaker who no one dared offend. To
see his talents. He wanted them all to see how Gu Fei could shine.
He wanted everyone around them to see how Gu Fei was different from the rest.
And for Gu Fei to see, just how extraordinary he was.
Sitting behind him, Gu Fei did not speak up again. He had his arms around Jiang Cheng, and
his head leaned against his back. Judging by the sound of his breathing, he must be asleep.
After class officially began for the semester, Gu Fei stopped arranging photoshoots for Jiang
Cheng, but did not lessen the workload at all for himself.
There would always be a couple of afternoons a week when he skipped class, and often had
to shoot into the evening as well.
It must be really tiring. Jiang Cheng bowed his head and gently stroked Gu Fei’s hands. How
exactly did this person manage to live this kind of tedious life for all these years.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei shifted groggily behind him.
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng patted his hands. “Go to sleep.”
It would seem that Fourth High treated its senior year classes as though the rate of getting
into a university was nil. The preparation for Sports Day began as soon as the school year
started, and even the seniors were allowed to sign up and participate, while the ones who
were not participating could go watch during class time.
Compared to his old school, where starting from their last summer, it was as though all the
senior year students disappeared from the sight of everyone else in the school, Jiang Cheng
sincerely believed that this principal was somebody who genuinely treated professional
accomplishments as dirt.
Under these circumstances, he could only rely on himself. Even between classes, Jiang
Cheng remained unmoving in his seat, slumped over his desk. Pretty much everyone else in
the classroom was frolicking outside in the corridor. He swept a glance forward, and saw
that only Yi Jing and him were still here studying.
And of course, the captain Wang Jiuri, who was silently studying her from his seat one row
behind.
“I have to pee.” Gu Fei was flopped over a textbook, looking at him with his head turned.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“I have to go to the washroom.” Gu Fei said again.
“Go on.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ay…” Gu Fei sighed. “Let’s go. Together.”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Stretch a little,” Gu Fei said. “You haven’t moved that spot all morning.”
After Gu Fei dragged him out of the classroom, Jiang Cheng did feel that his neck was a little
sore. Even his arms were sore. He sighed as he rotated his joints, “So I’ve never been this
nervous prior to a test before, not sure what’s going on this time. I keep getting the feeling
that with one less glance at the books I’m going to miss something important.”
“Well it’s not just any ordinary test this time, is it.” Gu Fei put one hand on the back of Jiang
Cheng’s neck and started massaging him. “I bought a little present for you, it arrived today.
Why don’t you come get it with me after school.”
“What present?” Jiang Cheng blinked, then leaned in closer and asked in a quiet voice.
“Don’t tell me you fucking went and bought some shameless sex toy?”
“……Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei blinked as well, then sighed as he also answered in a quiet voice. “Do
your fangirls know that your head is filled with obscene material?”
“It was just a casual question.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“It’s a very serious present.” Gu Fei chuckled as he said. “Truly, I realize now how much
more innocent I am compared to you, when it comes to filling in the blank with lewd
content.”
“Give me a break,” Jiang Cheng glanced around and lowered his voice. “As if you’re short on
tricks.”
“That’s different, I only express it in two ways.” Gu Fei said. “One is just thinking about it in
my own head, and the other one is putting it directly into action. Unlike you.”
“……Right, you’re right sir, so damn innocent.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Well then I only have
one way, and that’s talk.”
Gu Fei kept it together for two whole seconds before he bursted out laughing.
Jiang Cheng giggled along with him all the way to the washroom, where they ran into Lao-
Xu coming out the door just as they were walking in.
“What’s the good news,” Upon seeing them, Lao-Xu started laughing along even while he
had no idea what they were laughing about. “Let me hear it too?”
“It’s all from holding in piss for too long.” Gu Fei went into the washroom.
“Just dumb giggles.” Jiang Cheng laughed along with Lao-Xu a little.
“Can you come by my office during your self-study period?” Lao-Xu said. “For a little chat.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered. He figured Lao-Xu was going to ask him about the
performance.
If Gu Fei didn’t want to join, then Jiang Cheng didn’t want to keep pushing him.
Just like last time when He Zhou invited them to play ball, Gu Fei didn’t end up going in the
end. Jiang Cheng had gone and played with He Zhou and the others once during cram
school times to let out some steam, but Gu Fei didn’t even go watch.
Which is why he didn’t want to say anything more this time. Nor did he want to ask why Gu
Fei was like this. He had thought before that there was something about Gu Fei that he
couldn’t quite put a finger on, and even now he couldn’t figure it out. On top of Gu Fei’s way
of keeping himself on the fringe of everything, Jiang Cheng didn’t really have the courage to
get to the bottom of this.
Gu Fei had said that he would be here, that he would be behind him, always.
That was enough.
That’s what it’s like to be in a relationship sometimes, it’s enough just to hold onto what felt
good.
“Ayy……” Lao-Xu sat down at his desk and sighed. “I thought since you two are so close and
won the tournament together last time, that he’d say yes if you talked to him.”
“He probably has his own ideas.” Jiang Cheng stood leaning against the edge of the desk.
“Then what are your ideas?” Lao-Xu looked at him.
If Gu Fei is not going to participate, then I’ll probably just forget it.
That was what Jiang Cheng thought. He wasn’t very interested in these kinds of
performances on their own. If Gu Fei didn’t want to join, then he honestly didn’t want to
bother at all. After all, rehearsing takes time.
But the expectation shining through Lao-Xu’s eyes made him swallow the words.
Lao-Xu was a good teacher with a low emotional acuity. He gave
wholeheartedly to his students in his own fumbling way. Even though the result was so
negligible that it could practically be ignored.
Yet the kindness and care Lao-Xu brought him since he arrived here, was impossible for
him to ignore.
After a few seconds of hesitation, he spoke up, “I……can do it, but it’s been a long time since
I touched a piano, and there’s not much time to rehearse these days……”
“Oh that’s alright that’s alright,” Lao-Xu said ecstatically. “Honestly you don’t need to feel
any pressure. And for me, I have my own selfish considerations too.
I’ve led so many students, but never met such a good kid as you. I’m just kind of proud……
Do you have any other thoughts on the performance? Do you still need a partner?”
“A partner?” Jiang Cheng hadn’t even considered what he wanted to play, but if Lao-Xu had
wanted him to play with Gu Fei before…… He considered it, then said without thinking,
“Let’s get another guitar then.”
“Okay okay,” Lao-Xu stood up a little too excitedly, and paced around his office a few times.
“Let me think who else there is, let me think…… I’ll let you know when I think of someone,
you head back to class to study.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t continue discussing the performance with Gu Fei, and Gu Fei didn’t ask.
After school, the two of them went straight to the convenience store. Gu Fei went into the
inside room and brought out a cardboard box, placing it on the counter.
“This……” Jiang Cheng started laughing as soon as he saw what it was. “You’re way too……
adorable.”
He never would’ve guessed that Gu Fei would give him a shawl-style shoulder massager.
“Give it a try?” Gu Fei opened the box. “Apparently it feels really good, as though somebody
is kneading your shoulders.”
Jiang Cheng glanced toward the back courtyard. Gu Fei’s mom was standing there talking
on the phone, it made him a little uneasy.
“Go in the room,” Gu Fei gave him a little shove. “I told my mom I bought this for you.”
“Didn’t she think it’s strange?” Jiang Cheng went to sit down in the inner room.
“That you’re buying this for your desk-mate?”
“What’s so strange about it,” Gu Fei said. “Li Yan even bought me a foot soaking tub before,
complete with infrared and massaging functions……way more fantastical than this thing.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, “Why do you guys all have such fascinating ideas.”
Gu Fei took the massager out and wrapped it around his shoulder, then turned it on.
The massager instantly started making thumping sounds. Jiang Cheng could feel something
continue to knock against his shoulder.
“How is it?” Gu Fei bent down and looked at his face. “Does it work? Does it get to the right
spots?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. This thing is actually quite powerful, it really feels like
someone is knocking on his shoulder. “It feels pretty good……can you move it a little
lower?”
Gu Fei shifted the massager a little lower, “Here?”
“Ah……” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes. “Yes yes, ah…… Fuck, it really does feel good.”
“Can you not make this kind of noise?” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng froze, then stared at Gu Fei for a long time before suddenly closing his eyes and
letting out a moan, “Ah……mnng……hah……”
It was much too genuine of a moan. Jiang Cheng wondered if he might have gotten a little
too into it too quickly.
“I……fuck?” Gu Fei stood frozen for a good while before managing to say.
“Right here?” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes and grinned.
“You really are asking for it!” Gu Fei said in resignation with a lowered voice.
He turned to glance at the outer room, then lunged over and grabbed Jiang Cheng, planting
a couple of firm kisses on his lips.
Jiang Cheng was just about to reach his hand toward Gu Fei’s crotch, when Gu Fei’s mom
suddenly shouted outside, “Ah Da-Fei! I’m going out okay——”
Gu Fei had just closed the door of the small room, but Jiang Cheng was still so startled that
he almost slapped his own face in his scramble to draw his hand back.
Gu Fei didn’t answer, nor did he open the door to go out. Instead he drew open the curtains.
The window of the small room faced the street. As soon as the curtains were drawn, Jiang
Cheng could see the motorcycle parked outside the front door. It had only been a moment
but Gu Fei’s mom had already jumped onto the
backseat, grabbed the rider’s waist, and almost immediately, the bike set off.
Even though it was quick, Jiang Cheng was still able to make out that the motorcyclist’s
head was shaved on either side, with a long ponytail tied in the middle.
“This is……your mom’s new boyfriend?” Jiang Cheng was a little shocked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei put the curtains back down. “It’s only her good luck that nobody’s sold her
into the mountains all these years, though she’s probably above their age limit.”
It made Jiang Cheng want to laugh, but after a moment’s thought, he also felt a little down.
Looking at Gu Fei’s side profile, he could understand almost exactly what Gu Fei was feeling
right now.
And perhaps understand some of the things he had been feeling all this time.
Jiang Cheng’s phone was ringing. It took a long time before he pulled it out to look.
Wang Jiuri.
“Hello?” Jiang Cheng answered the phone.
“Jiang Cheng!” Wang Xu’s excited voice came over the receiver. “What do you think of me?!”
Jiang Cheng was baffled by this question out of the blue. After a pause, he answered
earnestly, “Not very much.”
“Shit, don’t be like that!” Wang Xu was a little worked up. “I can play the guitar pretty well!
If you don’t believe me I can play something for you…… You wait here, I’m gonna go get the
guitar……”
“No no, no need,” Jiang Cheng only now realized what Wang Xu was referring to. He glanced
in Gu Fei’s direction. “If you wanna join then go ahead.”
“You don’t need to consider our friendship either, I’ll send over a clip to you in a bit.” Wang
Xu said seriously. “You can check out my skill first.”
“……Sure.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Hey,” Wang Xu lowered his voice. “What song should we do?”
“I’ll talk to you about it at school tomorrow,” Jiang Cheng said. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“No problem, you can check out my skill level first!” Wang Xu said. “Although
I have a suggestion, let’s not do something that’s too popular, there’s not much point in
that. You’re great at piano anyways, just pick something no one’s heard of……”
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” Jiang Cheng hung up.
For some reason, even though it was Gu Fei who didn’t want to participate, he still didn’t
want to be discussing this with someone else in front of Gu Fei.
After all, it was something he originally wanted to do with Gu Fei. But now, not only were
they not doing it together, there was instead a Wang Jiuri stuck in the middle. It was a little
upsetting just to think about it.
“You’re……gonna do the show with Wang Xu?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah, yeah,” Jiang Cheng said. “Didn’t you say that he also plays the guitar?”
“He does,” Gu Fei nodded. “Though you probably have to write down the tabs for him, he
only plays by the tabs.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei’s words got him even more down. If he played with Wang Xu, the guitar section
would probably be some basic chords at most. But if it was Gu Fei……
with the way Gu Fei composed music……
Gu Fei’s music.
Gu Fei’s music?
Jiang Cheng figured his eyes must’ve lit up. Perhaps there was even a little lightbulb coming
out of his head.
He looked up and smiled at Gu Fei.
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked back at him.
“Let’s cook some frozen dumplings to eat, after that I have to go back and do homework.”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Alright,” Gu Fei asked as he opened the door and walked out of the room.
“What filling do you want?”
“Fennel.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Don’t have that.” Gu Fei paused.
“Then……” Jiang Cheng pondered over what other flavour to switch to.
“I’ll go buy it.” Gu Fei said. “They have that over by the market, just wait.”
Jiang Cheng was about to say no need to make a trip just for that, but Gu Fei was already
out the door.
Tsk.
He stood up, followed to the doorway and looked out. Gu Fei was already on his way to the
market with his bike. Jiang Cheng raised his arms to stretch, then sat down behind the cash
register.
Tsk tsk tsk.
He had just sat down, when Wang Xu’s message came in. It was a short video clip.
The recording was of a very sombre-faced Wang Xu playing the guitar.
He hadn’t even opened it, when Wang Xu continued to send over several more videos.
– some of these were recorded before, have a listen
Jiang Cheng chuckled and opened the video.
He was surprised to find that Wang Xu was not half bad. He wondered how it would
compare with Gu Fei…… Though he thought it probably would not
compare. After all Gu Fei was someone who once played in a band and even wrote his own
music but he didn’t want to participate so it was all meaningless anyway. Wang Xu’s skill
level could be considered cream of the crop among the average dudes who only played to
pick up girls.
In the videos he sent, there were ones of Wang Xu singing with his own accompaniment, as
well as ones of just guitar playing. His singing was nothing to rave about, but the playing
was pretty good.
Gu Fei practically flew on his bike to the market, bought the dumplings, then flew right
back to the store.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say that he must have the fennel filling dumplings, but he still wanted to
make the trip.
Regarding the fact that he didn’t want to participate in the performance, Jiang Cheng didn’t
so much as say another word about it, nor did he willingly bring it up to Gu Fei in the past
few days. Gu Fei couldn’t quite guess what Jiang Cheng was thinking, but he knew that he
must’ve been a little unhappy.
Right now, even if Jiang Cheng was craving the grilled meat from the barbecue restaurant in
the shopping center, he’d fly there and buy it without any hesitation, let alone some
dumplings.
He had no way of explaining himself, so he could only try his best to smooth out Jiang
Cheng’s feathers.
He could guess why Jiang Cheng wanted him to participate in the performance.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t someone who liked to show off in this particular area. It was only
because it would be the two of them together, and also because……
“You’re clearly so excellent.” Jiang Cheng had already said this before.
You’re clearly so excellent.
He would feel proud for Jiang Cheng, and Jiang Cheng would also feel proud because of him.
Only, the more that was the case, the more he wanted to break away.
Certain resolves could not bear to see the tiniest shred of hope. Even a small glimmer of
light would make him descend into anguish.
When he returned to the store, Jiang Cheng was sitting with his legs propped up on the
counter, scribbling something into a notebook. He didn’t even notice when Gu Fei came in.
Only when Gu Fei got near did Jiang Cheng abruptly raise his head, and closed the
notebook, “Damnit, how come you didn’t even make a sound when coming in?”
“How loud does it have to be to count as making a sound,” Gu Fei saw that Jiang Cheng was
writing down music, and couldn’t help but marvel. The overachiever Jiang Cheng could
make even sheet music look ugly. “Does somebody coming in and hauling away all the
merchandise count as making a sound?”
“Why don’t you try hauling it and see if I hear?” Jiang Cheng said with a smile.
Gu Fei thought that Jiang Cheng was in a pretty good mood. He reached out and stroked
Jiang Cheng’s face, then walked to the back courtyard to cook the dumplings.
“What will Gu Miao eat?” Jiang Cheng followed him.
“She’ll make her way here later when she gets hungry, I’ll just save some for her.” Gu Fei
said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied, then turned back into the store with light steps.
Gu Fei was suddenly a little curious. What kind of music was Jiang Cheng writing that put
him in such a good mood……or was it Wang Xu who put him in such a good mood?
……That’s not very likely.
If that was the case then he would have to have a little chat with Wang Xu.
After the dumplings, Jiang Cheng gathered his stuff and got ready to head back to his
apartment, “Are you coming over tonight?”
“Yep,” Gu Fei nodded. “I’ll come over after Er-Miao’s asleep.”
“Wha—” Jiang Cheng lowered his voice. “The way you keep sneaking out every night, does
she not suspect anything?”
“Nope.” Gu Fei said. “And it’s not every day……Though I would like to go every day.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he leaned in close and nuzzled his nose gently against Gu Fei’s
cheek, then went to pick up his backpack, “Then why don’t you bring me a snack when you
come over tonight.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei grabbed his arm and pulled toward himself. “Give me a kiss before you
leave.”
“Hey hey hey,” Jiang Cheng glanced out the door nervously. “Be mindful of the
surroundings.”
Gu Fei turned back to have a look, there was no one outside, so he leaned in and chomped
down on Jiang Cheng’s neck.
“Day after day like this,” Jiang Cheng touched his neck. “A bite here and a bite there, how
about next time you put some sauce on it, to make it go down better.”
“Good idea,” Gu Fei squinted his eyes slightly and looked him up and down, finally stopping
the gaze below his abdomen. “Chocolate sauce, or peanut butter, or mayonnaise……”
“Go away!” Jiang Cheng realized what he meant, and pointed a finger at him.
“And you call me shameless!”
“I follow my words with action,” Gu Fei pulled out a cigarette and put it in his mouth. “Fuck
the diem as they say, we’ll do it tonight then.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5753
TL word count: 3972
TL time: 3:04:20

Edit time: 0:37:05

Curse words: 5x fucks, 1x shit
TL’s Notes:
Last chap was so knife~
On the other hand, someone is starting to retranslate this into Spanish
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: May 11, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 86
“Sa Ye.”
“We gotta wash the sheets.” Jiang Cheng was lying face down against the pillow.
He said with his eyes closed.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng asked, eyes still closed.
“Not yet 11 o’clock.” Gu Fei said. “You still have time to study good sir.”
Jiang Cheng sighed and climbed out of bed. He stood up, then glanced back at the bed again,
“You. Right now. Go change the sheets.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded while leaning against the headboard.
“Let’s move it!” Jiang Cheng reached his hands beside Gu Fei’s ears and clapped. “Move
along!”
“……Where did you learn that!” Gu Fei jumped at the sudden clapping. “Did I not move
enough for you just now.”
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng grabbed his pyjamas.
Gu Fei asked after him, “Should I make a sandwich for you as a snack?”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng walked out of the bedroom.
“What kind of dressing would you like?” Gu Fei continued. “Mayonnaise or ketchup or……”
“No dressing!” Jiang Cheng turned and yelled.
He could hear Gu Fei’s laughter coming from the bedroom.
“I’ll smack you if you keep laughing!” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei’s laughter immediately quieted down.
After his shower, or more accurately, after he washed all the jam off of him, Jiang Cheng
went back to the room. Gu Fei had already changed all the sheets.
The sauce covered bedding from before were all folded and placed on a stool.
There was a little plate on the desk next to his pile of study materials, on it were some ham
and lettuce sandwiched between two slices of plain bread, with a glass
of milk beside it.
“I’m going to shower.” Gu Fei said.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng sat down at the desk and grabbed the plate.
He liked to have night snacks when he studied. Probably due to the extensive brain use, he
would start feeling hungry and sleepy around 11 p.m., and only be able to continue after
having had something to eat.
That was the case right now, especially since he not only exerted his brain, but his body as
well.
However, he picked up the sandwich, looked at it, then put it down again. Two slices of
toast, with only ham and lettuce in the middle. Gu Fei really did strictly abide by his orders
and did not put any dressing on it. But a sandwich like this……
Elicited no appetite from him at all!
Just from appearance it looked like it tasted bad.
Dry bread without any mayonnaise or butter tastes bad even if there are meat and lettuce!
How unappealing!
It definitely tastes bad!
However…… Jiang Cheng glanced at the jars on the side.
Tsk tsk tsk tsk!
Dammit, it’s like watching an adult video.
Even though the jams they used for the lewd activity before have no direct correlation with
the sauces in those jars, and it’s not like they used mayonnaise or butter……
Still, it’s a little difficult to swallow. As soon as he opened his mouth he would be reminded
of the graphic and inappropriate scenes.
That an overachiever, ever since he started hanging out with a slacker, started slipping off
into a shameless abyss. No wonder teachers and parents always advised against mixing
good students and slackers together.
Just look!
Look what happened!
By the time Gu Fei finished showering and came back to the bedroom, Jiang Cheng was still
spacing out at the jars.
“I also bought some yogurt drink,” Gu Fei got out more bread, quickly laid down some ham
and lettuce, then spread some mayonnaise on it and took a big bite.
“It’s in the fridge, want some?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Pretty good appetite you got there, huh.”
“These aren’t the ones I used before,” Gu Fei pointed at the jars. “I was using blueberry jam
and marmalade, and I scooped them out first too, it’s not like……”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng looked at him earnestly. “Shut up.”
Gu Fei smiled at him and didn’t continue. He finished his own sandwich in a few quick bites,
then pulled over the plate in front of Jiang Cheng and spread some mayonnaise and butter
onto the bread before handing it back to him.
Jiang Cheng sighed and took a bite. He really was hungry, and watching Gu Fei eat made
him even hungrier.
Having had his night snack, he turned on the lamp, flopped over the desk, and started to toil
away.
Gu Fei turned off the light in the room. He sat on the bed and watched Jiang Cheng with his
arms propped against the desk.
“You wanna copy the homework?” Jiang Cheng tossed the just finished
homework to Gu Fei.
“I’ll copy it tomorrow morning after I get up,” Gu Fei said. “I’m way too sleepy right now.”
“Your physique is a little lacking huh,” Jiang Cheng said as he went through the questions.
“And you have the audacity to have an after-smoke?”
“I didn’t today.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“……I forgot too.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Maybe I should go make up for it after this page.”
Gu Fei doubled over in laughter.
As a matter of fact, Jiang Cheng was still very good at concentrating on the questions once
he got started, especially the ones Pan Zhi gave him. They were clearly more difficult than
the ones from Fourth High. It was satisfying whenever he solved them.
When he finally looked up after finishing a set of mock tests, he rotated his neck and
glanced over at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was still sitting at the head of the bed with his elbow on the desk, but he was already
asleep.
Jiang Cheng stood up as quietly as he could, then walked out to the living room with a
cigarette in his mouth.
It was fully dark outside the window. The lights from other homes had all but gone out,
leaving only a spot of yellowish street lamp outside.
Jiang Cheng lit the cigarette and leaned on the windowsill.
It had been a while since he came here, but every time he noticed the scenery around him,
he still felt a faint sense of unfamiliarity. Occasionally it would even feel a little unreal.
In the span of almost a year, he had gone through not quite a lot, but every single thing was
enough for him to remember for the rest of his life.
At times he would marvel at how he came to move from a large bustling city, a key high
school, a not at all warm or comforting but at least normal family, to this place.
From disorder to having nothing, to…… He turned and glanced toward the bedroom.
The door to the bedroom was open. He could see a haze of warm glow inside.
Jiang Cheng stubbed the cigarette, washed up, then returned to his room and sat down at
the desk.
Gu Fei was still asleep, in the same pose as before. He leaned over and gently tapped Gu
Fei’s lips with his finger. Gu Fei didn’t move. He reached out his finger again and ever so
lightly poked the tip of Gu Fei’s nose. Gu Fei still didn’t move. Jiang Cheng quirked a smile
and reached out again for the spot between Gu Fei’s brows.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei suddenly opened one eye and said with sleep still in his voice. “I want to
tell you something.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng immediately withdrew his hand. “Did I wake you?”
“I wasn’t asleep,” Gu Fei closed his eye again. “I’m just resting my eyes.”
“Oy,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue. “I didn’t even rest my eyes after studying for the whole
night, but you’re getting eye fatigue from playing with your phone?”
“I didn’t play today, this is from watching you.” Gu Fei smiled and picked up his phone to
check the time. “Go to sleep Cheng-ge, it’s already past 12 o’clock.”
“I’ll go to sleep right on time at 1 a.m.” Jiang Cheng said. “Why don’t you go to sleep
properly, stop resting your eyes.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei shifted downward a little and laid his head on the pillow.
Jiang Cheng didn’t close his books until 1:30 a.m. He turned the lamp off and felt his way to
bed in the dark. Gu Fei was probably in a deep sleep by now. He laid down carefully for fear
of waking him.
Gu Fei turned over just as he laid down and wrapped him in his arms, “Finally, it’s long past
1 o’clock.”
“……I thought you already fell asleep?” Jiang Cheng touched his arm.
“I did,” Gu Fei buried his face in Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “Told you I left a nerve on for you.”
“Go to sleep then,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Good night.”
“Good night.” Gu Fei knocked his teeth gently against Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
This opportunity to perform on stage was very important to Wang Xu. Or rather, he was
very fired up about this opportunity to show off on stage. He pulled Jiang Cheng to the
corridor first thing in the morning when he got to school.
“I asked Lao-Xu for the key to the music room. There’s a piano in there; I brought my guitar
too.” Wang Xu said. “What do you say you don’t go home for lunch today, let’s just grab
something to eat and then go practice?”
“I……haven’t finished arranging the music.” Jiang Cheng was a little
overwhelmed by Wang Xu’s feverish enthusiasm. “What about this
afternoon……”
“Lunchtime! I don’t need your sheet music anyway,” Wang Xu said. “You just need to tell me
my part.”
Jiang Cheng sighed, “You only have chords, though I don’t know how to write guitar……”
“You can play it for me, I’ll note it down myself.” Wang Xu said. “Lunchtime, don’t you go
running off at noon. Every day you and Gu Fei are nowhere to be found once class ends. If
you two must come as a package deal, then just let him listen in on our lunchtime practice
today.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng replied.
He didn’t continue to bargain with Wang Xu, lest he came up with any more nerve-
wracking words like that.
Captain Wang Jiuri knew a little too much. Good thing he wasn’t very sharp, otherwise Jiang
Cheng would have to consider silencing him permanently.
As soon as class let out for the morning, Wang Xu was standing outside the front door of the
classroom staring at him from a distance.
“You go ahead and eat with Wang Xu then,” Gu Fei glanced at Wang Xu. “I’m going home to
do some photo editing anyways, gotta submit it this afternoon.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He didn’t tell Gu Fei that he was going to play his music. It had special significance, so he
wanted it to be a little surprise.
Frankly, he was pretty impressed with himself. Having only heard it once, he was able to
pretty much get the music down from memory alone. Though there would no doubt be
some differences in the details, and it would be different still when modified into a piano
music……
Wang Xu dragged him to the pizza place across the street for lunch. He wanted to go get
something to drink next door, but Wang Xu didn’t give him a chance, as he got yanked back
to the school like they were going off to battle, heading straight for the music room.
To be honest, if Wang Xu hadn’t mentioned it, he wouldn’t even know that Fourth High had
a music room. He was surprised to find that there were quite a few other instruments in
there besides the piano.
“Come on,” Wang Xu flipped open the lid of the piano. “Play a little for me first? What’s the
song?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He suddenly realized he didn’t know what Gu Fei’s song was
called.
But it didn’t matter anyways.
“Untitled.” Jiang Cheng sat down on the bench.
“……Never heard of it.” Wang Xu blinked, then quickly leaned on the piano with a face full of
anticipation. “Play it for me, maybe I’ve heard it before but didn’t know it was called
‘Untitled’.”
“You’ve definitely never heard it before.” The moment Jiang Cheng rested his hands on the
keys, a feeling that was at once strange yet familiar extended out from his fingers.
How long had it been? All this time, he didn’t so much as look at a piano. The staggered
black and white before him. The unspeakable emotion it stirred when his fingertips
touched the keys.
He sat there unmoving for a long time.
“Um, Jiang Cheng,” Wang Xu looked at him with knitted brows. “Don’t fucking tell me you
were lying? Do you really know how to play?”
Jiang Cheng shot a glance at him but didn’t speak. He swept his fingers over the keys and
played a scale as a way to stretch his hands, to remember the feeling.
“Looking pretty legit.” Wang Xu nodded in relief. “Honestly you don’t seem like the type to
play piano, why don’t you start off with a ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ first?”
“Why don’t you get out of here first?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “If you have so much to
say why don’t you go find someone to talk to first?”
Wang Xu shut his mouth and didn’t say anything else.
Jiang Cheng stared down at his fingers and took a deep breath. He closed his eyes, and let it
out, before letting his fingers fall on the keys. The first note quickly took him into the
imagery crafted by Gu Fei’s music.
I step onto thin air, I feel like I am flying
 Upwards is the unknown, I look down and hear you say this is a vast and empty world……
You say one two three, breaking what’s gone by, fading
The way back home, blown apart by the wind, do you see me sing out…… You say one two
three turn around, listen to the panic wiped out……
Jiang Cheng didn’t look at music as he played. The piece wasn’t long, and he had just
written it out from memory, so he could pretty much play the whole thing with his eyes
closed.
He didn’t like piano. The sensation of his fingers touching the keys would fill his head with
the unpleasant and gradually fading memories.
But today was a little different. Perhaps because the melody flowing through his hands
carried Gu Fei’s essence, or perhaps because it was with a different attitude that he was
sitting here today.
He became lost in the notes. A few fumbles here and there were not enough to bring him
out of the state.
He lifted his fingers after playing the last note, and stared at the black and white keys in
front of him for a long time without moving.
An enthusiastic applause rang out from behind him. Jiang Cheng startled and whipped his
head around to see Lao-Xu standing in the doorway with an excited expression.
“Shit Xu-zong, what are you doing here.” Wang Xu was also startled by his sudden
appearance, but soon started clapping along. “Bravo! Jiang Cheng you really are……
astonishing, what a surprise! I really didn’t expect this! Bravo!”
“What is this piece?” Lao-Xu walked over. “I don’t think I’ve heard it before.”
“You probably haven’t heard of a lot of them, have you sir?” Wang Xu suddenly felt a small
sense of superiority.
“Then why don’t you tell me, what is this song?” Lao-Xu asked humbly.
“This song is called…… It’s called ‘Untitled’!” Wang Xu said, then looked at Jiang Cheng. “Hey
Jiang Cheng, tell Lao-Xu about it?”
“Untitled?” Lao-Xu blinked. “There’s a piano song with this name? Who’s the composer?”
“Err……” Jiang Cheng hesitated. It would be a little too hasty to simply name it
“Untitled”, but he also didn’t want to go ask Gu Fei. “The title hasn’t been……
decided.”
“Not decided?” Wang Xu was also a little shook, then after a long pause finally said. “Don’t
tell me you wrote this yourself?! The fuck?”
“No no no,” Jiang Cheng waved his hand right away. “Not me.”
“Then why is the title undecided?” Lao-Xu asked again.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little apprehensive. Knowing Gu Fei, he wasn’t sure if it would
be appropriate to come out and tell Wang Xu and Lao-Xu like this.
“Let’s just rehearse first,” He didn’t answer Lao-Xu’s question. “I’ll tell you……
when the time comes.”
“Hey!” Wang Xu yelled a little unhappily. “Trying to keep things from me again?!”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I’m just saying, Jiang Cheng you really are…… Ayy FINE I’m going to the washroom.” Wang
Xu turned grumpily and walked out of the classroom. “You can tell Xu-zong in private. Geez,
so secretive to your own partner……gotta
keep everything from me……”
Jiang Cheng watched his retreating figure and opened his mouth but didn’t make a sound.
“Did you write it yourself?” Lao-Xu sat down beside him excitedly.
“I really didn’t.” Jiang Cheng looked at Lao-Xu.
“Then who did?” Lao-Xu looked back at him in anticipation.
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply, then eventually said after a while, “If you need to submit
information for the program, just put my name down for the
arrangement.”
Lao-Xu was quiet for a while, then suddenly asked haltingly, “Is it……Gu Fei?”
Jiang Cheng turned and stared at him in shock.
“Is it? It is!” Lao-Xu also stared at him. “I know that kid used to play in a band when he was
in middle school, but I never asked him about it. It’s way too hard to get through to him
with that personality, way too hard……”
“Wha—” Jiang Cheng was still shocked. “Sir, how do you know he played in a band?”
“I make the effort,” Lao-Xu sighed. “To get to know every single one of you students. It’s the
only way I can be responsible to every student. That was something Gu Fei’s mom told me
once, otherwise I wouldn’t even know that he played the guitar.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t know how to continue the conversation, so he kept quiet.
“Gu Fei is a pretty good kid, it’s just so hard to communicate with him. In that way I’ve also
failed him as a head teacher.” Lao-Xu pressed on a key, suddenly a little dejected. “They all
say to never give up on any student, but it’s hard to hold onto every single student…… For a
kid like Gu Fei, even though I circle him round and round, I still can’t get through to
him……”
Jiang Cheng stayed quiet. This time he really didn’t know what to say. He didn’t expect Lao-
Xu to open up to a student like this, so he also felt a little awkward even as thoughts filled
his mind.
“I’ve seen the photos Gu Fei takes,” Lao-Xu said. “What a talented kid. Such talent. It’s really
a shame if he continues to throw it away.”
Jiang Cheng still didn’t know what to say, he only sighed softly along with Lao-Xu.
When Wang Xu came back, Lao-Xu stood up and sat down on a nearby chair,
“You guys practice, I’ll just listen.”
“I still don’t know the music though,” Wang Xu picked up his guitar. After a trip to the
washroom, all his grumpiness was gone. When he picked up the guitar, he grew excited all
over again. “Jiang Cheng, just play the chords for me and tell me where to come in.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng pulled out the music he wrote and marked down the chords for Wang
Xu, then played it once for him.
If Wang Xu paid half as much attention in class as he was in this moment, Lao-Xu would
probably shed tears on the spot.
After he memorized his part, Wang Xu tried playing through it a couple of times,
“Like this, right?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Let’s try it together.”
As Wang Xu strummed his guitar along to the piano, Lao-Xu stood up in delight and walked
over to them.
A few bars later, Jiang Cheng paused and marked down a few changes to the music.
“Shit,” Wang Xu gently plucked the strings and said. “I suddenly feel like a master.”
“I’m the master.” Jiang Cheng said.
Wang Xu laughed at that, “Jiang Cheng you really are very thick-skinned sometimes.”
“I can afford to be.” Jiang Cheng swept a glance over him.
“Fuck, can you try being a little more modest.” Wang Xu looked at him. “How am I supposed
to continue from there?”
“You don’t have to continue.” Jiang Cheng set the music back on the stand.
“Let’s try that again.”
Wang Xu’s career as a class tyrant was a failure, but as a part of an instrumental duet, he
was not bad. He reacted quickly enough, and aside from the occasional half beat coming in
late, he didn’t make a lot of mistakes.
“How was that!” Wang Xu waved his arm as they came out of the music room.
“What did you think!”
“Mmn, pretty good.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“I’m parched, gonna go buy something to drink, want one too?” Wang Xu said.
“What do you wanna drink?”
“Lime black tea.” Jiang Cheng said. “Thanks.”
“What about Xu-zong?” Wang Xu looked to Lao-Xu.
“I’m going back to my office to have tea,” Lao-Xu said. “I can’t drink those things you kids
like, one sip and the sugary taste last all afternoon in my mouth.”
After Wang Xu went off to buy drinks, Jiang Cheng walked with Lao-Xu back to the
classroom. When Lao-Xu turned to head to his office, Jiang Cheng called out to him, “Xu-
zong.”
“What is it?” Lao-Xu turned around.
“Arrangement and performance by Jiang Cheng, Wang Xu on guitar.” Jiang Cheng said.
“That’s all. I’ll think of a title for the song and tell you in the next couple of days.”
“Oh,” Lao-Xu nodded, looking a little disappointed. “Okay okay.”
Jiang Cheng stuck his hands in his pockets and strolled slowly to class.
The title of the song……what should it be called?
The melody felt at the same time hazy and repressed, and the lyrics evoked the same
feeling. When listening to it, he felt an urge to lash out and shatter the constraints all
around him.
He had made some changes to the music when he wrote it down. Some parts he couldn’t
remember very clearly, while some parts felt too repressive. When he played it, there were
a few places where he wanted to press down hard on the keys, to lift the notes up, to cry
out.
I want to
Run free without a care
In your eyes
I want
One look to last
A lifetime
He took out his phone and called Lao-Xu, “Xu-zong, the song is called ‘Sa Ye’.”
[1]

Footnotes
[1] Run Freely (T⌓T)
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5808
TL word count: 3802
TL time: 3:56:39
Edit time: 0:56:32
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x shit
TL’s Notes:
This is a good time to say, hey, there’s an official song!
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: May 17, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 87
“What’s going on!” Jiang Cheng turned to glare at Lao-Xu.
For this year’s Sports Days, it seemed as though every senior class except for Class-8 had
one of their students participate. Though the reason Class-8 didn’t contribute anyone
wasn’t because they were all working hard to prepare for the University Entrance Exams. It
was simply that Class-8 had no chance of winning any of the activities.
The way they played in the last basketball tournament could probably go down in the
school annals as the time the losers striked back.
Gu Fei was rather looking forward to the Sports Days. It spanned from Friday to Sunday,
which meant that starting from this afternoon, he could skip class with the excuse of
watching the games. For the self-study class and the cram school on the weekend, it would
be a miracle if there were even ten people in the classroom at that time.
The loudspeakers continued to report on the status of the various games since school
started in the morning, as well as the announcement scripts submitted by each class. They
all sounded the same. Gu Fei thought it was no different from the class announcements he
heard in elementary school.
On this crisp autumn day, we say welcome to our Fourth High’s somethingeth annual school
Sports Days. Colourful flags flutter on the field, crowds converge, there is excitement in the air.
Everyone is rubbing their hands together in anticipation to show off their skills and secure
honour for their class. Just look, on the racetrack of the 100 meter dash……
“Are you not coming to school this afternoon?” Jiang Cheng asked beside him.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei turned to him. “I’m gonna try to get a set of photos out this weekend. Of the
street scenes. The weather’s nice these days, I’m going to walk around this afternoon.”
“Is it for a magazine?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah, some newly established little magazine. I know one of the editors, he’s from around
here. I used to learn photography from him.” Gu Fei said quietly.
“If they use it……it’s a pretty big spread this time, with good pay too.”
“That’s great,” Jiang Cheng looked happier than he was. “What’s the theme?”
“‘What you don’t see of the small industrial city’. The shuttered factories, laid off workers,
that kind of stuff.” Gu Fei said. “I feel like it’s made exactly for the
Steel Works.”
“Will you still be taking photos tomorrow?” Jiang Cheng said. “I wanna come along and
watch.”
“Watch me or watch me take photos?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mostly you, and the photography on the side.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Try to keep a low
profile.”
Gu Fei also smiled with him and nodded, “Alright.”
Sunday afternoon was the award ceremony and the concert. For the last couple days, Wang
Xu had been dragging Jiang Cheng off to practice every chance he got. He was very
enthusiastic and determined when it came to showing off, especially since this time he
would be showing off something positive. It’d be a big help in improving his score in Yi
Jing’s mind.
Frankly Gu Fei wanted to ask how Jiang Cheng could have time to watch him take photos,
but he didn’t.
He still hadn’t brought up the concert to Jiang Cheng. He figured that if he did, the
conversation would veer off in the direction of “why don’t you want to participate”, on
which he had no way of adequately expressing himself. Besides, his boyfriend had said, if
he really didn’t want to say something, then he should keep it to himself and keep it well.
And so he had no choice but to comply.
Saturday was cram school. Jiang Cheng did not skip it. Only, looking at Gu Fei’s empty seat
beside him, he felt a little hollow.
There were quite a few empty seats in the classroom. Most people were outside watching
the games or had already left the school to frolic on their own. Even if the whole class was
empty, he wouldn’t have felt anything. His eyes only flitted back and forth between the
lectern and the seat beside him.
Sometimes when he stopped to think about it, it felt a little scary. It was only a day or two
of not seeing Gu Fei, and he was already not used to it. Once he finished writing the
University Entrance Exams next year, they would probably have to be apart……
He wasn’t afraid of the long distance, but he was afraid of not seeing Gu Fei whenever he
turned around.
The melodrama and panic were probably common to a first romance, especially the start of
a first romance.
Tsk.
How powerful it had to be, that it turned a whole grown guy into a sissy, that
thinking about his boyfriend was all he did.
And the boyfriend?
The boyfriend was out taking photos. Who knows if throughout the whole morning,
whether he had thought about anything other than composition and lighting and what not.
His phone vibrated once.
Jiang Cheng glanced down. Good Little Bunny.
– Wanna see some photos?
– No shit, show
Good Little Bunny sent over a few photos. Jiang Cheng took only one look and froze.
The photo showed a few dilapidated buildings. In the sun, shards of broken glass reflected
speckles of glittering light. Junk was scattered haphazardly all over the rooftop, but it didn’t
look dirty, only deserted. It was a scene of bleakness under the sunlight, a quiet without
any sign of life.
Jiang Cheng was very familiar with this place. It was where the Steel Works Morons went
building-hopping before.
And Gu Fei must’ve taken the photo from the rooftop where Jiang Cheng hid.
– you went there?
– mhm, look what I found
Good Little Bunny sent him another photo. It was of Gu Fei’s stretched open hand. In the
palm was a walnut.
Jiang Cheng was a little shocked. He must’ve dropped this on the rooftop when he was
taking walnuts out of the bag. After all this time, Gu Fei was able to find it.
Not to mention……
– you have such pretty hands
– ……where is your focus eh overachiever
Jiang Cheng laughed at himself as well. He looked through the photos again, then sent
another message.
– how many did you find?
– two, i’m keeping them
– they’ve probably gone bad already, what are you keeping those for
– it won’t rot if i preserve it, and i can look at it whenever i miss you Jiang Cheng stared at
that line for a long time. It took Lao-Lu bellowing at Wang Xu to rock his mind back to the
present. He swiftly sent back a reply.
– you can look at me whenever you miss me, what the hell are you looking at walnuts for
– then take a photo of yourself and send it over, i’m missing you right now Jiang Cheng
hesitated for a moment and opened up the camera app. He might be a narcissistic
overachiever, but he rarely took selfies, especially in class. He had never done such a dorky
thing before.
Although, when he was with Gu Fei, it would seem that he had done more than his share of
these dorky things, so what’s one more? Only, when he flipped the camera to the front, the
sudden appearance of nostrils and a gigantic face almost made him drop his phone.
Flipping scary it was.
Front facing cameras really are the perfect stealth weapon.
After a moment to gather himself, Jiang Cheng set the phone on the desk in front of him. He
might not be a frequent selfie taker, but he understood very well which angle most
flattered him. At the moment, he was the only one in the last row, and didn’t have to worry
about anyone seeing him.
He adjusted himself for the camera, then pressed the shutter.
“CLICK-CLACK”
Since Lao-Lu had just finished his bellowing, the few people left in the classroom were
quieter than usual. This “click-clack” sounded practically like a burst of thunder in Jiang
Cheng’s ears.
Clickity-boommmmm!
Clackity-banggggggg!
Though it might not sound quite as loud in his classmates’ ears, still when it happened,
several people turned around.
Jiang Cheng quickly flipped his phone down to the desk and directed his eyes forward
stoically.
Zhou Jing chose this moment to turn around, “Jiang Cheng, hey, Jiang Cheng are you
taking……”
Upon reflection, Jiang Cheng realized it was unfortunate that he had overlooked Zhou Jing’s
presence. As someone sitting one desk in front of him, not to mention someone who was
bored out of his mind, he would cease to be Zhou Jing if he didn’t turn around and ask.
Jiang Cheng picked up his English textbook and swatted it at Zhou Jing before he could
finish his sentence, “Shut up.”
“I!” Zhou Jing blinked, his expression shocked.
“ZHOU JING!” Lao-Lu bellowed. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING! ARE YOU
TRYING TO TAKE LESSONS FROM THE HONOUR STUDENT! LET ME
CLAP FOR YOU THEN! COME ON, HOW ABOUT YOU GO STAND
BESIDE MR. JIANG THERE AND LEARN FROM HIM!”
Zhou Jing quickly turned back and flopped down on his desk, then began to scribble
furiously.
– you better appreciate this photo, i went through a lot to get it
Jiang Cheng couldn’t even bear to look too closely at how the selfie turned out before he
sent it to Gu Fei. Then he reached into Gu Fei’s desk drawer, took out a piece of chocolate,
and tossed it onto Zhou Jing’s desk.
– Cheng-ge, with this level of skill you really can only take photos of yourself, no one else’s
face could stand up to this
– bootlicker
A few minutes later, Gu Fei sent him another photo.
Jiang Cheng only took one look, before he quickly saved the picture into the folder on his
phone named “Gu Feifei”.
It was a backlit silhouette of Gu Fei’s profile. He couldn’t see his expression, but against the
bright background, Gu Fei’s straight nose, slightly open lips, elegant jaw, and the tiny burst
of exposure centered around his lips……
Compared to Gu Fei’s selfie, his own was as unsightly as comparing buyers’
photos to the seller’s photos.
Though of course, Gu Fei was using a DSLR.
Come lunchtime, Gu Fei was still out taking photos. He sent a message to report on his
progress. Looking at his plan, Jiang Cheng figured he would be lucky to finish by
dinnertime.
Although he couldn’t eat lunch with Gu Fei anyways. Wang Xu had already leapt to his side
as soon as the bell rang, “Come on come on let’s go! I sat here for a whole morning just to
get two hours of practice in with you at lunch.”
“Wasn’t it so you could stare at Yi Jing?” Jiang Cheng stacked his textbooks together and
stood up.
He had pushed all his study materials and books to Gu Fei’s side. There were probably less
than 20 people with a stacked desk like this in the entire school, let alone this classroom.
He remembered Pan Zhi had once posted a set of pictures in his Friend Circle, lamenting
about his tragic senior year of high school, the entirety of which was wasted on studying.
Those desks in the classroom were stacked so high with textbooks and notes that it was
enough to bury a person. It made Jiang Cheng feel a surge of panic.
Then looking at Class-8’s classroom, his own desk was especially prominent. A stranger
looking in would think all the books in the class were piled onto his desk alone.
“This is my last opportunity.” Wang Xu looked at him. “An overachiever as well as a good
looking guy like you probably can’t understand how I feel.”
“Let’s go,” Jiang Cheng said. “Hurry, I have to study in the afternoon.”
“I’m just saying, Jiang Cheng,” Wang Xu followed him out of the classroom.
“Are you planning to toil like this all the way until the University Entrance Exams? There’s
still almost a year left. If I was you I’d burn out for sure.”
“Which is why you’re not me.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
There was not much else to work on for the song. Wang Xu had dug out a whole lifetime’s
worth of concentration and brainpower for this show off event. He was now able to
accurately accompany Jiang Cheng, and even added more lines for himself. Aside from the
chords Jiang Cheng gave him, he also added a section of interlude in the middle.
“Don’t be nervous tomorrow,” Wang Xu said. “If you’re nervous you’ll make mistakes. If you
can’t find the right place to come in when I’m playing this part tomorrow, I’ll give you a
look as signal.”
“No need,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I know where to come in without even
listening.”
“Pfft, sure you can.” Wang Xu scoffed.
“You don’t need to fight me,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “You just have to concede.”
“Shit,” Wang Xu didn’t know what else to say after the shit, so he plucked the strings a few
times, then looked up and said excitedly. “Hey, let’s get Gu Fei to take some photos of us
tomorrow with his high-end camera?”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
If Wang Xu hadn’t brought it up, he never would’ve thought about it.
Although…… To participate on his own in an event Gu Fei didn’t wish to participate in, and
furthermore collaborate with someone else, and then get Gu Fei to take pictures?
It was true that this whole thing started because Gu Fei didn’t want to join, but to ask Gu
Fei to take photos……it was also true that he couldn’t bring himself to ask.
“The school would probably have someone take photos, right?” Jiang Cheng said. “Look
how excited Lao-Xu is, he’ll probably take some pictures too.”
“How can the school’s camera compare to his!” Wang Xu said. “Anyway, he only bought that
camera to look cool, never did see him having anything to show for it. What a great
opportunity for him to bring his camera out for a walk.”
“……We’ll see,” Jiang Cheng thought about it. “For a performance like this, moving media is
more interesting than static. You have to combine the music and the performance to show
the three dimensionality. The main focus for your showing off shouldn’t be for the photos,
it should be the live performance.”
“Ah, really?” Wang Xu was a little lost.
“Yi Jing will be sitting right there in front of the stage,” Jiang Cheng said. “But you want to
show her photos of it after? She won’t be able to hear it even if she could see. Isn’t it more
important that she’s watching you in that moment?”
“Ah, right! She’s gonna be sitting right there watching!” Wang Xu slapped his own leg.
“Fuck! She’s gonna be sitting right there!”
“……Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about this?” Jiang Cheng felt like he could probably
hear some echo if he reached over right now and knocked on Wang Xu’s head.
“I knew it this whole time, but when you suddenly put it like that,” Wang Xu rubbed his leg.
“I’m a little nervous. No. A little excited.”
“One more time through, then I have to go study.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
There was no official class scheduled for the afternoon, it was all self-study periods. The
teachers sat at the front of the classroom in case anyone wanted to ask questions. Though
usually, only Yi Jing and a couple of other students would go up and ask. The teachers were
always as lonely as a cloud.
Jiang Cheng had also gone up a few times to ask questions, but he didn’t today.
He was slumped over the desk memorizing passages.
Half of his brain was memorizing passages, while the other half was lost in a mess of
contemplation.
Yi Jing would sit in the audience and watch Wang Xu put on a performance. A performance
that on the surface looked like he gave everything he had just to show off, but was in reality
for her eyes only. It was kind of romantic.
Gu Fei would probably be sitting in the audience as well. Even if he didn’t participate, at the
very least he would come watch.
However, he had no idea with what expression and what emotions would Gu Fei watch
him.
He had never done anything like this before.
He figured Gu Fei had probably not gone through anything like this either.
Let it be a memory then. That year, I played the music you wrote. That year, you were my
audience.
“Your performance will be the third one.” Lao-Xu showed Jiang Cheng the program. “All the
senior students’ performances are scheduled at the beginning.
Don’t be nervous, give them a good show!”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng swept his glance briefly over the program. The two performances
before them were a chorus and a solo vocalist.
There was still an hour before the concert was due to start. The auditorium was already set
up, and students had started to file in according to their classes.
Jiang Cheng sat in the classroom and glanced at Wang Xu across the aisle. The performers
didn’t need to enter with the audience. They all waited outside the auditorium, and only
went to wait backstage when it was almost their turn.
“Should we be heading over after they’re all inside?” Wang Xu asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“How’s my clothes?” Wang Xu tugged on his T-shirt. The silver dragon
sprawled across it was enough to blind Jiang Cheng’s eyes.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He refused to wear matching clothes with Wang Xu, instead
opting for the clothes he usually wore: a white T-shirt and jeans.
Wang Xu had nagged him for a long time because he thought it was not hip enough.
“Should we put some makeup on?” Wang Xu suddenly asked. “Once the stage lights come
on, will it make me look washed out?”
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng answered simply.
His phone pinged once. He glanced down at it.
– I’m in the auditorium, when is your act?
– we’re coming on third
After replying to Gu Fei’s message, Jiang Cheng stood up and hopped in place a little: “Let’s
go, captain.”
The auditorium was already packed with students, and music streamed out of the speakers.
Fourth High had no affinity for academics, but never lacked when it came to these things.
Jiang Cheng even saw someone testing the track lights on stage.
“I’m nervous.” Wang Xu said.
“You won’t be when we go on.” Jiang Cheng walked to the entrance of the auditorium and
looked inside. He didn’t even need a second glance to see Gu Fei sitting in the third row, in
the seat nearest to the door.
Gu Fei also saw him. His mouth curved into a smile in Jiang Cheng’s direction.
Jiang Cheng stepped back outside. As soon as he turned around, someone got in his face
with a camera and snapped a bunch of pictures.
Next, even the girls beside them waiting to go on stage started to take pictures and videos
of him with their phones. He had no choice but to hide behind Wang Xu.
After the first act started, Jiang Cheng and Wang Xu walked into the auditorium.
“Oh fucking shit, there’s so many people.” Wang Xu said quietly.
Jiang Cheng glanced toward the audience. It was a dark mass of heads. When he spotted Gu
Fei by the door before, he hadn’t noticed that there were so many people inside. Looking at
them now, he finally started to feel some pressure.
He immediately glanced over to Gu Fei’s seat. Gu Fei was aiming his phone in this direction,
probably to record a video. Jiang Cheng was a little disappointed at first that the guy didn’t
bring his DSLR, but he quickly realized Gu Fei’s camera was in the hands of Yi Jing, who was
sitting beside him.
Yi Jing was very intently taking photos of them.
Jiang Cheng smiled.
Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up.
There were quite a few people backstage. Lao-Xu was also there, talking with the teacher in
charge of the sound. Jiang Cheng figured Lao-Xu must have really gotten into it this time.
The banner on stage with the huge words “Fourth High Concert” was written by Lao-Xu
himself, and now he was backstage helping out with every other thing.
“Xu-zong!” As soon as he saw Lao-Xu, Wang Xu lunged at him like he was a dear family
member. “I’m nervous.”
“Don’t be nervous don’t be nervous,” Lao-Xu patted him. “I’ve listened to you guys practice
numerous times, there’s not a single fault to be found. It’s perfect.
Just play like you normally do!”
Jiang Cheng hadn’t been very nervous at all, but with Wang Xu beside him stressing the
point over and over, it made him a little nervous too. He instinctively reached in his pocket
for a cigarette, but fortunately there was nothing in there.
“How’s it going back here?” Lao-Lu came out of nowhere and joined them, a staff badge
around his neck. “You two are going on third, right?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
A stupid little school concert has staff badges? And Lao-Lu’s wearing it so obediently too……
He suddenly felt like laughing, and was at once not nervous anymore.
“Nobody’s ever played piano at our school concert before,” Lao-Lu said. “Jiang Cheng here
is the first.”
“Well, probably no guitar either huh.” Wang Xu felt a little ignored.
“Nope, there were, quite a few too.” Lao-Lu said. Then after a moment of thought he patted
Wang Xu’s shoulder. “But this is the first time for piano and guitar.”
Wang Xu grinned, satisfied.
“I saw Yi Jing with a DSLR just now. How can she only shoot from the audience with such a
great camera.” Lao-Lu was a little displeased. “When you two go on later I’ll tell her to go on
stage and film you from there.”
“Yes! Great idea!” Wang Xu was instantly beaming from ear to ear.
After the chorus of the first act, the two overly dressed up MCs went on and recited a
segment of not at all funny jokes, then announced the solo vocalist for the next act.
A wave of applause and screams sounded from below. It was only then that Jiang Cheng
realized the singer was Wild Boar Head.
As soon as Wild Boar Head opened his mouth, the clapping and screaming started again.
Jiang Cheng sighed. If this was the reaction they gave to this level of skill, then once he and
Wang Xu go on later ……tsk tsk.
“Is Jiang Cheng from your class going to play piano?” Another teacher chatted with Lao-Xu
on the side.
“Yep,” Lao-Xu answered happily. “Wang Xu’s going to play guitar.”
“Wow, not bad, Jiang Cheng arranged the music too?” The teacher looked down at the
program.
“Uh huh,” The smile on Lao-Xu’s face was no less bright than Wang Xu’s. He lowered his
voice and said to the other teacher. “The music was written by our own Gu Fei.”
“Oh?” The other teacher was surprised. “Kids these days huh, impressive.”
Jiang Cheng frowned and looked in Lao-Xu’s direction, but he and the other teacher had
already directed the conversation elsewhere, so Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
“Hey Jiang Cheng,” The MC who had been fixing her makeup in a little mirror on the side
called out to him, and smiled as she said. “I thought you’d be performing the act with Gu Fei
today.”
“When has Gu Fei ever participated in something like this,” Wang Xu cut in.
“No one can convince him to.”
“Ayy… I’d love to hear him sing a song or something.” The MC’s expression was one of
disappointment. She was probably one of Gu Fei’s fangirls from another class, but her
makeup was so thick that Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell who she was.
Although, Jiang Cheng wouldn’t have recognized her anyway without the makeup. Even
within Class-8, he still had a hard time telling everyone apart.
Another round of applause rang out from the audience. The Wild Boar Head finished his
song.
“You two get ready,” The MC lifted up her skirt and walked toward the stage, all the while
reminding them. “Good luck Jiang Cheng!”
“What about me?” Wang Xu asked.
The MC didn’t have time to answer him as she walked onto the stage.
“The shit?” Wang Xu was a little unhappy.
“Good luck.” Jiang Cheng patted Wang Xu’s arm, and gestured to the side with his chin. “Yi
Jing’s here.”
Wang Xu turned and saw Yi Jing coming in from the side door to backstage, holding the
camera. He suddenly hopped in place, “Jiang Cheng, you better not drag me down later.”
“Alrighty.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
The MC prattled off a bunch of useless words on stage before announcing the next act,
“Next up we have a very special performance, a format that’s never been done at our school
before, a duet of piano and guitar. Is everyone excited to hear what that sounds like?”
Jiang Cheng sighed. He felt like telling her that piano and guitar was an extremely common
standard combination that could be seen practically
everywhere.
The applause and cheering was clearly much more enthusiastic than when Wild Boar Head
went on stage earlier. This pleased him.
“Then let us enjoy the performance together! Coming from Class-8: ‘Sa Ye’; piano and
arrangement by Jiang Cheng; guitar by Wang Xu……”
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and focused his mind.
Amidst the nonstop applause and whistles, the MC added, “Composer: Gu Fei.”
At first the auditorium was a little quiet, then came a wild burst of applause and screams
that was enough to take the roof off.
Jiang Cheng snapped open his eyes. He stared in a daze for a second before grabbing the
program on a table beside him.
Arrangement and piano: Jiang Cheng.
Guitar: Wang Xu.
There wasn’t a third line.
“What’s going on!” Jiang Cheng turned to glare at Lao-Xu, and asked in a lowered voice.
Lao-Xu was also caught off guard, “I don’t know.”

“Jiang Cheng,” Wang Xu tugged at him. “We have to go.”

Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell how he felt at this moment. When he passed by the MC and saw
the smile on her face, Jiang Cheng had an urge to hit a girl for the first time in his life.
He didn’t know the reason behind Gu Fei’s refusal to participate in the concert, but Gu Fei
probably wouldn’t mind if he played his song. However, now with the sudden addition of
composer Gu Fei……
The uncertainty and unease in his heart made his hands cold. He had no idea how Gu Fei
would react to something like this.
When he followed Wang Xu onto the stage, he couldn’t bother to pay attention to the
intensity of the audience’s enthusiasm. He swiftly shot a glance over to Gu Fei’s seat.
Then it was like his whole body sank abruptly in dread.
The seat was empty. Gu Fei had left.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6595
TL word count: 4509
TL time: 4:25:42
Edit time: 0:41:06
Curse words: 3x fucks, 5x shit
TL’s Notes:
To everyone who cried last chapter, I love you all _:3_L
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: May 26, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 88
“Cheng-ge, you know how it feels to be out of place here, don’t you?”
Two beams of tracking spotlights shone down on Jiang Cheng and Wang Xu, so bright that it
made it difficult to see anything around them. Jiang Cheng could feel the warmth of the
light, so hot it almost burned.
It took Jiang Cheng only five or six steps to walk from the edge to the center of the stage,
but beads of sweat were already emerging from his temples.
It was cold sweat.
The applause, cheers, and screams from below excited Wang Xu. In a swathe of dizzying
bright light, Jiang Cheng could see that Wang Xu’s steps were light.
He walked to the piano with his back to the audience. He didn’t dare look back.
In the span of one second his mind went through a whole quest of ice and fire, from heaven
to earth, and to deep under the ground. He couldn’t even feel his own brain.
His fingertips were a little cold and numb. But it wasn’t just his fingers. His whole arm felt
stiff and weak. When he sat down at the piano bench, he almost couldn’t lift the lid up.
In that instant, his peripheral vision was forcefully shut down, leaving only a circle of
blinding light around him, as though blocking out all other sights and sounds.
He couldn’t see, and he couldn’t hear.
The only thing remaining in his mind was the empty seat he just saw.
Gu Fei was not in his seat.
It was not a trick of light. There were still lots of people walking about and standing in the
aisles, but to him, even if there was only a corner of Gu Fei’s clothing, he’d be able to see it.
He’d be able to tell.
Gu Fei wasn’t in the auditorium anymore.
He couldn’t tell what exactly he felt at this moment. His mind was in such a jumble that he
had no way to guess or make judgment. Nor was he capable of forming any kind of thought.
As he stared in a daze at the black and white keys before him, it seemed like
everything else around him was stirred into a puddle of chaos by that empty seat.
“Jiang Cheng,” He heard Wang Xu’s voice. “Jiang Cheng! Fuck! Are you okay, Jiang Cheng?
What’s wrong! Jiang Cheng?”
He lifted his gaze finally, and saw Wang Xu’s anxious face above the piano,
“Are you not feeling well?”
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng sucked in a breath, and the surrounding environment slowly became
clearer. He could see outlines of things, and the sounds in his ears suddenly grew louder.
The clapping had already stopped; the remaining cheers were also sparse. There were only
the sounds of whistling that popped up every so often.
“If you don’t feel well we can switch with the next act,” Wang Xu said quietly, unconvinced.
“You don’t look that good. Is it nerves?”
“I’m fine.” Jiang Cheng gave him a smile. “Get ready.”
“Alright.” Wang Xu adjusted his guitar, and swept his fingers gently over the strings.
With these notes, the mood in the audience was lifted once again.
Gu Fei was no longer there. Jiang Cheng did not know why, nor did he know where Gu Fei
was. He wondered if Gu Fei could hear him, or whether he still wished to hear him.
Jiang Cheng took a deep breath. He could think about that later. He was the one who chose
to participate in the concert. He chose Gu Fei’s song. He chose to let Lao-Xu know.
And as for whether the MC heard it when Lao-Xu was quietly showing off to the other
teacher, or why she saw fit to make that addition to the credits, it was no longer important.
All this already happened. There was no point now in feeling annoyed, panicked, or
disoriented.
I’m still sitting here, he thought. Facing the music that couldn’t be more familiar to him if he
tried. He wanted Gu Fei to hear it, but he also wanted himself to hear it.
He rarely thought about “if”s and “what if”s. But once the “if” and “what if”
were in front of him, he still would rather charge right on ahead without thinking too much.
Jiang Cheng rubbed his hands together, then shook them out. The sounds of
quiet laughter rang out from the crowd below.
He turned and swept his eyes over the audience, curled his lips up in a smile, then lifted his
hands and set them on the keys. As the first note sounded beneath his fingers, everyone
suddenly went quiet.
All the way until Wang Xu joined in on his guitar three bars later, Jiang Cheng didn’t look
down at the piano, instead he gazed out at the audience below. He listened to their
applause as they suddenly seemed to wake up from their trance just as the guitar chords
started harmonizing.
During the guitar interlude, he turned back and looked down at his fingers. There were no
other sounds in his ears but the guitar strings.
Wang Xu must be playing above his usual skill level. Jiang Cheng glanced at Yi Jing, who had
already stepped onto the stage and was taking photos of them with the camera. Wang Xu
took a couple steps toward her with the guitar. Jiang Cheng figured his expression must be
as dazzling as the silver dragon on his shirt.
After a well-executed glissando, the piano joined in once again.
Another wave of applause and cheers rang out from the audience.
Jiang Cheng smiled to himself. What would his mom feel if she found out that her so-called
elegant and graceful piano music was being engulfed in such racket.
He however, felt sufficiently at ease now.
In this moment, the instrument he didn’t much care for, was producing music he liked very
much, written by the person he liked very much. The piano that used to bring him such
anguish and weariness, for the first time was bringing him a joyful experience.
Except.
Where did you go, you asshole.
You’ve never heard me play the piano.
I haven’t played the piano for ages. I thought I’d never play it again.
This song was for you. But you ran away.
The duet concluded as Wang Xu swept his fingers gently over the strings. Jiang Cheng
closed the lid on the piano and stood up, then bowed to the audience.
“JIANG CHENG I LOVE YOU——” Screamed a girl in the crowd.
Jiang Cheng turned and walked off the stage as the noise from the audience started swelling
up even more.
Even the teachers and students backstage were clapping.
“BRAVO! THAT WAS STUPENDOUS! THAT WAS THE BEST
PERFORMANCE IN FOURTH HIGH HISTORY!” Lao-Lu boomed in his
thunderous voice as he clapped.
Lao-Xu didn’t say anything. He only nodded forcefully when Jiang Cheng glanced toward
him. There were tears in his eyes.
Jiang Cheng sighed a little helplessly, “I’m……gonna go to the washroom.”
“So?!” Wang Xu asked ecstatically of Yi Jing, who followed them off stage.
“What did you think!”
“It really was amazing.” Yi Jing smiled and said.
When Jiang Cheng came out of the stage door, it caused a small commotion among the
students who were sitting near the exit. Several of them raised their phone at him.
He bowed his head and walked briskly out of the auditorium.
There were still quite a few students waiting outside for their turn to perform.
When he stepped outside, he was surrounded once again by a small crowd.
“Jiang Cheng,” Someone called out to him. “Did Gu Fei really write the music?
That’s hella impressive!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, nor did he look in the direction of the voice. He walked along the
outside of the auditorium and quickly turned a corner, leaving the astonishment and
discussion behind.
His already somewhat calm emotions were abruptly thrown into a lurch again by those
words.
The panic and unease that he had temporarily pushed down, the tiniest trace of
incomprehension, and the anger repressed in the vague echoes of irritation; all of that was
now swirling up slowly and spreading through him.
He didn’t need to go to the washroom, but he still went to the washroom.
His hand was stuffed in his pocket the whole way, clutching his phone, but not pulling it
out. There were no students on the field. He only saw a janitor walking past the edge of the
field as he approached the washroom.
Jiang Cheng only realized once he was inside and took his hand out of his
pocket, that his palm was covered with sweat.
He stood in front of the urinal for a while, and waited intently for the urge to pee.
It didn’t come.
There was only the disorientation and unease that was slowly transforming into anger.
He turned and walked out of the washroom, and glanced at his phone again.
Just as he expected, there was no message from Gu Fei. There was no unread message and
no missed calls. No sign of notifications that could’ve come in earlier that he might’ve
missed in the middle of all the ruckus.
In that instant all of his feelings toward Gu Fei turned into fury.
He sat down on a stone bench nearby, and took out his phone to call Gu Fei.
The million times dog-fucker!
If there’s a problem then just let it out! We can argue or throw fists, but what is this missing
persons business!
He only just pulled up Gu Fei’s number to dial, when he spotted in his newly recovered
peripheral vision someone walking this way. His finger trembled a little above the phone
screen, and stopped.
It was Gu Fei.
He had been dead set on having it out with Gu Fei. What he had done wrong, what Gu Fei
was mad about; they could let it all out face to face. At worst they’ll beat each other up.
But now that Gu Fei had suddenly appeared like this, he immediately felt another wave of
nerves.
What to say?
How to say it?
Who’s going to start?
All of the questions that had been scattered earlier by irritation and anger were all settling
back into place, clumping together in his throat like a ball of twine.
He almost had to cough to clear his throat.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei walked up and stopped beside him.
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng turned his phone in his hand and didn’t move, only
stared at the weed growing out of the crack in the concrete in front of him.
“Shall we talk?” Gu Fei said.
“Whatever.” Jiang Cheng said. “If you want to talk we’ll talk. If not then just let it be.”
“Come on,” Gu Fei said. “Let’s go for a walk.”
Jiang Cheng put his phone back in his pocket and stood up. He didn’t look at Gu Fei as he
walked right out of the back gates of the school.
Gu Fei’s footsteps were right behind him, but there it stayed. He didn’t catch up and walk
beside Jiang Cheng like he always did.
At this time of day, the restaurant street behind the school wasn’t at its busiest.
Only a few stalls had propped up their stands, with the owners lounging languidly on
chairs.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know where to go, only walked absentmindedly along the street. When
he stepped onto the sun softened black asphalt road, he could no longer hear the footsteps
behind him.
He turned his head ever so slightly backward. Gu Fei quickly caught up to him and walked
on his left.
Thus they walked aimlessly all the way to the bridge. Jiang Cheng hesitated for a second,
before turning onto the dirt path by the bridge that led to the river. They walked for a
stretch on the uneven ground with a view of the dried up riverbed, before he stopped.
“What did I do to you?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to play my song?” Gu Fei asked.
“Is that it?” Jiang Cheng knitted his brows into a knot. “Then I will apologize to you, I didn’t
think……”
“No,” Gu Fei cut him off. “It’s not that. You can play it, change it, do whatever you want with
it, but next time……”
Jiang Cheng stared at him.
He couldn’t see any emotion on Gu Fei’s face. The guy was always like that. No matter what
anybody said, as long as he was not willing, it was difficult to get any information from his
facial expressions. From his eyes.
“Next time don’t say my name.” Gu Fei said.
“What the hell kind of next time can there possibly be?” Jiang Cheng leaned back against a
tree, but immediately felt something on the trunk poking him in the back. It was sharp, and
it hurt. He straightened up right away. The pain made it a little hard for him to keep his
temper. “Next when? Bro, we’re in our third year of high school. This is the only time. You
think I have a lot of free time?
You think I have more shows lined up?!”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, only let out a soft sigh.
Jiang Cheng glared at him for a long time before circling back and realizing the key point in
what he said. He had a feeling when he heard the MC announce Gu Fei’s name, but hearing
Gu Fei say it out loud himself, he still couldn’t make sense of it, “What’s wrong with saying
your name? What, you’re not willing to participate in events, and now you can’t have your
name said aloud either?”
“There’s nothing wrong,” Gu Fei said. “Nor is it……”
“First of all,” Jiang Cheng took a step forward and stared directly into Gu Fei’s eyes. “I’m
very sorry for using your song without telling you first. Second of all, I didn’t tell them to
say the words ‘composer Gu Fei’. Only mine and Wang Xu’s names are listed on the
program. Third of all, it’s my fault that I didn’t follow up and tell Lao-Xu not to spread it
around when he guessed that the composer was you.”
Gu Fei looked back at him without a word.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know why you’re like this. I’m sorry. I don’t know why you can’t
participate in these things. I don’t know why you have to keep everybody at arm’s length. I
don’t know why you always have to linger at the fringe of a normal school life!” Jiang
Cheng’s voice gradually grew louder. All the incomprehension and distress he’d been
bottling up as a result of Gu Fei’s continued strange conduct were slowly blowing up. “So
I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have imagined that I could go on stage with you! I’m sorry! I shouldn’t
have single mindedly tried to give you a surprise when you didn’t want it at all! I’m sorry! Is
that enough? I am sorry Gu Fei! I’m too fucking stupid to know what you want!”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei frowned. He reached out and grabbed hold of Jiang Cheng’s arm. “Hold
on, don’t get angry.”
“Don’t touch me!” Jiang Cheng shouted and shook off his hand. “I told you, if you fucking
have a problem then just tell me! If you don’t want to tell me then don’t let me find out!
These two are the only options! If that doesn’t work for you then just fucking forget it!”
“Fine.” Gu Fei looked at him. “Do you think that I’m pretty awesome, that I’m pretty
exceptional, that I’m better than most people around here?”
“Don’t be so shameless!” Jiang Cheng said. “A few words of flattery to your face and you
fucking believed it! You just have a prettier-than-most face and long legs, that’s all!”
Gu Fei sighed. He turned around and pulled out a cigarette and put it in his mouth, then
crouched down facing the riverbed.
Jiang Cheng stared at his back for a long time, then eventually added, “Yes. I think you’re
very exceptional, talented, and smart. Not only me, Lao-Xu thinks so too.”
“So what?” Gu Fei asked around the cigarette in his mouth.
“What do you mean so what? So, what?” Jiang Cheng asked, a little annoyed.
“I’m exceptional, talented, and smart.” Gu Fei cocked his head. “So what?”
“FUCK YOUR SO WHAT!” Jiang Cheng exploded. “I just want people to know that you’re
more than what you seem, that you’re different from those Steel Works scum! I just want
you to know! You’re different from anyone I’ve met since I came here! You’re ten thousand
times better than them!”
“AND THEN WHAT!” Gu Fei also boomed. He stood and walked up to Jiang
Cheng, so that they were face to face, staring at each other. “And then what?
Cheng-ge, and then what? Do you know what kind of life I’ve been living? Do you know the
kind of life I’ve been leading ever since I can remember? Do you know?!!”
Jiang Cheng was a little shook by the yelling. If he recalled correctly, this was the first time
Gu Fei had lost control like this. It was the first time Gu Fei yelled at him, and at such a close
range too. He was almost a little dazed from the impact.
“What exactly did you want me to know? How great I am, how exceptional? Let everybody
know how smart, how talented I am? And then what?” Gu Fei
lowered his voice. “Cheng-ge, you know how it feels to be out of place here, don’t you?”
Jiang Cheng stared at him.
“If I’m asleep, then I won’t know anything.” There was a very small tremor in Gu Fei’s voice.
“Why do you have to wake me up? You can leave. You must leave. But what about me?”
Jiang Cheng felt like it was suddenly a little difficult to breathe. He wanted to say
something, but couldn’t get a word out.
How does it feel to be out of place here?
After getting off the train, he had felt it from the very first step he took out of the station.
That sense of hopelessness, the gloomy bleakness that filled his vision. Even now he
remembered it clearly.
It was also the reason why he had to leave no matter how hard he had to fight for it.
“What about me? Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said quietly. “I’m right here. I’m bound here by
shackles. Who knows when I can take them off, maybe never. And so I have to stay awake
and watch with my eyes open? I’ll want for more, I’ll feel pain, do you understand?”
Still Jiang Cheng stared at him.
“I know I could not live like those people, but right now it’s all I can do.” Gu Fei squatted
back down by the riverbank, and lit another cigarette. “I didn’t want to tell you all this. I
figured if we’re dating, I just want you to be happy. To keep it simple. There’s no need to
talk about all these things we can’t change and then sit here and sulk together.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything. He reached in his pocket but didn’t find a cigarette. He
didn’t keep any cigarettes on him since he was going on stage today.
Gu Fei reached back and handed him a lighter and a pack.
Jiang Cheng paused, then walked over and took it. He lit one and put it in his mouth, looking
at the smoke drifting up before his eyes. A few tendrils rose, twisted left and right in the
wind like they were dancing, before quickly fading into nothing, turning from a faint blue
into the invisible colour of the wind.
All this about Gu Fei, were things he had never considered.
Jiang Cheng always thought that Gu Fei was like an eagle tied up and forced to stand on a
thin chain, but never considered that Gu Fei had thought so as well.
And so he decided to close his eyes, bury his head, and throw away any thoughts other than
what was necessary to keep his balance.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t make sense of his emotions at the moment. There was a giant knot in
his stomach. He suddenly felt regret.
Although……
It was only at this moment, after hearing these words from Gu Fei, that he suddenly found
an answer to his confusion from their long-distance discussion the other day. When he
sensed that something was wrong that he couldn’t quite put a finger on.
It would seem that Gu Fei did not have the will to fight.
“Is it Gu Miao,” Jiang Cheng squatted down behind Gu Fei. “And your
mom…… No, it’s mainly Gu Miao, right?”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei replied.
“Have you tried?” Jiang Cheng bit his lips. He didn’t know how to accurately express
himself. “To have her accept changes more gradually, a little at a time.
Isn’t she going to those rehab classes already? You can try to…… Maybe she just can’t accept
changes to her own things, maybe……”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei snubbed out his cigarette and stood up. “Let’s go.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked, but rose with him just the same.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else, so he also remained silent.
Gu Fei led him back to his home. Only when the door opened did Jiang Cheng snap out of
the gloomy mood and squeezed out a smile at Gu Miao, who was sitting on the living room
sofa drawing a picture, “Er-miao.”
Gu Miao seemed very happy to see him. She held up the drawing in her hand and waved it
at him.
“Let me see,” Jiang Cheng walked over and sat down beside her, looking at the paper in her
hand. “Bunnies huh?”
They were drawings of bunnies. A lot of them. Almost filling up the entire page.
Every single one of them was green, just like Gu Fei’s display icon.
Gu Miao grabbed another piece of paper and continued to draw. She persisted on using
green, and drew the same bunny over and over again. It was clear that she was very
practiced at it. The bunnies emerged one by one from the paper, and soon the page was full.
Jiang Cheng watched her concentrated expression, and didn’t know what to say.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei walked over and crouched down in front of her. “Brother wants to discuss
something with you.”
Still holding the pencil, Gu Miao glanced at him as she continued to draw, and quickly
returned her gaze to the tip of the pencil.
“Er-Miao, look at your brother.” Gu Fei said. “Brother has something to discuss with you.”
Gu Miao paused, stilled her hand, then turned to look at him.
“Tonight,” Gu Fei spoke very slowly. “Would it be alright if you sleep in mommy’s bed?”
Gu Miao didn’t react.
“You won’t be sleeping in your own bed tonight, or the sofa in brother’s room.”
Gu Fei said. “You will sleep, in the bed in mommy’s room.”
Gu Miao still didn’t react. Just as Jiang Cheng thought that maybe she didn’t understand Gu
Fei’s words, she started to scream.
The sharp sound pierced through the silence, and cut through Jiang Cheng’s eardrums like
the tip of a knife.
Jiang Cheng felt like he couldn’t breathe. The waves of enormous yet formless pressure
generated by the scream made him want to cover Gu Miao’s mouth with his hand.
Gu Fei watched Gu Miao quietly. After a while, he finally took a deep breath and started
speaking softly to her.
Jiang Cheng could hardly hear what Gu Fei was saying. He only felt a sense of suffocation. In
his heart, in his head, and even in his ears.
When Gu Miao finally stopped screaming, Jiang Cheng had a strong urge to let out a few
roars himself.
“I tried, Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei held his hand, his voice low. “But it’s been years, and nothing’s
changed. She was born and raised here. Her accepted range goes only as far as the train
station. That’s how far she’ll go on her skateboard. Her sleeping range is right here. Her
bed. The sofa in my room. You can narrow her range of movement, but you can’t make her
leave it.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him and couldn’t get out a single word.
“That rehab class, it doesn’t come cheap. I can’t afford to take her there long term, so I don’t
know how much longer it will be until we can see improvement.
One year, two, three to five years, or ten to twenty.” Gu Fei’s hand started to tremble ever
so slightly. “Or forever. I don’t dare to think about it, I can’t think about it. All I can do is put
my head down and keep going. I don’t know how much further it is until hope.”
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around Gu Fei, “I’m sorry, Gu Fei. I’m so
sorry.”
Gu Fei held onto Jiang Cheng’s waist and put his cheek against his chest.
In the still air, in the midst of the scratching of Gu Miao’s pencil against paper, Jiang Cheng
heard a very low muffled cry.

Some Stats
Raw character count: 6138
TL word count: 4208
TL time: 7:52:03
Edit time: 0:55:06
Curse words: 7x fucks, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Happy early knives 8))) This one took me longer because I had to pause for tear breaks
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: May 29, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 89
I want you on my left shoulder, a smile on my right
This was the first time Jiang Cheng had seen Gu Fei cry.
First time hearing the sobs, feeling the slight tremble of his body. Jiang Cheng’s chest felt
warm from Gu Fei’s tears.
Jiang Cheng had always thought of himself as a pretty strong person. Since moving here, he
would reflect after every occasion of tear shedding. Ah, crying again are we. Why are you
crying again you sissy.
He always assumed that Gu Fei was stronger than him. Or rather, he thought that in certain
areas, Gu Fei simply didn’t feel as intensely as he did, that he was more ‘detached’. In his
subconscious mind, he had never made the connection between Gu Fei and tears.
But now, this person he thought was strong to the point of being detached, this mini tyrant
of the Steel Works, this troublemaker that no one in the school dared provoke, this Good
Little Bunny who took beautiful photos, kept candy in his pockets, who would act cute, seek
attention, and say “Cheng-ge I was wrong”, was burying his face in Jiang Cheng’s chest.
Crying.
What started out as repressed sobs slowly became a kind of guttural wailing,
heartwrenching, as though he was venting his grievances.
Jiang Cheng had never before seen Gu Fei like this, nor had he ever expected to see Gu Fei
like this. His mind was a tangled mess. He had no idea how he could console him, and at the
same time didn’t wish to console him.
When Gu Fei was like this, he probably didn’t need consoling. No matter how well executed
the consolation was, it would probably be useless to him.
Jiang Cheng only needed to be there, and listen.
Gu Miao, who had been drawing bunnies on the side, had stopped at some point to quietly
watch Gu Fei. With her brows knitted and a pencil in her hand, she watched him with a
calm expression.
Her expression reminded Jiang Cheng of the time when he and Gu Fei brawled on the
street, and of the time when Gu Fei flung a man into a tree. Each time Gu Miao had worn a
calm expression, as though she didn’t understand what was happening.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell what she was thinking, or whether she was thinking.
He wondered if she could feel Gu Fei’s pain.
He bent down and kissed the top of Gu Fei’s head, pressing his lips against the newly grown
stubbles.
What happened today was entirely out of his expectations. He felt a little regret.
Yet at the same time he was glad.
If he never heard Gu Fei utter those words today, would he ever find out how Gu Fei really
felt? Would his resignation and despair remain a secret forever?
And if…… if there really comes a day when they break up, would he then never know that
the person who had taken up such an important place in the confusing years of his youth,
had such a secret buried deep in his heart.
He bent down again and nuzzled his nose against the top of Gu Fei’s head.
“Does it not feel scratchy?” Gu Fei asked in a muffled voice against Jiang Cheng’s chest.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked. The nasal tone in Gu Fei’s voice sounded
heartwrenching.
“My hair, it feels scratchy even to me.” Gu Fei said.
“A little.” Jiang Cheng stroked the hair on his head. “Are you planning on not growing it out
again? How many times have you shaved it now……”
“I think I look very handsome like this.” Gu Fei rubbed his cheek against Jiang Cheng’s shirt.
“……Are you using my shirt to wipe your face?” Jiang Cheng looked down at him.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei paused, then slowly moved downward. “If that’s not allowed, I’ll use your
pants instead.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng jumped and shot a glance in Gu Miao’s direction. Gu Miao was still
staring blankly at them. He hurried to drag Gu Fei up by his collar.
“Your little sister is watching!”
Gu Fei stopped, his face still pressed against Jiang Cheng’s belly. He reached out a hand and
flicked his fingers against Gu Miao’s paper, and Gu Miao put her head down and started
drawing bunnies again.
“I’m gonna go……” Gu Fei braced a hand on the sofa and stood up, then bent down to look at
Jiang Cheng. “Wash my face.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
There were still traces of tears on Gu Fei’s face. His still wet eyelashes were stuck together
in little clumps. The way he looked made Jiang Cheng’s heart suddenly soften. It ached for
Gu Fei.
“You have such long lashes.” He said.
“You also have really long lashes.” Gu Fei smiled, then leaned in and kissed Jiang Cheng’s
forehead. “Is that what you’re waiting for?”
“Get out.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei went to wash his face. Jiang Cheng turned and looked at Gu Miao, who was close to
filling up the second piece of paper with drawings of bunnies, so he got out another page
for her.
It was very quiet in the living room. Jiang Cheng tilted his head up and leaned back on the
sofa. His heart felt a little heavy, but strangely clear. It was a feeling like he had lived
through a serious cold, suffered stuffy nose for a whole week, then was finally able to
breathe again.
Gu Fei did not hide from his view. He showed his tear streaked face in front of Jiang Cheng
without any reservation. He liked Gu Fei like this.
There might be parts of me that I don’t wish for you to see, but if I do decide to show you, there
will be no holding back.
Jiang Cheng stood up and walked into the bathroom. Gu Fei had wrapped a towel around
some ice cubes, and was currently pressing it against his eyes.
Jiang Cheng walked right up to Gu Fei and hugged him from behind, “Are your eyes puffy?”
“A little, it’s not too bad.” Gu Fei said. “It’ll probably be back to normal in 15
minutes.”
“I was worried just now that you’ll frighten Gu Miao.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Nah,” Gu Fei smiled. “She can’t sense other people’s emotions.”
“Ah, is that right.” Jiang Cheng let out a soft sigh. “I can……sense it.”
“Then did I frighten you?” Gu Fei asked.
“No.” Jiang Cheng said. “I just ached for you.”
“It’s nothing much really.” Gu Fei said. “Some things you just have to shut the door and
brood on it yourself. Once you step out into the world, nobody knows how much
misfortunes and dissatisfactions anyone else is harbouring, everyone
just looks the same kind of miserable.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He leaned down and bit Gu Fei’s shoulder.
“When did you memorize the music?” Gu Fei asked as he continued to ice his eyes.
“What music?” Jiang Cheng didn’t realize what he was talking about for a second.
“The song you played today.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh, when I listened to it last time, I memorized most of it then.” Jiang Cheng said. He felt
another wave of complicated emotions at the mention of the song.
He was sorry that Gu Fei didn’t get to hear it. But if it wasn’t for this complication, he and
Gu Fei wouldn’t have talked it out like this. “I couldn’t remember all of it, so I changed some
stuff.”
“It sounded really good, better than the original version.” Gu Fei said.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng lifted up his head in shock, and looked at Gu Fei through the reflection in
the mirror. “You heard it? Didn’t you leave? I didn’t see you when I went on stage!”
“I left after.” Gu Fei started to ice his other eye. “It’s not like the auditorium is soundproof. I
listened to the whole thing outside the window at the back of the building.”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng said, then kept his mouth open and didn’t know what else to say, so he
repeated again. “Fuck. ”
“Though I didn’t hear it very clearly,” Gu Fei turned to face him, leaning back against the
sink. “The school’s speaker system isn’t the best.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng was still speechless.
“Here Cheng-ge, hold the ice for me.” Gu Fei handed the towel with ice cubes to him.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng took it and pressed the towel against Gu Fei’s eye.
“It wasn’t written very well, I was still young then.” Gu Fei said. “It was just for fun.”
“Are you spewing bullshit good sir?” Jiang Cheng said. “How subtle of you.”
Gu Fei started laughing, “I’m serious.”
“In the eyes of those of us without a musical gift, what you just said is a solid
eight and a half pounds of braggy bullshit, sir.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“A little more civility please.” Gu Fei said.
“Eight and a half pounds of bull-beeeep.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei curved his lips, leaned over, and kissed the tip of Jiang Cheng’s nose,
“Were you really angry today?”
“It’s not so much anger,” Jiang Cheng removed the towel and wrung it out. “But you know
with my temper, sometimes I just can’t keep it in. At the time all I thought was, if you’re
angry, or unhappy, or annoyed, then at least let me know.
Even if you were to come and curse me out and say, Jiang Cheng you’re a fucking dumbass
or something, or fight it out, then at least I would know what’s going on, you know……”
Gu Fei didn’t answer as he leaned in and kissed him.
Jiang Cheng stilled for a moment. When Gu Fei’s tongue swept across his teeth, he finally
snapped out of it and pulled Gu Fei tight, tangling their two bodies together.
As though they were two enemies meeting, and couldn’t wait to get all up in each other’s
business. Their tongues battled for dominance. All at once, back and forth, it was hard to
tell who had the upper hand.
Jiang Cheng thought he must’ve seemed extremely thirsty, like he couldn’t wait to knead Gu
Fei into dough to squeeze tightly into his embrace, or give him bite after bite, leaving
behind a teeth-mark every time.
Gu Fei probably had similar thoughts. After pushing Jiang Cheng to the wall, he nibbled his
way from Jiang Cheng’s earlobe to his shoulder, toward the end of which Jiang Cheng finally
couldn’t stand it anymore and bit down on Gu Fei’s arm, before Gu Fei could do the same to
him.
“You’re a damn dog!” Gu Fei squeezed Jiang Cheng’s jaw. “Let go!”
Jiang Cheng let go, leaned back against the wall, and tilted his head up as he let out a long
breath, then closed his eyes.
When the two of them got back to the living room, Gu Miao had already finished filling
another page with bunnies. She was now reading from a picture book.
Jiang Cheng truly couldn’t understand what the kid was thinking. There were so many
pictures in the picture book, ones of bunnies, as well as of puppies, chickadees, birds,
kittens, and little pigs. She was happily reading along to all of it, but only liked to draw
bunnies.
“Here, you can change into this.” Gu Fei handed Jiang Cheng one of his own T-
shirts.
Jiang Cheng went into the bedroom and changed, “Are you going out to take photos? I
thought Yi Jing has your camera?”
“Mhm, she’s going to bring it back to the store.” Gu Fei said. “I won’t take any more today
though, the light’s not good at this time.”
“You seem keen on ignoring her normally, why does it feel like you’re suddenly pretty
familiar?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“She’s the class leader after all,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Lao-Xu used to set her up to tutor
me.”
At the mention of Lao-Xu, Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but click his tongue, “I really should’ve
followed up with Lao-Xu and told him not to spread it around.”
“Honestly, it’s not his fault,” Gu Fei said. “He’s just like that. Besides, how can anyone
possibly understand.”
“Then……what are you going to do?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Everyone knows now.”
“If they know, they know,” Gu Fei said. “When the gears of destiny start to turn, there’s no
telling when they’re going to ‘click’ and hit some kind of switch, like you for example.”
“What about me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Weren’t you brought in by the gear?” Gu Fei smiled. “Come on, I’ll take you somewhere.”
“Where?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Gu Fei was already back to his usual self. Whether it was in the way he talked or his
expressions, there was no trace of what happened before. No trace of the fact that just
moments ago, on the sofa, he had bawled with such intensity.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell if he really was okay, or if it was the years of experience that
allowed him to quickly recover, in order to maintain balance.
“The Steel Works.” Gu Fei opened his closet.
“Why are we going to the Steel Works?” Jiang Cheng was surprised. It had been a long time
since the two of them went to the Steel Works. Ever since he rented an apartment, that had
become their most private space. “If you want……to, can’t we just go to my place?”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei laughed as he held onto the closet door. “Can we be serious
for a second? What does the overachiever keep in his head all day long?”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t get out a word. He stared at Gu Fei for a long time, then finally waved
his hand and turned back to the living room, sat on the sofa and read a picture book with
Gu Miao.
Gu Fei followed him out. Jiang Cheng took one glance at him and was taken aback.
Gu Fei was carrying a guitar bag.
“What’s……that?” Jiang Cheng asked instinctively. He never expected Gu Fei to suddenly
come out with a guitar.
“A cello.” Gu Fei said.
“Bullshit!” Jiang Cheng said.
“Why would you ask then, like you’ve never seen a guitar before.” Gu Fei walked up to the
sofa, reached his hand in front of Gu Miao, and snapped his fingers. When Gu Miao looked
up at him, he said in a soft voice, “Brother has to go out. If you want to skateboard outside,
remember to text first.”
Gu Miao nodded.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei stood up. “Let’s go.”
Jiang Cheng followed Gu Fei, but it wasn’t until they were downstairs did he suddenly
realize, Gu Fei is going to play the guitar?
Going to the Steel Works, to play guitar?
It wasn’t very far, so Gu Fei didn’t take the bike, only walked toward the Steel Works with
the guitar strapped on his back. Jiang Cheng walked beside him, his eyes glued to Gu Fei the
whole way.
He had seen Gu Fei wearing a helmet on a motorcycle; had seen Gu Fei on a bicycle with Gu
Miao in tow on a skateboard; had seen Gu Fei playing
basketball; had seen Gu Fei with a camera; had seen Gu Fei clad in all black jumping
between buildings in the glow of a bonfire……
He had also seen Gu Fei crying.
But Gu Fei was surprising him yet again. He knew that Gu Fei had been in a band before,
knew that Gu Fei played the guitar, but seeing Gu Fei walking in the sun with a guitar
strapped to his back still gave him a thrill.
What was he thrilled about?
No idea.
Just, thrilled.
Every step he took, he wanted to turn and look at Gu Fei.
The Steel Works covered a large area. Jiang Cheng hadn’t been there very many times, so he
never did get to see the whole place. Gu Fei led them down a path he had never been on
before, like he was unlocking a new area of the map.
“We’re not going to the room?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Nope.” Gu Fei said. “Who knows if there’s any lecherous boy on girl or boy on boy action
going on there.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. The boy on boy probably meant Li Yan, but when he
remembered the lewd activities they themselves had conducted there, he figured Gu Fei’s
skin was all too thick. How dare he call someone else lecherous.
“I haven’t been around here before.” Jiang Cheng said by way of changing the subject.
“I don’t come around here often either.” Gu Fei said. “The buildings around this area are
mostly torn down, and if not, then they’re usually unsafe structures.
There’s no point in coming here.”
“Then where are we going?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“To a structurally unsound building.” Gu Fei answered.
“……Ah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
It was true that the buildings here had pretty much been torn down. There were only basic
frames left of most of the old buildings, around which were piles of broken bricks and
rubbles, as well as scrap pieces of steel with weeds growing all around them.
It must’ve been quite a flourishing place once upon a time. It was a large campus, and
everyone who used to live around here were employees of the Steel Works. There were still
signs of the Steel Works’ prosperous past littered around many places.
XX Steel Kindergarten. XX Steel Elementary. XX Steel Snacks. XX Steel Game Center. XX
Steel…… [1]
“It’s right up ahead.” Gu Fei pointed.
Through this patch of torn down old factories on the clearing ahead was a……
structurally unsound building. It was only one story, but it was very tall, like an
assembly hall of some sort, even larger than Fourth High’s auditorium.
It was certainly dangerous enough, as it looked to be half demolished.
However, when Jiang Cheng got closer, he realized it wasn’t half demolished, but half
collapsed.
Stepping over broken bricks, Gu Fei led him inside through the building’s
‘doorway’.
The lighting inside was great, since half the roof was sunken in. It really was an assembly
hall. The rows of seating were still there, but most of it had been buried by the collapsed
roof.
Where the stage was, the roof was intact, but the windows on either side were gone.
Sunlight streamed through the holes in the wall, covering the entire stage in radiance.
“Sit there,” Gu Fei pointed at a seat in the front row. “In the middle.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng glanced over, and walked up to the seat in the center of the first row.
There was a thick layer of dust on the chair. He wiped it with one finger, but beneath the
loose top layer of dust was even more dust that had practically melded in perfect harmony
with the chair from the years of being soaked by rain water.
He was about to find something to wipe it, but after a couple seconds of hesitation, decided
to sit down anyway, and leaned back in the seat.
Gu Fei stood at the center of the stage.
“Are you going to announce the credits yourself?” Jiang Cheng asked. He was pretty sure Gu
Fei was going to play the guitar. For him.
“In a minute,” Gu Fei chuckled. He crouched down and set the guitar on the ground. “I still
have some preparation to do, today was a little too hasty……”
Indeed it was hasty, he must’ve decided to do this at the last minute, because his
preparation actually consisted of stringing the guitar.
Jiang Cheng was quiet as he watched Gu Fei.
After tightening the strings, Gu Fei pulled out his phone and slowly tuned the guitar with
the help of a tuning app.
Based on the visual alone, from the first time that Gu Fei’s fingers brushed across the
strings, he had totally obliterated the silver dragon-clad Wang Xu.
Totally and completely obliterated.
Gu Fei had long fingers, and whether it was his right hand plucking out the notes, or his left
hand pressing on the strings, it was a feast for the eyes. Jiang Cheng didn’t even need to
listen to the sound to feel as soothed as if he was lying on a beanbag.
“Alright.” Gu Fei finished tuning and stood up. He picked up a stick that used to be either
the handle of a broom or a mop, and jabbed it into a crack in the flooring.
Jiang Cheng sat up straight and started clapping.
Gu Fei walked in front of the ‘mic’, and cleared his throat. Jiang Cheng immediately pulled
out his phone, aimed the camera at Gu Fei, and started recording.
“It’s been a long time since I touched a guitar, and a long time since I sang.” Gu Fei said.
“Standing here today, is also a surprise to me.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
“In this life, one often runs into all sorts of surprises.” Gu Fei said as he adjusted the length
of the guitar strap. “Some surprises are to be expected, while some are beyond our
expectations.”
For a second, Jiang Cheng didn’t understand what Gu Fei meant by these words, but no
matter, he was going to watch the video at least 800 times anyway.
“Jiang Cheng,” Gu Fei looked at him. “You are the surprise beyond my
expectation.”
“So are you.” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei on his screen, then lifted his eyes to look on
stage.
“This song is for you, it’s a little last minute, I only thought of it on the way here. Have a
listen first, and I’ll revise it later.” Gu Fei put his head down and gently swept his fingers
over the strings. “Sa Ye.”
Jiang Cheng’s hand shook. He had to take a deep breath in and use his other hand to help
stabilize the phone.
Gu Fei slapped the body of the guitar a couple times, before starting in on the prelude.
Jiang Cheng’s breathing halted for a second. Suddenly, it was like the faintest breeze
blowing past his ears carried a tune.
The melody from before had left a deep impression on him. He assumed that Gu
Fei’s own style was also like that. Dazed, panicked, and hollow.
This prelude however, gave off an entirely different vibe.
“I want one look to last, a lifetime……” Gu Fei opened his mouth. His voice was a little husky,
steady and gentle.
With that one line, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like he had been completely enveloped in Gu
Fei’s scent.
“I want, to look up and see the warm sun on spring grass, and me in your arms; I want, to
step on the unknown and walk through time, you’ll hear it if you open your eyes; I want you
on my left shoulder, a smile on my right.” Gu Fei looked up at him. “I want, to run free
without a care in your eyes; I want one look to last, a lifetime……”
In the sunlight, the young man in the white T-shirt stood on the stage with a smile on his
lips, his fingers brushing over the strings……
Jiang Cheng stared at Gu Fei in a daze. He felt like he was in a trance. He almost couldn’t tell
if the music he was hearing was playing in his ears, or in his heart.
Footnotes
[1]: China is so vast that if Wuzhe gave these places a name, there’s a chance of naming it
after something that actually exists, so authors avoid it by using XX.
↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5576
TL word count: 3886
TL time: 4:29:53
Edit time: 1:17:33
Curse words: 3x fucks, 4x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Ok here to plug the guitar x piano instrumental duet of saye.mp3 from the audio drama.
This is a different version from the official novel version of saye.mp3, but is also very good!
You can listen to the female (Ding Zhuxin) cover here, and the official male x male cover
here.
uwu here's a guitar x piano version of saye.mp3 from the AD
WHICH IS VERY GUD GO LISTENhttps://t.co/q6S0zzLJgK
pic.twitter.com/FAg0Usc39L

— ami | Where are you going? (@amidstwoods) January 22, 2021

SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: June 3, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 90
Mainly, it was because Gu Fei was exceedingly handsome.
“Clap for me, Cheng-ge.” Through the viewfinder, Gu Fei said behind the
‘microphone’ stick.
It was only then that Jiang Cheng snapped out of it. With one hand still holding his phone,
he slapped his other hand against his lap haphazardly, then put his fingers to his lips and
blew a sharp wolf whistle.
Gu Fei flipped the guitar to his back, jumped off the stage, and walked over toward him.
Jiang Cheng was about to stop the recording, when Gu Fei said,
“Hold on.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
Gu Fei walked all the way up to him, then brought the guitar forward again,
“There’s one more segment.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak. His phone camera happened to focus on Gu Fei’s hand. His fingers
brushed down against the strings, followed by a round of fancy fingerwork.
It was very slow, such that he could hear each note clearly articulated.
Then his fingers started to pick up speed, each note jumped out from beneath his fingertips
in succinct layers, then slowly converging as one.
As the picking got faster, the trailing sound of Gu Fei’s left hand sliding across the neck of
the guitar blended together perfectly with the musical notes.
Jiang Cheng’s not yet settled heart was once again thrown up in the air. In a daze, he saw
through the viewfinder Gu Fei’s fingers producing a residual shadow from the speed. In his
ears was the stirring music, and before his eyes were Gu Fei’s hands that were so stunning
they hurt his eyes.
When the guitar eventually stopped, Jiang Cheng was still holding the same pose. It wasn’t
until Gu Fei reached over the phone and gently brushed against his face, that he realized
with a start that he had started crying at some point.
No. This couldn’t be counted as crying.
This was only tear shedding.
Because he was surprised and moved; because it was so incredible; because of
this rundown but sun-lit stage; because of this memory that will be etched in his heart
forever……
Mainly, it was because Gu Fei was exceedingly handsome.
So handsome he could cry.
That was the description for Gu Fei.
“Fack.” Jiang Cheng stopped the recording, and wiped away the tears on his face. “You just
had to show off a trick at the end.”
“Usually the show-off is at the beginning, then the audience will all start screaming.” Gu Fei
smiled. “I forgot to. I was too nervous.”
“Were you nervous?” Jiang Cheng lifted up the hem of his T-shirt and pressed it against his
eyes a few times. He confirmed there were no more traces of tears on his face, then stood
up. “Even you get nervous?”
“Depends on the person,” Gu Fei said. “It’s my boyfriend sitting here after all.”
Jiang Cheng sniffled, then pulled Gu Fei into a kiss.
Between them was a guitar, above them was half of a sky, and underneath their feet were
rubbles and rubbish, with half buried rows of seating behind them.
This was no romantic atmosphere for a kiss. It was an awkward pose, and a slightly
unconventional setting.
And yet, Jiang Cheng still felt the way he did when listening to Gu Fei sing earlier. The
instant he touched Gu Fei’s lips, he sank. Completely and utterly.
A “BOOM!” sounded from off to the side, pulling Jiang Cheng down from the clouds. He first
froze, then jumped, and almost bit down on Gu Fei’s lips.
The sound came from off to the left. On their left was a collapsed wall, no one would climb
in through there, noto to mention this noise couldn’t possibly be from someone climbing
in……
When Jiang Cheng turned to look, he didn’t see anything other than the two meter high
cloud of dust hovering in the air.
“Go go go go……” At the sight of that, Gu Fei immediately started pushing him toward the
front door, a little anxious. “Hurry up and go outside!”
The dust cloud was already spreading over to them. Jiang Cheng could almost smell the
dirt. Upon seeing Gu Fei’s anxious demeanor, he immediately startled,
“The fuck? Is it gonna collapse?!”
“Hurry up and get out!” Gu Fei yelled.
“Oh shit shit fuck…… Why did it just start collapsing out of nowhere!” Jiang Cheng rushed
toward the door. “When the hell was this thing built……”
He looked back when he got to the door, and realized that Gu Fei wasn’t behind him. He
was suddenly covered in cold sweat, and without thinking, turned and charged back in.
“GU FEI! GU……” He only managed to shout once, before he smashed right into Gu Fei.
Gu Fei circled an arm around him and shoved him out.
When they were both under the clean air and sunshine again, Jiang Cheng finally noticed
the big grin on Gu Fei’s face.
“Shit?” He looked at Gu Fei, then whipped his head back to look at the building.
“Shit!”
The building didn’t collapse. Not only did it not collapse, but after that cloud of dust had
been dispersed by the wind, everything went back to normal, and half of the assembly hall
stood there quietly as before.
“A section of the collapsed wall fell off.” Gu Fei said as he laughed.
“I thought the whole thing was coming down by the way you were fucking reacting!” Jiang
Cheng glared at him, and thought it was a little embarrassing the way he’d been startled by
a falling of a stupid wall.
“There was all that dust, so I just wanted to hurry up and get out.” Gu Fei said.
“And then I suddenly felt like teasing you.”
“……You wanted to see how panicked I’d be when I didn’t see you outside?”
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly.
“No, I just wanted to spook you into running out.” Gu Fei grinned. “On the way out, I
realized I forgot to grab my guitar bag, so I went back to get it.
Although……”
Gu Fei held Jiang Cheng in his arms, “Seeing you panic like that still made me……”
“Please don’t be moved.” Jiang Cheng said. “I only went back in because the building was
still intact. If it really caved in I would definitely back up 100
meters and then dial 119.” [1]
“Mhm.” Gu Fei started laughing.
“Go ahead and laugh.” Jiang Cheng said. “Laugh a little louder.”
“HA HA HA!” Gu Fei tilted his head back and let out three laughs. “Is this loud enough?”
“……Enough, wrap it up.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
As they walked back the way they came, Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but glance back at that
crumbling building one more time.
From this angle, he could no longer see the stage, only the piles of rocks and weeds outside,
along with the caved in roof and broken walls.
If Gu Fei hadn’t brought him here, he never would have imagined that he’d leave behind
such a precious memory underneath that derelict exterior.
“I have to go back to the store later. Around this time is when my mom shuts the door and
runs off.” Gu Fei glanced at his phone.
“I’ll come with,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’ll eat in your store tonight then. Get Gu Miao to come
eat with us.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “What do you want to eat?”
“Dunno,” Jiang Cheng shook his head and rubbed his belly. To be honest, this whole
afternoon had been an emotional rollercoaster for him. Now that he finally calmed down,
there was also nothing left in his brain. He couldn’t even bring himself to absorb any more
study materials at this point, let alone think about what to eat. “I don’t even know whether
I’m hungry or not.”
“Shall we wrap dumplings to eat then?” Gu Fei asked.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei’s mom wasn’t in the store, but the door wasn’t shut. When Jiang Cheng followed Gu
Fei inside, he saw Li Yan sitting behind the counter, playing on his phone.
“What are you doing here?” Gu Fei asked.
“Times really have changed.” Li Yan said. “That you’d think to ask me this question.”
“It was just a casual question.” Gu Fei went and set the guitar down in the small room.
“Are you holding a guitar?” Li Yan glanced over, then froze in place. “Oh shit you were
holding a guitar, my eyes didn’t deceive me?”
“It’s a cello.” Gu Fei came back out, walked up to the shelves, and brought over a bag of
flour. “We’re making dumplings later, why don’t you join us.”
“Nope,” Li Yan shot a glance at Jiang Cheng. “I’m leaving right now.”
“Eat with us,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s almost dinnertime.”
“You think he’s earnestly asking me to stay and eat?” Li Yan said. “He’s just looking for
someone to help out and do the work.”
“Are you eating or not?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Yes! Tell me, am I mincing the filling or kneading dough?” Li Yan asked.
“You’re rolling out the wrappers.” Gu Fei said.
“Sure,” Li Yan nodded, and bowed his head to continue playing with his phone.
“Then call me when it’s time to roll them out. I’m gonna play for a while.”
Gu Fei got some meat out of the fridge and went to the kitchen. Jiang Cheng grabbed the bag
of flour, and was about to head out to the kitchen to knead the dough, when he walked by Li
Yan’s side and hesitated for a moment. He snuck a glance at Li Yan’s phone.
Indeed, it was the idiotic Aixiaochu.
“What level are you on?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m three levels above Da-Fei again.” Li Yan arched a brow at him. “So how about it, are
you going to catch up for him tonight?”
“I wasn’t playing for him.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Uh huh. If it wasn’t for you, he would be at least seven levels below me right now.” Li Yan
put his head down and continued playing. “Ever since he met you, his speed has shot up
like a fart jet, who else can it be.”
“It’s really not me. I’ve never been shot up by a fart jet.” Jiang Cheng said.
Li Yan put down his phone and looked at him, “Hey, I noticed your mouth’s even worse
than Da-Fei’s??”
Jiang Cheng smiled and headed for the kitchen.
“Hey, Jiang Cheng,” Li Yan called out to him in a hushed voice. “What were you two up to
just now?”
Jiang Cheng turned back and looked at him without a word. Li Yan’s question was
unintentionally astute. What were we up to? We were being lovey dovey. We also got all up in
each other’s business and made out.
“……I meant,” Li Yan probably realized his question came at a weird angle, and readjusted
himself. “He played the guitar?”
Jiang Cheng still didn’t answer. After what happened with the “composer Gu Fei”, he was a
little sensitive to everything about Gu Fei. He wasn’t sure if Gu Fei wanted Li Yan to know,
even if he knew that Li Yan and the guys were on solid terms with Gu Fei.
“It’s been at least two years since he played the guitar in public.” Li Yan glanced toward the
kitchen.
That much was true. After all, most people would simply loosen the strings if they don’t
play on playing for a long time, but Gu Fei went and uninstalled them completely.
“In public?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah. Who knows if he played in private late at night, with only himself and the moon.” Li
Yan said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I asked you a question?” Li Yan looked at him.
Jiang Cheng stared off with him for a while, then turned and quickly walked toward the
kitchen.
“Geez,” Li Yan was a little displeased. “Why are you running away so quickly!”
“I got propelled by a fart jet.” Jiang Cheng said.
“What were you two talking about?” Gu Fei asked him in the kitchen.
“Farts and jets.” Jiang Cheng said as he walked in. Gu Fei handed him a tub, and he said
quietly as he started pouring flour. “Has it been a really long time since you played guitar?”
“Li Yan asked you?” Gu Fei watched the flour.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng continued pouring. “I didn’t tell him, but he can probably guess, right?”
Gu Fei reached out and pushed on the bag of flour, “That’s good.”
Jiang Cheng set the bag to the side. Gu Fei came around and kissed him on the ear, “You
don’t need to be so careful, it’s tiring.”
“Well isn’t that because I’m afraid you’ll……” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, propped his hands
down on the counter, then said to the wall in a hushed voice in
imitation of Gu Fei. “And then what? Cheng-ge, and then what? ”
Gu Fei burst out laughing beside him. Jiang Cheng turned around and laughed along with
him for a while, then sighed, and stroked his face, “Gu Fei……”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei answered.
“I really didn’t know. And I really wasn’t trying to mess with you on purpose.”
Jiang Cheng held Gu Fei’s chin in his fingers. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t say that.” Gu Fei said. “I didn’t blame you, really. It was only my own ideas.”
“Anyways,” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a second. “You came out and said it, so I
understand now. I just wanted to say……”
He paused, and suddenly leaned into Gu Fei’s face, the tips of their noses almost touching,
“Gu Fei.”
“Yes.” Gu Fei’s eyes crossed for a second, then quickly straightened and shot a glance
behind him.
“I’m not trying to kiss you. You’re overthinking.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but giggle. “I’m
trying to tell you something serious.”
“Go ahead.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Close your eyes.” Jiang Cheng said. After Gu Fei closed his eyes, Jiang Cheng said again,
“Open your eyes.”
“If you want to keep your eyes closed, I’ll keep you company. And when you want to open
your eyes, I’ll hear it.” Jiang Cheng said. He cleared his throat, then hummed a line quietly. “I
want, you on my left shoulder, a smile on my right……”
Gu Fei looked at him, and for a long time did not speak.
“I got it right, right?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I really am impressed,” Gu Fei said. “Did you just memorize this version too?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng said. “Only this line, I forgot everything else.”
“Then how come you memorized the original one? But not the one I sang only for you?” Gu
Fei narrowed his eyes.
“No shit, I’m still reeling from it even now.” Jiang Cheng said. “If you didn’t come up and
show off that last trick, I might’ve been able to remember a few more lines. After that
showy ending, this is all I can remember, since this is the
one you used to show off. Even a boar would remember.”
“Ah.” Gu Fei nodded as he held back laughter. “True.”
Jiang Cheng sighed and did not speak.
Gu Fei also didn’t say a word. They stood there quietly, face to face with each other.
“Gu Fei……” Li Yan’s voice came from behind them. “Oops sorry please
continue.”
By the time Jiang Cheng turned around, there was no one there. Li Yan must’ve dashed back
inside at the speed of light.
“It’s fine,” Gu Fei started adding water to the tub of flour, then turned and yelled at the
backdoor. “Li Yan!”
Li Yan appeared in the doorway again, only sticking a head out as he looked this way, “Gu
Miao hurt her hand. I wanted to help disinfect it for her, but the little lassie wouldn’t
respond to me.”
Gu Miao was hurt? Jiang Cheng was a little startled, though Li Yan didn’t seem very
bothered.
“Cheng-ge, why don’t you go help her.” Gu Fei’s voice also sounded calm.
“Right now she probably doesn’t want to respond to me either.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng figured that Gu Miao probably got cuts and scrapes often enough that it
was nothing new to them.
“I told her today to text me if she’s going to go out and skate,” Gu Fei said. “She texted me,
but I probably didn’t hear it, and still haven’t texted her back. She’s definitely angry with
me.”
“……I didn’t hear your phone go off either.” Jiang Cheng was a little taken aback. Gu Miao
probably sent the message while they were still enveloped in the romantic atmosphere of
the rickety stage performance.
“Why don’t you go give it a try,” Gu Fei flashed him a smile. “She might react to you.”
Gu Miao’s wound wasn’t that serious, though there was a little blood. Li Yan wanted to
rinse it with some saline water, but Gu Miao stood in front of the cash register holding her
skateboard, and refused to budge.
“Er-Miao?” Jiang Cheng crouched down and waved a hand at her.
Gu Miao stared at him. There was no expression on her face, and no reaction.
Jiang Cheng gave her a smile. When Gu Miao opened her eyes wide like this, he could see
her eyelashes very clearly. It was the exact same as Gu Fei’s eyelashes.
“Er-Miao,” Jiang Cheng considered how he could get Gu Miao to understand his words. After
a few seconds, he leaned down and gently blew a puff of air on his own hand. “Er-Miao, my
hand hurts. Do you know what to do?”
Gu Miao’s gaze fell on his face.
“Er-Miao?” Jiang Cheng’s heart lit up with glee. He continued to talk to her quietly, “You……”
Before he could finish, Gu Miao reached out a hand and pushed the bottle of saline Li Yan
had set on a little table to the ground.
Jiang Cheng didn’t get a chance to say anything else, when Gu Miao flipped the little table
over too.
“Gu Fei!” Li Yan yelled toward the kitchen. “Your little sister is rebelling!”
“Just leave her standing there.” Gu Fei said from the kitchen.
Jiang Cheng stood up and went into the kitchen.
“This technically was your fault. If she’s angry then,” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“Should you apologize to her?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded as he worked the dough. “I’ll do it later.”
“Let me do this,” Jiang Cheng said. “She’s already like that, why don’t you go console her
first?”
Gu Fei stopped what he was doing, sighed, turned and hugged Jiang Cheng’s shoulders, then
leaned unmoving against him.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything else, just rubbed his back.
He was suddenly a little anxious. The way Gu Fei was acting, was it
because……he woke him up?
“I’ll go later.” Gu Fei said against his shoulder. “Later when she’s calmed down a little more,
it’s more effective that way.”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng held him tight.
“The little lass is too stubborn.” Gu Fei sighed. “Gets angry at the tiniest thing.
Sometimes when I’m annoyed I want to smack her.”
“Have you smacked her?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Nope. Never even yelled at her.” Gu Fei let go of him, turned around, and continued
kneading the dough. “Sometimes I just want to let her chill for a while. She has a temper,
but so do I, you know.”
Although, Gu Fei’s ‘temper’ was clearly nothing compared to Gu Miao’s temper.
After the dough was done, he went back inside to soothe Gu Miao.
When Jiang Cheng and Li Yan finished mincing and mixing the filling and went back in, Gu
Miao was finally back to normal, and sat down by the table to watch them wrap dumplings.
Jiang Cheng watched as Gu Fei also joined in on the wrapping. He couldn’t see any
weariness, and Gu Fei’s emotional state also seemed pretty normal, but perhaps it was
because of his different perspective, Jiang Cheng could detect a sense of helplessness he
never noticed before from the way Gu Fei patiently communicated with Gu Miao.
Before, he only thought that it must be really tiring for Gu Fei. But now, he could suddenly
empathize with the helplessness with which Gu Fei said those words earlier by the river.
Gu Miao wasn’t like this all the time. Certain days were worse than others. Back then when
he first met her outside the train station, he didn’t even notice how much Gu Miao was
different from other kids, other than the unwillingness to talk. Later on, he would play with
her on the skateboard, eat together, play games together, and she would even smile at him.
Whenever he thought of these instances, his heart would soar a little. When she was like
that, it made him hopeful. He would think that perhaps the situation wasn’t that bad.
And yet, when he heard her screams, saw how she refused to communicate with others, the
cold indifferent expression she showed the outside world, when he remembered the
bunnies she drew in page after page, remembered how he anticipated Gu Miao would
answer him but instead was met with her flipping the table, his heart would plummet
again. As though he was yanked back to reality from his delusions.
What followed this rise and fall, was a profound sense of helplessness.
Gu Fei might have gone through countless rises and falls, before eventually deciding to give
up on the empty hope.
Li Yan left after they finished eating. Jiang Cheng sat in the store and watched as Gu Miao
zipped back and forth through the aisles on her skateboard.
Gu Fei sat behind the counter and checked the accounts. He didn’t know how much his
mom had taken from the store this month, and how much was left.
Either way, Gu Fei wasn’t wearing the happiest expression as he counted the money.
Money. Aside from Gu Miao, it was probably the heaviest thing weighing on him.
Gu Fei couldn’t even let Gu Miao continue the rehabilitation treatment. It was only a small
treatment center in this shitty little city that couldn’t possibly be very legitimate, yet still
they were unable to keep it up in the long term.
Jiang Cheng frowned.
“They gave me your pay for two of the photoshoots.” Gu Fei said as he tapped away on the
calculator. “Should I transfer it to you tomorrow?”
“I thought it’s been cleared, has it not?” Jiang Cheng blinked in surprise.
“Even if I sold you off, you’d probably still be sleeping with me happily.” Gu Fei threw him a
glance. “Don’t you keep track of your money at all?”
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not like I spend money irresponsibly. Not a spendthrift,
never lost money anywhere, therefore, I don’t need to keep a record.”
“Ooh what sound logic you have, overachiever.” Gu Fei said.
“That’s right slacky-slacker.” Jiang Cheng said.
After he said this, something suddenly occurred to him. He stared at Gu Fei and hesitated
for almost five minutes before he spoke up, “Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him with a pencil in his mouth.
“How about you, don’t give me the money.” Jiang Cheng said. “Just……leave it in your
account. You can keep it saved for me.”
Gu Fei didn’t reply. The pencil in his mouth flicked back and forth.
After a while, Jiang Cheng saw the corner of his mouth curl up and form into a subtle smile.
“Is that okay or not!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei took the pencil and twirled it in his hand. “I must’ve done some really
great deeds in my previous life, to have met you in this one.”
Footnotes
[1]: The emergency number for fires and other disasters. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5839

TL word count: 3929

TL time: 4:15:17
Edit time: ???
Curse words: 4x fucks, 7x shits
TL’s Notes:
More thorough edit later orz
SAYE MANHUA – CHECK IT!
First posted: June 11, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 91
“Geez, you can insult me, but you insult my boyfriend too?”
If he left the money saved in Gu Fei’s account, then in the future if Gu Fei needed money, he
could say “why don’t you use those first”. It would probably go over easier than saying
“here take my money”, and easier for Gu Fei to accept.
Jiang Cheng had enough left in his own account for this last year of high school tuition,
study materials, and living expenses, as well as what he would need for the first year of
university. He could give the remaining to Gu Fei.
But as soon as he had opened his mouth, Gu Fei had seen right through him. Gu Fei didn’t
expose his intentions however, nor did he continue the conversation, so Jiang Cheng also
didn’t bring it up again.
Gu Fei still had to do some photo editing that evening, and couldn’t join him in his
apartment to ‘accompany him in studying’. Jiang Cheng stood at the intersection watching
Gu Fei with Gu Miao rolling along on her skateboard beside him, and his mind wandered.
Everybody had their own story, whether it was happy, sad, or resigned. Without knowing
someone profoundly, you would never know what every passing person carried in their
deepest of hearts, or whether behind every lit window was a sigh.
Gu Fei turned back several times and waved at him, indicating that he could end his watch,
but still he stood there unmoving.
Until Gu Fei called him on the phone, “Did you hurt your back or something?”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Can’t I watch for a while.”
“I can hardly walk straight from your staring,” Gu Fei said. “Hurry home, don’t you still have
to study?”
“When you say that,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “It suddenly makes me feel anxious.”
“Then I won’t say anymore.” Gu Fei said. “You can keep watching for a bit, I’ll be turning in
five meters.”
After hanging up, Jiang Cheng laughed and continued to watch Gu Fei’s receding figure that
was blurring out of view. Gu Fei waved at him again as he turned onto the side street, as if
he was blowing a kiss.
Jiang Cheng checked that there was no one around, then also waved his arm to
blow a kiss.
Having gone back to his apartment, Jiang Cheng felt like he was a robot that moved
according to programming. He showered, tidied himself up, sat down at the desk and
finished his homework, then started to study as per the plan in his head.
Unlike some people, he didn’t write out his study plan on paper. The books to read,
question banks to get through, all of that were stored in his brain. It also included what he
wanted to get done every day, what he did yesterday, where the problems were, what he
wanted to do today, what could be left until
tomorrow……
Upon opening one of his textbooks, the colourful rows that filled the pages made it look like
a book of codes, he alone knew what each colour stood for. And then there were his
notebooks.
Jiang Cheng opened one of them. He was always very brief with his notes, usually writing
only a prompt for each point, since he would remember the content once he saw the
prompt. And when combined with his handwriting……
he figured nobody would want his notes after he graduated, not even for free. It was truly a
text from the gods. [1]
Ahhh, this handwriting……
Jiang Cheng started memorizing passages as he wrote, and jotted down a few key words
and phrases, as a way to practice his handwriting.
Speaking of which, he really did improve on it. He could at least control himself from
writing cursively, which only added to the atrociousness.
With one stroke at a time, as hideous as it was, it was at least possible to make out the
words.
On the desk was a notebook that classmate Gu Fei had left here. Jiang Cheng picked it up
and flipped through it. Gu Fei’s so-called notes was basically a blank new notebook. He put
the same notebook on his desk in every class, putting up a front, as a way to show the
teacher some respect.
If Jiang Cheng remembered correctly, Gu Fei had been using this since last semester, and
until now……he’d used about eight pages in total, and each page was only half filled.
Jiang Cheng had never flipped through Gu Fei’s notebook before, and it was only today that
he saw what Gu Fei had been writing in there. He laughed out loud at the first sentence.
Lao-Lu’s voice tolls like a magnificent bell, it’s an even better energizer than the school bell.
Sleepy.
Very very very very very very very very sleepy.
Can’t get past this level.
Li Yan is 12 levels past me. Scum.
Forgot to bring a portable charger.
Gonna eat meat pies.
I don’t want noodles no noodles noooo noodles no.
Population regeneration, the renewal of generations of population, births, deaths.
Jiang Cheng’s brows arched briefly. He was a little surprised at the fact that there was
actually classwork related content. He figured it was probably written down when Gu Fei
was flopped over the desk, bored, with nothing better to do.
Although, it was just that one row, which was followed by a tangled ball of scribbly lines,
that was definitely the subconscious product of a wandering mind.
After he finished admiring Gu Fei’s ‘notes’, Jiang Cheng stretched and continued
memorizing passages.
He should encourage Gu Fei to make more of these notes, he thought. His mood felt lifted
after reading it, and so was his energy. If he glanced at it a few times while resting, he could
probably sit there and study until 3 a.m.
Gu Fei’s head fell forward, smashing his face solidly onto the keyboard.
“Fuck!” He cursed, a wave of sore twinge washed over his nose, it took him a long time to
recover from it.
Usually he wouldn’t be so sleepy when editing photos late into the night. He didn’t expect
to fall asleep with the mouse in his hand today, not to mention it was with such sincerity
that his face smashed into the keyboard.
Although, this kind of sleepiness wasn’t the same as what he usually felt in class when
drifting off without a phone in his hand. It was also different from having worked all day
and then having to drag himself out to play with Gu Miao on the skateboard or fight with
his mom.
It was more like a kind of relaxation one felt after having vented.
When his nose felt a little better, he smoothed his hand over the keyboard too.
With such an upright and handsome nose, who’s to say it won’t break the
keyboard?
Today really was……a kind of release. It was the first time in all these years that he had told
someone what he really thought, and the first time he cried in such an uninhibited and
unreserved manner in front of someone, even though Jiang Cheng had to ‘force’ it out of
him. Still, he suddenly felt lighter.
It was just like when he was jumping the ‘hurdles’. He didn’t know whether he could jump
over, whether he would land on the other side, or on the ground; whether he would be
alright when he landed, or if he would break a leg.
Stepping out was the hardest part, but you’d feel a sudden release after the jump, and all
speculations as to what happens after that would disappear.
Speaking up was the hardest part, but once the first sentence had been spoken, there would
not be as much pressure.
All thoughts about the unsolvable future, about how these troubles once said out loud will
only add to the other person’s worry, were all cleared as well.
Tomorrow…… Gu Fei picked up his phone, opened the Fourth High forum, then after some
hesitation closed it again. He didn’t need to wait until tomorrow, the forum must’ve been
exploding since this afternoon.
The people of Fourth High were very idle day in and day out. Endless
discussions and discourses emerged every single day. There would even be posts about the
love lives of teachers, including bets on whether they would split up, and after how long.
A headline like “Gu Fei knows how to compose music” would probably be enough to last
them a whole week.
When he left the auditorium today, he had thought about Jiang Cheng’s reaction; he didn’t
want Jiang Cheng to be disappointed. He could’ve ignored the exclamations in the forum,
but when all the surprised and contemplative faces started turning to him, it was
impossible for him to sit still.
Can you believe that Gu Fei is this great! Can you believe that Gu Fei is this awesome!
The constant feeling of being reminded was unbearable. Besides, he had been so used to
evading other’s looks all these years, that when the words “composer Gu Fei” came out, he
felt a sudden panic not unlike being torn open.
He didn’t have time to think about how Jiang Cheng would feel seeing him leave. He
practically bolted out of the auditorium that very instant, as if running for his life.
He knew how long Jiang Cheng had prepared for the performance, and how
much he dedicated to it. He didn’t dare to imagine how disappointed Jiang Cheng would feel
when he saw the empty seat.
When Jiang Cheng yelled at him by the river, he wasn’t even a little bit angry or annoyed.
All he had was resignation. And heartache.
He ached for Jiang Cheng, because Jiang Cheng was holding onto him as though he was
holding onto the last little piece of support, but still couldn’t obtain the sense of security, of
landing on solid ground, that he was truly after.
Gu Fei let out a soft sigh and glanced at the time on his phone. It was past midnight. The
overachiever must still be immersed in the grand endeavour of preparing for the exams.
He decided to wait until 1 a.m to text the overachiever.
There was a sound of the door opening outside. It was his mom coming home.
Gu Fei was a little surprised. Usually by this time, if his mom wasn’t back yet, she would be
spending the night at some boyfriend’s house.
He frowned, put down his phone, and walked out of his room.
His mom was changing shoes at the door. When she heard him walk out, she said without
lifting her head, “You’re still up huh?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei looked at her. “I didn’t think you’d be coming back tonight?”
“Where can I go if I’m not coming back here!” His mom said haughtily, then grabbed her bag
and started walking toward her bedroom.
Gu Fei swept his glance over her face, then grabbed her arm, “What happened to your
face?”
“Nothing,” His mom turned away. “Go back to whatever you were doing.”
Gu Fei didn’t reply as he lifted up a portion of her hair, then said, “Did your boyfriend beat
you?”
“Aiyah!” His mom roughly shook off his grasp, turned, and pushed open her bedroom door.
“Why do you reach so far!”
By the time Gu Fei got there, she had already shut the door. He tried the knob twice, but
didn’t manage to open it.
“Have you not,” Gu Fei said in a low voice. “Had enough of getting beaten up by men!”
There was no response from inside the room, all was quiet.
“Have you been beaten dumb!” Gu Fei could not for the life of him describe how he felt at
this moment. “Open up!”
The door opened. His mom stood in the door, with a finger pointed at him, “Say that one
more time!”
She had brushed her hair behind her ears, and the bruises on her face were even more
obvious.
“I asked you, have you not had enough of being beaten up by men!” Gu Fei said.
She didn’t say anything, as a slap landed square on his cheek, “What did you say!”
Gu Fei could’ve dodged this slap from his mom, but he didn’t. The slap landed on his cheek
loud and clear.
“What did you say!” A sprinkling of tears started appearing in her eyes.
“I asked you, have you not had enough of being beaten up by men.” Gu Fei repeated himself.
His cheek felt hot, but these minute sensations were nothing next to the fear brought on by
the unforgettable memories, which those bruises invariably evoked.
“How was I to know that he would hit me!” She suddenly bursted out crying.
“He was so good to me before! How was I supposed to know that he would get violent!”
“Do you not have eyes? Don’t you know how to read people? Do you not have judgment
skills? Do you need him to beat you before knowing that he’s not a good person?” Gu Fei let
out a string of questions, his voice trembling. “How old are you now? You’re not a teenager
anymore, do you expect to keep living like a teenage girl forever? Even teenage girls have
better discretion than you!”
“What’s wrong with acting like a teenage girl!” She suddenly shoved him hard.
“What’s wrong with me acting like a teenage girl! I’ve been with your father ever since I
was a teenager! I’ve never had a chance to act young! He’s dead!
Don’t I get to act young! This is what I want to do! I want to act like a teenage girl forever!
He’s dead and gone, but who’s going to pay me back for my lost youth! Who’s going to
pay?!”
Gu Fei watched her without a word.
“I once asked you this right?” She stared back at him. “You told me to pay for myself, right?
So this is me paying myself back! Isn’t it? I’m trying to pay myself back!”
Gu Fei stared at her for a long time, then turned and walked away to his own room.
“Da-fei……” His mother called after him. “Da-fei.”
He turned around.
“Have you had enough of me?” She asked.
“Yes.” Gu Fei answered.
“You would’ve gone and left me behind, if it wasn’t for Er-Miao,” She wiped her eyes. “You
would’ve left me behind a long time ago. If I don’t have a boyfriend, I’ll be all alone sooner
or later, and I’ll be a lonely old hag when I die.”
Gu Fei was quiet.
How important is a sense of security to a person? That need for security hidden deep
within one’s heart or never even perceived, how much impact does that have on a person?
He sighed, then opened his arms.
His mom threw herself into his arms and sobbed quietly.
Gu Fei patted her back, “Hey, don’t cry, go clean up later, and don’t go out with that person
again.”
She did not answer.
“If you don’t break it off with him,” Gu Fei said. “Then don’t complain that every single one
of your boyfriends was beaten off by me.”
She pushed him away, glared at him for a few seconds, then turned to go into the bathroom.
Gu Fei hadn’t washed up yet. He went back into his room and sat down at his desk. He
almost didn’t want to get back up again. He could barely move the one and a half steps it
would take to go from here to the bed once he finished editing the photos, let alone
standing up to go wash.
He sat in front of the computer, and stared at a photo for at least five minutes, before
remembering what he was meant to be doing. As he grabbed the mouse, he was suddenly
filled with admiration for Jiang Cheng.
No matter what environment he was in, Jiang Cheng could get into a study mode in a very
short time. Even after a day like today, he was certain that at this moment, Jiang Cheng’s
mind was filled with nothing else but the books and study materials before him.
How extremely cool, a person like this.
He chuckled to himself, and clicked with his mouse. The desktop wallpaper appeared. Jiang
Cheng’s smug as all hell face showed up before his eyes. Gu Fei tilted his head, leaning his
forehead on one finger, and stared at the face.
He switched his wallpaper about once a week. At this rate, his privately saved Jiang Cheng
photo collection could last him through to the university entrance exams next year.
He stared at the photo for a little while longer, then grabbed his mouse and started to work.
These photos all have to be submitted the next day. Ever since he started going to Jiang
Cheng’s place all the time to keep him company while he studied, all of his photo editing
tasks had been pushed too close to deadlines.
These photos had to be finished tonight. If it was like before, he might skip half or even a
whole day’s class the next day, and stay home to work on it slowly. But he had to go to
school tomorrow.
Even if he were to skip class, it couldn’t be tomorrow. If he didn’t go tomorrow, Jiang Cheng
would definitely think it was because of “composer Gu Fei”.
He picked up his phone at 1 a.m. to send Jiang Cheng a message. Just as he picked it up, his
phone buzzed, and a text came in. It was from Jiang Cheng.
– checking to see if you left a nerve on for me
Gu Fei grinned as he replied.
– I’m still up, all my nerves have been left to you
– still up at this hour?
– working on photos, i’ll sleep in a bit, are you done studying?
– mhm, you got time to video chat?
Gu Fei sent a video request over, and Jiang Cheng quickly accepted on the other end.
When Jiang Cheng’s face popped up on the screen, Gu Fei’s emotions, which had been left in
shambles by his mom just now, were suddenly calm again.
Jiang Cheng really was an omnipotent cure. He could help with sleep, libido, could
tranquilize, could energize……
All your emotional needs can be straightened out with only one Jiang Cheng.
“Are you planning to sleep now?” Gu Fei leaned back in his chair and smiled.
“Mhm, gonna fall asleep to some English recording.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Will you be able to fall asleep like that?” Gu Fei asked.
“Sure, it has about the same effect as hypnosis, I’ll fall asleep halfway through.”
Jiang Cheng yawned. “How much longer until you’re done with the photos?”
“Half an hour.” Gu Fei stared at Jiang Cheng’s neck.
Jiang Cheng was leaning back against the chair with his head tilted back. The line of his
neck was very……energizing.
“Then you go on, and tomorrow……” Jiang Cheng hesitated. “Are you going to school?”
“Yep,” Gu Fei nodded. “But you’re gonna have to call me when you get up, I probably won’t
be able to wake up on my own.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng immediately grinned. “I’ll wait for you at the breakfast stalls.”
“Will it be your treat?” Gu Fei asked.
“My treat.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Alrighty then,” Gu Fei glanced at the time. “You should sleep now.”
“Wait wait wait,” Jiang Cheng sat up straight. “Um……I want to see you.”
“……We’ve been talking but you couldn’t see me this whole time?” Gu Fei was a little baffled
as he glanced down at his phone. His face was very clear on the tiny window.
“See your collarbone.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh,” Gu Fei suddenly started laughing. Once he started, he couldn’t stop, then in one
motion he pulled off his shirt. “Are the collarbones enough? I have other parts, if you want
you can buy one and get more.”
Jiang Cheng giggled and didn’t answer.
Gu Fei aimed the camera at himself, and swept it from his face to his neck, to his
collarbones, then continued southward. When it got to his belly he asked, “Do you need
more?”
“……No,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’ll affect my sleep if you keep going, and I still have to recite
English in my dreams……”
Before Jiang Cheng finished the sentence, Gu Fei swiftly tugged open his pants and aimed
the camera at it, “Little feifei come say hi to Cheng-ge.”
“Fuck your great uncle, Gu Fei!” Jiang Cheng yelled from the other end. “You
piece of shameless dog-fucker!”
Gu Fei moved the phone camera back up and couldn’t stop laughing, “Geez, you can insult
me, but you insult my boyfriend too? Won’t your conscience be hurt?”
“……Hurt your ass!” Jiang Cheng threw himself back on the pillow and pointed at his own
camera. “You’re affecting my studying, you know that?”
“Really?” Gu Fei said. “Then should I interview you tomorrow morning, see if you dreamed
of English or me.”
Even though work became more efficient as soon as his mood was lifted, but since he spent
so many days accompanying his boyfriend, he left a little too much work to the last minute.
By the time Gu Fei finished, it was already past 3
a.m.
Gu Fei usually took about half an hour to fall asleep, but on this day, as soon as his head hit
the pillow, he closed his eyes and lost consciousness, as though someone had knocked him
out.
He was not one to dream of English, but this whole night, he didn’t even get to dream of
Jiang Cheng before he was woken up by his ringtone.
“Shit.” Gu Fei turned over. If he didn’t have any dreams, he always felt like the whole night’s
sleep was for nothing, like he only just closed his eyes and had to open them immediately
after.
The phone call was from Jiang Cheng. Gu Fei picked up, and before he could make a sound,
Jiang Cheng’s voice carried over the line, “Gu Fei, are you up?”
“Yep,” Gu Fei sat up. He was still a little groggy, and not entirely awake yet, but he could still
tell that Jiang Cheng’s voice was lacking the usual cheerfulness it had when waking him in
the morning. “What’s wrong?”
“Li Hui is outside, and he brought a few other guys too.” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t know
how he found this place, but he probably doesn’t know which floor I’m on, which is why he
hasn’t come up yet. But he’s right downstairs.”
“I’ll be over right away.” Gu Fei jumped off the bed. “How did you realize that he’s outside?”
“He just called me,” Jiang Cheng sounded agitated. “I already said I don’t want anything of Li
Baoguo’s. None of that has anything to do with me anymore.
Why is he still bothering me endlessly?”
“Did he say why he’s looking for you?” Gu Fei ran into the bathroom. He had no time to
brush his teeth, so he only gurgled some mouthwash from the big case his mom had
bought, under the influence of one of her boyfriends she had met on her path to find her
teenage self.
“Asked me for Li Baoguo’s savings account.” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t come over, I’m going
downstairs now. I fucking hate dumbasses like this who just don’t know when to stop.”
“Wait for me.” Gu Fei didn’t even bother to wash his face as he dashed out of the door
topless.
Whether Li Baoguo actually had a savings account was another story, but even if he did,
there was no way it would be left to Jiang Cheng.
Li Baoguo could not get along with Li Hui for the entirety of their whole lives, for no other
reason than that he was trying to care for Li Hui in a uniquely Steel Works way, and that Li
Hui responded to it in a similarly unique Steel Works way.
Li Hui himself must’ve understood this point well. He went to Jiang Cheng not because he
couldn’t find the savings account. More likely it was to ask for money.
Jiang Cheng grew up in the big city. His old family got by comfortably. He had a bank card
given to him by his adoptive parents. If Li Baoguo had known this, then Li Hui also knew
this.
Someone like Li Hui was like gum melted under the sun, and there was no logic or
sentiment to speak of with him.
Jiang Cheng could not take care of him. If anyone could, it was the mini tyrant of the Steel
Works……
Gu Fei didn’t take the bicycle. He brought out his motorcycle, and floored it all the way to
Jiang Cheng’s apartment.
Footnotes
[1]: It’s common for upperclassmen with good grades to sell their well-made study notes to
the lower years after they graduate, but in Jiang Cheng’s case….
Also, [天书] or “text from the gods” is just a saying to describe something as unreadable,
because in the legend this references, a “text from the gods” is actually blank = [无字天书] ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5811
TL word count: 4125
TL time: ???
Edit time: 1:05:53

Curse words: 4x fucks, 1x shit, 2x asses

TL’s Notes:
Hiiii, this is not a requirement to keep reading the translation, but if you’ve bought the
novel on jjwxc (or physical copies!), it would make me really happy if you will send me
screenshots/photos of your purchases <333
–> amidst.woods@gmail.com
Here’s a guide to access jjwxc receipts on the mobile app.
And if you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search
for if you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: June 19, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 92
No matter how hard it is, he has to leave this place.
It was an overcast day. The sun that was supposed to rear its head did not appear, and the
few intact street lamps along the lane were still lit.
Gu Fei felt the breeze a little chilly against his body as he zoomed toward Jiang Cheng’s
apartment on his motorcycle.
Though it was also a satisfying kind of feeling, as if his whole being was enveloped in the
cool and refreshing wind.
It had been a long time since he rode the motorcycle. Usually he only took it out when he
went cruising with Li Yan and the guys, but since getting together with Jiang Cheng, he
seldomly went out with them anymore. Just the other day Liu Fan had called him, and said
he was writing a poem to commemorate the “bestie who abandoned me”.
It wasn’t far to Jiang Cheng’s place from his own. On the motorcycle, and at the speed he
was going, it only took less than five minutes in total.
He was a little worried that Jiang Cheng would be unable to restrain his temper, and go
downstairs to deal with Li Hui on his own.
Jiang Cheng would certainly not be at a disadvantage against Li Hui. Even though Li Hui had
help with him, with Jiang Cheng’s fighting ability, there was no way the other side would
come out on top.
However, these were special times. Jiang Cheng was a high school senior preparing for his
exams. It would be a big deal if something so much as affected his mood, let alone getting
stuck with trouble like this.
It was enough of an impact for him to have moved from a key high school to a place like the
Fourth High, and then to be plagued with all these problems……
There weren’t many people on the street at this time. The ones who had to go to school or
work hadn’t yet left home, so the only people out and about were grannies and grandpas
who got up early to exercise or buy produce.
Therefore, as soon as he turned the corner onto Jiang Cheng’s street, Gu Fei was able to see
the people standing not far ahead.
He wasn’t wearing his glasses. From this distance, he could only make out Li Hui, who was
standing a few steps away from the rest. He didn’t recognize anyone else.
But it didn’t matter anyway. The only people Li Hui could manage to summon were idle
delinquents. The sole difference was between Steel Works delinquents, and non-Steel
Works delinquents.
Gu Fei didn’t slow down as he charged at the group of people standing by the road.
Delinquents tend to be fairly nimble. In the roar of the engine, they all turned their heads,
and started to show some signs of moving out of the way.
Gu Fei lowered himself to the bike, and pulled a long rubber baton out from the modified
back fender.
When the motorcycle roared up to the group, many of them had jumped out of the way.
However, they were not Gu Fei’s target.
Li Hui’s reaction was clearly slower than these thugs. Only when everyone else had
scattered did he just manage to turn his head.
Gu Fei swung. The baton in his hand cracked against Li Hui’s ass.
Li Hui yelled, but not with a lot of conviction or power, in fact, probably only 70% of it. The
colour of his face gave away the fact that he likely stayed up all night playing mahjong; it
was steel grey.
He was indeed living up to his role as the dear son Li Baoguo had brought up by hand.
By the time everyone else came around and swarmed, Gu Fei’s bike had already passed by
more than a few meters.
He squeezed on the brakes and stuck one foot on the ground. The tail end of the motorcycle
swung out, and the bike pivoted.
This time he was closer, and was able to make out the people Li Hui had brought. There
were four or five of them, all from the Steel Works
neighbourhood, but he only knew the guy people called San Gou, who often bought things
from his convenience store. [1]
San Gou recognized him, and blinked in shock, “Da-Fei?”
“Out of the way.” Gu Fei said.
The motorcycle once again charged at the group. San Gou hesitated for a split second, then
stepped back.
This time the other guys were prepared. Someone stepped up to the bike with a knife in his
hand, and swung it hard toward Gu Fei’s face.
Gu Fei steered a little to the side to avoid the knife, as he smacked the baton down on the
guy’s arm. As the bike charged past once more, he heard the sound of the knife clanging to
the ground.
He didn’t use a lot of force on this strike, as his purpose was only to smack the knife away.
He didn’t wish to provoke these people more than necessary, because he didn’t know them
well. If any of them turned out to have the same temperament as Monkey, it’d be another
difficult mess to get out of.
His target was only Li Hui. Li Hui was a coward. If he didn’t have people with him, he
wouldn’t have dared to come look for Jiang Cheng on his own. Even with a posse, he still
didn’t dare to look for Jiang Cheng at the school.
To students at Fourth High, fighting came to them as easily as eating. If Jiang Cheng really
brought other people to go up against him, Li Hui would never dare to face him head on.
Li Hui wanted to get out of the way, but he couldn’t be quicker than the motorcycle. Just as
he turned to run away, Gu Fei’s baton slammed down once again, this time onto his leg.
“Fuck!” Li Hui bursted out. “I fucking fuck your great uncle! Did I fucking do anything to
you!”
“You did.” Gu Fei swung his bike around again.
“You wanna bet I’ll take you out too!” Li Hui pointed at him. As he said this he glanced to
the sides, signalling to the others that they should all rush up together.
“This matter has nothing to do with these bros here.” Gu Fei killed the engine and got off
the motorcycle. Holding the baton, he walked up to Li Hui. “You called up all these people
just to come bother a highschooler. If word gets out, you won’t just be embarrassing
yourself, you’d also make a joke of the ones who helped you.”
“Don’t try to sow discord!” Li Hui was practically spitting as he shouted. “He took my dad’s
savings!”
“Did your dad have savings?” Gu Fei sneered. “Maybe you should go look it up at the bank
first. If the bank won’t let you check, you can call the cops to help.
The cops will help you for sure.”
“I don’t need to check! I know he took it!” Li Hui shouted.
“Alright then,” Gu Fei looked at him. “When are you going to pay me for all those things you
took from my store last time?”
Li Hui was bewildered, “When the fuck did I take anything from your store?”
“A whole box of Zhonghua, and two cases of Maotai,” Gu Fei said. “And……”
[2]
“Bull fucking shit!” Li Hui interrupted him. “Does that shitty store of yours even have that
much Zhonghua and Maotai!”
“Then did that dad of yours who had to keep a tab even for gambling have a savings
account?” Gu Fei asked.
“You……” Li Hui blinked as he tried to keep up.
“Don’t you worry about whether I have it in the store,” Gu Fei said. “I said you took them. I
know you took them.”
“You fucking……” Li Hui’s eyeballs were practically bulging out of their sockets. He hardly
knew how to continue the conversation, so he decided to swing his arm and aim a punch at
Gu Fei’s face.
Gu Fei didn’t bother dodging. Li Hui’s fist was taking such a long time to get there, that
when his own punch landed on Li Hui’s nose, the guy still had his arms open like he was
going for a hug.
When Jiang Cheng heard the sound of a motorcycle, he paused for a split second and
wondered if it was Gu Fei. Just as he was about to look out the window, he heard the roar of
engine revving outside from the sudden acceleration, and knew immediately that Gu Fei
had come, and that he had come to fight.
Before he even checked out the state of the battle outside, he reached back and grabbed the
slingshot on the table, and picked up a few pebbles from the flower pot. He pulled back the
sling first, then as he looked down to take aim, he finally checked out what was going on
downstairs.
His whole body was frozen in shock as he caught sight of Gu Fei standing outside, shirtless,
with a black rubber stick in his hand.
He had never seen Gu Fei leave the house without a shirt before. And because of Gu Miao,
Gu Fei hardly ever went shirtless even when he was at home, let alone when he went out.
Although it was another matter entirely that he sometimes went without pants when he
was at Jiang Cheng’s place.
The point was, at this moment Gu Fei was shirtless, wearing only a pair of track pants with
white stripes down the sides, and holding a stick in his hand.
……It was the long absent Mini Tyrant of the Steel Works.
Li Hui had brought four people, five including himself. Jiang Cheng trained his eyes on them
with the sling pulled tight, but aside from Li Hui, none of the other guys showed any signs
of making a move.
He figured that Li Hui had only brought guys who usually hung around the neighbourhood.
Even if Gu Fei had ‘lost’ to Monkey before, that method of
‘dueling’ clearly didn’t represent actual physical prowess. These people no doubt still felt
trepidation at the thought of going up against Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t hear the exchange between Li Hui and Gu Fei, but he could tell that Li
Hui was extremely agitated and angry. Then, he saw Li Hui lash out a fist.
Jiang Cheng didn’t get to release the pebble he’d been holding. Before Li Hui’s fist finished
its slow arc through the air, Gu Fei’s punch had already landed on his nose.
Li Hui stumbled back violently, then reached a hand behind himself.
There it is.
As Li Hui pulled out a cleaver from behind his back, Jiang Cheng released the sling with a
“pop!”, and the pebble flew out, hitting the wrist of Li Hui’s hand that was holding the
cleaver.
Jiang Cheng had tested the power of this slingshot many times already. With this one strike,
Li Hui’s hand would swell up for sure. If instead he had used a steel bearing, it would
certainly fracture some bones.
Li Hui’s cleaver clanged to the ground. Before he could stoop to pick it up, Gu Fei’s foot was
already stepping on it. He swung the baton down on Li Hui’s shoulder.
Only then did Gu Fei turn to look up.
Jiang Cheng swiftly retreated inside, where he opened the apartment door and ran down
the stairs three steps at a time.
It wouldn’t do to simply hide in his room and snipe in the dark. That way all their fury
would converge on Gu Fei. He didn’t wish for Gu Fei to be tangled up in these messes again,
and didn’t want to see another Steel Works style braindead duel.
As he charged out of the stairwell, he saw that Gu Fei had already kicked the cleaver to the
side. The black rubber baton had also been tossed aside. With his hands empty, Gu Fei was
standing face to face with Li Hui.
“If you want trouble, I’ll keep you company.” Gu Fei said.
“I don’t need your company!” Li Hui wiped his mouth, noticed Jiang Cheng running out, and
immediately pointed at him. “You’re the one I’m looking for.”
A corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth twitched, “What’s your business with me?”
“It doesn’t have to do with him anymore.” Gu Fei said. “Right now it’s between you and me.
If you think Jiang Cheng called me here to lend a hand, you can also get someone to help
you. Who will you pick?”
Awkward expressions emerged on the faces of the other guys and they all started to look
uncomfortable. One of them frowned and said, “Li Hui, could it be a misunderstanding? If
we just come for a kid like this, it wouldn’t look very good if it really was a
misunderstanding.”
“Thirty thousand yuan!” Li Hui clutched his shoulder, which had just been smacked by Gu
Fei. “Jiang Cheng, spit out the thirty thousand you took from my dad, and I’ll forget about
this whole thing!”
“If Li Baoguo had thirty thousand to spare,” Jiang Cheng tried to suppress his rage and
irritation. “He wouldn’t have been driven to jump off the building by you.”
“Bull fucking shit! He jumped right after you went upstairs……” Li Hui was riled up and
spewing insults as he charged at Jiang Cheng, but he wasn’t able to take more than two
steps.
He couldn’t even finish what he was saying.
Gu Fei lunged to the side and landed a square kick on his stomach. Li Hui immediately
doubled over into a ball.
Gu Fei closed in and smashed an elbow on his back. Once Li Hui was kneeling on the
ground, he grabbed Li Hui’s hair in one hand and bashed his face into his knee.
When he let go, Li Hui fell flat on his back, the blood gushing out from his nose made a mess
around his mouth.
Jiang Cheng watched the series of moves from Gu Fei, and couldn’t quite make out how he
felt at this moment. Every time he saw Gu Fei fight……or rather, saw Gu Fei beat someone
up, he’d feel a little taken aback.
It was the cold expression on Gu Fei’s face and the decisiveness and precision with which
he made every move.
It was only because of this viciousness that he’d bestowed the title of Mini Tyrant of Steel
Works onto Gu Fei. But it wasn’t entirely accurate either. The term “Mini Tyrant” was a
little too cute for what Gu Fei was, it wasn’t adequate to describe all that he encompassed.
If Gu Fei wasn’t Gu Fei, he would be an actual brutal tyrant of the Steel Works that no one
dared cross.
The Steel Works Number One Boss.
Supremo Gu of the Steel Works.
Jiang Cheng looked at Li Hui, who had been lying on the ground for a while and didn’t seem
to be getting up any time soon, then looked at the helpers he had brought who’d been
watching coolly from the sidelines with no indication of coming to help him up, and was all
of a sudden at a loss as to what to do next.
“Li Hui,” Gu Fei spoke up. “Don’t think that I don’t know the kind of person you are.
Everyone who grew up around these parts knows the kind of person you are. I’ll consider
this matter done and over with now. Whether your dad really had a savings account, and
where he kept it, you know better than anyone.”
Li Hui’s legs twitched as he cupped his nose, but he stayed quiet.
Gu Fei looked around at the other guys, “I’ll say this again. I grew up here.
Anyone who knows me knows this, I never go looking for trouble. But if anyone gets the
idea in their head to cross me, I’m not going to just roll over and take it.”
They all laughed nervously. Gu Fei focused on one of them in particular, “San Gou.”
“Ayy, I know I know.” The one he called San Gou came over and clapped Gu Fei on the
shoulder. “This must’ve been a misunderstanding, yeah!”
“I appreciate the courtesy.” Gu Fei bent down and picked up the rubber baton from the
ground, and returned it to the back fender of the motorcycle.
San Gou waved his hand, and the others, after some hesitation, all turned and left with him.
Out of these so-called helpers Li Hui had brought, not one of them even bothered to go help
him up before leaving.
Jiang Cheng stared in shock at Li Hui lying on the ground, and was suddenly overcome with
a feeling he couldn’t quite name.
This place, and the people here, all of which were difficult to describe with satisfaction.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei got onto his bike. “Do you still have to go upstairs to get your books?”
“Mhm, I’ll……go get them.” Jiang Cheng shot another glance at Li Hui, and lowered his voice.
“What about him?”
“He’ll walk away on his own in a bit,” Gu Fei said. “Not like I broke any bones.”
“Then wait for me.” Jiang Cheng quickly turned into the stairwell.
He ran upstairs and picked up the backpack he’d already packed, put his slingshot back in
the drawer, then pulled a T-shirt at random from his closet, before running back
downstairs.
When he came out again, Li Hui was no longer lying on the ground. Jiang Cheng looked
down the street, and saw Li Hui slowly cross the road with his back hunched over.
“Put this on.” Jiang Cheng tossed the T-shirt to Gu Fei.
“He’s not gonna come bother you again.” Gu Fei glanced down the road as he put the shirt
on. “My guess is he probably owes money somewhere.”
Jiang Cheng sighed.
“If he comes again, you still gotta tell me. Don’t get into a direct conflict with him.” Gu Fei
continued. “You must not touch these kinds of people, don’t let it affect your studying and
your exams.”
“And what about you?” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“I know how to deal with these kinds of people.” Gu Fei smiled. “Don’t worry.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t reply as he got on the bike behind Gu Fei. As the engine roared to life, he
gently rubbed his hands against Gu Fei’s sides, “Is this the only way? To deal with these
things?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered. “How else? You don’t even have a reason to call the police, and
they can’t do anything about it either. If you want to appeal to their reason, well, if he’s
reasonable he wouldn’t have come to you in the first place.
For these people, your only choice is to beat them into submission, until they don’t dare to
come bother you again.”
“This is also how you used to resolve things before, right?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei smiled as he extinguished the engine, and turned to look at Jiang Cheng.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“Do you?” Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“If it was before,” Gu Fei said. “Every single one of them who was here just now, I wouldn’t
have let them go. I’d be counting everyone in attendance, don’t anyone even think of
leaving.”
“Why didn’t you do that today?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Trying to take after the overachiever,” Gu Fei said. “Trying to follow the boyfriend’s
example, and to keep my boyfriend from worrying.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak, only patted his back.
“Let’s go get breakfast?” Gu Fei started the engine again.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “My treat.”
When Li Hui’s call came first thing in the morning, Jiang Cheng also couldn’t think of any
other way to resolve this other than go out and give him a beating.
If Gu Fei hadn’t come, and he had come downstairs to face Li Hui himself, it would have
happened the same way.
It was like Gu Fei said, he didn’t even have a reason to call the police. Nor did he have the
energy. A high school senior busy with studying and preparing for the exams seemed to
have no other choice when going up against a scoundrel like Li Hui.
And yet — he stared at the back of Gu Fei’s head — even if Gu Fei no longer acted like he
used to, Jiang Cheng still felt uneasy.
No matter how Gu Fei tried to “follow the boyfriend’s example”, he was the only one doing
it. Aside from him, no one else around here — surely the majority of people — would
follow anyone’s example. They would never
change.
Jiang Cheng could leave this place. He most certainly would leave this place.
But what about Gu Fei?
Gu Fei shielded him from the filth and sludge, but then what?
Jiang Cheng bowed his head, and leaned against Gu Fei’s back.
Yes, even now, he still didn’t know what to do. Gu Fei had gone from being full of hope, to
burying his hope, to closing his eyes in peace; he didn’t know what to do either.
But even so. He couldn’t help but clench his jaw.
Gu Fei has to leave this place.
No matter how hard it is, he has to leave this place.
It wasn’t that Gu Fei didn’t have hope, he only buried it.
Just as Jiang Cheng was full to the brim with determination, just as his spirits were flying
high, Gu Fei suddenly leaned back a little and pushed against him.
Jiang Cheng was only a second away from bursting out in song.
Come away with me!
We ride at dawn!
“Sit up straight,” Gu Fei turned his head. “There are Fourth High students up ahead.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng looked ahead. They had already turned onto the road where they usually
went to get breakfast. There were quite a few people standing and sitting around the
breakfast stalls. “You can still see without your glasses?”
“I guessed.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng started laughing.
“It’s true my eyesight can’t compare to yours, even from upstairs you didn’t miss a shot.” Gu
Fei said. “When did you buy a new slingshot?”
“Pan Zhi gave it to me last time he was here,” Jiang Cheng said. “This one is really…… I feel
like next time he might just straight up give me a crossbow.”
“It’ll be October 1st soon, will he visit again?” Gu Fei stopped the bike. [3]
Indeed there were a few students from the Fourth High at the breakfast stalls.
Frankly, Jiang Cheng didn’t recognize any of them. He could only tell who they were
because when he and Gu Fei got off the bike, these people all turned to look at them in
unison.
“He can’t come, his fourth grandpa has just passed away, on such short notice he can’t make
up any more relatives to pass away again. Not to mention, if they died too frequently,
nobody would believe it.” Jiang Cheng said. “Fourth High doesn’t give days off for October
1st anyway, but mainly it’s because I can’t afford to lose any more time.”
There were no more vacant tables at the breakfast stalls. The two of them bought breakfast,
took a turn about the tables, and finally had to make do with sharing a table with two other
Fourth High students.
These two were probably a young couple. As soon as the two of them sat down, the couple
exchanged glances knowingly, took a sip of soy milk, then swept their eyes over Gu Fei’s
face.
Jiang Cheng frowned. He could already begin to see how powerful the words
“composer Gu Fei” were.
He looked at Gu Fei worriedly. Gu Fei himself was pretty calm. He had a fried dough fritter
in one hand and a bowl of tofu pudding in the other, and was happily eating away.
When the couple finally finished eating, and stood up to leave, Jiang Cheng let out a breath
of relief, “Shit.”
“What.” Gu Fei finished his own tofu pudding, then grabbed Jiang Cheng’s as well and took a
couple of gulps.
“Nothing,” Jiang Cheng picked up a bun. “I just think these people are so annoying, openly
staring at you like that. The fuggedy fack are they staring at.”
Gu Fei smiled a little, and didn’t speak.
When they arrived at school, they continued to receive all sorts of looks. Jiang Cheng was a
little sorry that he didn’t encourage Gu Fei to skip class.
However, it was much better after they entered their classroom. After all, the people of
Class-8 had been in the same room with Gu Fei for so long, that even if they were surprised,
they didn’t have as extreme a reaction as everyone else.
Besides, there was the fake tyrant of the class, captain Wang Jiuri, trying to forcefully steal
the show.
“Exactly!” Wang Xu was sitting on his desk, boasting to the people around him.
“I just don’t bother to show off normally, when I started fooling around with the guitar, you
all were probably still shower singers!”
“Anyways, my skill level is only okay.” Wang Xu turned and spotted Jiang Cheng, and
immediately beckoned. “Jiang Cheng! Come tell them, how was that solo interlude I added
before! Did it not add a lot to our performance!”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng nodded earnestly, and gave him a thumbs up.
“Are you planning to apply to a music school?” Somebody asked.
‘We’ll have to see, it’s not like you have to get into a music school to learn this,”
Wang Xu’s expression was solemn. “What if one day I fly out of this shitty place and end up
in some big city, I gotta have a skill I can live on!”
“Oh…… Everyone nodded their heads in unison.
Jiang Cheng chuckled, but suddenly felt a little melancholy as he sat down.
Even Wang Xu would talk big about his dream of someday making it out of this place, and
dared to call his guitar playing as something to live on……
Gu Fei was the one who actually had a skill to live on, more than one, at that.
Even if he were to apply to the shitty local schools, if Gu Fei wanted to, he could at least get
into the most unshitty one of the shitty bunch.
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei. He wouldn’t tell Gu Fei this. Right now, everything was still
up in the air. If Gu Fei didn’t wish to be woken up, he could not wake him.
Jiang Cheng sighed and slumped over his desk.
He was sleepy. He hadn’t slept well the entire night, and with Li Hui causing a ruckus so
early in the morning, he only felt an extreme fatigue now that everything had quieted
down.
In the short hour of the morning self-study period, he must’ve yawned at least eight
hundred and sixty times, his vision was practically covered with tears.
“How are you this sleepy?” Gu Fei set down the phone he’d been playing with.
“Have you been thinking inappropriate thoughts the whole night?”
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng laughed, then as soon as he stopped, he yawned again.
“How about you……doze for a bit?” Gu Fei asked.
“Nah, I still gotta copy down the key points.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his eyes.
“Looks like I’ll need to buy a voice recorder.”
“Do you want me to take notes for you?” Gu Fei asked.
“What?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“The key points you were talking about, and notes,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll take them down for
you, you just have to listen, and if you can’t stay awake, you can snooze for a while?”
“Then, you’ll……” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei, and pushed his own notebook toward him.
“Help me take notes?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei flipped open the notebook. “Ah, the first class is English?”
“……You don’t even know what the first class is?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I don’t know what any class is, I only find out when the teacher walks into the room.” Gu
Fei glanced at Lao-Lu, who had just entered the classroom. “When you review the notes,
will you be so stimulated by my beautiful handwriting that you won’t be able to focus?”
“Oh get over yourself.” Jiang Cheng said.
As usual, Lao-Lu first slammed his warrior god palm on the lectern to stun the sleepy
students to a half-awake state, before starting his lecture.
Jiang Cheng flopped over the desk with his head resting on his arm. He listened to Lao-Lu
with his ears, while his eyes stayed on Gu Fei.
Gu Fei twirled the pen, looking a little nervous, probably because he had never taken
proper notes before, let alone English notes.

When Lao-Lu turned to the black board and started writing down key focus points, Gu Fei
put his head down and started to copy.
Jiang Cheng’s mind wandered as he stared at Gu Fei’s profile.
When you open your eyes, I’ll definitely hear it.
Footnotes
[1]: San Gou = 三狗 = Three Dogs or Third Dog ↩
[2]: Zhonghua: brand of cigarettes (expensive)
Maotai: brand of sorghum liquor (high end) ↩
[3]: October 1st: the National Day of China – the formation of the PRC, aka major major
holiday. ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6633
TL word count: 4847
TL time: 6:04:46
Edit time: 1:23:34
Curse words: 9x fucks, 8x shit, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Thanks everyone who sent in pictures of your jjwxc/physical copy purchases last week !!!
<33333
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
Also, look up the artist 机甲没充电 on weibo and you’ll find some amazing
fanart of this chapter :DDD
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: June 27, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 93
“Walnuts eggs milk red dates sesame banana beans…… Which one do you like?”
Jiang Cheng spent the whole morning battling the urge to doze off while the lectures
droned on in his ears. The teachers at Fourth High all taught class like old monks chanting
the scriptures, with the exception of Lao-Lu, who would sometimes interject with an
insulting rebuke or two to wake them up. The other teachers, including Lao-Xu, all trudged
straight ahead with their monotone voices that lacked any sort of rise and fall, losing
students to sleep along the way.
In this season where the temperature was getting just cool enough that you could feel it,
and the weather was very soothing, the only ones who could manage to stay awake during
lecture without the help of conversation were probably limited to Jiang Cheng and Yi Jing.
Oh wait, Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei, whose head was bowed as he copied notes, and Gu
Fei.
And yes……Wang Xu, who could probably identify Yi Jing’s silhouette amid the backs of ten
thousand other students.
When class let out for the morning, Jiang Cheng instantly collapsed on the desk and closed
his eyes, “Wake me in twenty minutes.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered and closed the notebook.
“Hey, Da-Fei, Da-fei.” Zhou Jing collected his things and turned around.
“Da……”
Gu Fei looked at him.
“That’s Jiang Cheng’s shirt you’re wearing, right?” Zhou Jing asked.
Jiang Cheng lifted his head. The feeling that “there’s no time to lose, this person has to be
shut up permanently” came over him.
“No.” Gu Fei said.
“Isn’t it?” Zhou Jing was a little skeptical. “I thought I saw him wearing this last week.”
“It’s just the same style.” Gu Fei said.
“……Oh,” Zhou Jing hesitated. “But it doesn’t look new, and I’ve never seen
you wear……”
“Go away.” Gu Fei cut him off curtly.
Zhou Jing sighed and stood up, “Can’t even continue a normal conversation, geez.”
During class, Jiang Cheng had felt so sleepy it was as if the whole world had disappeared, as
if the teacher’s voice was drifting to him from outside the realm of reality. Now that class
was over and he was able to catch a snooze in peace, Jiang Cheng couldn’t fall asleep.
Still, he stubbornly kept his eyes closed, and didn’t open them until Gu Fei said beside him
that twenty minutes was up. He wiped away the tears that was practically rolling down his
face from being so painfully sleepy yet not able to fall asleep.
“You didn’t sleep, did you?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I’m going blind from sleepiness.”
“Yet you stayed down the whole time, you’re blinking so much that your eyelids are turning
into wings.” Gu Fei smiled and pushed the notebook to him. “Check if this is okay? If not,
you should hurry up and clarify with the teacher.”
Jiang Cheng opened the notebook, and was enlightened by the stream of refreshing notes.
He had started keeping notes when he first started middle school. Several years had passed
since then, but it was the first time he saw such clean and neat handwriting in his own
notebook.
As a slacker, Gu Fei could not tell the important information from the rest. If it was on the
blackboard, and repeated by the teacher, he would copy it down.
Jiang Cheng would have to pick out the important points himself when reading over it.
There was, however, one thing that impressed him very much. Gu Fei’s
handwriting not only looked good, he also wrote quickly. The way he had copied
everything down without sparing any details, it wasn’t a small feat.
“Damn impressive,” Jiang Cheng said. “I have to use abbreviations and symbols when I take
notes, otherwise I won’t be able to keep up.”
“No shit,” Gu Fei said. “I only had to copy, and not analyse anything.”
“Slacky-slacker, you probably never paid so much attention in class in all your life huh.”
Jiang Cheng stood up and stretched.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei stood up as well, and the two of them walked out together.
“Indeed, many fantastical experiences await me when being with an
overachiever.”
“Then……” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Is it tiring? Is it annoying, to take notes?”
“It’s alright.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t continue on the subject of class and studying, but he could feel that Gu
Fei was unlike other academic slackers in this regard. The typical slacker would certainly
find it annoying to take notes for a whole morning, even if they weren’t actually listening to
the content, and only copied things down.
Take Pan Zhi for example, the most classic archetype of a slacker:
Pan Zhi would fall asleep with his head propped on the pencil if he had to take notes for
even one period, let alone for a whole morning like Gu Fei had done.
At the thought of this, Jiang Cheng felt on behalf of Gu Fei, a surge of heartache and a
yearning for more.
To witness with his own eyes, helpless as he watched Gu Fei bury his own hope and walk
along the path of the Steel Works, it was upsetting.
Every time he got a taste of Gu Fei’s own resignation, his mood would slide all the way to
rock bottom.
“What do you want to eat for lunch?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng reined back his wandering thoughts and pondered for a few minutes, before
answering, “I don’t know.”
“What a conundrum.” Gu Fei sighed.
“I’m just hungry, but not really craving anything specific.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his stomach.
“How about we go eat something a little more refined?”
“The pizza across the street?” Gu Fei started laughing.
“Definitely not,” Jiang Cheng tsked audibly. “Wang-er Meat Pies are way better.”
After a long discussion, they ended up going to the place across from Gu Miao’s old
elementary school for a bowl of lamb vermicelli.
Even though it was only lamb vermicelli, at least from appearance and price, it matched the
standards Jiang Cheng had voiced of ‘refinement’.
Jiang Cheng had passed this restaurant many times before, but he had assumed it
was a bar. He even thought it was mighty brave of this little shitty city to allow a bar to be
opened right outside of an elementary school. Not to mention that it was a bar with an
unconventional name like Big Bad Wolf……
“It’s probably the first and only time we’re gonna come here,” Jiang Cheng exclaimed as
they walked out after eating. “It’s way too expensive, twenty bucks! Did you not feel me
tugging on you to leave just now?”
“I didn’t, I thought you were just straightening my hem.” Gu Fei laughed. “I thought the
price was alright, they gave plenty of meat. I was gonna ask for another portion of meat for
you as a supplement for all your mental exertion recently, but seeing as the portion was big
enough, I didn’t fork out for anymore.”
“Right! It was so expensive that you didn’t even want to add more meat. How can you say
the price was alright?” Jiang Cheng laughed for a while, then released a drawn out sigh.
“Ayyy…… When I start working in the future, I’ll take you to eat vermicelli worth eight
hundred bucks a bowl, and add on two hundred bucks worth of meat.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei nodded seriously. “If you don’t add meat you’re not my countrymen.”
At that, they both devolved into another fit of laughter.
When they arrived at the convenience store, Gu Fei’s mom was sitting by the front counter,
looking a little low. Usually when they met, she would call out “ah Jiang Cheng, you’re
here!” in her not-so-quiet voice, but today she only glanced at the two of them before
continuing to stare blankly into space.
“Have you eaten?” Gu Fei asked her.
“Yeah,” She replied in a weak voice. “Took Er-Miao to get some rice rolls. She was insistent
on eating those things, they’re so cold, my stomach is hurting even now.”
“You should go home,” Gu Fei put a hand to her forehead and felt for warmth.
“Why does it feel like you have a bit of a fever?”
“I don’t,” She stood up, grabbed her purse under the counter, and walked toward the door.
“You don’t need to worry about me. I feel tired on your behalf even if you don’t.”
“Bye auntie.” Jiang Cheng watched her figure recede, then turned to Gu Fei.
“What’s up with your mom?”
“She acts out on occasion,” Gu Fei sat down, opened the register, and checked the cash.
“Yesterday her new boyfriend hit her, so she’s probably in a bad mood.”
“……Is it the one with the motorcycle from last time?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Dunno,” Gu Fei’s eyebrows were knitted. “If it happens again I’m going to go take care of
the guy myself.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, and sat down beside him.
“You can’t get through to her with just words, I’ve tried talking to her at least eight hundred
times, if not a thousand.” Gu Fei pulled his phone out and started swiping at random. “I
think she should go see a therapist, but she would refuse for sure. Not to mention here……
it’s not like we have any reliable
psychologists.”
Jiang Cheng took the phone from him and grabbed his hand, squeezing it gently and
rhythmically.
Yes, even in this whole run-down city, if one were to visit a psychologist, they would
become a crazy person in the eyes of the people around them, let alone doing so in the Steel
Works neighbourhood. Gu Fei’s mom probably had the same thought. To see a psychologist
was to admit that she was crazy.
“She asked me yesterday, if it wasn’t for Gu Miao, would I have stopped caring about her a
long time ago.” Gu Fei said.
“Would you have?” Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“Yes.” Gu Fei said. “She’s a grown person. We can all walk our own paths.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say any more, he only felt lost.
“You should go take a nap,” Gu Fei said. “Otherwise you won’t make it through the
afternoon.”
“And you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Are we supposed to squeeze together on that little cot?” Gu Fei chuckled. “I don’t need to
nap, I’m not sleepy.”
Gu Fei must’ve recently changed the beddings on the little cot in the small room.
The duvet and pillow cover, as well as the sheets, all smell fresh and full of sunlight. Jiang
Cheng collapsed on the cot and, clutching the cover, was asleep in less than two minutes.
When Gu Fei woke him, he was reluctant to get up, and wouldn’t let go of the covers in his
arms, “Ahhhh sleepy……”
“You skipping class then?” Gu Fei asked.
“No.” Jiang Cheng buried his face in the covers.
“Then, up?” Gu Fei asked again.
“Sleepy.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then skip class?” Gu Fei continued asking.
“No.” Jiang Cheng continued recycling his answer.
“Then let’s do it?” Gu Fei asked.
“……Do what?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“Me, do you.” Gu Fei leaned over the head of the cot and tugged on Jiang Cheng’s pants. “As
long as we don’t have anywhere to be, and you don’t wanna get up.”
Jiang Cheng turned and stared at him, “Holy shit.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, with a single movement he lifted his shirt halfway off his body.
“Hey! Hey hey hey……” Suddenly Jiang Cheng was fully awake, he bolted up and jumped off
the bed. “Collect yourself, we have to go to school.”
“Not sleepy anymore?” Gu Fei pulled his shirt back down.
“Not sleepy anymore, I’ll go wash my face!” Jiang Cheng ran out to the courtyard.
The afternoon self-study periods were cancelled. Lao-Xu stood at the front of the class and
gave a very earnest ten minute speech that encouraged everyone to rise above the harsh
blow of having their self-study period replaced by various main subjects, to little effect.
Lao-Lu, whose class took over the first self-study period, could not help himself from
interrupting Lao-Xu’s speech, “Mr. Xu, it’s no use saying all this! Look at these people! Why
don’t you take a rest, I have to start class now! You’ve taken up half my class time already!”
Lao-Xu gave up his spot at the lectern reluctantly, “There’s less than a year left!
Students! You’ve already played away two and a half years! You must summon up the
energy to fight for this last stretch!”
“WAKE UP!” Lao-Lu walked up with a hard slap on the lectern. “Commencing class!” [1]
Jiang Cheng, whose mind hadn’t been wandering, was startled by the sudden slam, while
Gu Fei, who had been spacing off beside him, dropped his phone from the fright.
“Please at least think of your Xu-zong!” Lao-Lu said. “Day after day like this, he’s wearing
out his own lips nagging you! Everyone else will lose ten pounds or more while preparing
for the exams, but just look at yourselves! Nice and plump, every one of you! I’ll need to
find a pork scale from the market just to hold you!”
Jiang Cheng shot a glance at Gu Fei.
“Don’t look at me,” Gu Fei told him quietly. “I stay in very good shape.”
Jiang Cheng kept his laughter in.
“You lost weight though,” Gu Fei continued. “It’s already visible to the eyes. We should
weigh you this evening, I can see at least a 10 pounds difference.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng gave him a smile.
After school that day they went to the pharmacy. Gu Fei stepped onto the scale and said,
“I’ve been the same weight for the last three years.”
“Do you come here every time to weigh yourself?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a beat, then turned and asked the pharmacy staff, “Big sis, is your
scale working properly?”
“It is, it’s new!” The woman said. “We replaced it only a couple months ago, it’s pretty
accurate.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng stepped onto the scale, then blinked in shock. “Holy, what the shit…… I
haven’t lost any weight?”
Gu Fei took away the backpack in Jiang Cheng’s hands, as he said, “You might as well carry
me along with it.”
“I won’t be able to.” Jiang Cheng cracked up, then checked the number on the scale. “I’m
lighter than you now, we were probably about the same before?”
“Probably,” Gu Fei squeezed Jiang Cheng’s waist. “You probably need more proper nutrition
in your diet.”
“That’s exaggerating,” Jiang Cheng stepped off. “I never needed to supplement my diet
ahead of tests before. I used to also toil every day when I was preparing for my high school
entrance exam, and my mom……never made any additions to my diet. Told you, I’m not that
delicate.”
“High school entrance exams aren’t as stressful.” Gu Fei pulled out his phone and looked
down at it as he walked. “Besides, you’ve been too careless with
what you’re eating these days. Let’s not eat out for dinner for now on.”
“Will we eat in the store then?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded solemnly. “No eating breakfast outside either, fried dough fritters
and fried pancakes aren’t exactly full of nutrients.”
“You gonna make me breakfast then?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei continued to nod.
“Whatcha lookin’ at?” Jiang Cheng leaned in from the side.
“Healthy recipes. Look at this, ‘A Different Nutritional Breakfast Every Day’.”
Gu Fei pointed at the screen.
“What, you’re gonna make it?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “You don’t even cook as well as Li
Yan.”
“Then let Li Yan cook for you.” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye. “I’m really not that delicate.”
“I refuse to fuck off.” Gu Fei grinned and put his phone away.
Pan Zhi was one of those people Lao-Lu talked about, who gained weight whenever there
were exams. His family still would not accept the reality that he was an academic slacker,
which meant that every time Pan Zhi posed in front of his desk before an exam while
secretly swiping away on his phone, his mother would think that he was an overachiever
held back by a lack of nutrition.
Therefore, even for midterm tests, Pan Zhi would gain anywhere from three to five
pounds……
……Then lose it all again amidst the verbal and physical disciplines that followed the test
results.
Jiang Cheng had never received the special treatment of extra nutritional meals.
Shen Yiqing had strict standards when it came to diet. In her mind, as grueling as studying
was, the meals they had at home contained more than enough nutrients to keep up. Any
sort of addition served only as a placebo effect.
Perhaps because of that, Jiang Cheng never thought he lacked extra nourishment when he
studied, he only felt lethargic easily. Although, with his capabilities, it was nothing a cup of
instant milk tea couldn’t……
“Lethargy is a product of mental overexertion,” Gu Fei was holding his phone in one hand
and a spatula in the other, as he stirred the chicken wings in the pot.
“Which means you need additional nourishment.”
“And eating chicken wings will nourish my brain?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Walnuts eggs milk red dates sesame banana beans……” Gu Fei rattled off a whole list of
foods. “Which one do you like?”
“……None of them.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Well there you go. You don’t like fish either,” Gu Fei said as he looked at his phone. “You
only like meat, right? Oh great pork belly.”
“Wings are great too.” Jiang Cheng gulped as he watched.
“That’s why I figured, as long as it tastes good it should be fine. Better than having a bunch
of weird stuff that you don’t even want to eat, and I don’t know how to make.” Gu Fei kept
stirring for a long time, then pointed with his spatula to one side. “Go, get the cola and pour
it in.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng went and opened a can of cola. “All of it?”
“All of it.” Gu Fei looked down at his phone again.
“Do you not have any Coke? Pepsi isn’t as carbonated……” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng-ge, I get the feeling that your brain really is starting to max out,” Gu Fei glanced at
him. “You’re asking for fizz in your Cola Wings?”
“……Can I have a bottle to drink?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“It’s in the fridge.” Gu Fei said.
The pot of wings was very substantial, since Gu Fei also had to factor in Gu Miao, who didn’t
need extra brain nourishment, but who had an enormous appetite. He had slogged in the
kitchen for a whole hour, such that Jiang Cheng had already memorized several pages of a
political textbook, when he finally yelled, “Gu Er-miao, come set the table!”
Gu Miao ran into the kitchen and came out with bowls and chopsticks.
“Er-miao, let’s go wash our hands together?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Miao looked at him, nodded, then walked with Jiang Cheng to the sink.
“I’ll go first?” Jiang Cheng said, made sure that Gu Miao was still calm, then twisted open the
tap and washed his hands with a very small stream of water.
Gu Miao followed suit, reaching her hands under the tap, and scrubbed them.
“She’s fine.” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “It’s been almost a year since she last freaked out about
water.”
This is progress, right? This counts as progress? Jiang Cheng didn’t ask Gu Fei this, he knew
that Gu Fei must’ve experienced countless instances of similarly raised hopes, only to be let
down.
Cola Wings was probably one of the easiest ‘impressive’ dishes to make, there was next to
no technical skills required. Gu Fei had made it while checking the recipe on his phone step
by step, yet it still tasted pretty good.
“How’s the salt?” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng.
“Just right.” Jiang Cheng gave him a thumbs up as he munched on the wings.
Gu Miao immediately followed suit, and also gave Gu Fei a thumbs up.
“Seriously, maybe you can set up a wok in the store and sell some wings on the side.” Jiang
Cheng quickly finished a chicken wing, and picked up another one.
“No time for that,” Gu Fei smiled. “Not to mention even if I did, it probably won’t even be
enough to feed you.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he shoveled some rice into his mouth.
It was true that Gu Fei didn’t have time. The store was only just getting by, since no one was
around to run it properly. It wasn’t feasible to have Li Yan come by to guard it every day
whenever Gu Fei went off on his photography gigs. Gu Fei’s mom would often watch the
store for a while, then when it came time to go out, she would simply shut the doors and
close down shop.
Jiang Cheng glanced over at Gu Miao. If Gu Miao’s condition improved, she could help out
sometimes and watch the store, which would take a lot of weight off of Gu Fei. Although, if
she really did get better, she should probably be going to school.
He gnawed on the bones of the chicken wings as he brooded. A lot of problems were
actually closed loops, intersecting circles that tightly locked everything together.
After dinner Jiang Cheng left first to his apartment, he had to do his homework and
continue studying.
Gu Fei wrapped things up in the store, took Gu Miao home, spent some time playing with
her, then finally after she was asleep, came over with a thermos in his hands.
“What’s this?” Jiang Cheng glanced at the time. Gu Fei was an hour later than usual, it was
already past ten o’clock.
“……Cola Wings,” Gu Fei twisted open the lid of the thermos. “I just made it at home, your
night snack to…… nourish your brain.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng felt all warm and fuzzy inside, but after a second of warmth, he also felt
like laughing, and accidentally let it spill out.
“Be serious,” Gu Fei screwed the lid back on. “Didn’t you like eating this?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded with a forced straight face, but couldn’t help cracking up again
a second later.
Gu Fei glared at him for a while, then also started laughing. He sat down at the edge of the
bed and said, “Anyways, at this stage, this is the only dish I know how to make, so bear with
me.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng stopped laughing, then reached out and touched Gu Fei’s lips. “Gu Fei,
thank you.”
“No problem, just call me good samaritan.” Gu Fei touched his chest. “Forgot to wear my
neckerchief of honour.” [2]
“Sure thing, good samaritan,” Jiang Cheng laughed as he picked up his book from the desk.
“Are you tired?”
“Nope, why?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng handed the book to Gu Fei, “Quiz me……” [3]
He already realized the second he saw Gu Fei’s mouth quirk up, but still he couldn’t dodge it
in time, as Gu Fei landed a smack on his arm.
“What the hell!” Jiang Cheng rubbed his arm vigorously.
“I just smacked you,” Gu Fei took the book. “What else?”
“Now massage it.” Jiang Cheng stuck his arm out in front of Gu Fei.
“Alrighty!” Gu Fei took Jiang Cheng’s arm and gently kneaded it, then looked down. “I didn’t
use force, why is it red?”
“I’m malnourished, remember,” Jiang Cheng said. “Gimme a wing.”
Gu Fei went into the kitchen, found a bowl and washed it, then put two chicken wings
inside and brought it back to the desk, “So did you want me to quiz you on random points?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng started munching on a wing. “Pick any random thing you want, just flip
to a page and go.”
Gu Fei picked up the book and read out loud, “The geographical border of
division of our nation’s population……”
“Generally divided by a straight line drawn from the Heihe city in Heilongjiang to the
Tengchong city in Yunnan,” Jiang Cheng gnawed noisily on the bone. “A large portion of the
population sits to the south-east of that line, whereas a smaller portion of the population
sits to the north-west of it.”
Gu Fei also picked up a chicken wing, “The population migrating out of Sichuan had a
proactive……”
“Benefit in easing the conflict between the people and land of this region, playing a role in
strengthening the economic, technological, philosophical, and cultural connection between
Sichuan and the society at large……” Jiang Cheng was interrupted halfway by the ringing of
his phone he had thrown on the bed.
“Who can it be at this hour?”
“Pan Zhi?” Gu Fei grabbed the phone for him, then paused blankly as he saw the caller ID on
the screen. “Shen Yiqing?”
Jiang Cheng’s hand froze in midair on its way to the thermos.
“Your…… adoptive mom?” Gu Fei hesitated, then seeing as Jiang Cheng still hadn’t moved,
asked again. “Will you not pick up?”
Jiang Cheng stared at the phone, then after a long time finally said softly, “I don’t want to
pick up.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything as he turned the phone on silent, and put it back on the bed.
Then he put two more chicken wings into Jiang Cheng’s bowl.
“As well as increasing income and facilitating economic development; the impact of an
increasing mobile population on urban development……” Jiang Cheng said.
“Huh?” Gu Fei blinked in confusion, then suddenly realized Jiang Cheng was continuing his
interrupted train of thought from before.
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak again, he stared at the silent yet glowing cell phone screen and
frowned.
Footnotes
[1]: Bolded words were spoken in English XD ↩
[2]: The red neckerchief [红领巾] is something worn by elementary (and
sometimes middle school) students who are in the “Young Pioneers”, as part of their school
uniform. There’s a whole history, it’s a CCP thing, but also so normalized that it’s not really
seen as political and mostly regarded as, hey, that’s a young student. ↩
[3]: Jiang Cheng said 抽, which in context, means “quiz” the verb, but in most

other settings, means smack/beat. Gu Fei purposely misunderstood it as “smack me” ↩

Some Stats
Raw character count: 6088
TL word count: 4298
TL time: ???
Edit time: ???
Curse words: 2x fucks, 4x shit
TL’s Notes:
Hope everyone is staying safe and cool in this heat wave <3
Cola Wings recipe.
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: July 7, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 94
“I got a boyfriend.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to take the call. Ever since he had arrived at this place, no, ever
since he realized he was adopted, he had found it difficult to face Shen Yiqing, nor did he
wish to face Shen Yiqing.
There was no significant conflict between him and that home, but the strict, almost
oppressive disciplines, the frosty atmosphere that prevented him from truly relaxing even
when he was at home, plus the hidden nature of Li Baoguo’s imprint within himself……
Perhaps it was because of all this, he had entered a so-called rebellious stage probably
since he started elementary school, and continued ‘rebelling’, not stopping until his
eventual departure.
He did not know what the family dynamic was like at home when he was not there, but as
soon as he stepped through the door, he could sense the irritation in the air, which would
reflexively activate all the thorns around his body.
The warmth, the ease, and the sense of being grounded that that home gave him was far
from that provided by Pan Zhi’s home, with his parents who spent most of the week playing
mahjong.
Other than academic achievements, there was probably not a single thing about him that
satisfied his parents. His relationship with them was as if he was forcefully conscripted into
a war, with them commanding the other side, while he never once won a single battle.
It was why he put such an importance on his grades. No matter how much he
‘acted out’ normally, he would always give his all when it came to tests and exams. In the
almost twenty years of this war, this was his sole stronghold.
Alas, that final explosive argument finally did sever the last thread of bond between him
and that home.
He had always thought that his dad’s……or rather Jiang Wei’s stay at the hospital from
pneumonia had nothing to do with him, it was a coincidence that it happened after their
argument that had almost escalated to a physical fight. As for the subject of that argument,
it was nothing more than another skipped class.
He harboured a lot of resentment for the fact that Shen Yiqing had always blamed the
incident on him.
Now that he thought about it, perhaps it was not entirely unrelated.
Perhaps, it had been from a chronic suppression and buildup over time. It must’ve been
tiring, that the child they had adopted never fitted into the family,
always rebelling under their tutelage like a bomb that might go off at any time.
Jiang Cheng grabbed his phone from the bed, the screen had already darkened.
He was quiet.
If he did not know that he wasn’t their biological son, if he had not come back to this place,
perhaps he would continue like he did before, emboldened to keep struggling in that home,
to fiercely rebel.
Now, it was as though he had finally jumped out of a part of the story. When he stood on the
sideline and looked back on the past, it was as though there was finally an answer to
everything, whether it was his own actions or those of everyone else in his family.
His phone rang again, it was still Shen Yiqing.
Jiang Cheng picked up the phone, looked at it for a while, then swiped at the screen with
one finger and picked up the call, “Hello?”
“Is this Xiao-Cheng?” It was Shen Yiqing’s voice.
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei got up and walked out of the bedroom, gently closing the door behind him.
Jiang Cheng leaned back against the chair. If he counted the days, it had not been very long
since they last contacted each other, but Shen Yiqing’s voice on the other side suddenly
sounded unfamiliar to him.
All at once, he felt a little dejected. Almost twenty years and they had failed at building a
close relationship, while it was this easy to become like strangers.
“How are things with you right now?” Shen Yiqing asked.
“Pretty good.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Then……what about Li Baoguo?” Shen Yiqing continued.
Jiang Cheng frowned. He didn’t want Shen Yiqing to know about this, he was afraid of being
asked to recall it: what happened, why, and then what happened……
When Shen Yiqing did not get an answer, she said, “Did he……commit
suicide?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“What happened?” From her voice, he could imagine the way she was furrowing
her brows as she spoke.
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng shut his eyes briefly, then opened them again. “He got lung
cancer, and couldn’t afford treatment.”
Shen Yiqing was quiet for a while, then spoke again, “Did it have anything to do with you?”
“What?” Jiang Cheng was stunned.
“His suicide, did it have anything to do with you?” Shen Yiqing asked.
“What the fuck?” Jiang Cheng had never felt so shocked.
A sigh came through the receiver that expressed Shen Yiqing’s displeasure at his cursing,
“Tell me the truth, even though you’re not part of this family anymore, but……”
“What truth?” Jiang Cheng felt maybe his brain was a little muddled from memorizing text
passages all night, he could make no sense whatsoever from Shen Yiqing’s question. “What
truth should I tell? What truth do you want to hear?”
“Xiao-Cheng,” Shen Yiqing said. “Your older brother already called me.”
“Who the fuck is my older brother?!” Jiang Cheng yelled. The utter confusion of realization
yet not quite understanding anything at all made him want to blow up right this very
moment.
“Calm yourself down!” Shen Yiqing also raised her voice. “I don’t want to hear you shouting
hysterically anymore!”

Li Hui had called Shen Yiqing. That wasn’t surprising.

What did Li Hui say to Shen Yiqing? No idea. Whatever it was, it would not be surprising.
Whatever Li Hui had said, Shen Yiqing had not believed him.
But what had made Jiang Cheng suddenly blow up, was that Shen Yiqing did not believe
him either.
She called only to confirm.
Why was it that less than a year after he came back, Li Baoguo had killed himself.
Why would Li Hui call her and say……
“Sure, I’ll calm down.” Jiang Cheng took in a deep breath, patted his pockets, and did not
find any cigarettes. He got up and opened the bedroom door.
Gu Fei was standing by the living room window looking at the moon, and at the sound of
the door, he turned around.
Jiang Cheng walked up and found a pack of cigarettes in Gu Fei’s pocket, then put one in his
mouth. Gu Fei took out a lighter and lit it for him.
“Can you first tell me what Li Hui said?” Jiang Cheng turned back into the bedroom and
closed the door.
“You……” Shen Yiqing might have heard the sound of the lighter, and could also tell that he
was speaking with a cigarette in his mouth.
“Yes I’m smoking,” Jiang Cheng said. “Sorry, I can’t help it right now.”
I’m sorry.
It was probably the single thing he had said the most at home. Every time he failed to gain
the higher ground, he would say this first.
As time passed, and as the number of times he said this increased, the words
“I’m sorry” would often take on a note of anger, like that day by the river when he roared
out a strand of “I’m sorry” to Gu Fei, as if venting. Like right now, when he told Shen Yiqing
sorry as he was almost bursting with irritation.
In certain situations, “I’m sorry” had become a way for him to express his emotions.
It was laughable.
“Li Hui said you took thirty thousand from Li Baoguo,” Shen Yiqing stopped going in circles
and said plainly. “The money that would’ve saved his life. Is that true?”
Even though Jiang Cheng could pretty much guess what Li Hui had said — it could not
possibly be anything other than money money money and more money
— still, hearing Shen Yiqing say it out loud like this, it made his chest feel tight.
There was a buzzing in his mind and a stuffiness in his chest, to the extent that it made him
want to laugh.
And then he felt a little nauseous. At the sudden intense urge to throw up, he quickly picked
up the cup on the desk and gulped down some cold water.
“It’s not like you’ve never met Li Baoguo before,” Jiang Cheng took a breath in and tried to
keep his emotions under control. “When you adopted me, and when you reversed the
adoption. You know very well what kind of person he was.”
Shen Yiqing did not say anything.
“Forget if he even had thirty thousand yuan, but is it plausible that he would put the money
anywhere within my reach?” Jiang Cheng took in two long drags of the cigarette. “Even if
you don’t know what kind of person he was, at the very least you raised me for seventeen
years, even if you raised a dog you’d know when it would wag its tail and when it would
bite people!”
“Xiao-Cheng,” Shen Yiqing sighed. “I understand that asking like this makes you feel
uncomfortable. But it’s important that some things be clarified so I can make a judgment on
where I stand.”
“I’ve never touched his money, and his suicide has nothing to do with me either.
When he was sick I gave him money, and after he died Li Hui asked me for money, I gave it
then too.” Jiang Cheng said.
He suddenly felt very sorry for himself as he said these words, his nose twinged.
He had to explain to this woman he had called mom for the past seventeen years, a truth
that he thought she should already know.
Even though that was exactly the kind of person Shen Yiqing was. Still, at this very moment,
Jiang Cheng was once again deeply disappointed.
Perhaps he was too naive. In his own naïveté, he innocently thought that the
‘mother and son’ bond of almost two decades would more or less still remain. He assumed
that where a mother ‘stood’ never depended on any sort of prerequisite of truth, that
choosing to believe in your own child was simply second nature.
However, that kind of second nature clearly did not exist between him and Shen Yiqing.
Shen Yiqing logically required a ‘truth’ before she could decide what side she was on.
Jiang Cheng understood, but found it hard to accept.
All the bitterness from over years, that he had spent so long to force himself to stop
thinking about and brooding over, was once again being turned to the surface.
“Xiao-Cheng, to be honest even though you……but I still thought there was no way you’d
touch his money.” Shen Yiqing said. “It’s only because Li Hui had said it so sincerely, he
even cried, that’s why I wanted to ask you about it first.”
“It’s fine,” Jiang Cheng let out a little laugh. “You don’t know the people here at all. If you
were face to face with him, he might even cut his wrist to prove his own earnesty.”
“Where are you living now? Did you move out?” Shen Yiqing asked.
“I’m renting my own place.” Jiang Cheng answered.
Shen Yiqing sighed quietly, and was silent for a spell. Jiang Cheng felt like he could already
guess what she wanted to say, and why she was hesitating. After all, this was the only
person he ever associated with the word “mom” in his mind, he knew her well.
“I’m doing well right now,” He stubbed out the cigarette in the ashtray. “I……
I’m fine where I am.”
“You’re all alone there……” Shen Yiqing was still hesitating.
Jiang Cheng interrupted her, “I’m not alone.”
I’m a dog. [1]
He summoned all of his willpower to keep himself from blurting out this last sentence.
But he suddenly wanted to laugh.
And so he did.
“What’s so funny?” Shen Yiqing was baffled by his sudden laughter, and her tone of voice
reflected her obvious displeasure. “Why are you still so casual toward your own life?”
“Casual?” Jiang Cheng stopped laughing. “No, I am not at all casual with my life. Right now, I
know very well what I need and what I don’t need.”
“Fine,” Shen Yiqing likely did not wish to continue the conversation. “If that’s what you
think, then I won’t interfere.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng said.
“One last thing I’ll ask,” Shen Yiqing went back to her usual cool demeanor.
“You said just now that you’re not alone?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the closed bedroom door. “I’m not alone.”
I’m a dog.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what got into him, it was like his brain had been filled with glue, he
couldn’t let go of this joke.
Even though he was angry and annoyed, he still wanted to laugh. He wanted so much to
laugh that he had to bite his lips to keep himself from cracking up like some deranged fool.
“Did you get a girlfriend?” Shen Yiqing asked.
Girlfriend.
Premature romance.
Shen Yiqing had never come right out and told him it was forbidden, but how she felt about
it was clear from the disdainful comments she made about Pan Zhi, who was always in the
middle of various ‘premature romances’.
Jiang Cheng stood up, walked to the bedroom window, and looked out at the night scene
that was already tinged with a neglected bleakness, but was now affected by a hint of
autumn air. He suddenly felt an impulse to shake off everything that binded him.
Even though he did not even know what exactly they were. Still, he wanted to scream out,
to rip his clothes off, to make a leap, to take a step into thin air.
“No,” He looked at the especially round moon hanging in the sky, closed his eyes, and took a
breath in. “I got a boyfriend.”
He couldn’t make out Shen Yiqing’s reaction on the other side, nor did he wish to hear it. All
he felt was a gust of wind whistling through his mind, his body, and in the shifting shadows
that appeared ever more dark in contrast to the brightness of the moon outside.
The breeze made him feel refreshed all over.
“Thank you for raising me all these years, for all the energy you spent,” Jiang Cheng closed
his eyes. “But I never did bring you any happiness, and I’m very sorry for that. Though
there’s no way of making up for any of it now, with everything that’s happened over the
years, it can’t be fixed. I’m sorry. You don’t need to look out for me anymore, I’ll be alright.
No matter where I am, I have ways of proving my own worth to myself.”
Whatever Shen Yiqing was saying, he couldn’t hear, the wind was too loud.
“You should change your number, I really don’t want you to be harassed again by
scoundrels like that on my account. Don’t tell me the number either.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Also, just this once, I hope you’ll believe me when I say, I really can live a very good life.”
When the bedroom door opened, Gu Fei was about to light a cigarette. He had already
moved back and forth at light speed between the bedroom door and the window at least
seven times.
Every time he thought Jiang Cheng was about to come out, he would hurry and move to the
window, and calmly pretend to light a cigarette. And when there was no sign of movement,
he would go over and listen, then go back to the window and pretend to light a cigarette
again.
Although this time, he really was intending to light one, and Jiang Cheng really was coming
out.
He was even holding the thermos with the chicken wings.
“Done with the call?” Gu Fei set the cigarette and lighter down on a nearby table.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Forgot to close the lid before, it might be a little cold now,
should we heat it up?”
“Here,” Gu Fei took the thermos. “I’ll just dump it into the pot to reheat.”
Jiang Cheng followed him to the kitchen, and leaned against the wall as he watched him
work.
Gu Fei took a little pot, washed it in the sink, then dumped the chicken wings inside, before
setting the pot on the stove to heat up. The whole time, Jiang Cheng leaned against the wall
without a sound.
Gu Fei didn’t ask either. The reason for Shen Yiqing’s call was obvious, it must’ve been
because Li Hui had called her. Nobody would be in a good mood after a chat like that.
“Starting from today.” Jiang Cheng suddenly said, his voice calm.
“Ah.” Gu Fei turned to him.
There was an air of solemnity about Jiang Cheng, with an expression as though he had
made some big important decision.
“I will go to sleep one hour later every night.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Huh?” Gu Fei still couldn’t catch up. “Sleep one hour later for what?”
“To study of course.” Jiang Cheng said.
“……Oh!” Gu Fei didn’t expect this to be his big important decision, and all of a sudden
didn’t know how to respond. “Oh!”
“You sleep later too, you can quiz me, until 1 a.m. is fine.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Thanks for the hard work,” Jiang Cheng clapped his shoulder. “Xiao-Gu.”
Gu Fei quickly reached out and felt Jiang Cheng’s forehead. No fever.
“What’s the matter Xiao-Gu?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“……Nothing Xiao-Jiang,” Gu Fei said. “The wings will be ready soon, will you have a bottle
of milk too?”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded and walked out.
And then Gu Fei heard the sound of Jiang Cheng’s unrestrained laughter coming from the
bedroom.
He hesitated for a moment, turned the stove off, and also went into the bedroom.
Jiang Cheng was lying on the bed, laughing so hard that he couldn’t stop.
“Are you alright, Xiao-Jiang?” Gu Fei bent down with one knee on the bed, and stroked his
face.
“I’m fine, it’s just for some reason,” Jiang Cheng looked at him as he continued laughing. “I
suddenly really wanted to laugh. I could hardly hold it in during the call just now.”
“If you want to laugh, then laugh,” Gu Fei gently squeezed his chin. “And when you’re done
you can get back to studying.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Jiang Cheng laughed for at least a whole minute, before he suddenly stopped and sat up
with a frown. Before Gu Fei could get a word out, he suddenly jumped off the bed and
dashed out of the room without even his slippers.
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei shouted after him.
“Barf!” Jiang Cheng ran into the bathroom.
By the time Gu Fei followed him into the bathroom, Jiang Cheng was already doubled over
with one hand against the wall, vomiting like there’s no tomorrow.
Gu Fei hurried back to the bedroom and brought Jiang Cheng’s cup, and waited beside him
with a wet towel.
“Fuck me,” Jiang Cheng finally managed to regain his composure after several minutes of
vomiting. “What the fuck is this reaction of mine.”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei thought his voice sounded alright, so he handed the towel over.
“If this was a TV show, then someone in your situation would probably clutch at his chest,
black out, then spray out a mouthful of blood. But right now you’re malnourished, so you
can only barf out some recently ingested food.”
“Screw you,” Jiang Cheng cracked up laughing into the toilet, then let out a long drawn-out
sigh. “Ayyy——”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei looked at him. “I’m a little worried.”
“A little?” Jiang Cheng flushed the toilet and turned to look at him.
“I’m very worried.” Gu Fei immediately corrected himself.
“I’m fine, really.” Jiang Cheng leaned over the sink, turned on the tap, and splashed water on
his face. “I’m just mad, I really was furious, but I didn’t bottle it up, I later combed through
and smoothed out my channels and meridians all on my own.”
“Did Li Hui call them and say that you took Li Baoguo’s money?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm, because I took the money that was supposed to save Li Baoguo’s life, which was why
he jumped off the roof and killed himself.” Jiang Cheng said as he rinsed his mouth. “Gu Fei,
do you know where Li Hui lives?”
“You wanna go find him?” Gu Fei blinked.
“Mhm, find him.” Jiang Cheng said. “I need to clear away all of my obstacles.”
“What obstacles?” Gu Fei asked.
“Obstacles that would affect my mentality while studying.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
“……Oh!” Once again Gu Fei had no response to that, so he nodded
vehemently.
Gu Fei couldn’t shake the feeling that Jiang Cheng only seemed calm on the surface, that his
emotional state was still a little unsteady.
Even though by his miraculous memory, he got every single question right when Gu Fei
quizzed him, he was still a little abnormal. For example, he asked Gu Fei to take him to Li
Hui’s house at 1:30 in the morning, apparently to familiarize himself with the location.
“Didn’t you say it wasn’t far? That it’s still in the Steel Works neighbourhood.”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered, he got out one of Jiang Cheng’s coats from the closet and handed
it to him. “Put this on, it’s getting cold.”
“You put one on too.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Alright.” Gu Fei took out another jacket, and the two of them went out.
The night breeze was already strong enough to pierce through two layers of clothing and
onto one’s body. As soon as they stepped out the door, both of them
zipped all the way up out of reflex.
There were no pedestrians or cars on the road at this time. They walked along under the
street lamps that sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t, the stark surroundings made it
feel like they were walking in some parallel dimension.
Li Hui’s building was right up ahead, it was among the cluster of low-rises at the very edge
of the Steel Works neighbourhood.
“It’s up there,” Gu Fei stopped and pointed. “The one with the 7.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng also stopped and looked that way.
The wind was a little stronger by now, Gu Fei shuffled closer, pressing his arm against Jiang
Cheng’s.
“Honestly, I just wanted to come take a look.” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “I wasn’t planning to
pick a fight with Li Hui, I’m not here to threaten him or yell at him or beat him up, he’s not
worth it. I just wanted to come take a look, as a way of clearing the obstacle in my own
mind.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“A guy like that,” Jiang Cheng said. “That’s all he is. I will no longer let myself be affected by
these people. From now on, I cannot be disrupted again.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei rubbed Jiang Cheng’s lower back with his hand.
“After all, I’m the guy who has to treat you to 800 yuan worth of vermicelli plus 200 yuan
worth of meat,” Jiang Cheng said. “I have to stay focused.”
“You can definitely do it.” Gu Fei smiled.
He was just about to ask Jiang Cheng if he wanted to take a walk somewhere else to clear
his mind, when a torrent of shouts sounded from the direction of building 7. There were
curses of a man and screams of a woman, the noise activated all the corridor lights in the
two adjacent buildings.
Jiang Cheng paused, and was about to take a couple of steps forward to check it out, but Gu
Fei with his discerning Steel Works Radar pulled him into the shadow on the side of the
road.
They’d only just stood still when they saw a figure come charging out of building 7.
A pale mass.
A man, naked from head to toe.
He came charging out like that, all the while screaming and crying, sheathed only by the
wind.
“Li Hui.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng knitted his brows and didn’t speak.
There were a few others behind him, all of them clothed.
They all carried weapons in their hands. Aside from sticks and clubs, Jiang Cheng also
noticed the shimmering glint of metal. It could be a metal rod, or it could be a knife.
Li Hui on the other hand, had nothing on his entire body other than the parts he was born
with. He managed to take a few steps before he was pushed to the ground by the group of
fully dressed people behind him.
And then he disappeared from their sight.
“I CALLED THE COPS! I ALREADY CALLED THE COPS!” A woman
screamed as she ran out from the stairwell, wearing only her underwear and bra.
The people who had Li Hui surrounded seemed not to have heard her, one of them brought
his hand down hard.
“Let’s go.” Jiang Cheng turned his head. They were beating him like they wanted him dead.
“Let’s go take a stroll.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei answered.
They walked down another road for a long time, until they could no longer hear the noises
behind them. Jiang Cheng threw his head back and took in a deep breath, and sang quietly,
“I want to, step on the unknown, and walk through time……”
“Didn’t you say you only knew one line?” Gu Fei asked with a smile.
“I was lying,” Jiang Cheng arched his brow. “I want, you on my left shoulder……”
Gu Fei quickly moved from his right side to his left. Jiang Cheng glanced at him, and
continued with a laugh, “A smile……”
“A smile on your right.” Gu Fei quickly switched back to his right side, and sang with him in
harmony.
Footnotes
[1]: I’m alone [我一个人] in Chinese taken literally, means “I’m one person”,
and so this is basically a “dad I’m hungry” “hi Hungry I’m dad” joke but “you’re alone” “no
I’m dog” ↩
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6443
TL word count: 4428
TL time: 4:58:40
Edit time: 0:55:31
Curse words: 4x fucks
TL’s Notes:
Since we’re in the exam prep arc, I’d just like to throw in a little more background about the
university entrance exams in China. TLDR if you don’t care XD
高考, or Gao Kao, used to be (and still is) seen by many Chinese people as the great equalizer, a
true meritocratic rite of passage, that one can use to get ahead in life, to go from remote
countryside to the big city, from an impoverished family to an elite university. There’s the
belief that if you tried hard enough in high school, studied hard enough, all of which will
pay off when you get into a good university, which promises better career prospects in a
better city, because The Test is the same for everyone (kind of), and regulations around it
are so strict that there’s no way to cheat. That’s probably how it used to be at least, when a
Bachelor’s degree was actually prestigious enough to guarantee a pretty good job right out
of school.
These days, the competition is so high, that increasingly companies are asking for a higher
levels of education from more elite schools and/or more experience, for the same positions
as before. But I digress.
All this is to say, because of the competition at the higher level, the university entrance
exam has also become more contentious. In lieu of all this, cram schools have cropped up
all around the country, offering classes at extremely high rates with promises of highly
qualified teachers who will drill your child until they’re good enough to get into the top
universities. Furthermore, the high school student (especially in the senior year) becomes
someone whose sole purpose in life is to prepare the exams, which means they need
someone to take care of them, to a larger extent than they’ve been taken care of before.
This often means the student’s mom will quit her job or work less hours to support the high
school senior child: to make extra, nutritious meals; to take them to and from cram school;
to be their counsellor, confidante, when the pressure becomes all too much. This is all so
that the student, preparing for the exams, don’t have to spare a thought to anything else
other than studying. You may see where I’m going with this.
Essentially, The Test is not as equal as it’s made out to be. A harmonious family, caring
parents, one parent who can be the sole economic provider for the household while the
other one takes care of the student 24/7, disposable income to afford the ridiculously high
rates of cram schools, the cost of extra study materials/textbooks/question banks, a good
school environment that encourages learning, and an actual good physical home
environment in which to study (i.e., the student having their own room and desk), these are
all advantages and privileges that not everyone has.
Still, it doesn’t stop students and parents from wearing themselves to the bone in
preparation for this ‘single

most important event of their life’, many families even book hotel rooms near the test
center for the week of The Test, just to minimize the possibility of anything going wrong.
Anyways, that’s the background, though I’m sure it’s not that unique of a situation, as many
countries, especially in Asia, are probably also like this. I’m SO. Glad. that I didn’t have to go
through this lol If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title
to search for if you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: July 17, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 95
Ah, it’s already been one year.
After that night, Jiang Cheng found that all of a sudden, his heart had become still like
water.
He did not try to find out what happened to Li Hui, but in a place like the Steel Works, news
of anything tended to permeate efficiently and thoroughly.
Whether it was Gu Fei’s family’s store, or the community clinic next to it, they were all
transfer hubs of information.
Initially, the rumour was that the eldest Li son, as well as his whole family, had been beaten
to death. This was later debunked by another source that said, no, their child did not die.
Later still, someone corrected that claim and said that it was only Li Hui who had died.
The causes of death were varied and illustrious, the two most popular of which were that
he either owed money to loan sharks and got beaten to death by the debt collectors, or that
he was murdered by the man whom his wife cheated on him with.
However, not even a week later, another truth came to light:
Li Hui was not dead, but he had been beaten to a vegetative state, and the perpetrators
were still at large.
Jiang Cheng did not know the full extent of these debates, nor would Gu Fei bother to tell
him, usually he only got fed an earful whenever he was at the store.
Not to mention, the sources of these tales would take care to avoid him whenever they saw
him.
In Jiang Cheng’s mind, whatever kind of news there was no longer mattered to him. This
person who happened to be of utmost proximity to him in blood would never cross his path
again in the future.
He changed the phone number that he had been using for years, and with that change, Li
Hui was not the only person who disappeared from his life.
As the temperature dropped day after day, and the leaves on the trees grew sparse, in these
days when the dry chilly air made one’s nose itch and become uncontrollably drowsy, the
seniors at Fourth High were finally experiencing the proper pre-exam atmosphere.
The walls of the corridors and classrooms were plastered with all sorts of
motivating slogans, black writing on red backdrops, black writing on white backdrops,
accompanied by giant exclamation marks. Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but chant along in his
mind every time he saw them. Aside from these, there were also various reminders
highlighting the fact that time was running out.
We’re running out of time everyone!
The uni entrance exam is almost here!
Ah! It’s right up ahead!
……Pretty scary stuff.
Time, as a whole, actually passed quite slowly. It’s only when looking back, that one realizes
with a start that “it’s already been so long”.
Jiang Cheng was half-slumped over his desk with a pen twirling between his fingers,
looking at the math teacher through the gap beside the ear of Zhou Jing, who for some
reason was sitting ramrod straight today.
To everyone in the classroom, time must’ve been passing extremely slowly at that moment.
Perhaps this time next year, they would realize when they look back, that the senior year of
high school actually flew by in a flash, so quickly that it barely left behind any memories at
all.
Jiang Cheng at this point did not feel like time was passing by slowly. He felt that time was
flying by too fast, that there was not enough of it.
Not enough time to memorize the texts.
Not enough time to go through the question banks.
Not enough time to listen to lectures.
Not enough time to go for a walk with the boyfriend.
Not enough time to look at the new photos that said boyfriend had taken.
Not enough time to see……little sister-in-law’s new hairstyle.
……
This time next year when he looked back, no, whenever, whether it was next year, or the
year after that, or five years, even ten years later, when he looks back, the memories of this
year will always be rich and fulfilling.
“Did Gu Miao make a fuss when you changed your chat icon from that furry green bunny
avatar?” Jiang Cheng asked between class periods as he organized the notes he took from
the previous lecture.
Gu Fei had changed his icon from the green bunny to a photo of Gu Miao.
It was the little girlie’s new haircut. After her hair had grown long enough, Li Yan gave her a
short bob, one where the bottom edge of her fringe was a hundred miles away from her
eyebrows. In the photo, she had one of her brows arched as though in a rather good mood,
appearing extremely singular and smug.
“All good, she’s the one who changed it for me.” Gu Fei said. “Do you need to go pee?”
“Ah, I……” Jiang Cheng paused.
“You don’t know, right?” Gu Fei sighed and stood up. “Let’s go take a piss.”
“I was gonna say I don’t think I feel the need,” Jiang Cheng tsked once and stood up as well.
“Why not just say you want me to accompany you to the washroom.”
“I don’t need you to accompany me,” Gu Fei said immediately. “Really, it’s not necessary,
you can go back to the classroom.”
Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes.
“Go back, I beg you,” Gu Fei said. “Please allow me to go to the washroom by myself, allow
me to bravely trudge on all by my lonesome, toward the
washroom.”
“Weirdo.” Jiang Cheng walked along with him down the stairs. “I’m a little hungry, should
we go to the concession stand later to get something to eat? Zhou Jing said they’ve started
to sell oden now.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
“This is one of the nice things about Fourth High,” Jiang Cheng gulped and said.
“In my old school, the concession stand was only open for half a semester before it got
scrapped. The cafeteria doesn’t sell food outside of regular meal times, so if you don’t carry
some food of your own, you’d die of starvation before mealtime starts.”
“This little concession stand at Fourth High rakes in quite a lot of revenue every month,” Gu
Fei chuckled as he said. “Much more profitable than our store.”
“Your family’s store is just lacking a person with the time to manage it, otherwise it
wouldn’t be like that.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I only went in the first time because it looked
cleaner than the other places.”
“If you hadn’t gone to my place that day, you would’ve passed out on the ground for at least
an hour.” Gu Fei said.
“Bullshit.” Jiang Cheng replied simply.
“Really, even when I wanted to bring you inside, Liu Fan and the others were against it.” Gu
Fei smiled. “This is not a peaceful place, a lot of people are afraid of drawing trouble to
themselves.”
“Then why did you have to take me in?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“You helped Gu Miao,” Gu Fei said. “Besides, I can’t let her witness her own big brother
stand by while someone dies before her eyes.”
“I only passed out for a while, I wasn’t dying!” Jiang Cheng corrected him.
“So mainly, it was because you’re attractive,” Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up.
“Very handsome.”
Jiang Cheng clucked his tongue.
The oden at the school concession stand was pretty good, it was only unfortunate that by
the time they brought it from the concession stand back to the classroom, it had just about
cooled down.
By this point, Jiang Cheng was already able to follow the local customs, so he put his head
down and ate as he listened to the lecture. He was even a little envious of one of the
students of the Class-7 next door, who had brought an electric thermos to school so that he
could cook food in class…… Of course, the guy who had done that was already made to do a
self-condemnation in front of the whole school, apparently reported by a classmate who
didn’t have anything warm to eat in class.
“Jiang Cheng!” Lao-Lu shouted from the lectern.
Jiang Cheng had just skewered the last fishball, and was about to deliver it into his mouth.
On the impact of Lao-Lu’s roar, his hand shook, and the fishball fell to the ground along
with the skewer.
“Ah……” He cried quietly in pain. It was bad enough to see that he only had one fishball left
when he was nowhere near full or satisfied, but he couldn’t even get the last one into his
mouth.
He almost wanted to pick it up while no one was watching and rinse it in the broth, then eat
it.
“I’m just saying! I get that you all are tired from studying, so I won’t lecture you about
sneaking some food during class!” Lao-Lu pointed at him. “But aren’t you eating a little too
slowly! Did you think this was a cuisine appreciation class? I would’ve thought you’d
bought a full Han-Manchurian feast by the way you were eating! Come on up and translate
this passage here!”
Jiang Cheng carefully put the paper bowl into his desk drawer, there was still a little bit of
broth left, he could chug it later to sate his craving.
He walked up to the front of the room, but just as he picked up a chalk, Lao-Lu was already
handing him the short piece in his own hand, “Use this one! You don’t need to expend
energy to snap a new one! I already sharpened this for you!”
“……Oh.” Jiang Cheng took the chalk and started writing without pause on the blackboard.
Usually around this time, no other teacher would call students up to solve a question. They
had to hang onto every precious minute to hammer in the key points, or grill them with
mock exams, which were then dissected at length, all the while repeating the same key
points over and over.
Here is an important point, that there is also an important point, these are all important
points, those have all been tested in previous years! After a whole round of this, one would
think that there was not a thing that was unimportant in the entire textbook.
There was only Lao-Lu, who persevered to call someone up in every single class. Jiang
Cheng thought it must be why the students were relatively more focused in his class, since
who knew when they would suddenly get picked out, and if one couldn’t answer or recite
correctly, they faced a round of harsh rebukes.
“Your handwriting has improved,” Lao-Lu looked at Jiang Cheng’s answer on the
blackboard. “It has improved. Not bad, not bad. If I were the one marking the exams, I will
not deduct you marks for aesthetics.”
“Thank you teacher Lu.” Jiang Cheng said.
It was true that his handwriting had improved, he knew it himself. Every day when he
memorized passages, he would jot out key points on a scrap paper to increase its retention,
and as a way to train his handwriting as well.
As Gu Fei put it, it was finally legible.
“Da-Fei!” When class ended for the morning, Wang Xu squeezed aside Zhou Jing and
plopped himself down on their desk. “Jiang Cheng!”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng answered with his head down, he was finishing up a set of questions he
didn’t get to complete in the last period.
“You guys aren’t busy later, right?” Wang Xu said. “Let’s go eat meat pie, my dad made a
new filling, come try it out?”
“What new filling?” Gu Fei asked.
“Corn!” Wang Xu said. “To be honest it’s not that unique, but it does taste pretty good.
Really, come eat?”
Gu Fei threw a glance at Jiang Cheng.
“Ugh I’m so done with you guys.” Wang Xu waved his hand. “Shouldn’t have asked you in
the first place…… Jiang Cheng?”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng smiled and nodded his head.
Sooner or later both Wang Xu and Zhou Jing would have to be taken out. They could keep
Wang Xu for a little longer, since after all, he was the provider of delicious meat pies.
“Shall we call up Er-Miao too?” Wang Xu said.
“Nah,” Gu Fei said. “My mom’s making wontons for her today.”
“Alrighty then,” Wang Xu stood up. “Let’s go go go go.”
Jiang Cheng’s schedule was tightly packed from day to day. After school he usually went
straight home, and rarely even dropped by the convenience store.
Since he was not efficient during the time when he was waiting on the side for food, it was
easy to get distracted, so Gu Fei made him go back to the apartment directly after school,
where he would bring the food over once it was done.
And after eating, that was basically it for the day, there was nothing else to do for the night
aside from review, memorize, and question banks.
Of course, he still had time for relaxing leisurely activities. Exercise on the bed might be
physically taxing, but it was very mentally stimulating……
Going to Wang Xu’s place to have meat pies today was probably the first ‘fun’
group outing in the last couple of months.
“I used to think that Yi Jing was enough of an overachiever,” Wang Xu lamented as he
pedaled his bike. “But after seeing Jiang Cheng, I finally realized I was too shortsighted.”
“Isn’t Yi Jing grinding pretty hard.” Gu Fei said.
“It’s not the same,” Wang Xu glanced at Jiang Cheng. “I noticed recently, Jiang Cheng lost
more weight than Yi Jing did.”
“…… Shut up.” Jiang Cheng said.
Best stop saying that he lost weight. Whether it were the ingredients or the quantity, the
meals Gu Fei made every day were definitely heading in the direction of raising high quality
hogs. Just from Wang Xu saying that Jiang
Cheng had lost weight, Gu Fei would probably pull his mouth open and start shoveling food
in through a feeding tube.
“Hey,” Wang Xu rode beside Jiang Cheng. “Honour Student Jiang, have you decided what
school you want to apply to? Have you decided on a major?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng said.
“The fuck?” Wang Xu was baffled. “Don’t people say you overachievers all have your sights
dead set on some university or another ever since you were little, and then when you
finally get in, it’s a hella inspiring tale? How can you still not know at this point?”
“I,” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him. “Can go anywhere I want to. I don’t need to set my
sights on anything from since I was young.”
“…… Goddamnit.” Wang Xu glared at him. “I hate you overachievers and your pointless
showing offs!”
“I’m not pointlessly showing-off,” Jiang Cheng grinned. “I’m only showing off.”
“Die mad about it.” Gu Fei said from beside them.
“What the hell!” Wang Xu yelped. “Can the two of you adjust your attitudes, you’re going to
my home to eat! Can you please treat the meal provider with a little bit of gentleness?”
Wang Xu’s dad Wang Er……or, maybe his name wasn’t Wang Er, though Jiang Cheng never
did ask what his name really was. Either way, daddy Wang’s meat pies really were the best
he had ever had.
Even the ones with corn filling and only a few specks of meat were surprisingly delicious.
Of course, after finishing a heap of corn filling pies, he topped it off with three more that
had pork belly filling.
“Oh my,” Wang Xu’s mom glanced at the empty baskets on the table when she came in to
bring them snacks. “How did you guys eat so fast?”
“He’s trying to fatten up for the winter.” Wang Xu pointed at Jiang Cheng.
“Overachievers are not like us, that’s the way overachievers eat, and he still gets skinnier
every day.”
“You have the face to say that,” Wang Xu’s mom smacked the back of Wang Xu’s head.
“Whatever you ate all stuck to your body, none of it went to your brain!”
“Hey!” Wang Xu peered at his mom in embarrassment. “Don’t do that in front of
my classmates.”
“Do what! So what if I do!” She smacked his head a couple more times.
“It’ll make him dumb.” Gu Fei said.
“Oyo, well it’s too late for that, been whacking him like that since he was little, he might be
dumb already.” She set the two plates of beef jerky down on the table. “Try this, it’s
delicious, spicy, and not tough.”
Jiang Cheng picked up a strip and stuffed it into his mouth.
“Looks like Jiang Cheng quite likes our meat pies huh?” Wang Xu’s mom smiled at him and
asked.
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “It’s amazing.”
“We’ll have new versions coming out around New Years,” She said. “If you think the food at
home is getting too heavy around the holiday time, feel free to come over and have some
meat pies!”
Jiang Cheng had to ponder for a moment, then nodded, “Alright.”
“You talk so much,” Wang Xu gave his mom a push. “Go back to work, let us talk by
ourselves.”
After Wang Xu’s mom went out, he went to close the door to the dining room,
“Sorry about that Jiang Cheng, my mom didn’t know……”
“It’s fine,” Jiang Cheng gave a smile. “Really.”
It’s almost New Year’s.
If Wang Xu’s mom hadn’t mentioned it, he never would’ve noticed that it’s almost the end
of the year.
He knew only that it was almost winter break, and he had to spend it in cram school, and
that everyone in class expressed the unwillingness to accept this harsh reality.
And yet, Jiang Cheng never did make the connection between winter break and New Year’s.
Perhaps he never dared to think about it.
To have a heart that was still as water didn’t mean that it would be still even over the
holiday season.
After all, it was the time of year when families reunited, full of laughter and cheer.
Chinese people’s insistence on celebrating New Year’s and their unrelenting sorrow about
not being able to go home for New Year’s was something carved deep into their bones.
Whether one cared or not, during this period of time, it was inevitable that one’s mood
would change along with the surrounding environment that grew redder and redder.
The children who wore red woolen coats, running about with firecrackers in their hands;
the pedestrians on the street hurrying to go home; the people crowding against each other
in markets, striving to make their holiday purchases; all sorts of reporting on the ‘Spring
transport’ in the news on TV; the handful of holiday songs that resounded through the
streets and alleyways that never seemed to change…… All of which came together in a
symphony that screamed: it’s New Year’s time!
And it was only then, that Jiang Cheng finally realized, ah, it’s New Year’s time.
He didn’t have any special memories of the past New Years, which were mostly spent
eating, drinking, and visiting relatives, as well as going out every day with friends. He only
remembered that there never seemed to be enough time to play to his heart’s content
before school started again, and why couldn’t summer break lend some of its days to the
winter break.
But now he felt a little lost.
It’s New Year’s.
How to celebrate?
Where should he go?
…… Should he celebrate?
“Usually we spend New Year’s at the store,” Gu Fei said when they had finished the meat
pies and were on their way back. “Er-Miao liked to celebrate it in the store, it’s more
convenient for her to run in and out with the firecrackers.”
“Is she not scared of the noise?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Nope, she really likes it. Whichever house was setting off firecrackers, she would zoom
over on her skateboard right away.” Gu Fei smiled. “Last year, a tuft of her hair even got
singed.”
Jiang Cheng cracked up laughing.
“Come spend it with me this year,” Gu Fei said. “You can come by once dinner’s ready, and
we’ll set off firecrackers together, then you can go back and study after that.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“And if you think that’s not lively enough, we can get Li Yan, Liu Fan, and the others there
too.” Gu Fei said. “Those guys can’t bear to stay still at home after dinner anyways.”
“Do you like it to be more lively?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Doesn’t matter to me either way,” Gu Fei said. “In the past for New Year’s we……it’s just me
and Er-Miao. My mom usually went out as soon as we were done eating.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng thought about it. “Then call them up too, if we come together and make
some noise, Er-Miao will probably like it?”
“Then I’ll say this first,” Gu Fei looked at him with a smile. “If they’re coming by, you have to
go back and study on your own that night, I’ll definitely be dragged off to play for a whole
night.”
“No problem.” Jiang Cheng steered his bike closer to Gu Fei, and clapped him on the
shoulder.
Gu Fei hardly went out with Li Yan and the guys at all this semester, since he spent all his
time circling around Jiang Cheng all day. Jiang Cheng felt like if one day Pan Zhi got a
girlfriend and suddenly disappeared from his view, he’d definitely be unhappy about it.
As for the New Year’s, Jiang Cheng only brooded over it for one night, after which he
returned to the usual routine of studying. Without realizing it, the beginning of the winter
break cram school arrived, and connected seamlessly with the tail end of the semester. He
was impressed at what a good studious youth he had been.
Gu Fei was spending four or five days out of a week at his apartment. Usually he went to
sleep first after he accompanied Jiang Cheng through his readings and nighttime snack.
However, for the last two days, he would stay sitting up at the head of the bed, playing with
his phone.
“Playing the idiotic game?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Nah, who has time for that, Li Yan is already more than twenty levels ahead of me now,
been throwing it in my face every day, sending me screenshots all the time.” Gu Fei said.
“Ooh sounds like you’re quite busy?” Jiang Cheng shot him a glance.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded seriously. “I have to keep my boyfriend company every day while he
studies. I shot up more than 50 spots in the final exams this time, Lao-Xu even pulled me
aside the other day with tears in his eyes.”
“You can actually……” Jiang Cheng put his head down and continued doing
questions without finishing his sentence.
You can actually get pretty good grades if you put in a little effort. But if he said this out
loud, Gu Fei might think too much into it. He forcefully swallowed his words.
“You can actually sleep first, no need to wait for me.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I wasn’t waiting for you,” Gu Fei stuck the phone in front of Jiang Cheng’s face. “I was
looking up recipes.”
“For New Year’s Eve dinner?” Jiang Cheng looked at it.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei continued to look at his phone. “In the past during New Year’s, my mom just
threw together a pot of whatever we had, then wrapped some dumplings and called it a
day. Sometimes when we were lazy, we would simply take some frozen dumplings from the
store. This year let’s make it more formal, since it’s the first New Year’s we’re spending
together.
Jiang Cheng smiled, “Will you be heading the kitchen?”
“You don’t have faith in me?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the empty bowl of nighttime snack that was still on the desk.
Tonight they had Four-Delights Meatballs, five of them each the size of a fist. “It’s alright,
only……can you look at some vegetarian recipes too?”
“What good are vegetarian dishes, I thought you liked eating meat?” Gu Fei said.
“Classmate Xiao-Gu,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I’ve recently grown to appreciate vegetables a
little more, leafy greens, also fine if they’re not green, cabbages are fine too.”
Alright,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll braise some cabbages for tomorrow’s nighttime snack.”
“……I wouldn’t mind if you drop some meat in either.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Didn’t you say you wanted to eat vegetables?” Gu Fei said.
“Are you only offering all meat or vegetarian as options?” Jiang Cheng said in exasperation.
“Fine, I want to eat meat-veggie combo dishes!”
“It’s called an omnivorous pairing.” Gu Fei corrected him.
Jiang Cheng pointed at him, and couldn’t get a word out, so he put his head down and
continued to study.
The winter break cram school lasted all the way until the 28th day of the last month,
leaving everyone with only one day off. According to Lao-Xu, it was to give them time to go
home, clean up their room, and go shopping for holiday stock with their parents.
Gu Fei woke Jiang Cheng up early in the morning.
“Where are we going?” Jiang Cheng asked blearily.
“Grocery shopping.” Gu Fei flung the covers off the bed as he put on his own clothes.
“What,” Jiang Cheng pulled the covers back over himself. “Weren’t you running to the
supermarket every free minute you had in the past few days? I was afraid you’d clean the
place out. Are you still missing stuff?”
“That’s different,” Gu Fei smiled as he leaned over the headboard. “Don’t you want the
joyful experience of going New Year shopping with your boyfriend?”
“……Weirdo.” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “Alrighty then, I’m up.”
Two days before New Year’s Day, the holiday spirit filled the air. When Jiang Cheng was
washing up, he could hear the sounds of talking and laughter outside as well as……sounds
of arguments, louder than usual, and livelier too.
He walked over to the window and looked down as he brushed his teeth.
There were several extremely ugly snowmen on the ground outside, with rusty buckets
over their heads; a bunch of little brats were running about wildly, one kid was howling
while spewing insults at some unknown person; meanwhile there were two people
standing by the side of the road, shouting at each other with hands on their hips were a
grandpa and a granny.
Ah, it’s already been one year.
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little sentimental. Watching the messy scenes unfolding
downstairs, for the first time, he did not feel annoyed at the disorder.
It was also the first time that the holidays actually felt different from normal. To his own
surprise, he was really looking forward to the tiresome activities of crowding at the
supermarket, fighting people for loot, then standing shoulder to shoulder with others in
line for the check out.
Footnotes
General footnote just to say that “New Year” here is referring specifically to the lunar new
year, and all mentions of “the last month of the year”, and “28th day”
etc, are all pertaining to the lunar calendar. Modern Chinese people use the Gregorian
calendar in day to day life, but when it comes to traditional (aka non-

western) holidays, it’s always the lunar calendar.

Some Stats
Raw character count: 6127
TL word count: 4594
TL time: ??????
Edit time: 0:43:32
Curse words: 1x fuck, 1x shit
TL’s Notes:
Please take a look at the updated FAQ (´。＿。｀) If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the
novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step
tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: July 30, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 96
“Go ahead and shout then!” Jiang Cheng threw his head back. “AHHH——”
“What a wonderful winter jasmine, don’t we love it so……” Gu Fei had been singing along with
the music in the supermarket for a long time as he pushed the shopping cart along. “What a
wonderful winter jasmine that welcomes light back to the land; what a wonderful winter
jasmine that blooms in every home……” ▶
“You may all recall the person singing right now as the shining star of the Steel Works
brain-dead event from last time.” Jiang Cheng walked behind him, his hand holding up his
phone as he recorded a video. “Let us come along today on his supermarket excursion……
To be quite honest, the Cantonese pronunciation of this shining star sounds pretty okay to
our inexperienced ears, it may just give Pan Zhi a run for his money……”
“Bring a branch of the winter jasmine and let the fragrance spread to a thousand homes;
bring a branch of the winter jasmine and let us all rejoice……”
Gu Fei glanced back at Jiang Cheng as he sang. It was then that the loudspeaker music
changed, and without missing a beat, he pinched his voice and started up again. “The god of
wealth comes knocking at my door, the god of money comes knocking at my door, the god of
prosperity comes knocking at my door, come children let’s light up the lanterns……” ▶
“Shit!” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “Don’t tell me you know how to sing all of them.”
“Yep, and I won’t get any of the words wrong either.” Gu Fei said. “I even bought CDs of
these New Years songs, we played them in the store every year.”
“How come I don’t see you playing them now?” Jiang Cheng pointed the camera at him.
“The player’s broken, it’s been that way for the last few years.” Gu Fei said, then pinched his
voice and continued. “May you all have great great great fortune in this New Year, may you
all have great great great fortune in this New Year……”
The song after that was “Every Step Higher” which didn’t have any lyrics, so Gu Fei finally
stopped following along and said, “Are there any snacks you want to eat? I have to get some
for Er-Miao.” ▶
“Dunno, let’s go have a look.” Jiang Cheng put away his phone.
There were a lot of people at the supermarket. Many people who didn’t get a vacation until
that day were in there doing last minute looting, and many shelves were emptied before
the stores had a chance to restock them.
“Do you eat walnuts?” Gu Fei held up a box and examined it. “Nourishes your brain.”
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng’s answer was decisive. He didn’t much like these kinds of things, he
preferred things like pork jerky.
“Nourishes your brain.” Gu Fei repeated.
“My brain is quite outstanding already thank you very much, the ridges are much deeper
than those on the walnuts.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else. He put the box of walnuts in their shopping cart and
continued walking slowly forward.
“Wait,” Jiang Cheng took a look at the price label. “This thing is way too expensive, do you
know how much these are at the market? They’re all the same thin-skin varieties too.”
“The market’s closed already,” Gu Fei said. “You can pick at these as snacks for the next
couple of days.”
“I want pork jerky,” Jiang Cheng said. “And air-dried beef, and tiny mala fish, and……”
“Didn’t you say you’re tired of eating meat?” Gu Fei interrupted.
“And mala green peas.” Jiang Cheng swiftly held back the salt roasted chicken wings he was
about to say, and changed it last minute to green peas instead.
“Grab some then,” Gu Fei smiled. “Get all of it.”
“Just a couple bags are fine,” Jiang Cheng picked up a bag of air-dried beef, looked at the
price tag and threw it back in shock, then grabbed the regular beef jerky beside it. “Wow,
it’s real fucking expensive.”
“Get it, it’s fine.” Gu Fei picked up the air-dried beef and put it in the cart. “I have a gift card,
500 bucks.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“From Li Yan.” Gu Fei said. “In previous years there’s even more, but this year he’s fighting
his mom remember, and the fight’s not over, so his mom only gave him one.”
“I guess it’s not a very intense fight then, since she still gave him 500?” Jiang Cheng
chuckled.
“He’s the precious son after all.” Gu Fei picked up a bag of jelly pudding cups.
“Don’t you have those in your store? Buy something you don’t have.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Er-Miao won’t eat the ones in the store.” Gu Fei said. “I told her before, the things in the
store are for sale, she shouldn’t eat them willy nilly. Since then she’s pretty much stopped
eating them, she’ll only eat bought things.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied. “Can’t refute that logic.”
“Besides, the ones in our store aren’t as fancy as these,” Gu Fei said. “It’s New Year’s, let’s
eat some expensive things.”
After they got everything they wanted to buy, they walked toward the cash. Jiang Cheng
froze after he got a glance from a long way away, then immediately started running, turning
back as he did so to say, “What the fuck, I’m gonna go line up first.”
The line had already extended from the cash registers to the aisles, where it took a turn.
Every person in line had a shopping cart piled with things, it didn’t help at all that Jiang
Cheng sprinted over a tiny bit earlier.
By the time Gu Fei reached him, a few more people had lined up behind Jiang Cheng, but he
didn’t even have the courage to count how many people there were in front of him.
“I feel like we won’t be able to get out of here before noon.” Jiang Cheng said.
“No worries,” Gu Fei pointed at the prepared meals section. “I looked, we can eat there.”
“…… You’re pretty calm?” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“Of course,” Gu Fei said while leaning on the cart. “If it was just me, I’d just drop everything
and go, but with you beside me, it doesn’t feel like a big deal…… although it may be eating
into your studying time.”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng quirked his eyebrows and pulled a stack of thickly folded paper from his
back pocket. “There isn’t a place where I can’t study.”
“Oh shit.” Gu Fei was astonished. Jiang Cheng was holding a set of English mock exams in
his hand.
“I didn’t wanna be so unbelievably cool either,” Jiang Cheng dug a pencil out of his other
pocket. “The thing is, we only have a few days off, and these mock exams, even if evenly
spread, would have to be done two a day.”
Gu Fei laughed for a while, then lifted a case of yogurt drink from the cart and set it atop the
child seat, “You can write on here.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng bent down and tried it. “Maybe a little higher.”
Gu Fei stacked another case of orange juice on top, “Like this?”
“That’s good.” Jiang Cheng put his papers down and started to write.
It was a rather fantastical feeling. Gu Fei kept one hand on the shopping cart and stared at
Jiang Cheng’s profile. The guy had gone into a focused state in less than a minute, he
probably couldn’t hear or see the noisy crowd around him anymore, there was only his
pencil and his ugly…… his no longer so ugly handwriting.
The line shifted half a meter forward, but Gu Fei didn’t move, this tiny bit of distance meant
nothing. Besides, his boyfriend was busy scribbling down his deconstructed hieroglyphics,
he couldn’t move now.
An auntie behind them grew impatient, she slammed Jiang Cheng’s butt once with her
shopping cart, “Move forward why don’t you, keep up!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t stop writing, as if he didn’t feel a thing.
Gu Fei glanced at the auntie and went to stand in front of their cart, taking up that half
meter of space, then looked at the auntie again, “Move where?”
The auntie gave him a glare, then turned her head away and started to curse quietly.
After a little while, Jiang Cheng stopped writing and nudged the cart forward,
“Let’s move up.”
“I thought you didn’t know?” Gu Fei moved out of the way and pushed the cart forward one
small step.
“I heard it, but in times like these my brain is a one-way street, I can’t process other
information. I don’t exist in this world when I’m doing questions.” Jiang Cheng said quietly
as he looked through the next problem. “But as soon as you opened your mouth, I exist in
this world again. I only came back to reality after I heard you speak.”
“How magical.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Episode one of ‘Cheng-ge Shows You the World: The Magical Honour
Student’.” Jiang Cheng twirled his pencil. “Subheading…… Answering
Questions, or In a Trance?”
Jiang Cheng finished one side of his question bank page and the people in front of them,
who had pretty much come to move the whole supermarket to their home, finally finished
paying and left. The two of them moved up to the edge of the checkout counter.
In one fluid motion Gu Fei picked up a little box from the shelf by the counter and tossed it
into their cart.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the little box as he folded the papers back up again.
Ultra Thin.
Naked Sensations.
Those four words made him suddenly drop his voice, “You’re getting that?”
“What?” Gu Fei looked at him, and also lowered his voice. “There’s no more.”
“…… Can’t you buy it from the pharmacy?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“It was right there, and we have a gift card.” Gu Fei said.
“With all these people watching, does good sir not feel even a teensy bit embarrassed?”
Jiang Cheng flicked the box with his finger, disappearing it into the crack between all the
other things they bought.
“No,” Gu Fei laughed. “If you’re embarrassed then don’t use it.”
“Sooner or later you’re gonna corrupt me.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Sooner or later.”
After finishing up the New Year’s purchasing activity, the two of them took everything back
to the convenience store and quickly stuffed themselves with some food, then Gu Fei took
Jiang Cheng back to his apartment.
“I have to do some tidying around the house today, cleaning and stuff,” Gu Fei said. “Then
I’ll come tonight and tidy your place.”
“My place is pretty tidy already, I don’t even have anything.” Jiang Cheng looked around.
“A bit of dusting then, you don’t need to worry about it,” Gu Fei gave him a kiss.
“Go do your studying.”
“This dinner’s still gotta have some meat, you can’t skimp on meat just because there’s a
feast tomorrow. There’s gotta be vegetables and some meat.” Jiang Cheng urged him. “You
don’t need to make it fancy, pork belly slices tossed with cabbage leaves is fine.”
“Got it,” Gu Fei cracked up. “What’s with this craving.”
Jiang Cheng sat down at his desk after Gu Fei left, and leaning back in the chair, lifted his
arms in a stretch as he listened to the north wind gusting outside. It was just past noon, but
the sky had already darkened. It looked like another snow
storm was coming.
On days like these, when the chilly weather outside was frightful, to be inside and warm, it
gave him a feeling of ease in the midst of all the desolation.
What’s with this craving.
True, and maybe it was because of this peculiar feeling. Even if it was bone-chillingly cold
outside, there was someone who would satisfy all of his little wishes. He could be a little
bossy, a little unreasonable, he no longer had to keep everything buried deep in his heart.
I want to eat this, and that; I want to do this, I want to do that.
He no longer had to stop himself from speaking up for fear that his thoughts would be
refuted.
“Ahhh……” Jiang Cheng drew out an exclamation, and stretched again. What perfection.
Gu Fei would surprise Jiang Cheng in a lot of different ways, but when it came to tidying,
there were no surprises there. He was a slacker student after all, and had no method to
speak of when tidying up.
Compared to Jiang Cheng, who had been required to tidy his room into a clean and orderly
state ever since he was young, Gu Fei tended to just gather everything up in one place and
stick it somewhere where it couldn’t be seen, like the drawer or closet, and be done with it.
If there was anything to be tidied here at Jiang Cheng’s place, it would be the books and
study materials piled up everywhere.
Gu Fei gathered them all up in one stack, and subsequently became a little lost,
“What to do now? There’s nowhere to hide these things.”
“I was gonna use it, what are you hiding them for.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Never mind then,” Gu Fei flopped down on the bed. “Hey, I realized there’s really nothing
to tidy at your place. You’ve been here for a pretty long time, and it’s not messy at all.”
“I usually just tidy as I go, and put things back in their places.” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t like
tidying, which is why I try not to make a mess so I don’t have to take time to clean it up.”
“I’m always too lazy to put things back.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Ah but then you have to clean, it takes one second to put it back, but when you accumulate
the mess it’ll take several hours to tidy up, which one is more worth
it?” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye. “No wonder you’re a slacky slack slacker……”
“I don’t have the time, and when I do, I really don’t feel like moving.” Gu Fei sighed.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything else. That was true. Gu Fei carried a lot on his mind, it wore
on him day in and day out, so he couldn’t be bothered with maintaining these small details.
When will he not need to be so tired anymore?
Jiang Cheng stared at the pages in front of him. Ah, soon he would be writing the exams.
Ah, soon he would be leaving.
Ah, soon they would be separated.
And ah, the “after” that neither of them could find an answer for, was also coming.
Jiang Cheng was blasted awake by the sound of the firecrackers first thing in the morning
on New Year’s Eve. Upon entering the twelfth month, it was common to hear what sounded
like cannons going off practically every day. There was no ban on pyrotechnics here in the
Steel Works area, so everyone set off firecrackers from morning till night: one strand for
breakfast, one strand after lunch, and one strand for dinner. And of course, extra strands if
they were feeling bored.
Only, the one this morning was hung from a stick, reached out from the window upstairs,
and when it was lit next to the window of Jiang Cheng’s living room, the impact of it almost
made Jiang Cheng bounce from his bed to the floor, he felt as though the building would
collapse in the next second.
“Ayyy!” Jiang Cheng turned over in bed in resignation.
Gu Fei sat up, then after a moment of daze, got off the bed, “Cheng-ge.”
“Mmmm……” Jiang Cheng answered from beneath the covers.
“I’m going to head over to the store, Er-Miao’s probably there already.” He said as he put on
clothes. “I have to go prepare the ingredients first, you can come right over for breakfast
when you’re up.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng turned his head. “I’ll help you wrap dumplings later.”
“Why don’t you keep Er-Miao company,” Gu Fei said. “You haven’t played with her much
lately, just yesterday she was asking after you.”
“What did she ask?” Jiang Cheng flipped over his whole body again to look at him.
“Just, ‘Cheng-ge’.” Gu Fei tugged his pants up.
“…… That’s it?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“That’s it, you’re lucky she said anything at all.” Gu Fei said.
“Does she only talk to you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “She doesn’t speak much to me either, just occasionally, it wasn’t
long after she started to talk that…… I feel like she never really got to learn how, so this is
pretty good already.”
“Yeah……” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Why don’t you doze for a little longer, it’s just past 8 o’clock.” Gu Fei jumped on the bed
and gave Jiang Cheng’s head a kiss. “Remember to bring your books when you come,
overachiever.”
When the overachiever reached the door of the convenience store on his bike, along with
his books, the shop next door happened to be lighting a firecracker. It exploded behind him
just as he got off his bike, and he all of a sudden felt like he had stepped into a war zone.
Then, he saw a bright red figure fly out from the hutong between their convenience store
and the community clinic, and with a sharp whistle, dash into the fiery smoke behind him.
“Er-Miao!” Jiang Cheng yelled.
Gu Miao was dressed especially jovial today, with a little red puffer and green form-fitting
pants—even her boots were red, and she dragged a long white scarf behind her.
After diving headfirst into the cloud of firecrackers, Jiang Cheng could no longer see her
clearly, he could only see a vague red shape moving around. A few seconds later, Gu Miao
popped out once again from the smoke, with excitement written all over her face.
“Er-Miao!” Jiang Cheng opened his arms and stood in front of her.
Gu Miao braked hard, the head of her board pivoted to one side as she stopped sideways in
front of him. She grinned and reached out a hand, snapped her fingers, and held up a
thumb.
“Happy New Year!” Jiang Cheng also responded with a snap and a thumbs up.
Gu Miao hopped off her skateboard, kicked up the skateboard, caught it in her hand, and
dragged him into the store.
The woolen curtain over the doorway was not able to keep out the smoke from the
firecrackers, and the smell of gunpowder was everywhere inside, filling the store with the
New Year smell.
Gu Fei was just coming in from the back courtyard, holding a large tub with his flour
covered hands.
“Is it time to wrap dumplings?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not yet, I just finished kneading the dough.” Gu Fei pinched off a small clump of the dough
and handed it to Gu Miao, who was waiting with an expression of anticipation, then pointed
at the food warmer nearby. “Want some meat buns?
There’s also milk and soymilk.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng nodded, opened the food warmer, and took two meat buns. “How
come you still got these today, surely nobody would come buy them now?”
“I got them just for you, there’s no time for anything else.” Gu Fei smiled. “Go ahead and
pick from the milk and soymilk, there’s hot ones too.”
“When does your mom get here?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Soon,” Gu Fei looked at the clock on the wall. “Li Yan and Liu Fan are coming in the
afternoon.”
“In the afternoon?” Jiang Cheng paused. “They’re not gonna eat dumplings at home?”
“They’ve each got big families, it’s a whole mess around the holidays, with the younger
people running all over the place.” Gu Fei glanced out the door, then suddenly froze, his
face immediately darkened a little.
Jiang Cheng quickly followed his gaze outward. The curtain had been lifted, and Gu Fei’s
mom was standing outside with…… the ponytail guy they saw the other day.
The guy was still wearing a ponytail, along with a pair of shades.
It was a cloudy day, with tufts of snow occasionally drifting down from the sky, and the
streets outside were covered in clouds of smoke from the firecrackers.
With such dark sunglasses sitting on his face, Jiang Cheng almost wanted to go out and
hand him a walking stick.
“Come on in,” Gu Fei’s mom said. “This is my son Gu Fei, you haven’t met yet right? That’s
my girl, Gu Miao. And that’s his classmate Jiang Cheng.”
“Happy New Year auntie.” Jiang Cheng greeted her, then nodded to the ponytail guy. He
couldn’t bring himself to say “uncle”, the guy wasn’t very old, but da-ge also sounded
annoying, so he opted for silence.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Gu Fei clapped the flour off his hands and asked.
Jiang Cheng locked his eyes on Gu fei, ready to jump in to intervene whenever Gu Fei
decided to make his move. It was the holidays after all, both Gu Fei’s mom and the ponytail
boy had dressed well, clearly looking like they had put in a lot of effort to prepare for the
occasion. Perhaps it was for meeting the son, perhaps it was for a date, either way it was
unsuitable to beat someone up at this time.
“We’re just gonna have a meal together,” Gu Fei’s mom grabbed Gu Fei’s arm and dragged
him toward the back courtyard, speaking quietly. “Don’t give him attitude.”
“He was the one who hit you last time, right?” Gu Fei asked loudly, making it clear that he
wasn’t cutting anyone any slack.
“It wasn’t him……” She continued in a quiet voice.
What they said after they went out to the courtyard, Jiang Cheng could not hear.
Besides, the atmosphere suddenly became a little awkward.
The ponytail guy stood about two meters in from the doorway, while Jiang Cheng and Gu
Miao stood in front of the cash register. Since Gu Miao had no understanding of what was
going on, she still held her skateboard in one hand and squeezed on the dough ball with the
other, all the while staring without a blink at the ponytail, with her extremely cool and
extremely cold eyes.
Jiang Cheng, due to brain overuse in recent days, could only stop himself from staring like
Gu Miao, but other than that, could not find a single appropriate thing to say.
“I didn’t hit her,” The ponytail guy said. “It was her ex-boyfriend, I already settled it for
her.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng replied, still having absolutely nothing to say.
The ponytail guy didn’t speak again either. He stood stalk-straight, with his face slightly
tilted up.
Jiang Cheng leaned against the counter, and mentally serenaded him with “me and my
unyielding heart”. [1]
Me and my last stubbornness, tighten my hold and never let go, whether the next stop is really
paradise, do not despair in the face of disappointment…… ▶
Halfway through, he suddenly realized that he could also dedicate this song to Gu Fei.
Gu Fei and his mom finally came back in. Gu Fei stayed quiet, but she beckoned, “Come on,
hurry up and get busy.”
The ponytail guy nodded and followed her out to the courtyard.
“Busy with what?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“Cooking, my mom brought a cook to make food.” Gu Fei said, then suddenly cracked up
laughing. “I can’t even get mad.”
“That guy’s a cook?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei laughed, then sighed. “If he wants to cook then let him cook, whatever.”
“That’s nice,” Jiang Cheng squeezed his hand. “It’s gotta be better than what you make while
checking your phone the whole time, right.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded. “I really can’t bother anymore, just let it be.”
“Anyways, the more people the merrier during the New Year.” Jiang Cheng considered for a
moment. “How about we go play with fireworks.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei clapped his hands. “Er-Miao!”
Gu Miao turned her head, and he bent down to her, “Shall we go set off fireworks?”
Gu Miao nodded forcefully.
Gu Fei had bought a bunch of firecrackers and fireworks a few days ago, almost two cases
of them, all stored under the counter. They filled a bag with them and took Gu Miao out to
the street.
Lots of families had started their meals already, the explosive bangs in the street were so
dense that it was hard to hear people talk.
They had originally wanted to find a relatively smoke-free place to set off the fireworks, but
after walking down the length of the street, they realized there was no such place at about
this time. Jiang Cheng set the bag on the ground,
“Let’s just do it here!”
When Gu Fei took the fireworks out and laid them on the ground, Gu Miao started to
excitedly circle them round and round on her skateboard.
The moment the vibrant flares bursted out, Gu Miao gave out a loud whistle.
“IS IT PRETTY!” Gu Fei yelled in Jiang Cheng’s ear.
“Yeah!” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Why did you shout? We’re setting off fireworks, not
firecrackers!”
Their surroundings at this moment was actually quieter than before, so Gu Fei’s shout rang
especially loud.
“I DON’T KNOW!” Gu Fei continued shouting. “I JUST WANTED TO
SHOUT!”
“Go ahead and shout then!” Jiang Cheng threw his head back. “AHHH——”
“AHHH——” Gu Fei also threw his head back.
Footnotes
[1] A popular song by Mayday: Stubbornness (my translation) ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6208
TL word count: 4349
TL time: ??????
Edit time: 0:53:52
Curse words: 2x fucks, 2x shits
TL’s Notes:

(*≧∀≦)ﾉ (*≧∀≦)ﾉ (*≧∀≦)ﾉ

GUYS, SA YE DONGHUA PV ~~~~~~~~ (don’t ask me when it’ll be out idk either)

If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: August 11, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 97
But no matter what the answer was, it all seemed insufficient next to ∞.
The two of them “AHHHH”ed for a long time with their heads thrown back. It was rather
satisfying, but Jiang Cheng soon felt a little lacking in oxygen after a while of yelling in this
position.
He quickly took out his phone, “Here, hold this position and don’t move.”
“You’re taking a picture?” Gu Fei turned and asked.
“Mhm, don’t move, look at the camera,” Jiang Cheng held his phone above their heads, and
they both looked up at their faces on the screen. “Now yell, AHHH
——”
Gu Fei laughed and started yelling again with him. Jiang Cheng pressed on the shutter,
“Very good, my neck is getting sore.”
“Let’s do the fireworks.” Gu Fei kicked the plastic bag.
“Does Er-Miao dare to set them off?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“She doesn’t know how,” Gu Fei said. “You have to hold her hands and light it.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng pulled out his pack of cigarettes. “I’ll do it with her.”
“Hey hey hey,” Gu Fei handed Jiang Cheng the lighter in his hand. “You’re gonna let her light
it with a cigarette?”
“…… I forgot.” Jiang Cheng took the lighter from Gu Fei, it was a long stemmed one he got
from the store. “Come on Er-Miao, shall we light the fireworks?”
Gu Miao sat down beside him holding her skateboard, and Jiang Cheng placed the lighter in
her hand, “Press down here.”
Holding down Gu Miao’s finger, they lit the lighter together, then he took her hand and
reached over to ignite the fuse.
“Okay okay it caught!” Jiang Cheng pulled her back a couple of steps.
The one they set off was a bundle of eight sticks, and though it wasn’t that impressive to see
in the light of day, still Gu Miao let out an excited whistle the moment the sparks shot out.
The bag of fireworks Gu Fei brought out didn’t contain very much, but Gu Miao
wasn’t like the other kids when it came to setting off fireworks. Other kids liked to watch it
go off one after another, but Gu Miao got so excited after each one that she would roll out
on her skateboard and take a couple of laps around the area before coming back. And if
someone was lighting firecrackers nearby, she just had to go zoom through the smoke.
And that was why it took almost an hour for them to finish setting off all of their fireworks.
“Alright, we’re out,” Gu Fei said. “And the rest we’ll set off tonight when it’s dark, it’ll look
better.”
Jiang Cheng was about to speak, when across the smoke-filled street, from what felt as
distant as the other side of the world, came a call.
Loud and clear.
“Feifei Miaomiao and classmate—— it’s time to eat——”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng turned to stare at Gu Fei in shock. “Who’s that calling us?”
“Who else.” Gu Fei wore a complicated expression on his face.
“Ponytail boi?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“…… Your nicknaming speed is kind of somewhat a little impressive huh?” Gu Fei sighed.
“Come on, let’s go check out the boy’s cooking.” [1]
“It’s boi, not boy.” Jiang Cheng corrected his pronunciation.
“Boi.” Gu Fei repeated as he walked back.
“But he’s a boiii, why did that sound so much like a female opera singer just now,” Jiang
Cheng was still having a hard time recovering from the voice. “I thought it was your mom
calling you, Feifei.”
“You wanna bet I’ll smack you.” Gu Fei gave him a sideways glare.
“Come on, do it or you’re not my countryman.” Jiang Cheng was suddenly in a great mood.
In this smoke-filled air, though he couldn’t see what was in front of him, having the person
he cared about most by his side, walking down the street like this, buying things together,
setting off fireworks together, eating a New Year’s Eve meal together…… He couldn’t help
but be in a great mood.
He bounced a little, took a big stride forward with his left foot and landed in a lunge, then
put his hands on his hips and started to shake his shoulders, speaking to some kind of beat
as he did, “Do it, or you’re, not, my country, man.”
Gu Fei looked at him without any expression on his face, and after a few seconds, turned
and started running away, “Run Er-Miao! There’s a monster!”
Next he let out a whistle, and at that, Gu Miao immediately kicked off on her skateboard and
rolled out.
The ponytail guy made pretty quick work of the cooking. By the time they returned to the
store, there were already six dishes and one soup laid out on the table, and all of them ‘big’
dishes too.
He really was living up to his job description.
Judging by the dishes, said cook probably did not work at a very fancy place, but still the
whole spread smelled delicious, and made one salivate at the smell.
“You’ve worked hard.” Jiang Cheng said when he sat down.
“Naww, it’s my field of expertise.” Ponytail waved his hand. “This is nothing.”
“I’ll go get some alcohol.” Gu Fei’s mom ran to the shelves where they kept the alcohol, then
picked a bottle of Jin Liu Fu. “This one looks jovial, let’s have this.” [2]
“Er-Miao, go get a bottle of something for yourself.” Gu Fei said to Gu Miao.
Gu Miao ran to the fridge and took out a can of beer, then turned to look at Gu Fei.
“…… Alright.” Gu Fei said.
“Come, Miaomiao,” Ponytail pulled out a red envelope from his pocket. “Take this.”
Gu Miao didn’t look at him as she focused on pulling the tab off of the can of beer.
“Er-Miao?” Their mom called to her. “The uncle is giving you lucky money.”
Still Gu Miao did not lift her head. After yanking off the tab, she threw her head back and
took a few gulps of beer, then wiped her mouth and sat down, staring at the food on the
table.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei spoke up.
Gu Miao lifted her head.
“The uncle’s giving you lucky money, take it, and thank him.” Gu Fei said, looking at her.
Gu Miao finally turned around and looked at Ponytail. She stood up and first
bowed, then took the red envelope and put it into her own pocket.
“Come on,” Ponytail stuck his hand into his pocket again. “Feifei……”
“That’s okay,” Gu Fei froze, and waved his hand in extreme awkwardness. “It’s really not
necessary.”
“You don’t need to give it to him,” Gu Fei’s mom stopped Ponytail. “He’s an adult now, not a
child.”
After a few rounds of extremely awkward back and forth, Ponytail eventually put the red
envelope away. Gu Fei’s mom picked up her cup and said, “Come come, let’s first drink to
my son’s prosperity, my girlie’s health, and Jiang Cheng getting into an elite university……”
“What about me?” Ponytail asked.
Jiang Cheng was shocked to hear the whining tone in his voice, and shot a glance in Gu Fei’s
direction.
Gu Fei was holding his cup, his expression a swiftly changing enigma.
“Oh you,” Gu Fei’s mom giggled as she leaned a little against Ponytail. “Here’s to everything
going your way.”
Her tone was also intentionally cute, and holding his cup, the sweat on Jiang Cheng’s face
was practically dripping down. Meanwhile, Gu Fei had already turned his face away in
embarrassment.
Only Gu Miao was still acting completely normal, as she stared blankly at the table full of
food in front of them.
After this exchange, Gu Fei’s mom and Ponytail suddenly activated a mode of clingy
romantic behaviour, as if there was no one else there but them, and still holding their cups,
they’d begun to blatantly flirt with each other while forgetting where they were.
Gu Fei gently knocked his cup against Jiang Cheng’s, “May Cheng-ge be ever triumphant this
year.”
“May you succeed in all that you do,” Jiang Cheng noticed out of the corner of his eyes that
the other pair was still off in their own world, so he added in a low voice, “Boyfriend.”
Gu Fei chuckled and took a drink, then reached over and knocked his cup against Gu Miao’s
beer can, “May Er-Miao quickly grow up.”
“May Er-Miao make progress every day.” Jiang Cheng also knocked against her beer can.
[3]
It wasn’t until they had started eating, that Gu Fei’s mom and Ponytail finally came back to
earth. However, they had already forgotten about the toast, and simply joined them and
dug in on the food.
Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng didn’t talk very much during the whole meal, but it wasn’t awkward
either, because there was a very sweet couple flirting with each other the whole time while
they ate.
When they weren’t flirting, Gu Fei’s mom was resting her chin in her hand, listening to
Ponytail boast about his feats.
At least his boasting was more or less constrained to the subject of wanting to take over his
boss’s business this year. Jiang Cheng kept wanting to remind him, whether he had asked
his boss if he even wanted to sell the business……
However, the pair was so engrossed in their conversation that no one else could manage to
get a word in edgewise.
Ponytail’s cooking was not bad; it smelled good, and tasted pretty good too. Gu Miao had a
great time eating everything, and never taking a break in reaching out with her chopsticks,
she took a sip of beer for every bite of meat. It was very satisfying.
The lovers across from them were probably not full, Jiang Cheng hardly saw them touch the
food.
“We’re gonna go out for a spin,” As the meal wound down to a close, Gu Fei’s mom stood up.
“And get a good taste of the New Year atmosphere.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“Have fun.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Thank you.” Gu Fei’s mom said as she dragged Ponytail out. Soon after, they heard the
sound of a motorcycle receding into the distance.
Jiang Cheng leaned back in the chair and, stretching his legs out in front of him, looked at
Gu Miao who was still busy working away at the food.
Beside him, Gu Fei lit up a cigarette, “Want one?”
“In a bit,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m just gonna have a couple more bites.”
“These dishes aren’t too bad.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng ladled a bowl of soup for himself. “How does this guy……
compare with the other ones from before?”
“Dunno,” Gu Fei frowned. “There were guys who looked even more reliable than this one,
but it all ended the same way.”
“Then……” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“As long as he doesn’t touch the money in the store,” Gu Fei leaned back a little.
“I can’t be bothered to interfere. We’re all adults here.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng picked up the bottle and swung it lightly, and thought aloud as he filled
up Gu Fei’s cup. “He’s drinking and driving, isn’t he?”
“Ayy,” Gu Fei laughed. “Honestly Cheng-ge you…… He probably had a shot at most.”
“When Li Yan and the others get here this afternoon, and you guys drink, you should
probably just ride bikes if you’re going out.” Jiang Cheng said. “You’ve definitely had more
than a shot.”
“We’re not going out, there’s nowhere to go,” Gu Fei said. “We just stick around here,
watching TV and talking nonsense, and occasionally play some cards.”
“Old people life.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “I’ve already lived out my young life in bed with you.”
Jiang Cheng shot a glance at him, “Watch your words.”
“In bed in bed in bed in bed,” Gu Fei said. “Bed him bed him bed him bed him.”
“Go to sleep.” Jiang Cheng said.
After Gu Miao finished gnawing on the last piece of short rib, the two of them tidied up the
table.
Washing dishes was the most annoying chore, but this was the first time Jiang Cheng felt in
a pretty good mood while doing the dishes. Gu Fei played music out of his phone, which he
had set to the side, and Jiang Cheng happily finished washing the dishes to the beat of the
music.
About this time, every family was inside eating together, so the sound of firecrackers
outside had diminished somewhat. Jiang Cheng walked out of the kitchen and stood in the
courtyard, listening to the distant booming noises.
He never felt very sentimental during New Year’s in the past. Whenever he heard the
raucous noises, he would feel annoyed, the racket was ear-splitting and disturbing. This
was the first time in his life he could listen to the sounds with such calm composure, he
could even feel that beneath the dilapidated exterior of the Steel Works, there were signs of
life emerging because of the New Year.
“It’s snowing! Good thing we were fast!” Liu Fan’s voice carried out from inside the store.
Jiang Cheng looked up, the snowflakes drifting down from the sky were still very small,
circling around in the wind. When they landed on his face, he first felt a tiny bit of cold that
quickly disappeared soon after.
He turned to go back into the store. Liu Fan, Li Yan, and Luo Yu had just come through the
door, and were taking off their jackets.
“Jiang Cheng! Happy New Year!” Luo Yu greeted him.
“Happy New Year.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I thought you’d be studying today too,” Li Yan said. “Da-Fei said you were studying from
morning to night every single day.”
“I’m going back later to continue studying.” Jiang Cheng said.
“…… Why don’t you hang out for a while and then go back,” Li Yan said. “We brought a
whole bunch of holiday food, wanna have a taste?”
“I really can’t taste anything right now,” Jiang Cheng patted his belly. “I’m stuffed.”
“Jiang Cheng, gege has something to give you.” Liu Fan picked up a large plastic bag and
walked over. “We had Chen Jie put this together, he has a friend interning at First High, who
got the study materials from their senior class.”
“Holy shit,” Gu Fei laughed. “You guys didn’t have to.”
“As a bunch of people who’ve never gone to college, we respect and envy the top of the
grade.” Li Yan smiled and sat down, then pulled out a bulging red envelope and stuck it
inside Gu Miao’s pocket. “This is lucky money from all your big brothers, you keep it for
yourself, don’t give it to your brother.”
Jiang Cheng felt an unspeakable emotion as he accepted the heavy bag into his hands. It
took a long time before he managed to say, “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Liu Fan answered.
Everyone laughed after that. Luo Yu sighed, “Don’t be so formal, I can’t even continue this
conversation.”
They spread out, flopped down on the chairs, and started to chat.
Jiang Cheng pulled out a few of the study materials and flipped through them.
These were the mock tests handed out at First High in the past weeks, as well as other
materials gathered by the teachers there. Some of them overlapped with the ones from the
Fourth High, but most of them he’d never seen before.
That Li Yan and the guys would obtain study materials for him was something
Jiang Cheng had never expected. It was also quite bewildering that him preparing for an
exam had somehow alerted the guys who were up to nothing all day long.
But it was also because of this, that he suddenly felt an immense pressure.
Taking a glance at Gu Fei, who was sitting across from him and listening to the others
ramble on, he thought: and what expectations did Gu Fei have for him?
When Li Yan suggested that they play cards, Jiang Cheng decided to head back and study.
“I’ll call you over to eat when the dumplings are ready.” Gu Fei walked out the door with
him. “Do you want me to take you back? And pick you up later tonight?”
“I bet even Gu Miao doesn’t need you to take her back and forth.” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“It’s an excuse anyways,” Gu Fei stretched. “I just wanted to get a few more looks at you.”
These words made him want to take Gu Fei in his arms right there in the middle of the
street, and shower him with kisses.
Wanted to get a few more looks at you.
Jiang Cheng was the same. When he studied, his peripheral vision was always taken up by
Gu Fei. Even when he entered a state where he no longer existed in this realm, one word
from Gu Fei was all it took to pull him back.
Want to look at you, want to listen to you speak.
But the most unbearable thing was that these days of spending every waking moment
together was steadily running out, along with the countdown to the exam. The feeling of
panic that arose whenever he thought about it, was overpowering even the panic at the
upcoming exams.
Jiang Cheng strolled back to his apartment on his own; he didn’t let Gu Fei walk him back.
The way they clung to each other like this, if he didn’t cut it off in time, they might end up
walking each other half a dozen times to and fro between his apartment and the store.
The ground outside his building was also littered with leftover bits of red paper, and the
corridors looked like they were covered in a red carpet. Jiang Cheng walked up the stairs,
taking in the scent of remnant firecrackers the entire way.
The building might be old, but the heating was miraculously abundant. Jiang Cheng felt a
wave of warmth as soon as he walked through the door.
He changed into comfortable clothing, then sat down at his desk and began to study.
First he worked on the mock tests from Fourth High, followed by the various contents that
Pan Zhi had sent him, and then the materials from First High.
In the eyes of others, he probably seemed like a machine incapable of feeling tired. After all,
he was an overachiever. He had strong self-discipline, and was a good learner with a strong
memory, who tackled studying with a plan.
Even so, it was still very tiring. His pencil would halt every so often as he wrote, and his
brain would stop working from time to time as he memorized texts.
Ever since he was young he had strived on a held breath: he must do it, and he must do it
well. It was purely an effort to be acknowledged. Whereas now, the reason he toiled and
worked himself to the bones had become more complicated.
He no longer had any other option.
And neither did Gu Fei.
Come dinner time, Gu Fei called to tell him to come have some dumplings. If it wasn’t
because of the fact that Gu Fei’s custom ringtone was itself a stimulus for him, he probably
wouldn’t have reacted at all.
Li Yan and the other guys had wrapped the dumplings. Apparently ten of them contained
money, and whoever got one would have their wishes come true.
They couldn’t fit all the dumplings on one plate, so Gu Fei divided the dumplings directly
into each person’s bowl. The result was that each person got one yuan from their
dumplings — Gu Miao even stared blankly for a good while because she bit into a coin —
while all five dumplings in Jiang Cheng’s bowl contained coins.
“Ah!” Jiang Cheng shot a glance at Gu Fei as he bit into a coin for the fifth time.
“Da-Fei,” Li Yan couldn’t help but crack up. “Did you cheat.”
“He must’ve,” Liu Fan tossed the coin in his hand, and said as he laughed. “He’s already
taking our friendship into consideration by not giving all ten to Jiang Cheng.”
“It’s not like you guys have to take the exam.” Gu Fei said.
“Then you could at least leave a couple for yourself,” Luo Yu said. “We’re not taking the
exam, but you are.”
Gu Fei smiled but didn’t say anything.
In Jiang Cheng’s mind, the main events of the New Year’s were over after the dumplings
had been eaten, and for the next few days of the break he kept himself inside and hardly
went out at all.
Every couple of days, Gu Fei would drag him out to take a walk and breathe some fresh air,
and along the way would quiz him sporadically on some key points.
Jiang Cheng was surprised to find that, even though Gu Fei hadn’t specifically tried to
memorize anything, for the questions he quizzed more than once, he knew whether Jiang
Cheng’s answers were right or wrong without even
checking.
“Nice,” Jiang Cheng said. “You remember it all?”
“Nah,” Gu Fei smiled. “No way, I only have a vague recollection, you can’t make me give a
whole answer, though I can tell if your answer is right or wrong.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look.
Even though he didn’t know how much it would help, he gradually increased the times he
asked Gu Fei to quiz him. One reason was that the closer they got to exam day, the more he
needed to continue refreshing his memory of the knowledge. While the other reason was
that secretly, he still didn’t want to give up.
He would not say anything out loud, but he thought this method of mutual benefit was
good. And Gu Fei would not notice.
Just like that, the winter break passed by in measured rhythm and flowed into the early
start of a new semester. Compared to the tragic fate of Pan Zhi and his peers, who had to
start classes only four days into the New Year, Fourth High at least gave its students the
week off.
“Students! It’s February! If you don’t work hard in February, if you don’t work hard in
March, if you don’t work hard in April, if you don’t……” Lao-Xu ranted from his spot at the
lectern. He probably didn’t realize there would be so many months to say before he started
talking, but after listing all of them, he was starting to stumble over his words. He cleared
his throat a couple times before he continued. “Work hard in May, then only sadness awaits
you in June! From this moment on, you will not have any breaks, and you must not loosen
your grip……” [4]
The day after next was Valentine’s Day. Jiang Cheng was reminded of it with a start only
when Wang Xu came in the morning to ask him what he should give to Yi Jing for
Valentine’s Day.
It was true that Jiang Cheng had practically wrung his brain dry from all the studying. There
was no time to make something for Gu Fei, still he wanted to give Gu Fei something, but
what?
“Stop thinking about Valentine’s Day!” Lao-Xu raised his voice. “Don’t think that I don’t
know what all of you are thinking!”
Jiang Cheng’s heart jumped, and arching his brows, he gave Lao-Xu a look out of reflex.
Gu Fei started laughing beside him, “Was Lao-Xu right about you?”
Jiang Cheng smiled, and didn’t say anything.
“We can just set off a couple of fireworks while we’re out for a walk.” Gu Fei said quietly.
“It’s extreme times, stop mulling over it.”
“There’s still fireworks? I thought Er-Miao went through all of it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Where’s your brain?” Gu Fei said. “You can buy it everywhere these days, I bought some.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng laughed, then sighed. “Alright then, what’s one year in the grand scheme
of things, we’ll celebrate it properly next year.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Next month is the first prep exam,” Lao-Xu was still rambling on sincerely in front of the
classroom. “You must muster up the energy, and let me see your real capabilities!”
There was not the usual background buzzing of conversations in the classroom.
Probably everyone had played a little too hard during the break, and most people were
slumped over their desks, catching up on snooze.
Ah, the first prep exam is next month……
“Look at this! It’s the countdown! Do you see this!” Lao-Xu continued to raise his voice as he
pointed at the countdown paper plastered at the top of the blackboard. “Come on people!”
Jiang Cheng leaned back in his chair. There were 114 days until the university entrance
exams.
He knew that there wasn’t much time, but three months sounded much longer than 114
days. Upon suddenly seeing these three meagre digits, he chest couldn’t help but tighten.
114 days.
The time he had left to stick by Gu Fei’s side in every waking moment was only 114 days
plus another…… His mind was suddenly reeling a little, he wasn’t even able to do such a
simple calculation.
But no matter what the answer was, it all seemed insufficient next to ∞.
Footnotes
[1]
Explaining a pun makes it even less funny but here we go:
马尾男子 = ma wei nan zi = ponytail guy (correct, normal)
马尾蓝纸 = ma wei lan zhi (a Jiang Cheng special) = ponytail blue paper
(literal) = ponytail boi (localization)
马尾篮子 = ma wei lan zi (Gu Fei said it wrong) = ponytail basket (literal) =
ponytail boy (localization) ⤴
[2] 金六福: a baijiu, a 500ml bottle of 52% alcohol costs around 118 RMB, and that’s the four-
star grade. ⤴
[3] No need to read too much into their toasts to Gu Miao, it’s not targeted, the words are
very typical of what one would say to a child. Yes, even “quickly grow up”, there’s no hidden
meaning lol ⤴
[4] A reference to a line in a poem, 少壮不努力，老大徒伤悲, or if you don’t
work hard while you are young and strong, you will be left with only sadness and regret
when you are old ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5740
TL word count: 4196
TL time: ??????
Edit time: 0:39:41
Curse words: 1x fuck, 1x shit
TL’s Notes:
The dumpling tradition is more of a northern China thing, when I get time at some point I’ll
write a little thing about the Steel Works and how it and its neighbourhood is so typical of a
small post-industrial city in the North-East OTL
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3

SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday

– CHECK IT!
First posted: August 20, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 98
There will always be a way.
Jiang Cheng never really felt one way or another about Valentine’s Day, but this year when
he had an opportunity to feel some kind of way, he ended up not having any time for it.
Though, he also did not place very much importance on such rituals. He was too busy
studying, working through questions and memorizing texts. His vision was filled with study
materials from various subjects, but in his peripheral vision, there was his boyfriend sitting
on the bed playing with his phone.
Valentine’s Day was a few minutes away.
It was snowing outside, he could hear the sharp screeches of the northerly wind as it
scraped past his window. Even the sound of it made him feel cold.
And yet, it was quiet in the room. There was heating, a midnight snack, the sound of him
quietly reciting the text to himself, and the scratching of pencil against paper. There was
also Gu Fei, who gave him a sense of peace just from a single look at him.
Compared to gifts and rituals, this kind of down-to-earth scene was what he really wanted.
Exam on my left shoulder, love on my right.
Oh yo yo~
Hello everyone and welcome to the first season of contestant Jiang Cheng’s mental livestream.
Recently, contestant Jiang Cheng had put all of his energy into the warming-up portion of the
university entrance exams tournament.
Instructor X, based on your experience, what do you think of his current state?
This contestant possesses very strong individual skills as well as strong self-control, and
exhibits emotional stability throughout the competition. To many contestants, this
competition is a once in a lifetime event. If he can give it his all, I believe he shall achieve a
very good score.
Do you think he has given it his all?
Clearly he has not, there is something else in his peripheral vision…… Hey, isn’t that the
champion from the livestream of the Steel Works Brain-dead Tournament?
His phone made a sound from its place at the corner of his desk. Jiang Cheng heard it, but it
felt as though he hadn’t. The phone immediately went off again.
For a total of two times.
That was Jiang Cheng’s only analysis of the sound when he was in study mode.
And as to why his phone had gone off: if it was a text message or WeChat or a news
notification, what it would be about, whether he should take a look……
All of these thoughts that would naturally follow did not appear in his head.
However, after the second notification, Gu Fei clicked his tongue audibly.
Jiang Cheng immediately came back to reality.
“Hm?” He looked at Gu Fei.
“Who is the other one from?” Gu Fei said.
“The other one?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand what he meant. He picked up his phone
and saw that there were two messages.
One of them was from Pan Zhi:
– Happy Valentine’s Day! I’m the first one for sure, automatic sending is exactly on time, no
doubt it will trump any lovey dovey person who needs time to draft a romantic prose!
The second one was from Gu Fei:
– Look at me.
Jiang Cheng blinked, then looked up toward Gu Fei.
“Whether or not it’s Valentine’s Day, I’m always here.” Gu Fei said. “Happy Valentine’s Day,
boyfriend.”
“Happy Valentine’s Day,” Jiang Cheng grinned. “Boyfriend.”
“Who sent the other one?” Gu Fei pointed at the phone. “Did it arrive before mine?”
“Ah, yes,” Only then did Jiang Cheng realize, and started cracking up as he stuck the phone
in front of Gu Fei. “Pan Zhi.”
“Fucking,” Gu Fei took one look and laughed. He grabbed Jiang Cheng’s phone and sent a
voice message back to Pan Zhi. “Do you have way too much time on your hands huh, Pan
Zhi?”
“I can’t believe you found out already,” Pan Zhi’s voice message quickly came back. “Happy
Valentine’s Day, good night! You two hurry up and go play.”
“He set a timed message?” Gu Fei clicked his tongue several times consecutively. “This guy
is maddening.”
“He’s just bored.” Jiang Cheng laughed as he ripped a piece of air-dried beef. It was the bag
they’d bought from the supermarket, that just in the last couple of days had already
bottomed out. He had to rip out a tiny piece every time and nibble on it like a sissy, he
couldn’t bear to take large bites. “You don’t know the amount of crap this guy has in his
phone, it’s at most three months before he has to factory reset, and it takes maybe three
resets before he has to change the phone.”
“Can you take it all in one bite please?” Gu Fei said, looking at him. “We have one more bag,
do you have to do that?”
“There’s another bag?” Jiang Cheng was confused. “I thought we only got one that day?”
“We bought two,” Gu Fei sighed. “I guess I overestimated your power huh, even you
experience memory loss when you study.”
Jiang Cheng stuffed the piece of jerky into his mouth, “Ayyy——feels so good!
Satisfying! Why didn’t you say so earlier! I’ve been nibbling at it like melon seeds for the
whole evening, making each piece last eighty bites.”
“I just realized that you’ve been saving it,” Gu Fei stood up, took the bag to look inside, and
pushed it back into Jiang Cheng’s hand. “Bring it with you to eat on the way, let’s go.”
“Go where?” Jiang Cheng looked out the window, but couldn’t tell how heavy the snow was.
“To set off fireworks,” Gu Fei walked to the window and took a look. “There’s less snow
now, wanna go? I just thought if we do it during the day, there’d be too many people
everywhere, but there’s even more people in the evening.”
“Let’s go, let’s go for a walk, let’s go play.” Jiang Cheng stood up, his eyes still glued to the
textbook, and after reading the last passage, finally stretched. “An important mark of
showcasing the traditional Chinese culture is the traditional architecture, also known as a
solidified form of art, while the invention of the written word is the symbol of humans
entering into an era of civilization……
The difference is, han text is an important marker of Chinese culture, and along with
historical texts and classical records, are evidence of the Chinese culture’s long historic
origin……”
They both bundled themselves up tightly before venturing outside. They were probably the
only two people in the Steel Works neighbourhood who would brave the old north wind
and snow to go out and set off fireworks in the middle of the night.
Luckily, Gu Fei had a magical artifact.
Jiang Cheng felt a great happiness wash over him as he climbed into the cornstarch bun
amid the wind and snow, “Start driving, old deary.”
“We’re off,” Gu Fei closed the car door and started the engine. “Sit tight, old deary.” [1]
“Hurry it up!” Jiang Cheng smacked Gu Fei’s back.
The little mantou set off into the night.
There was not a single hair of a person to be found on the streets. The only thing out here
was the snowflakes dancing in the light of the streetlamps. Jiang Cheng enjoyed looking at
the flurry; through them, he could see the paths of the wind.
Wind is a very special thing, with no shape, colour, or smell.
And yet you could see it, in the fallen leaves, in the drifting snow, in the swirls of firecracker
remnants on the ground. It had the same smell as the yellowing grass, but at the same time
it smelled white and cool, and also like the red smoke of gunpowder……
Even though there was no one else on the streets, Gu Fei still drove them all the way to the
riverside. They had not been here since their fight last time.
The river was dry, only a large swathe of white covered the bank all the way to the middle
of the river.
“If we came during the day, there would definitely be other people here.” Gu Fei got out of
the car. “This river is the most romantic place in the whole Steel Works neighbourhood, it
just barely has the forced requisite of the water, grass, and trees.”
“And the two of us are also forcing the romantic activity.” Jiang Cheng pulled his scarf tight
and made his way down to the dried river with Gu Fei.
The ground near the river was covered in soil and rocks, and with the blanket of snow on
top, every step felt like their feet would slip out from under them and they’d slide all the
way to the bottom.
Gu Fei reached his hand back. Jiang Cheng took it and said, “Are you afraid that I’ll lose my
balance and bowl you right into the river.”
“No, you were on the school basketball team at some point after all.” Gu Fei looked back at
him. “I just wanted to hold your hand, it’s pretty warm actually……”
Gu Fei didn’t get to finish his words when he stepped on something and
suddenly lurched forward.
Jiang Cheng immediately clutched Gu Fei’s hand tight, then felt a strong forward tug. He
tried leaning back to counteract this force, but was not successful.
His feet couldn’t find purchase on the uneven ground, and he lasted less than half a second
before he got dragged down, landing on his butt, his legs immediately taking out the
already unbalanced Gu Fei.
Gu Fei fell on him, and the two of them crumpled into a ball as they slid, rolling and
tumbling all the way down the slope to the edge of the river.
“Fuck!” Jiang Cheng yelled. He felt like someone had taken a stick and gave his entire
backside a beating.
“Did I land on your balls?” Gu Fei seemed to be doing okay, since Gu Fei had Jiang Cheng as
a cushion.
“Would you still be hearing from me right now if you did?” Jiang Cheng leaned against the
ground, his butt still needed some time to recover. “What a special Valentine’s Day this is,
huh boyfriend……”
Gu Fei reached out and pinched his leg, cutting off the second half of his sentence. It was
right at that moment when he sensed that along the river’s edge, beside them, in his
peripheral vision, there was another person.
Jiang Cheng whipped his head around and froze in place.
“Fuck.” Gu Fei said in a low voice. He stood up and reached out a hand in front of Jiang
Cheng.
Jiang Cheng grabbed his hand and helped himself up. Then the two of them turned around
together to stand face to face with the person who was standing not 10 meters away from
them.
The atmosphere was more than a little bizarre.
It was indeed strange for someone else to be here at this time, in this place. But if they
could think of coming for a date at this hour at “the most romantic place in the whole Steel
Works neighbourhood”, naturally, so could other people.
It wouldn’t be a big deal if they ran into another person, since not everyone recognized him
and Gu Fei, and not everyone had such fantastical imaginations as the divine beings in the
Fourth High forum…… Not to mention, ever since he came out to Shen Yiqing that day, Jiang
Cheng felt as if he had put down a bag of cement he’d been carrying, and that nothing really
bothered him anymore.
But. This was only one person.
Moreover, this was a person who definitely knew them, and knew them rather well too.
From the perspective of studying, Jiang Cheng didn’t want people around him to know
about this, for fear of letting it affect him before the exam.
Therefore…… It was finally time to silence Wang Xu once and for all.
He was rather surprised that the first one to go wasn’t Zhou Jing, but Wang Xu.
“What……” Gu Fei was the first one to speak up. “Are you doing here?”
“Valentine’s Day.” Wang Xu answered.
Against the chilly wind, Wang Xu’s voice sounded especially desolate and……
sad.
It was in that instant that Jiang Cheng temporarily set aside the matter of getting rid of
Wang Xu. He was shaken by Wang Xu’s spirit, the spirit of a singleton who just had to come
out to the river in the middle of the night on Valentine’s Day, all so he could stand in the
freezing air and torture himself.
What kind of illness is this?
“By yourself?” Gu Fei was probably just as shocked as Jiang Cheng. “Or are you waiting for
someone?”
“I thought I was waiting for someone,” Wang Xu’s voice was full of sorrow.
“But it turns out I’m spending it by myself.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet. He only just noticed on the snow-covered ground by Wang Xu’s feet,
the fireworks that had been meticulously arranged into the shape of two hearts.
Now that made sense.
Wang Xu had painstakingly prepared a romantic setting to profess his love, but the leading
lady Yi Jing never showed up.
“…… Oh.” Even Gu Fei, with his high emotional intelligence, couldn’t find anything to say in
response to the scenario at hand.
The scene once again plunged into silence.
Jiang Cheng could hear the sound of snow falling on the ground beside him.
“You two……” Wang Xu stood quietly in the wind for a while, then suddenly looked up and
stared at them. “What’s the deal with you two…… Oh, fuck?
Don’t tell me you’re…… don’t tell me……”
According to the way TV dramas usually go, the two of them should be pulling out their
guns from their pockets, aiming it at Wang Xu’s head and “bang bang”, before watching him
slowly collapse backward into the fireworks on the ground.
“For Valentine’s Day.” Jiang Cheng looked back at him. At this hour, in this kind of place,
facing a Wang Xu who couldn’t be killed off, he no longer had anything else to hide. “You got
a problem with that?”
Wang Xu was probably even more flustered than the two of them were just now.
He opened his mouth, but didn’t make a sound.
“You, me, and him.” Gu Fei said in a gruff voice. “If a fourth person finds out about this, I’ll
make certain of your death.”
It might have been the old northerly wind that just blew past, but Wang Xu shuddered
cooperatively, “Oh I won’t tell I didn’t…… so to me this, guy on……
guy, I don’t…… don’t have a problem, nope no problem.”
“Alright then,” Gu Fei nodded. “You can go home now.”
“Why…… why do I have to go home.” Wang Xu asked.
“Because we’re going to set off fireworks here.” Gu Fei glanced at him, turned and walked
back a couple of steps, and brought over the bag they had dropped during their earlier
tumble.
“Mother……fucker……” Wang Xu leaned in and took a look. “I really fucking gotta hand it to
you two.”
Neither Gu Fei nor Jiang Cheng spoke, as they looked back at him together.
Wang Xu’s brows were knitted as he stared at the fireworks in the bag, and didn’t speak for
a long time.
The moon wasn’t especially bright, and there were no street lamps near the river, but
because of their close proximity, Jiang Cheng still saw the glint of tears in Wang Xu’s eyes.
“Wang Xu?” He was a little taken aback.
“Fuck me!” Wang Xu suddenly yelled out grievously. “Fuck me! Even two guys are able to
fucking get together! Why is it so fucking hard for me to just be with someone!”
“You……” Gu Fei leaned back a little at his outburst. “Yi Jing’s not coming?
Did she say anything about it?”
“Just that she’s not in the mood, and that she has to study, so can’t come.” Wang Xu said in a
nasally voice.
“That’s normal though, an overachiever like Yi Jing, she’s probably busy with studying
about this time. We have just over 100 days left.” Gu Fei said.
“What about overachievers? Isn’t Jiang Cheng also an overachiever? And several levels
above her too. When Jiang Cheng studies he doesn’t even move an inch, like he’s been
frozen or something.” Wang Xu was not convinced. “But isn’t Jiang Cheng in a relationship?!
And with a guy too!”
“Yell,” Gu Fei looked at him. “Go ahead, yell a little louder. Or maybe I should find you a
megaphone so you can go yell it out on the streets too?”
Wang Xu bit his lips, squatted down, and stopped moving.
They once again were stuck in a stalemate. Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei couldn’t very well leave,
nor could they bear to arrange another set of fireworks on the ground right next to Wang
Xu’s, lest it triggered him.
And so the three of them froze in the northerly wind, staring into the cold together.
“Were you guys gonna arrange it into a heart?” Wang Xu finally spoke up after a long time.
“No,” Gu Fei said. “We just came for the fireworks, wasn’t gonna arrange it.”
“Oh, why don’t I……” Wang Xu rubbed his nose, and pointed at the fireworks he had
arranged on the ground. “Give these to you two. It’ll be my blessing.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“I’ve been here since 11:30,” Still in a crouch, Wang Xu shifted himself over to the
fireworks. “I bought some fuse, and strung them all together, you only have to light it once
to set the whole bunch of them off crackly crack.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei answered.
“Let’s string up the ones you brought too,” Wang Xu wiped his eyes. “The more the
merrier.”
Gu Fei shot Jiang Cheng a glance.
Jiang Cheng nodded.
Oh well, string them up then. He couldn’t relate to Wang Xu’s feelings, but this sudden onset
of tears left him even more helpless than last time after the basketball game.
After all, it was Valentine’s Day, and this was certainly a special way to spend it.
The three of them crouched on the ground and strung up the fireworks they brought to the
other fuse.
After that was done, Gu Fei stood up and clapped his hands together, “So, Jiuri, thank you.”
“No need to be so courteous with me.” Wang Xu sniffed. “Let’s light it!”
“Wait,” Gu Fei looked at him. “You’re gonna watch?”
“I…… have to step away?” Wang Xu was shocked. “You guys don’t want an MC, or witness,
or host or something?”
“We just came to set off fireworks,” Gu Fei’s face was a rapidly shifting kaleidoscope of
expressions. “Not to get married.”
“Oh,” Wang Xu looked at the two of them. “Then I’ll just watch.”
“What Gu Fei meant was, he’s afraid that you’ll get triggered.” Jiang Cheng piped up.
“I won’t,” Wang Xu sighed, his face full of profound sincerity. “I’m already numb.”
“Then, watch I guess.” Gu Fei rubbed his hands together and pulled out a lighter.
He was probably too cold to continue wrestling with Wang Xu anymore.
Jiang Cheng went to stand beside Gu Fei, watching as he bent down and lit the fuse.
After the initial flash of a spark, the first beam of blue light shot out of one of the cylinders,
followed by a second one.
Gu Fei reached over and grabbed Jiang Cheng’s hand. Jiang Cheng squeezed back.
The fireworks were of different colours. Wang Xu’s were all gold, while the ones they’d
brought were multicoloured. Together it looked especially dazzling.
Jiang Cheng squinted his eyes against the smoke that had drifted over as he looked at the
brilliant light show in front of them.
“I wish a lasting happiness for you both.” Wang Xu suddenly said amidst his sobs.
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng said.
This Valentine’s Day was indeed different. Even if they redo it more formally next year, it
wouldn’t leave as deep of an impression as today.
Who could’ve foreseen a crying MC coupled with a sincere blessing.
After the fireworks ended, Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng got ready to go back, but the MC stood
there somberly with his head down, and didn’t move.
“You’re not going?” Gu Fei asked.
“I…… am.” Wang Xu sighed, and started walking in front of them.
“How did you get here?” Gu Fei asked.
“I biked,” Wang Xu said. “But my bike is up ahead, I walked all the way here while looking
for a spot.”
“Want a ride over there?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“No, I want to have some quiet time.” Wang Xu said. “You guys go…… Oh and I won’t say
anything about you two, you can trust me, I’m a man of my word.”
They sat in the little bun and watched as Wang Xu disappeared into the drifting snow
before Gu Fei started the car, “How is this for a Valentine’s Day?”
“Awesome.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I’m also beyond impressed, that Wang Xu would come here to set off fireworks too.” Gu Fei
looked up at Jiang Cheng. “Was it something you taught him? I heard him asking you the
other day what kind of gift to give for Valentine’s Day.”
“How can I possibly think of anything creative right now with my brain like this,” Jiang
Cheng said. “I told him to give her a fountain pen.”
“Ayy,” Gu Fei sighed. “Looks like Wang Xu’s gonna be down for a good while.
At least his exam results will probably be the same regardless of his emotional state.”
“I never knew Wang Xu was so serious about it,” Jiang Cheng leaned against his seat and
patted his dirtied pants. “Though with Yi Jing…… there’s probably no chance huh.”
“Mhm, Yi Jing’s family gets by pretty well,” Gu Fei said. “She’s definitely not going to stay
here. While Wang Xu will probably take over running his family’s meat pie shop……”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer as he looked at the back of Gu Fei’s head.
“What I mean is,” Gu Fei seemed to also realize what he said, and turned around to look at
Jiang Cheng. “They’re different from us.”
“What’s the difference.” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue extra loudly, then scoffed just as
loud.
“Well for one thing,” Gu Fei said. “You like me, and I like you.”
“What a wordsmith.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I really haven’t been dwelling on it very much
lately. I just think…… Gu Fei.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered.
“Please keep your eyes forward,” Jiang Cheng said. “We might have fallen over while
walking just now, but this here is a car.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei chuckled as he turned to face the front.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng leaned his head back and said slowly. “I just think, there’s nothing
really to keep dwelling over. All we can do is continue on, keep going forward, and forward.
Some things can’t be planned for ahead of time, so I won’t worry about it, there’ll always be
a way.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“There will always be a way.” Jiang Cheng repeated, then closed his eyes. “Even if there
really really is no other way forward, even if we have to give up, it’ll have to be after we
gave it everything we got…… No. No no no no no, non non non non, that won’t happen,
there will always be a way.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled as he reached his hand back and stroked Jiang Cheng’s face.
Jiang Cheng grabbed Gu Fei’s hand, and gently bit the pad of his ring finger.
Footnotes
[1] Nothing in English quite captures the absolute HEART of 老伴儿, which literally means old
companion. It’s something that elderly couples use to refer to each other, whether directly
or indirectly, and it’s honestly the cutest thing ever.
⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5738
TL word count: 3942
TL time: 6:11:42
Edit time: 1:11:53

Curse words: 10x fucks

TL’s Notes:
RIP Wang Xu :’)
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: September 4, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 99
Therein lies the difference.
As soon as Valentine’s Day was over, the last trace of lightheartedness in the air
disappeared along with it.
Without subjects that circled around which two were a pair or which pair would go out and
celebrate the day together, even the conversations felt a lot more hollow.
The atmosphere in the classrooms slowly sank down. Overachievers were studying; the
middle of the range students who wanted to seize this one last opportunity were gritting
their teeth and listening to lectures; the ones who wished to give up but couldn’t quite
resign themselves to it would listen at times and sleep at other times; while a few of the
ones who had given up entirely would not even come to class.
Jiang Cheng would see Lao-Xu lingering around and outside the classroom all day long. His
face appeared at the front door, the backdoor, the windows; every time he looked out, eight
out of ten times there was Lao-Xu’s face
People talk about the overachievers losing weight, but Jiang Cheng thought that even Lao-
Xu had lost a lot of weight—his face was looking very thin.
“Did Lao-Xu get a face-slimming shot,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “He looks like he’s lost so
much weight.”
“From all the worrying of course,” Gu Fei glanced toward the front door. “He’s been busy
doing home visits and chasing down slacking students to have a chat with them, soon it’ll
be the overachievers’ turn.”
“There’s nothing to chat about with me,” Jiang Cheng said. “Hardly anyone in this whole city
is grinding as hard as I am.”
“He’s under greater pressure than you right now,” Gu Fei smiled. “He’s just about going to
follow you into the exam himself.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at the half of Lao-Xu’s face showing by the front door.
Lao-Xu cocked his head and gave him a nod, his face suddenly overtaken with a feverish
enthusiasm. Jiang Cheng immediately nodded back, afraid that if he responded too late that
Lao-Xu would shoot his hands up and start cheering.
About one week before the first practice exam at Fourth High, Pan Zhi sent him the
questions from their first practice exam at the Associated High. In order to achieve the
greatest accuracy, and prevent Jiang Cheng from accidentally seeing
the questions, this time Pan Zhi sent it to Gu Fei’s phone.
The Associated High had created their own questions for the first practice exam.
Even though Jiang Cheng figured he was putting in enough effort at studying, he still
wanted the comparison.
“I’ll go and print it out then?” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I’ll start on them in the next couple of days.
“Will it be too much pressure to do them all in a row?” Gu Fei asked.
“Besides…… if your two scores are different, will it affect your mindset?”
“Are you afraid that if my scores for the Associated High tests are lower than the ones from
Fourth High tests, that it’ll affect my mindset?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei glanced at his phone. “I took a look at the geography one, it looks pretty
hard.”
“It’s alright,” Jiang Cheng stretched. “We’re already here, which means it’s time to face the
difference head on. How can I keep charging on if I don’t know how much further I have to
go.”
“Aren’t you already charging hard enough?” Gu Fei turned to face him.
“My whole life, my biggest strength has been to work hard.” Jiang Cheng patted Gu Fei’s
shoulders. “Cheng-ge will show you what charging looks like.”
Gu Fei gave him a smile, and didn’t reply.
To be honest, perhaps it was because he grew up in this kind of environment, but Gu Fei
had never met anyone like Jiang Cheng before. And it wasn’t just the overachiever aspect.
It was his entire being. It was the courage to charge forward, to look straight ahead and
face whatever came at him, and the powerful air about him when he let it all go and threw
himself into a task.
Like the hottest summer sun, the kind of air that ignited everything.
Gu Fei had never seen someone like this before, nor had he ever thought that he would one
day meet someone like this. Even more so, he hadn’t expected for someone like this to leave
behind such a deep imprint on his life.
Jiang Cheng didn’t leave school after class ended. These days, teachers would come into the
classroom during the evening self-study periods to go through questions. Even though
Jiang Cheng never really asked any questions himself, he would still sit there until the end
of the evening self-study sessions every single day.
He would go from the end of last class to the end of the last self-study session, then go back
and continue studying until around 2 a.m.
Gu Fei went to print out the practice exam after school. When he passed by the drugstore,
he went in to buy a few boxes of ginseng tea. In the last few days, among the more
hardworking students in the class, there were quite a few who fell sick. Some had fevers,
while others caught colds. Jiang Cheng might have a good constitution, but his state of
constant battle had extended from last semester until now—he was too tightly wound.
“Ah Mr. Xu, I’d still recommend that you rest more, your health is important.”
Gu Fei heard this as soon as he entered the store. He turned and saw Lao-Xu, standing over
by the Chinese medicine counter.
“Well I’m teaching the senior year right now, there’s just a few more months left.
I can relax after they finish their exams.” Lao-Xu said.
“Don’t mind my nagging, but in all of Fourth High, even with you worrying like this, there’s
not gonna be that many who make it.” The drugstore owner said as he prepared the herbs
for Lao-Xu. “Just look at my son, look at that score he brought home last year, and he didn’t
even want to take it again this year.”
“Ayy, you can’t force it with kids.” Lao-Xu smiled. “But in my class this year I have a good
seedling who’s definitely going to make it into one of the top universities. He’ll place first in
the city for sure, and maybe even the province.”
“Mr. Xu, I never knew you were so good at talking big.” The owner handed the packed herbs
to Lao-Xu.
“No way am I talking big,” Lao-Xu waved his hand. “You just wait and see.”
“If it’s true, then would he be the first in Fourth High history to make it into a top school?”
The owner asked.
“Absolutely!” Lao-Xu lifted his chin with pride and walked toward the door with his
medicine.
Gu Fei hesitated for a second, then walked after Lao-Xu and called out, “Xu-zong.”
“Yeah,” Lao-Xu answered first before turning around. “Gu Fei? What are you doing here……
You’re sick?”
“Not sick, I’m here to buy some Shi Quan Da Bu.” Gu Fei looked at the medicine in Lao-Xu’s
hands. “Is that yours?” [1]
“Ah, I’m fine,” Lao-Xu smiled. “There’s always something or another when you’re getting
old.”
“You’ve only just passed fifty, you’re calling that old?” Gu Fei said.
“It’s just a little insomnia,” Lao-Xu sighed. “It’s my nerves, a little stress and I can’t fall
asleep, so I’m getting some herbs to do a little tune-up.”
“If they can make it they’ll make it, and the ones who can’t, even if you lose sleep over it
they still won’t be able to get in.” Gu Fei said. “Why are you troubling yourself so much over
it.”
“It’s not like I want to worry,” Lao-Xu looked at him. “Take you for
example…… Ayyy you kids, you never understand our pains. I’d give anything to take the
exams for you, but every one of you just doesn’t take your future seriously at all.”
“You should hurry home,” Gu Fei turned to go into the drug store. “Go take your medicine.”
“Ah Gu Fei,” Lao-Xu called out to him. “Are you still studying with Jiang Cheng these days?”
“…… Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“How’s he doing right now? I was planning to talk to him after his first practice exam scores
are out, otherwise I’m afraid of putting too much pressure on him.”
Lao-Xu said.
“He’s been working pretty hard this whole time, you don’t have to worry.” Gu Fei said.
“You…… try to relax okay, you’ve been looking like you got a face-slimming shot lately.”
“Face-slimming shot?” Lao-Xu blinked. “What’s that?”
“You get a shot on your face, and then your face will poof and become a whole chunk
smaller.” Gu Fei said.
“That powerful huh?” Lao-Xu chuckled. “Then I should tell teacher Lu to go get a jab, he’s
been putting on weight recently.”
“You should go home and eat.” Gu Fei said as he walked into the store.
“A face-slimming shot? I can’t believe such an incredible thing exists.” Lao-Xu laughed as he
walked away.
After buying the Shi Quan Da Bu pills, Gu Fei went to print out the practice exams before
having them bound, then went to order some meat pies for take-out from Wang Xu’s place.
“You gotta hurry on your bike,” Wang Xu said. “Otherwise the outside will get soggy, and it
won’t taste as good.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
Ever since that night before Valentine’s Day, Wang Xu had suddenly become a lot more
mature, steadfast, and reticent, as if he’d taken some fast-growing pig hormones. Even
when he talked, it was without the flagrant boasting tone he used to speak with.
Gu Fei couldn’t tell if that counted as growth or depression.
“You want to take some lamb soup too?” Wang Xu asked. “I’ll get you guys a thermos.”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
Wang Xu put the soup in the container and handed it to him.
“Are you……” Gu Fei paused. “Going to the self-study period?”
“Da-Fei,” Wang Xu looked at him. “Don’t you think that’s a very cruel question to ask me?”
“…… Oh.” Gu Fei looked back at him, feeling like Wang Xu could come up with a broken-
hearted poem in the next second, so he quickly grabbed the food.
“See you later.”
Behind him, Wang Xu let out a sigh.
When Gu Fei arrived in the classroom, it wasn’t yet time for the evening self-study. There
were only a handful of people sitting in their seats, poring over books.
Jiang Cheng was buried behind a giant pile of study materials taller than his head, and he
didn’t even notice when Gu Fei walked up to the desk.
Gu Fei opened the bag of meat pies and placed it on his own side of the desk.
A few seconds later, he saw the furiously scribbling pen pause for a moment, before Jiang
Cheng quickly whipped his head around.
“Got a pretty good nose there.” Gu Fei chuckled and said quietly.
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng gulped and grabbed a meat pie. “I was so hungry my hands were getting
icy.”
“Did the crust get soggy?” Gu Fei sat down.
“Nope, it’s delicious.” Jiang Cheng ate half the meat pie in two bites. “You printed out the
tests?”
“Got everything,” Gu Fei waved the thick file folder in his hand. “Which one do
you want to do first?”
“I’ll do it according to the standard order,” Jiang Cheng said as he munched.
“What’s in the thermos?”
“Lamb soup.” Gu Fei said.
“Quick,” Jiang Cheng’s eyes positively sparkled. “Gimme a bowl.”
Gu Fei poured some out into the thermos lid for him. Jiang Cheng’s hands were almost
shaking as he accepted the bowl. Gu Fei found it amusing, “Are you being serious?”
“The meat pies and soup from Wang Xu’s place are the most delicious things on this earth.”
Jiang Cheng said.
At this, Yi Jing, who had been sitting with her head down in the front row memorizing
passages, turned and looked back.
Gu Fei met her gaze, and she gave a little smile.
“The shit?” Jiang Cheng noticed Yi Jing’s movement, and said quietly as he continued to chip
away at the meat pies. “Did the spineless Wang Jiuri tell her??”
“I don’t think so, she probably just caught the food smell.” Gu Fei picked up the meat pies
and waved it at Yi Jing, who shook her head and turned back to continue studying. “Wang
Xu is pretty reliable when it comes to these things. If this was war time, he’s gotta be one of
those who gives up only after a whole week of beatings.”
“Ones like him who look like they don’t know anything useful would be dead within a week
from the beatings.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Is he still like that? All heartbroken?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei picked up a meat pie and ate it slowly. “I don’t even know how to talk to him
now.”
“He should take some lessons from Pan Zhi.” Jiang Cheng glanced in Yi Jing’s direction.
“Look at our Master Pan, year after year he dumps and gets dumped so often it’s as normal
as eating and drinking to him. If he doesn’t tell you, you can’t even tell when he’s dating and
when he’s broken up again. That scum.”
“Sooner or later someone will come along to handle him.” Gu Fei laughed and said.
“I’m just waiting for that day,” Jiang Cheng said. “If one day he gets in the dumps from a
breakup, I will be on the side laughing for 180 days straight.”
Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing as he ate.
Jiang Cheng used his evening hours to do the first practice exams from the Associated High.
He would return one period earlier from evening self-study every day, and Gu Fei would
invigilate for him.
“We will be handing out the papers now, everyone please remain quiet, and do not talk to
one another.” Gu Fei said as he pulled out the last of the English exams from the file folder.
“You have 120 minutes to complete the test. Do not be nervous, read the questions
carefully, organize your time well……”
He placed the papers in front of Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng took the papers and first wrote down his name, then began to quickly leaf
through the pages.
Gu Fei sat down beside him and started the timer on his phone.
That was the last of the Associated High exam set. He had already scanned and sent the
completed ones back to Pan Zhi, who would print it out and have the teachers there mark it
for him.
At times, Gu Fei could feel the pressure Jiang Cheng had on him. Simply completing a set of
practice exams from the Associated High already involved so many people. Jiang Cheng’s
old head teacher Lao-Yuan even called him a few times about it.
The expectations of these people were all pressure added on his back.
Although, Jiang Cheng seemed okay. His confidence in his own academic abilities was able
to withstand this pressure.
Damn impressive, boyfriend.
Gu Fei held up his phone and took a picture of Jiang Cheng’s hardworking back.
The questions from Associated High’s first practice exam were rather difficult; Jiang Cheng
felt a little apprehensive after he finished. He was relatively calm however, because no
matter how he did on these questions, it would at least tell him the gap he had to overcome.
As long as the university entrance exams didn’t begin tomorrow, then he still had time.
One day before Fourth High’s first practice exams were due to start, Pan Zhi sent Gu Fei the
results of each subject and the total score.
“Wanna look at it after you finish these ones?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Pan Zhi said it was pretty great.” Gu Fei continued.
“He’d say that as long as I scored higher than him,” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Mostly I just wanted to see how far behind I am after spending a year here. I can only catch
up if I have an idea of the difference.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei turned to Jiang Cheng from his position slumped over the desk, then pulled
out two small yet different bottles from his desk drawer. “Come on, chug these.”
“Why does it feel like I’m taking these several times a day,” Jiang Cheng accepted them and
gulped it down. Gu Fei had been buying him boxes of supplements meant to nourish the
brain, benefit the immune system, and boost energy, and making him drink them every day.
“Didn’t I take it just this morning?”
“These are twice a day, okay.” Gu Fei said. “Looks like you really do need it, your brain is
only good for studying these days, can’t even fit another thread in there.”
Jiang Cheng laughed for a while at the little bottles in his hand, “Can you fit a lot of threads
in your brain?”
“Nope,” Gu Fei sighed. “My brain is all filled up with things about you now. The other day
Er-Miao was asking me what’s 7 times 9, and I had to start reciting all the way from 4 times
9 to land at the correct answer.”
Jiang Cheng put away his smile, reached out a hand discreetly, and touched Gu Fei’s leg,
“You’ve been working hard.”
The arrival of the first practice exams finally instilled an air of tension at Fourth High. The
school didn’t simply pull the desks apart like they did for regular tests, but instead mixed
the different classes together.
Jiang Cheng was surrounded on both sides by people he didn’t recognize. When he looked
to the right, he couldn’t see Gu Fei’s familiar profile, nor the way he rolled dice on the
answers. He was not used to this.
On the other hand, these practice exams used the standard tests used across the city, and
with the Associated High’s tests he wrote before, Jiang Cheng felt that these were relatively
easier.
Therein lies the difference.
That was the phrase echoing around Jiang Cheng’s mind as he worked through each
problem.
There were people leaving early for every subject—they had already given up and only
came to show their face and confirm that they really couldn’t answer
the questions.
Jiang Cheng had sufficient time remaining after he finished, but he still stayed in his seat
and checked back and forth until the last second. There was no need to show off this time.
He was also delighted to see that in the classroom next door, Gu Fei did not hand in his test
early either, nor did he roll the dice on the questions.
“Really?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Really.” Gu Fei said. “Have to give my boyfriend some credit, don’t I? Since I kept you
company for so long while you studied, it would be embarrassing, wouldn’t it, if I still have
to roll the dice during the test?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, only narrowed his eyes.
“Am I wrong?” Gu Fei smiled. “The way you’re on my back day in and day out, making me
quiz you.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue, but still didn’t say anything.
“Did you think you were being discreet?” Gu Fei asked.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to say. Judging by Gu Fei’s reaction, he seemed to
have noticed a long time ago, but didn’t seem to feel displeased about what he did either.
Though it didn’t mean that he would admit it so easily.
“Isn’t quizzing each other a normal thing to do?”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei reached his arms up into a stretch, and rotated his shoulders.
“The way you were treading so carefully……”
“When did I ever tread carefully.” Jiang Cheng cut him off.
“The way you were treading so carefully, it was really touching.” Gu Fei insisted on
finishing his sentence.
Jiang Cheng paused, then sighed, “Fine, so I was treading carefully. It’s my boyfriend after
all, if it was anyone else I wouldn’t have the energy to bother.”
“To be held in someone’s heart like that,” Gu Fei slung an arm over Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
“Is a pretty special feeling.”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei was talking about himself, but Jiang Cheng felt the exact same way.
To hold someone in your heart is actually a very difficult thing.
Everyone longed to have it, but not everyone would receive reciprocation.
“Your score from before,” Gu Fei pulled out his phone. “Wanna see it now?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei’s words pulled Jiang Cheng back to earth. “Is it higher than 630?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer right away, he frowned and said, “Pan Zhi’s words really can’t be
trusted.”
“It’s 628, which is already really good.” Gu Fei tapped play on the voice message Pan Zhi
had sent, and put the phone next to Jiang Cheng’s ear. “Here, you can listen to what he said.”
“Lao-Yuan said, you’re not done with revision yet, plus this time we marked all the tests
harder. His test was also marked by a stricter standard. I checked the rankings, his total score
places him in fourth, only 2 points less than the third place. Compared to his abilities before,
he’s stayed about the same, and didn’t fall back. Also, he wasn’t deducted marks for neatness
this time. You remember his shitty writing before? Well it actually doesn’t look like shit
anymore. He’s been practicing his handwriting even as he studies, don’t you think that’s really
impressive of him. ”
Jiang Cheng tsked audibly and handed the phone back to Gu Fei.
“What do you think, the tests were already on the hard side, and they were strict with the
marking.” Gu Fei said.
“What did the first place get?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“637.” Gu Fei glanced at him.
Jiang Cheng tsked again.
After a while, he tsked yet again, then as if a dam had been opened, he tsked all the way
from the classroom to the front gate of the school, at least 80 times, drying out all his saliva.
“Is your tongue still okay?” Gu Fei sighed.
“That’s a whole 10 points difference.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Nine points.” Gu Fei corrected him.
“Ah nine points, that’s a whole question’s worth.” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows. “Therein
lies the difference.”
“There’s more than two months left.” Gu Fei said.
“Charge!” Jiang Cheng flung his arm up.
Only Gu Fei understood the weight behind Jiang Cheng’s “charge!”.
After all, Jiang Cheng’s total score for Fourth High’s practice exam was 648—
first in the whole city. Standing at the lectern, Lao-Xu was so excited that his lips were
trembling.
Only Gu Fei knew that to Jiang Cheng, their tests were not that difficult. Even if they were in
the best high school in the city, it couldn’t compare with the Associated High where he was
from.
By Jiang Cheng’s standards, he still needed to charge forward.
It was a very simple word, but to put it to action was a little scary.
Gu Fei thought that Jiang Cheng was already working very hard, but didn’t know that he
could go even harder.
As a matter of fact, Jiang Cheng didn’t increase the time he spent on studying every day, but
it was clear that his attention was more focused than before, and the times he would sneak
glances at Gu Fei throughout studying had decreased drastically.
Even while he ate his night time snack, his eyes would stay glued to the books.
Jiang Cheng in this state surprised Gu Fei, but he also felt proud. However, slowly with the
passing of each day, Gu Fei felt more and more anxious.
Therein lies the difference.
Those were the words Jiang Cheng had said.
To Jiang Cheng, the difference was those points.
But to Gu Fei, the difference was much more complicated.
If he were to trace the source of the difference, he’d have to go deeper and deeper, until the
realization that the difference was right there at the start.
These differences, with the lengthening of time, with the change in surroundings and the
people around them, would gradually grow bigger. It might take one year, two years, or
three…… Perhaps it would end up becoming a great chasm, unable to be filled merely by
the affection of two high school students leaning on each other.
“Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng set his book down.
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Will you massage my neck?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Gu Fei walked up behind him, and gently kneaded the back of his neck, “Here?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng put his head down, and his hand was back on the book.
“Feels good.”
“Why don’t you rest for a bit?” Gu Fei asked.
“I’m resting now,” Jiang Cheng drew his hand back. After a while he cocked his head and
said, “Hey, I wanted to ask you.”
“What?” Gu Fei stroked his cheek with a finger.
“Have you been in a bad mood lately?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Have I?” Gu Fei smiled. “You got time to think about these things?”
“Is that a no?” Jiang Cheng turned back to look at him.
“No,” Gu Fei said. “I’m just…… a little nervous.”
“Nervous about what?” Jiang Cheng was a little lost.
“I can’t tell exactly,” Gu Fei thought for a moment. “I guess after all, I’m also someone who’s
about to write the university entrance exams.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng paused for a beat, then turned away and couldn’t stop laughing. “Why
does it sound not at all believable coming from you.”
“Then what is believable?” Gu Fei also laughed.
“You saying you like me,” Jiang Cheng leaned his head back against Gu Fei’s stomach. “That,
I believe.”
“I like you,” Gu Fei looked down at him. “Superduperthunderandlightning much.”
Footnotes
[1] Shi(ten) Quan(complete) Da(big) Bu(tonifying) Wan(pills) [十全大补丸]: an old and renowned
patented Chinese medicine formula meant to supplement qi and blood, one of those that
are common enough that people often buy it over the counter without seeing a doctor first..
⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6135
TL word count: 4298
TL time: looong

Edit time: 40:19

Curse words: 5x shits
TL’s Notes:
Sorry for the long wait orz (no schedule but the pace should pick up in October) If you
haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if you’re
using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: September 18, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 100
It might be the last chance in their high school career to get to laugh wildly like this without
any inhibitions.
Almost every time he went to the drugstore, Gu Fei would run into Lao-Xu getting his
herbal medications filled. He almost suspected that Lao-Xu might have been diagnosed with
some kind of incurable illness.
“Be honest, what exactly do you have?” He blocked Lao-Xu outside the
drugstore one time. “You’ve been picking up medications every week.”
“It’s all qi and blood supplementing stuff,” Lao-Xu opened a paper wrapped pack of herbs
and showed him. “I’m just a little deficient in everything, that’s all, it’s like this every time I
teach a senior class.”
“Really?” Gu Fei looked at the herbs. To be quite honest, he didn’t recognize any of it.
“Now, why would I lie to you,” Lao-Xu said before shooting him a look, then started
laughing. “Ayyy, this kid.”
“What are you laughing at?” Gu Fei looked back at him. “I just mean that if you’ve really got
some kind of terminal illness, you should tell us the truth. It’s not like we’re members of
your family, there’s no reason to hide it.”
“It’s true that my health isn’t the greatest, but I’m not quite terminal.” Lao-Xu clapped Gu
Fei’s arm happily. “Kid, you say such unflattering things, but I’m very touched.”
“Boss,” Gu Fei said, looking at him. “Why do you bother? You wear yourself out like this, but
no one appreciates what you do for them, and no one’s gonna buy into it.”
“Says who,” Lao-Xu pointed at him. “You for one, appreciates what I do.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
“For most people, they only go through school once. If they miss out, then that’s it.” Lao-Xu
said. “And when you look back a decade or two later, you may just regret it, you may say if
only my teachers reined me in a little more back then, I wouldn’t have turned out like
this…… My goal is to, as much as possible, not let you kids have regrets later. If I can pull
one student up, that’s one student more.
Anyways, this is what we do as teachers.”
Gu Fei stared at him. Frankly, Lao-Xu had made similar speeches more than a
few times in the past. From the first year of high school until now, he lost track of how
many times he had heard this before. Every time he heard it in the past, he only felt
somewhat hollow and empty, and not able to empathize with it at all.
It was only now, when he once again heard Lao-Xu say these things, that he felt for the first
time something different.
“Mhm,” He answered, clapped Lao-Xu on the shoulder, then turned and walked into the
drugstore. “You’ve worked hard, boss.”
“You’ve also been coming here frequently, what medicine are you buying?” Lao-Xu asked
after him.
“Kidney supplements.” Gu Fei turned back and answered. [1]
“…… You just can’t be serious for more than a second!” Lao-Xu sighed.
Jiang Cheng was sitting with his eyes half closed, memorizing text passages. He actually
looked like he was enjoying the process, the way he was stepping on the chair with his legs
bent and his chin resting on his knees.
The fact that he could get into a state like this while studying, was impressive on its own.
Gu Fei took two vials of the Shi Quan Da Bu out of their packaging, stuck straws in each of
them, and set them on the desk in front of Jiang Cheng. These days, the guy tended to go on
for a shockingly long time once he started his memorization, and unless he stopped himself,
he’d glare at anyone who dared to disturb him midway.
“The reason and the impact of the boom in multiple schools of thoughts in simultaneous
contention,” Jiang Cheng reached out his hand and grabbed one of the vials, then pointed at
Gu Fei. “Classmate Gu Fei, go.”
“Politically… the society went through a period of major changes and
turbulence; every vassal state was keen on attracting talents, in order to strengthen their
own state……” Gu Fei continued out of reflex.
“Economically… the widespread use of metal tools and oxen for tilling……
blahblahblahblah.”
“Provided the material conditions for increases in production power and socioeconomic
development.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “How come the medicine today tastes so sweet.”
“I switched it up,” Gu Fei said. “This one is for preventing colds.”
“…… Why do I have to prevent against colds?” Jiang Cheng blinked. “It’s been a long time
since I’ve had a cold.”
“That’s why you should prevent against it. They’ve already cut off the indoor heating, or did
you not notice?” Gu Fei bent down and looked at him.
“I know,” Jiang Cheng tutted. “The second practice exam is soon, of course they’ve cut it off
by this time.”
“Are you numbering your days according to practice exams now?” Gu Fei smiled.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “All I have in my head now is the practice exams one and two
and three and four, five and six and eighteen strokes……” [2]
He said as he ran his hand all over Gu Fei’s leg, from his thigh all the way to his calf, “Oho
check out these long straight legs on my boyfriend.”
Even as he said this, his eyes were still glued to his book. Gu Fei felt like laughing, “When
you say things like this, can you act a little more professional and at least spare me a
glance?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng turned and looked at him. “Oh fuck, so handsome. Check out this good
looking face on my boyfriend…… You got a short buzz cut again?”
“I got Li Yan to give me a little trim yesterday.” Gu Fei lifted a tuft of hair on Jiang Cheng’s
forehead. “Cheng-ge, how’s about you take one hour out of your day tomorrow to let the
design director Li give you a new hairstyle? It’s almost covering your eyes.”
“What’s a design director civet [li]?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“Li Yan.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng paused, then leaned back in his chair as he cracked up with laughter, “Alrighty
then, let the design director civet give me a haircut like yours, that way I won’t have to
worry about it for a while.”
“That won’t do, the shorter it is the more often you’ll have to maintain it, otherwise it’ll
easily become like a ball of cactus.” Gu Fei said. “It should last you longer if you just get a
little trim.”
“Alrighty then, whatever you say.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
And that was about it for the slivers of conversation he managed to get with Jiang Cheng.
Other than that, they were also able to get a little conversation in before bed, but usually by
the time they got to the fourth sentence, Jiang Cheng would already be asleep.
“You look like you’re about to die from fatigue.” Gu Fei said with his arms around Jiang
Cheng.
“It’s alright, there’s just too many things to memorize; I’m not good at memorizing texts.”
Jiang Cheng turned around halfway and leaned further into Gu Fei’s embrace. “These days
I’m reciting passages in every waking moment, and even while asleep.”
“Do you regret it yet? If you had chosen STEM way back when, you wouldn’t have to do so
much memorization.” Gu Fei smiled. “Not to mention, you’d get a higher score too.”
“Regret my ass, if I had time to regret, there’s more where that came from. Why did I used
to skip so many classes, and get into fights; why did I used to only cram for exams two
weeks before……” Jiang Cheng said. “If I were to start regretting, there’d be no end to it.”
“That’s true,” Gu Fei smiled. “Cheng-ge is right.”
“Besides, the problem sets in STEM subjects are annoying too. It’s all annoying, but at this
point, there’s nothing left to do but to get a grip and keep churning……” Jiang Cheng said as
he rubbed Gu Fei’s leg. “I feel like I’m becoming near-sighted. Yesterday when I tried on
your glasses, I was actually able to see pretty clearly.”
“Don’t just wear any glasses,” Gu Fei said. “Why don’t you go get your vision checked.”
“There’s no time for that. I can see just fine anyways, I’m probably just ti—”
Halfway through the sentence, Jiang Cheng suddenly went quiet.
He fell asleep.
It was quite powerful, really. Gu Fei thought as he pulled the covers over Jiang Cheng. The
sentence before had been crisp and clear with no logical fallacies, and the following
sentence was suddenly asleep.jpg.
Although the others in their class who were still trying to study were not that different.
They didn’t even look as energized as Jiang Cheng, at least Jiang Cheng wouldn’t fall asleep
in class. These days, even Yi Jing could often be found slumped over her desk during class.
It felt like not long after the first practice exam ended, it was already time for the second
practice exam.
Lao-Xu stood in the corridor, watching as the students from his class filed into the testing
room, and reminded each of them, “Try to relax, read the questions carefully, and plan your
time well……”
Gu Fei walked into the classroom and looked around. This time, they were seated in a
different order yet again from the arrangement of the first practice exam. It seemed they
changed it up every time.
The people around him all wore solemn expressions that didn’t vary between the students
with good grades and students with bad grades. Sweeping his gaze across the room, it
seemed like everyone was an overachiever.
However, the difference was clear once they actually started to answer the questions.
Even though everyone had their heads buried, and would start writing after reading each
question, one would still be able to tell from their bearing whether the student knew what
they were doing or not.
It used to be that Gu Fei would draw answers out of scraps of papers at random as he went
through each question, while at the same time observing the people around him. It was a
rather wonderful feeling, to feel like none of it really mattered.
However, now that he couldn’t just draw answers randomly, there was a lot more pressure.
To kind of know something but not be sure about it was the most torturous. He relied
mostly on his memory of Jiang Cheng’s mumbling
fragments of memorization. If you asked him to write the whole thing out, he didn’t know it
enough. But if he were to piece the fragments together as he went, there wasn’t quite
enough time for that.
On the other hand, the questions in the second practice exam were much harder than the
first one. He wondered how his boyfriend was doing in the classroom next door.
Two days of exams didn’t sound like very much, but when the bell rang, signalling that it
was time to hand in the test papers, and the end of the last subject, Gu Fei still felt an
immense sense of relief.
He didn’t have that much time after he finished the questions, just barely enough to do a
very cursory once-over.
When he stood up to hand the papers in, there was a sudden commotion from the first row
—the sound of desks and chairs bumping together.
Gu Fei looked over just in time to see that one row away from him, Yi Jing had collapsed on
the ground. The sound of a head thumping hard against the floor was disturbing. The other
students instantly devolved into a disorderly chaos.
He dashed over in two strides, crouched down, and carefully turned Yi Jing over.
Her face was pale and her eyes shut—she seemed to have fainted.
Next came the invigilating teacher’s slightly anxious voice, “What’s wrong?”
“Someone passed out!” One student shouted.
“Yi Jing from class-8 fainted!” Another student yelled.
“Quick, take her to the infirmary!” The invigilating teacher squeezed into the crowd.
“Someone, go notify the teacher on patrol!”
“I’ll carry her.” Gu Fei said.
A few others helped to lift Yi Jing onto Gu Fei’s back, and Gu Fei immediately started
running out the door.
The other teachers had all gathered outside, with Lao-Xu at the very front, “How come she
passed out! Why did she pass out! Is she hurt from the fall?!”
“It’s probably not that serious.” Gu Fei said as he ran toward the stairs.
“What’s wrong!” Wang Xu dashed up to them.
Gu Fei glanced at him, and saw that the guy’s eyes were already red, even his voice was
hoarse.
He didn’t refuse when Wang Xu jumped to take Yi Jing from him, and
transferred her into his arms. By the rush going through Wang Xu at that moment, he
would definitely get to the infirmary twice as fast as Gu Fei.
“Yi Jing! Yi Jing! Yi Jing!” Wang Xu kept calling her name. He forwent the option of carrying
her on his back, and went straight to picking her up in his arms. The speed at which he
raced downstairs was almost too fast for Gu Fei to catch up, despite not carrying any
weight.
Under Lao-Xu’s lead, everyone from class-8 rushed to the infirmary. The doctor had already
received the call, but was still startled by this massive throng of people.
As soon as Yi Jing was placed on a bed, she started kicking people out, “Get out, everyone
out! And quiet down!”
Other than Wang Xu—who refused to leave—and Lao-Xu, everyone else was kicked out.
When it came to the students at Fourth High, if they were to gather everyone who
genuinely treated the University Entrance Exams as a big deal, it wouldn’t even fill up one
classroom. However, the pressure that came with the exams was something that everyone
felt. Today there would be a student falling sick in this class, and the next day someone
from another class would take a sick leave; and now they got a student collapsing right in
the examination room.
Everyone standing outside the infirmary door had frowns on their faces.
“Did she hit her head?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly beside Gu Fei.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei turned to him. “It was loud too, but the chair kind of broke her
fall, so it’s probably not that serious.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “When I heard Wang Xu yelling like that I… that gave me a
scare. I almost twisted my ankle running over here.”
“She should be fine, probably just didn’t sleep enough from all the stress.” Gu Fei said
quietly. “That’s why I keep telling you not to sleep past 2 a.m.”
“I always go to sleep on time, don’t worry.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Yi Jing’s condition was not too bad. She simply lacked rest, was under too much pressure,
and did not eat breakfast that day before coming to write the exams.
She probably felt uneasy during the test, but managed to stick it out until the end, before
she finally relaxed and passed out.
Even so, she only rested at home for one day before returning to class.
“See, sometimes people can bear much more than they think they could.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Take Yi Jing, she looks like a gust of wind can knock her over, but see how much pressure
she can take.”
“I really think,” Gu Fei frowned. “You shouldn’t push yourself to that point.”
“I won’t, I have a healthy foundation.” Jiang Cheng lifted his arms. “So.
Strong.”
Gu Fei laughed, “You haven’t worked out for what, six months now. At least before, you
could do some exercising in bed, but now even that little bit of exercise is canceled…”
“Sir, can you please watch your language when you speak?” Jiang Cheng looked around.
“We’re in public.”
“I’m just protesting quietly here,” Gu Fei lowered his voice. “Will there be compensation
after the exams?”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng threw his head back and laughed for a while. “I’ve been thinking
about this, we gotta go at least a few hundred rounds of it after the exams. This summer, I
won’t do anything else but you.”
“Uh huh, it’s important to have dreams in life…” Gu Fei said as he laughed.
Before the results of the second practice exams came out, there was a sort of lightness in
the air, the kind one felt after studying day and night for a test that was finally over. But it
did not last very long.
The countdown on the blackboard changed from three digits to two. It changed every day,
and with every change, it would shake up a storm in everyone’s hearts.
Some were nervous—time was quickly running out; while some were anxious—
hurry up and get it over with so summer break could come.
When the scores came out for the second practice exams, it didn’t do much to change the
students’ emotional states. The nervous ones became even more nervous, and the anxious
ones became even more anxious.
The singular exception was Lao-Xu, who seemed to have collected all these feelings for
himself, going through an emotional rollercoaster every day.
Jiang Cheng’s total score on the second practice exams was 656. While the difficulty had
gone up this time, so did his scores. Gu Fei felt like whenever Lao-Xu saw Jiang Cheng,
flowers could blossom out of his eyes.
“If you come up with 700 on the third one, Lao-Xu could probably bounce all the way from
the ground level to the third floor.” Gu Fei said. “Then if you come back with a top of the
province during the official exams, Lao-Xu could probably piggy-back you for 20 laps
around the downtown square.”
“Dream on,” Jiang Cheng laughed for a good while. “You really are
underestimating the other overachievers out there.”
“Wasn’t the 1st place last year for Humanities 650 something, I think it’s not entirely out of
reach.” Gu Fei leaned back against the wall and swung his legs back and forth.
“There are Humanities 1st place holders elsewhere that get close to 700. If I hadn’t come
here, and instead been at the Associated High until now, would I be able to do better?
There’s no way to compare these things.” Jiang Cheng also leaned back and swung his legs
along with Gu Fei. “Like you said the other day, wouldn’t it have been better if I’d chosen
the STEM stream? There’s no need to think about these things, since they didn’t happen
anyway. I only ever look forward.”
“Mmn,” Gu Fei smiled. “Now that’s breadth.”
“Don’t look back, don’t look around, and there’s no problem. If you keep looking back as
you walk, it’s easy to trip and fall.” Jiang Cheng tilted his head a little. “At most, I’ll take the
time to look at you.”
“Keep your voice down,” Gu Fei glanced forward. “Zhou Jing’s hearing is really getting sharp
these days.”
“Did you call me?” Zhou Jing swiftly turned his head around.
“Want candy?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yeah!” Zhou Jing nodded vehemently.
Gu Fei scrounged up a few pieces of candy from his pocket and handed it over, and Zhou
Jing accepted them happily.
After Zhou Jing turned back and continued slumping over his own desk, Gu Fei said in a
suppressed voice, “See that?”
“I did,” Jiang Cheng drew back a little with his exaggerated expression of horror.
“Scared me to death.”
Gu Fei glanced at him, then put his head down and started to laugh.
“The hell you laughing for.” Jiang Cheng pulled a set of papers toward him and started
writing, then after a moment also cracked up. “Wasn’t it frightening?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer, but continued to giggle nonstop.
Jiang Cheng could not keep talking either, as he laughed along with Gu Fei, still holding the
paper.
“What?” Zhou Jing once again turned around. “What’s so funny?”
Neither of them responded as they laughed uncontrollably, unable to stop. Jiang Cheng had
a mind to keep it down, since there were quite a few others in the class still studying, but
seeing the total confusion on Zhou Jing’s face only made him laugh harder.
In these days of crushing, high intensity studying, even the people who had already given
up were repressed into silence by the pressure in the atmosphere.
The usual chatterboxes were all quiet.
And now, hearing someone else laughing hysterically, it was as if a switch had been flipped,
and the laughter soon spread from a couple of people to the entire classroom.
In the short span of less than 20 seconds, and for no reason at all, the whole class was
howling hysterically.
It was like a release, but also like venting. An entire classroom of students simultaneously
laughing out loud with what was almost like a sense of collective honour. Some of them
teared up from laughing, while others slammed the desks and kicked the chairs as they
laughed.
Lao-Lu stood up from where he was sitting at the lectern in shock. He held the pointer stick,
but didn’t know where exactly to point it. Then after standing there for a while, he put the
pointer stick down and also started laughing.
By the time the patrolling Guidance Director came running, Lao-Lu was leaning against the
front of the lectern, pointing at a student who had laughed so hard that a snot bubble had
come out of his nose, while he himself was doubling over
in laughter.
“Teacher Lu!” The director’s eyes were so wide they almost reached her temples. “What’s
the meaning of this?”
“Look at him!” Lao-Lu walked to the director’s side as he continued cackling, and pointed.
“Snot bubble!”
The laughter that had gotten a little more under control from the arrival of the director,
once again erupted after Lao-Lu’s words.
“Teacher Lu!” In resignation, the director dragged Lao-Lu outside the classroom.
“They’re disturbing the other classes that are studying! How can you act out with them!”
“Ayyy…” Lao-Lu sucked in a breath and finally got a grip. “Okay okay, we’re just taking a
breather, just taking a breather. Studying is so grueling that they’re not even chitchatting
anymore, I’m not used to it.”
“Is there something wrong with you!” The director looked at him and said in a low voice.
“Are you done now? The teachers from the other classes are all looking at you!”
“Alright everyone, let’s wrap it up,” Lao-Lu went back inside and beckoned to them. “I know
that everyone’s very tired these days. When the exams are over, Boss Xu and I will take you
all out for a feast, you can have whatever you want!
For now, let’s get back to work!”
After the hysterical outburst, the atmosphere in the classroom was suddenly a little
different. It was as if they suddenly realized that, in a little over a month, everyone here
would have to go their separate ways. It might be the last chance in their high school career
to get to laugh wildly like this without any inhibitions.
This faint sense of sorrow did not seem to lessen throughout the third practice exam, that
came just as suddenly as it passed.
As expected, the third practice exam was made to build up the students’
confidence. Compared to the two before it, the difficulty of the third one was within an
acceptable range. After this, at least to the students at Fourth High, the school would not be
organizing any more formal tests. The next test they would be taking would be the
University Entrance Exams.
“This part is very auspicious, and very you.” Gu Fei said. “You got 666. This time, contestant
Jiang Cheng’s performance was certainly very 6666666!” [3]
Jiang Cheng smiled at him without a word.
“Let’s do something to destress tonight,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll take you out for grilled meat. We’ll
take a cab there, quickly stuff ourselves, then take a cab back,
get off at the main intersection, walk for 20 minutes, then come back and continue
studying?”
“Really?” Jiang Cheng could feel his own eyes twinkle. To be fair, he had not been holding
back on eating at all recently; Gu Fei either did the cooking himself or bought all sorts of
take-outs. However, to him, grilled meats would forever have the strongest hold on him.
“Pork belly, fatty veal, pork belly, fatty veal……”
“Really.” Gu Fei nodded. “But I’m telling you right now, we have to keep the portions under
control. I don’t want you to have too much greasy food and get diarrhea.”
Jiang Cheng started laughing, “No like, grandma Gu, why are you such a worrywart?”
“Is it my fault that my grandson’s always stirring up trouble?” Gu Fei said.
“Get out!” Jiang Cheng flicked Gu Fei’s forehead with his finger.
He did this very openly, because their desk was piled so high with books that it formed a
wall around them. Once they both slumped over their desk and turned their faces toward
each other, it was like an isolated world.
It was probably the only time they got to experience what it was like to have this little
world surrounded by books. Jiang Cheng stared at the tip of Gu Fei’s nose, reached out his
hand again, and stroked it gently.
Footnotes
[1] In Chinese medicine, and popular knowledge, kidney as an organ is responsible for the
reproductive system ⤴
[2] 模考 = mokao = practice exam; mo (mock) sounds like 摸 (touch), and “18
摸” is a very old, lewd, song about innappropriate touching ⤴
[3] 666, repeating infinitely, is internet slang for “smooth” ⤴

Chapter 101
“You’ve worked hard, boyfriend.” He planted a kiss on Gu Fei’s lips.
Jiang Cheng felt very satisfied and very delighted by the post-practice exam barbeque feast.
Gu Fei could not stop him from bringing plates upon plates back to the table, because if he
did, Jiang Cheng would glare at him and look as though he would throw a fit. As if the guy
had been eating only leafy greens and drinking only water for the past five years.
Fortunately, they didn’t get the runs. The only side effect was that Jiang Cheng did not have
much of an appetite for the next few days. Not because he was still too full from the feast,
but because nothing else tasted as fulfilling as grilled meats.
Because of this scary side effect from barbeque, Gu Fei did not take him out for a feast again
before the exams. When they ate at home, there was not much to pick from whether he
liked the food or not.
Although Jiang Cheng was very good at adapting. Probably because he was too deeply
entrenched in his studies, he could finish anything given to him regardless of whether it
was fun to eat.
This continued on until June, when the exam countdown changed to single digit.
“I need to go get a haircut today.” Jiang Cheng said, his eyes still on the teacher at the front
of the room, who had already stopped mentioning words like “study”
and “exam”.
These days, the teachers were recommending that students take a break. They no longer
gave out question banks to do, they just wanted everyone to try to relax, and to review by
themselves the points that they had memorized for so long.
“Will you still get the design director civet to do it for you?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng tugged at the hair on his forehead. “What he did last time was pretty
good…… Oh and I want to skateboard with Er-Miao for a bit this afternoon.”
“Sure, I’ll tell her to come and wait for us.” Gu Fei took out his phone. “She’ll be so happy.”
“It’s been a long time since I played with her, I’m worried that she won’t want to hang out
with me anymore.” Jiang Cheng grabbed at his hair. “She even knows how to multiply 7 by 9
now, and I haven’t praised her yet.”
“You don’t need to,” Gu Fei laughed, but his laugh carried a hint of resignation.
“She just found a multiplication table to fiddle with that one time, she can’t even tell you
what 1 times 1 is.”
“Really,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “It’s okay, at least if she knows to ask you that, it’s
worth commending.”
“Go ahead then, will you buy her something to eat?” Gu Fei turned to him.
“Did you say that she liked the jelly pudding cups we got last time?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“…… Last time?” Gu Fei blinked.
“Last……” Jiang Cheng thought about it, then chuckled. “Oh yeah, that was during New
Year’s. Shit, it’s been that long?”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei stretched his legs out. “It’s been months since you plunged head first into
the great rapids of studying. Don’t you know, one day in the rapids is three months on
earth.”
To Jiang Cheng, it did not even feel like much time had passed at all before the semester
was already over.
The last semester of high school passed by just like that, amidst the days and nights of
incessant studying. He did not even get to properly savour the taste before it disappeared.
Once time started to sprint, it really was… impossible to catch up or hold it back.
Those stretches of time that felt so gruelling and difficult, it was only when you occasionally
turned back that you realized, they were already behind you.
Those feelings of pain, of being lost; of struggles, surprises, and happiness; of the reluctance
to part; all of those emotions that you thought you would never get over at the time were
suddenly already behind you. Some of those feelings had passed, while others were stuck in
an infinite loop.
For example, the times of happiness and feeling settled whenever he was with Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng slumped over his desk and turned his face aside to watch Gu Fei.
The happiness of each day would pass, but there would be new happiness emerging, in
every minute and every second.
Where he was concerned, pain and confusion was only a straight line, with every step
forward, there was one step less. But happiness was a circle.
That afternoon before school let out, Lao-Xu came to the classroom again to encourage
everyone, and to remind them to relax in these next few days, to sleep early and not study
so intensely as before.
Looking at the tired expression on Lao-Xu’s face, that like everyone else’s, was tinged with
nerves and excitement, then looking at the single digit countdown above his head, Jiang
Cheng yawned.
Let it go then. He had already fought for so long. Jiang Cheng was never one to look back
and feel regret, but even if he were to regret, there was not much to regret in this past year.
He could finally relax and give his nerves a break.
And play on the skateboard with Gu Miao or something.
As soon as they came out of the school gates, they spotted Gu Miao outside, looking like she
had been waiting for a long time and was clearly bored out of her mind.
Gu Miao was sitting on the railings by the sidewalk, and as usual wore a blank and cold
expression. She sported that extremely metal haircut of hers, courtesy of Li Yan, and her
skateboard was leaning beside her.
When she saw them walk out, Gu Miao kicked once on her board, jumped down, and
dashed right up to them.
“Er-Miao!” Jiang Cheng leaned down and grinned at her. It was only when he bent down
that he realized with a start—Gu Miao seemed to have grown taller.
He did not need to bend at quite so steep an angle as before. He turned to Gu Fei and asked,
“Did she get taller?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Just this past half year alone she grew almost 10 cm.
Can’t even fit into last summer’s clothes anymore.”
“I’ve been too busy studying these days,” Jiang Cheng looked back at Gu Miao.
“That I don’t even have time to play with you. I didn’t know that you’ve grown so tall……
Looking dashing in these cropped pants huh.”
“Those are long pants that got too short for her.” Gu Fei chimed in beside him.
“…… Still very dashing.” Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers and gave her a thumbs up.
Clearly in a good mood, Gu Miao returned the greeting. She then rolled to the side on her
skateboard and beckoned him.
“Hold this.” Jiang Cheng tossed his backpack to Gu Fei and ran after her.
The weather had been nice recently, it was the kind of early summer day when it was
comfortably warm, but before the scorching heat. As he glided forward on the skateboard,
Jiang Cheng felt a sense of complete ease wash over his whole body. When he closed his
eyes, he could imagine the shape of the gentle breeze slipping over his skin.
He took turns with Gu Miao on the skateboard, and by the time they had raced all the way
back to their street, there was sweat all over Jiang Cheng’s head, and Gu Miao’s face was
covered with sweat and streaks of dirt from when she wiped her face haphazardly.
“Here, give it a wipe.” Jiang Cheng hopped off the board and handed her a napkin, then
looked back the way they came.
With one hand still holding onto Jiang Cheng’s bike, Gu Fei came pedaling up slowly on his
bike.
“Having fun aren’t you?” Gu Fei put his foot on the ground. “What do you think of this
logistics manager?”
“I forgot,” Jiang Cheng laughed as he took back his own bike and got on. “Er-Miao, how
about I give you a tow?”
With one foot on the skateboard, Gu Miao cocked her head and looked at him.
“Let’s go!” Jiang Cheng stepped on the pedals and shot out.
Gu Miao quickly caught up from behind, dashed in front of him, and even looked back and
gave him a whistle.
“Hey little twerp!” Jiang Cheng tutted and pedaled hard a few times to pass her.
The instant his bike passed her, Gu Miao grabbed hold of the frame on his back seat, pushed
down with the momentum, and glided forward for a stretch while keeping head to head
with his bike.
“Awesome!” Jiang Cheng shouted. “Shall we go buy some jelly pudding cups!”
Gu Miao’s eyes twinkled as she turned, then quickly decelerated as she held onto the back
seat and stopped dashing forward.
The two of them took Gu Miao for a stroll inside the supermarket. When they got back to
the store after buying a bunch of snacks, they found Li Yan sitting behind the counter,
asleep, with his head titled back.
Li Yan opened his eyes when he heard them come in, “Masters! Can you show a little
sincerity when asking people for a favour!”
“Sorry,” Jiang Cheng set the pile of snacks on the counter and handed a pudding
cup to him. “We went to buy food for Er-Miao.”
“And to think that I stupidly brought over a bunch of groceries,” Li Yan accepted the
pudding cup. “But ended up having to watch the store.”
“Where’s my mom?” Gu Fei asked. “Shouldn’t she still be here for the
afternoon?”
“She went out with her boyfriend right after I got here.” Li Yan opened the pudding cup and
handed it to Gu Miao. “Hey, hasn’t this one lasted a pretty long time? She hasn’t switched
yet?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered. “Will you stay here and eat?”
“Nah, I have a date after I give master Jiang here his haircut.” Li Yan said.
“Oho.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“What?” Li Yan gave him a side-eye. “Is it very ‘oho’ of me to have a date?
You’ve been tormenting this single dog for the past year, can the dog not fight back?”
“Haircut.” Gu Fei said before taking Gu Miao to the courtyard in the back to wash her face.
Li Yan was very skilled at cutting hair, comparable, if not better, than the
‘Tony’s, the ‘Jim’s, the ‘Kevin’s, and the ‘Peter’s in the fancy looking salons.
“They’ll probably offer you a master stylist position at any random salon you walk into.”
Jiang Cheng said with his eyes closed.
“Offer my ass.” Li Yan was working on Jiang Cheng’s fringe. “I’m not done playing yet.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng thought that that was a perfectly valid reason.
“You have pretty good skin, Jiang Cheng.” Li Yan said. “How come you don’t get any acne
even with all this stress?”
“Just goes to show that I’m not that stressed.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Sure, keep boasting.” Li Yan said. “The way you’ve been memorizing stuff with every
second of every day, I feel like your eyes can’t even focus anymore.
Last week I ran into you on the street, did you see me?”
“Nope, you didn’t call out to me?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I didn’t have the heart to, seeing you like that, all dazed.” Li Yan said. “But you seem okay
today, is it because the exam is soon, so you can relax a little more?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Ace this test, and get an amazing score.” Li Yan said. “In all my life here I’ve never heard
anyone from this place get a good score, they thank their ancestors just for getting into
second tier universities.” [1]
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Don’t move, or I’m gonna leave a gap in your haircut.” Li Yan considered for a while, then
sighed. “Though when I think about it, you don’t really count as being from here. If you
really do get a top score, it’ll be the Steel Works neighbourhood and Fourth High that
lucked out.”
“If I’m not from here, then where am I from?” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile.
Li Yan did not answer, just continued to snip away at his hair little by little.
After a long time, he finally spoke up again, “Gu Fei really is a very good person.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“He’s had it pretty hard since he was little. He has it hard even now.” Li Yan spoke quickly,
probably trying to finish his speech before Gu Fei came back in.
“I don’t know why he would…… Anyways, I just want to say that if you went off to school
and started having second thoughts, we won’t let you off easy.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes a tiny slit.
“We’ll team up and demolish you.” Li Yan said.
“…… Got it.” Jiang Cheng was momentarily stunned, before he chuckled. “I got it.”
The handful of days before the exam went by slower than the earlier days of endless
studying. Perhaps it was because by this time, for better or worse, everyone was counting
the seconds and hoped for the 7th to arrive sooner.
The more they hoped, the slower the hours passed.
But once it came time to pay a visit to the examination halls, the atmosphere was suddenly
once again overrun by nerves.
“It doesn’t matter anymore to me. I want it to come faster, the sooner we die the sooner our
souls will move on.” Wang Xu said, his face resolute.
Wang Xu always hoped he could be in the same examination hall as Jiang Cheng or Gu Fei.
According to him, seeing them made him feel a little more settled.
However, he didn’t get his wish. And so he would repeat that sentiment at least
five times per day—pretty much every time he saw Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng might not have said anything, but his feelings echoed Wang Xu’s.
The difference was that his wish only included Gu Fei, and not Captain Wang Jiuri.
However, even though the city was not large, and there were not many high schools within
it, the chances of it happening was still very low. Which was why when Jiang Cheng
eventually found out that he and Gu Fei were assigned to two different examination halls
within the same center, his mood was overall still cheerful.
Visiting the examination halls were akin to painting a new layer of nervousness onto
everyone’s hearts; the silent peers, the stern-faced teachers, the patrolling staff guarding
the examination halls, and the strange environment. It was probably because they had led
the same monotonous lives for such a long time, that when faced abruptly with a
completely unfamiliar battleground, everything about it unnerved them.
“You’ll have to watch over me tonight and not leave my side for even a second,”
Riding their bikes on the way back from the examination center, Jiang Cheng suddenly
squeezed on the brakes. “I’m a little scared.”
“Mhm, I’ll watch over you.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Are you scared? Panicky?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“No shit, of course I’m scared.” Gu Fei smiled. “Which is why I also want to stick to your
side. It’ll make me feel more grounded.”
“I said before, I can prove myself, no matter where I am.” Jiang Cheng said.
“And right now, the only way I can prove myself is to ace this test. I must ace it.”
“You don’t even have to perform above your usual levels, you only need to do it like you
always do.” Gu Fei said. “All this time, and you still don’t know yourself?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng frowned. “Do you?”
“Somewhat.” Gu Fei smiled at him.
“That’s enough. As long as you know me, I don’t have to worry about anything else.” Jiang
Cheng continued forward. “As long as you know.”
“You’re not gonna study tonight, are you?” Gu Fei caught up to him.
“Mmn, I won’t touch the books.” Jiang Cheng said. “I will meditate.”
“Meditate on what?” Gu Fei asked.
“I want to sort through everything once in my mind.” Jiang Cheng said. “Sit there with my
legs crossed, and whoosh! Play the whole thing through like a movie, so it’s easier to look
for things during the test tomorrow.”
“Then I’ll meditate too,” Gu Fei said. “Sit there with legs crossed, and whoosh!
Play back the images of you memorizing stuff for the last year once over in my mind, so it’s
easier to guess at the answers tomorrow.”
“What if you… perform above your usual level tomorrow.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
That evening was not very different from the rest. Gu Fei went home first to see Gu Miao,
then played with her for a while, before heading over to Jiang Cheng’s place.
Jiang Cheng had already taken the vegetables out of the fridge, and had very diligently
washed and chopped them already.
“What do you think?” Jiang Cheng said with one hand on his hips, and the other hand
gesturing grandly over the vegetables. “Is it flawless or what!”
“Yes, very flawless.” Gu Fei hugged him from behind and nuzzled against his neck. “Just one
question, we got celery, cabbage, onions, and bell peppers, how do you plan to put them
together?”
“Celery and meat stir-fry, cabbage and meat stir-fry, onions and meat stir-fry, bell pepper
and meat stir-fry,” Jiang Cheng didn’t even bat an eye. “Then we’ll have a cabbage and
mince soup. Four dishes and one soup, a good balance of veggies and meat.”
“Alrighty sir, let’s do what you said. It’s not a bad idea to keep it light tonight.”
Gu Fei released him, walked to the counter, and got to work.
Jiang Cheng stepped back and leaned against the wall, watching Gu Fei’s back.
He actually had not been thinking very much about the exam in the last couple of days.
Conversely, there would often be thoughts flitting through his mind about what would
happen after this summer.
A new school, a new environment, a new life, and the new unsettled feeling of not having
Gu Fei by his side.
Jiang Cheng was not one to feel unsettled easily. But too much had happened in this past
year, that if it was not for Gu Fei, he did not know what he would be like coming out the
other end. Besides, he was used to the state of ‘having Gu Fei by his side’. He only needed to
look up to see Gu Fei, turn around to see Gu
Fei, reach out to touch Gu Fei, and whether his eyes were open or closed, there was Gu Fei.
If this kind of stability were to be broken, he did not know how long he would need to get
used to it.
And as for the warm comfort of the present, he did not want to miss even a second of it.
Gu Fei’s cooking really wasn’t that great. Even after such a long period of practice there still
was no improvement. Just by his movements as he cooked, it was clear that this was not a
person who cooked well. Tsk tsk. Jiang Cheng thought, how did he persist in eating only his
cooking for such a long time and thoroughly enjoyed it too?
So it’s true, the power of love can take away a person’s taste buds.
After dinner they did not bother to do anything else, but went straight into the bedroom,
opened the curtains, then sat on the bed facing the dark night sky outside and started to
meditate.
Completely serious, with eyes closed and legs crossed. At first Gu Fei even pressed his
palms together in front of his chest, but it took only one look in Jiang Cheng’s direction
before he burst out laughing, “Oh, so meditation isn’t the same as praying to buddha?”
“…… If you want to pray that’s fine too.” Jiang Cheng cracked up. “I may have said
meditating, but it’s really just closing my eyes and quietly going over everything I studied in
the last year.”
“Alrighty.” Gu Fei rested his hands on his legs and closed his eyes.
Jiang Cheng continued to think through every point of knowledge, reviewing them one
more time in his mind subject by subject.
A brain was a contraption that turned very quickly, but to go through every single point in a
subject still took a lot of time.
Jiang Cheng had just started in on History, when he heard a “thump” beside him, and
immediately after that, the mattress bounced a few times.
When he turned around to look, he found Gu Fei fallen over on his side, asleep, with one leg
still bent in his cross-legged pose.
“Oh shit.” Jiang Cheng burst out laughing at Gu Fei for a while, then kept laughing as he
pulled out his phone and took several photos.
Even with him laughing like this, Gu Fei still did not wake up at the end; he was sleeping
soundly.
Jiang Cheng put his phone away and let out a soft sigh. He reached over and stuffed a pillow
under Gu Fei’s head, then pulled a thin towel blanket over him.
“You’ve worked hard, boyfriend.” He planted a kiss on Gu Fei’s lips.
Gu Fei might not have spent very much energy on studying in the last several months, but
Jiang Cheng knew how much energy he spent on taking care of him while he studied. Now
that the exams were tomorrow, Gu Fei’s last thread of tightly wound nerves was finally able
to relax.
It was his first time seeing Gu Fei falling immediately asleep, and so soundly at that. Jiang
Cheng stared at him for a long time.
So handsome indeed. Tsk tsk.
Jiang Cheng also slept very soundly that night. He felt grounded, as if he had been
sharpening his blades for a thousand days and was about to finally take out the enemy with
his own hands.
Perhaps because he was overly grounded, he did not even hear the alarm on his phone go
off in the morning. It was not until Gu Fei shoved and flipped him over, that he suddenly
jolted awake and bounded straight from the bed onto a standing position on the floor.
“…… How limber of you, young hero?” His movements startled Gu Fei, who sat stunned at
the edge of the bed.
“Are we late?” Jiang Cheng stared at him.
“Nahh babe,” Gu Fei stood up and pulled him into his arms, and rubbed his back for a long
time. “We have enough time to wash up, eat breakfast, and even walk to the exam center.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng let out a breath of relief and leaned into Gu Fei’s embrace.
“Damn it scared me.”
Gu Fei had already brought back the breakfast he had bought; there were meat buns, fried
dough fritters, and tofu pudding. To prevent any possible mishaps, he had gotten the usual
things they ate all the time.
When they finished breakfast and were about to leave, Jiang Cheng’s phone rang. It was a
call from Lao-Xu. “Don’t rush, I’m already waiting for you guys outside the examination
center. Don’t forget your IDs, and don’t stuff yourself at breakfast, don’t eat any cold
foods……”
“Mhm, got it.” Jiang Cheng said. “Lao-Xu, are you calling everyone one by one to remind us?”
“Yeah,” Lao-Xu said. “Teacher Lu is also at the other examination center doing
these calls. Every year we have people forgetting one thing or another.”
Forgetting things was out of the question. Jiang Cheng had prepared all of his and Gu Fei’s
things the night before. Even though it was only an ID and a small bottle of water with the
label ripped off, he still checked over everything at least three times.
“Will you still bring a book to review on the way there?” Gu Fei asked him at the door.
“Nope.” Jiang Cheng pulled open the door and bounded out. “I can’t take in any more
information at this point, it’ll just disorient me.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei locked the door. “Let’s go, we’ll take a cab over.”
The two of them strolled together to the intersection. Jiang Cheng was just about to check
to see if there were any taxis coming in the distance, when he heard someone call out from
behind him, “Jiang Cheng?”
He was confounded for a few seconds. The voice did not sound familiar, yet he somehow
felt that he had heard it before. He turned around and with shock, saw Li Qian standing a
few meters behind him.
“What…… are you doing here?” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ve been hanging around here for a while. You changed your phone so I don’t have your
number.” Li Qian gave him a little smile. “I’ve been hanging around here since a couple days
ago, but never did run into you, and I didn’t think it’d be appropriate to ask Da-Fei.”
“Is something wrong?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“No, nothing.” Li Qian was holding a bag in her hand, and after some hesitation, handed it to
him. “You’re starting the exams today, aren’t you? I brought this for you, to cheer you on.”
Jiang Cheng was a little surprised. All of a sudden, he could not get a word out.
“Thank you.” Gu Fei accepted the bag for him.
“Thank you.” Only then did Jiang Cheng come back to his senses.
“You guys should hurry to the exam then.” Li Qian said. “Hey Xiao-Cheng, I hope you do
well, break a leg okay?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
It was not until they were in the taxi that he opened the bag Li Qian had given him. Inside
was a box of North American ginseng slices. [2]
“You should put one in your mouth now, wake you up.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng smiled and put a slice in his mouth, then handed a slice to Gu Fei.
“I really didn’t expect Li Qian to come look for me.”
“Li Qian never even went to high school. Li Baoguo only cared about Li Hui and Li Hui only.”
Gu Fei said. “At the time, she wanted to go to a vocational school or something, so she could
leave this place, but Li Baoguo didn’t let her……
Seeing you write your way out, it’s probably a kind of solace for her.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng did not say anything more, only took Gu Fei’s hand and squeezed it
tightly.
Footnotes
[1] In China, second tier universities, or 二本, is only a concept that exists in popular rhetoric,
and not a physical (or written) difference between schools. The difference is only that
when sending out acceptances after the exams, some universities get first pick, so they’re
called first tier (一本). The universities that get second pick of students are called second tier (二
本). When students graduate from these universities, they all get a bachelor degree, and of
course their diploma would not specify whether it came from a first or second tier
university, except that for the more prestigious institutions, their names speak for
themselves. ⤴
[2] Last time it was Shi Quan Da Bu, this time it’s N. American ginseng slices.
These are all common supplements based in TCM that Chinese people like to take in every
day life. ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5959
TL word count: 4535
TL time: 5:48:12
Edit time: 51:06
Curse words: 3x shits
TL’s Notes:
Thanks for following along and sharing in this story! Just so everyone knows, we’re only ⅔
of the way through. The entire novel including the extras comes to exactly 150 chapters, so
hang on tight :)))
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm

me on twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: October 7, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 102
“Since in my case, I’ve people depending on me, hm? I need to stand on solid ground, and
make sure that every step is steady.”
“Are you guys high school seniors?” The driver asked while driving.
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng replied.
“From Fourth High?” The driver continued.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered.
“Good luck! Try not to stress, it’s just a uni entrance exam, eh? Nothing to stress over. You
can only do well if you’re not tied up with nerves.” The driver said. “I graduated from
Fourth High myself. Back then, I didn’t do well on the exams, all because I was too nervous.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng responded with a smile.
“Really, trust me.” The driver glanced at them through the rearview mirror. “You two
probably don’t get very good grades, huh? You have even less reason to be nervous then. If
you try to go about it with a relaxed mindset, maybe you can even outperform yourself.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei started laughing as he squeezed Jiang Cheng’s hand.
“Uh huh, then I’ll try to relax, see if I can outperform myself.” Jiang Cheng said as he
laughed.
When they arrived at the examination center, the driver did not take their money.
“This here is an Exam Fleet of Compassion,” He said. “We’ve been giving all the examinees
free rides! Hurry up and go in!”
There was still ample time before they were due to enter the examination center, but
crowds were already gathered outside. There were many people and cars here to see the
students off, as well as several police cars and ambulances, beside which were parked free
exam shuttles.
Even ones who were not nervous would get nervous upon seeing a spectacle like this.
“Here! Over here!” Lao-Xu started waving as soon as he spotted them from afar, his voice
already starting to get hoarse.
The two of them walked over and retrieved their admission cards. Quite a few
students and parents were huddled around Lao-Xu, each of them with solemn expressions
on their faces; especially the parents, who seemed a lot more solemn than their kids.
“How did you rest?” Lao-Xu asked.
“Pretty well.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Try to relax, you will have no problems for sure. Don’t drink a lot of water during the
exam,” Lao-Xu said as he pointed to one side. “And go to the washroom first before you go
in.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei smiled. “You should save some for later, if you wear your voice out now, how
are you supposed to continue yelling?”
“I have lozenges.” Lao-Xu said in a hoarse voice, then took out a lozenge from his pocket
and put it in his mouth.
Since it was not yet time to enter the examination center, they found a spot outside away
from the crowd where they could wait.
Gu Fei crouched by the side of the road with a cigarette in his mouth, and Jiang Cheng stood
beside him, spacing out while staring at the top of his head.
For some reason, he was a little nervous now. Not because of the exams, but because of a
baseless feeling of anxiety that he could not pull Gu Fei into his arms in broad daylight in
public.
Of course, the reason he wanted to hug Gu Fei was probably due to exam nerves.
Get a grip, Cheng-ge.
You already threw down the gauntlet, that you will be able to prove yourself no matter what,
Contestant Jiang Cheng.
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the time; there was more than 10 minutes left. He kicked Gu
Fei. “Let’s go to the washroom.”
“Do you need to go,” Gu Fei stood up and looked at him with a smile. “Or are you nervous?”
“Just in case,” Jiang Cheng turned and started toward the washroom, then after a few steps,
turned around again. “But really I’m just nervous. Holy shit, I’m so fucking nervous that I
want to bounce around right now. What’s wrong with me?”
“So even you overachievers get nervous.” Gu Fei laughed as he caught up to Jiang Cheng,
and walked side by side with him. “But it’s the University Entrance Exam after all, very
rarely are there people who don’t get nervous.”
“Are you nervous?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Sure I am,” Gu Fei said. “I can’t let myself fail no matter how much I mess up, so I’m also
nervous.”
Miraculously, there was no one else in the washroom. Jiang Cheng backed up a step to peek
outside and saw that the people behind them were still a good distance away. He dashed
quickly into the washroom behind Gu Fei, who was standing at the urinal about to pee, and
wrapped his arms tightly around him, trapping Gu Fei’s arms to his body.
“Ahh the fuck!” Gu Fei jumped in surprise, then turned slightly and said in a lowered voice.
“I was pulling it out, you almost made me strangle it!”
Jiang Cheng burst out laughing while still holding him. It wasn’t until he heard the voices
outside come closer that he let go and stepped to the side.
When they came out of the washroom, Gu Fei reached out and rubbed Jiang Cheng’s back.
“Hey, Cheng-ge.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You da best~!” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng cracked up again, “Muack-muack~!”
It was soon time to enter the examination center. As they started walking inside, all the
students around them fell into silence. The word “nervous” was plastered on every one of
their faces.
Jiang Cheng however, suddenly felt a calm wash over him. He was often like that—once the
matter was actually before him, he would not be so stressed about it anymore.
Over the past year or so, he had not skimped on all sorts of quizzes and tests, most of which
were pretty high on the difficulty scale. He had gotten through them all, and not once was
his score especially low.
Ever since he was small, Jiang Cheng had never experienced the phenomenon of severely
underperforming below his own skill level. There were only a handful of times when he did
not do well on tests, and even then it was only because he did not prepare properly. Not to
mention, the so-called ‘not doing well’ was only where his parents’ expectations were
concerned. If it was to Pan Zhi’s standard, it would still be classified as overperforming.
After going through the checkpoint, Jiang Cheng sat down in his designated seat and laid
out his things at the corner of the desk according to regulations. Then he looked around
him, but did not see anyone he recognized.
Leaning back in the chair, he closed his eyes and took in a deep breath and released it in a
drawn-out exhale.
Alright. Let’s begin.
From the second the invigilating teacher started to recite the exam hall rules to them, Jiang
Cheng seemed to be isolated in his own little bubble.
The teacher’s voice quickly disappeared; the tiny sounds of papers rustling, the miniscule
thumps of pencils against the desk when everyone picked up their writing utensils, the
quiet dragging of chairs on the floor, the low coughs……
Any and all sounds vanished from his hearing.
With the exam paper spread out in front of him, he picked up his pencil, twirled it once in
his hand, and started to quickly look through the questions.
The person sitting in the seat in front of him was wearing a yellow top. In Jiang Cheng’s
peripheral vision, it looked almost like the yellow light bulb that lit up his nightly study
sessions at his desk. The familiar state that had persisted for almost a year returned to him
in an instant.
There were many books piled up to the right of him, and on his left were all kinds of test
papers and notes. And to the left of that, at the corner of the desk, was usually his
boyfriend. Leaning there, the boyfriend sometimes had one hand propping up his head and
the other hand playing with his phone, and sometimes he was slumped over the desk,
watching him.
And when Jiang Cheng said “quiz me”, his boyfriend would immediately pick up a book and
flip it open.
After looking through the essay question, Jiang Cheng flipped back to the first page and
started answering the questions.
The essay question was not especially difficult. He had not written on that topic before, but
he was able to quickly decide on a theme and, searching his memories, found similar
content that he had written before, that could be used on this.
If he could finish the essay question in the set amount of time he allotted himself, then he
could answer all the questions before that with ease.
Before his eyes were rows and rows of questions, in his ears was the scratching of his
pencil on the answer card, and the sound of his own quiet and even breathing.
All was calm.
A benefit of having done a lot of question banks was that he had a very accurate grasp of
the timing. He did not need to look up at the clock, he could pretty
much guess how much time had passed just by his own speed going through the questions.
Every time Gu Fei timed him on the mock tests, and when he did the practice exams, he
would always start the essay question within 5 minutes of his own designated deadline.
Today was the same. He briefly reviewed the other questions after he finished them. Then
when he looked up at the time, he saw that indeed, his timing was on point.
Contestant Jiang Cheng’s grasp of the time demonstrates just how powerful a master’s psyche
is in a face-off.
At this moment, Contestant Jiang Cheng is in a perfect frame of mind. You can tell by the speed
at which he reviewed his completed answers. There were very few questions he was unsure
about. It would seem that Contestant Jiang Cheng had prepared well for this battle.
Alright, now we will see his analysis and interpretation of the essay section.
……
Now let’s direct our attention back to Contestant Jiang Cheng’s battle status.
Jiang Cheng quickly made a rough outline on his draft paper, and made note of the points
he wanted to include in the various sections, then after he looked once through it to make
sure nothing was amiss, he started writing.
Contestant Jiang Cheng’s handwriting was kind of ugly. He had been training himself
pointedly in the last little while, but when the writing covered large areas like this, it was
still a challenge to give the judge a good impression right off the bat……
If he wanted to keep the writing neat, he would have to compromise on his speed. This was
also why Contestant Jiang Cheng gave himself more time than usual on this section of the
competition.
It would appear that contestant Jiang Cheng is a person with a plan!
As Jiang Cheng wrote down the last full stop on his essay, he glanced at the clock. There was
still time, enough to check over all the other answers one more time.
He gently twirled the pencil a few times between his fingers and quickly went over the
questions from the top. He remembered the few he was unsure about, and focused most of
his time on those during his check.
However, even if he had a different answer upon a second look, he would not
easily change the answers. The first judgment was made at a time before his brain was
scrambled by everything else, and was often the most accurate.
He only changed one answer during the second check, and left the rest untouched.
It was only when the invigilating teacher announced that they had 5 minutes left, did Jiang
Cheng slowly come back from his isolation bubble.
The objects around him gradually regained their colours and movements, and sounds
started to drift back into his ears little by little. The tiny breeze that broke through the air
when the teacher quietly walked past him; the sounds of papers shuffling all around him;
the anxious last minute corrections; an eraser rubbing against the page, gently rocking the
desk with it……
The ringing of the bell that signalled the end of the exam was especially clear.
Jiang Cheng let out a long breath upon hearing the chime, and swiftly sealed all materials
related to the exam away in his mind. Whatever the result would be, it was over. [1]
Walking out of the examination hall, he spotted Gu Fei immediately.
Even from a long ways away, Gu Fei gave him a big grin and arched his brows, the smile
contained in his eyes jolted Jiang Cheng wide awake. When he returned the smile back to
Gu Fei with his face that had been without any expressions for the last two hours, he felt a
thoroughly pleasant feeling spread through him, as though he was stretching out his whole
body.
“How was it?” Gu Fei asked.
“Feeling pretty great about myself.” Jiang Cheng spread his arms out and stretched hard.
“Nothing I was really unsure about. I feel like the difficulty of this one is on a similar level as
the second practice exam… What about you?”
“It was alright,” Gu Fei said. “I feel pretty much the same about any exam anyway; I just
write what I know and make up the rest.”
“Did you make up a lot?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not too much, I more or less have a vague impression. I’ve been studying with my
boyfriend every day after all.” Gu Fei quirked a smile.
Lao-Xu was waiting for them outside, and encouraged his students one by one,
“Good job, you all did a good job! No need to think about it now that you’re done. Take a
break and get some rest. Good luck in the afternoon, I’ll still be waiting for you at the same
spot as I was in the morning…… Jiang Cheng! How was it!”
“Didn’t you say to not think about it now that we’re done?” Jiang Cheng said.
“…… Oh right, right.” There was a brief moment of disappointment in Lao-Xu’s expression,
but he quickly went back to his high spirited tone. “Don’t eat anything too greasy for lunch,
and don’t get too full, make sure to rest well……”
“It went pretty well.” Jiang Cheng interrupted him with a smile.
“You little rascal!” Lao-Xu blinked, then a grin spread so wide on his face that it could
hardly be contained. “How can you tease me at this time! I knew you wouldn’t have any
problems!”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng smiled and nodded at him.
“And what about Gu Fei!” Lao-Xu turned to Gu Fei. “You little rascal probably look the same
no matter how you do, I can never tell with you.”
“It was alright,” Gu Fei said. “At least I did all the questions, and wrote a full essay too.”
“That’s good! You’ll be just fine then!” Lao-Xu clapped him on the shoulder.
“Keep it up in the afternoon!”
They did not plan on going back home at lunch time. Jiang Cheng could never nap after
lunch, whenever he napped, he would sleep like a pig, especially in this kind of weather. If
he got up after a 30 minutes nap, he would need a full hour to go back to full consciousness.
For the sake of keeping his brain in working condition, he must not sleep.
“Should we have dumplings?” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s simple and tastes good, add on a couple
of plates of marinated beef slices……”
“Chilled marinated beef slices?” Gu Fei asked.
“No shit of course, the cold ones taste better.” Jiang Cheng gulped. After a whole morning of
wound up nerves, he was past famished at this point.
“You can’t have cold ones, it might not be clean.” Gu Fei shot down the idea without a
second thought.
“I’ll just have a few cloves of garlic with it.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then go back to the exams with a mouthful of garlic smell?” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Just
dumplings, nothing else.”
“…… Cruel and inhuman.” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“If you don’t like it, keep it to yourself.” Gu Fei turned away from him.
“Don’t copy the way I talk.” Jiang Cheng pulled him back.
“I just did, you got a problem?” Gu Fei turned back and retorted once again viciously. “Keep
it. To yourself.”
Jiang Cheng did not speak as he maintained eye contact and stared back at Gu Fei, but after
a while he couldn’t help but burst out laughing, “Ah fuck.”
“Come come come,” Gu Fei opened his arms. “C’mon, ohhhhhh……”
“You shut up,” Jiang Cheng looked around. Everyone around them was either frowning or
had a grave expression on their face. They were the only ones who giggled as if they had
already finished all of their exams. “Have some dignity will you?”
“Nahhh, what good is dignity? As long as I have you.” Gu Fei said.
“Aiyooo,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Fine then, dumplings it is.”
There was quite a crowd inside the dumpling restaurant, a lot of them examinees. They had
only just sat down when the boss lady came by the table,
“Just finished an exam, huh?”
“Yep.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Here, take your pick,” The boss lady set the menu on their table. “Auntie’s giving all you
examinees half off for the next two days.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Gu Fei still insisted on not getting any cold dishes, but seeing how desperate Jiang Cheng
was for some meat, he ended up ordering a plate of sautéed beef.
Halfway through their meal, Jiang Cheng’s phone rang; it was Pan Zhi,
“Gramps! How was it! Have you straight-up ascended yet!”
“Yeah, you better hold onto my legs,” Jiang Cheng said. “And what about you?
Have you taken off?”
“Taken off my ass, aren’t I supposed to be on the ground holding onto your legs?” Pan Zhi
seemed to be in a pretty good mood, though the biggest strength the guy had was that his
mood could not be shaken even when he got 17% on a test. “Me, I’m just the same old, no
way for me to take off without some sort of miracle.”
“Have you eaten yet? Your mom must’ve prepared a big feast for you, huh?”
Jiang Cheng laughed.
“I’ll be eating in a minute. I just wanted to see how you’re doing, so I can report
back to Lao-Yuan.” Pan Zhi said. “I think he wants to ask but is afraid to, in case it affects
your mood.”
“You can tell him for me, it was pretty good. I performed as well as I usually do and my
mind is calm.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Okay,” Pan Zhi replied. “Keep soaring in the afternoon.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng laughed as he stuffed a dumpling in his mouth.
The businesses around the examination center were all very considerate. The two of them
strolled along the street for a while after lunch, and saw a coffee shop that offered itself as a
free rest stop for examinees and their parents.
They went in, found a booth to sit down, and the server even brought over a jug of freshly
squeezed juice. Gu Fei asked if they could have a warm drink instead, and the server
happily changed it to hot fruit tea.
“You old mammy.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Keep your opinions to yourself.” Gu Fei poured a cup for him. “Drink this and take a good
rest.”
Jiang Cheng smiled as he took a sip, then leaned back in the seat and stretched his legs,
looking out at the gradually emptying street outside.
There were fewer pedestrians and cars now that the examinees and their parents had all
left. Some had gone to eat, and some to nap, so the once bustling street all of a sudden
quieted down.
The sunlight had become a little too stifling, much like the anxiety and restlessness that had
begun to seep through after the calm of having finished one subject.
Only when he turned to look at Gu Fei, sitting beside him with his eyes closed and arms
crossed, did he feel his heart suddenly unclench.
Due to the excellent rest he had at lunchtime, Jiang Cheng felt like he was filled with energy.
Besides, since he had already finished one subject in the morning, he was now used to the
unfamiliar and tense atmosphere of the exam. When he was once again seated in the exam
hall, he was very much relaxed.
Especially since compared to language arts, he was much more confident about math.
Moreover, he did not need to expend energy to focus on his handwriting.
It was easier for Jiang Cheng to get into a flow state when doing math problems, he could
not even hear the sound of his own pencil scratching against the paper.
The only thing he could hear was the incessant mumblings in his own mind as he
worked through each question.
Contestant Jiang Cheng etcetc……
Contestant Jiang Cheng really is a flawless master of problem-solving. He may have chosen the
Humanities stream, but one can still see his excellent STEM
abilities from the way he works through the math problems……
Jiang Cheng kept his old habit while doing the math exam. The first time through, he
quickly solved all the questions that were immediately clear to him, then went back and
worked on the ones that made him hesitate, using the third time to check over his answers
while redoing the few he was still unsure about.
Near the end, his brain was turning so quickly it could stir up a gust of wind.
Even the teacher’s voice announcing the time was blown a far distance away, almost like a
voice calling to him from outside of a dream.
He was still in a bit of a daze as he walked out of the hall after the exam. Only when he
walked all the way to the gates did he finally say to Gu Fei, “I think my math exam went
pretty well too.”
“Fucking hell,” Gu Fei said quietly, his voice filled with relief. “You finally talked. You almost
scared me to death.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng turned to him and started laughing. “I just took some time to come
around.”
“The way you were acting, it’s like you missed all of the compound questions at the back or
something,” Gu Fei let out a long breath. “I didn’t even dare ask.”
“My bad,” Jiang Cheng laughed as he slung his arm over Gu Fei’s shoulder.
“Let’s find somewhere away from people so I can give you a good smooch.”
“…… Let’s go back home and smooch,” Gu Fei gave him a look. “Can you hold it for that
long?”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers.
Lao-Xu was still waiting for them outside, but Jiang Cheng noticed that he clearly did not
look as cheerful as he did in the morning; even his words were a little different.
“Relax, don’t pressure yourself.” Lao-Xu said to him. “Just treat it like a normal test. Make
sure you go home and eat properly, and go to bed early. Relax, relax!”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng did not know why Lao-Xu made a point of telling him to relax, though
he did feel pretty relaxed at the moment. The Humanities comprehensive exam tomorrow
was a little more difficult, since there was too much to memorize. However, he had been
memorizing so much that it was
enough to make a god cry, not to mention the English exam the next afternoon was his
strong suit, so he had nothing to worry about there.
There were many taxis and shuttle buses parked near the examination center, offering free
service to the examinees. The two of them found a vacant taxi and climbed into it.
The driver had so much to say over the entire journey that the cab itself could hardly
contain his words; he was full of all kinds of encouragement, well wishes, and laments over
how he should have studied harder way back when.
His rant was only cut short when a call came in on Gu Fei’s phone.
“Da-Fei!” It was Wang Xu’s voice on the other end, sounding like he was about to cry.
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei was stunned, and immediately anxious. “Are you okay? What’s
wrong?”
“Yi Jing’s done for! Her exam this year is totally done for!” Wang Xu actually started crying.
“What do you mean? Don’t run your mouth,” Gu Fei said. “What do you mean done for,
you’re not even done for, what does she have to be done about?”
“She fainted again during the math exam,” Wang Xu sobbed as he said this. “She got sent to
the hospital halfway through!”
Wang Xu shouted the last sentence into the receiver, so Jiang Cheng heard it very clearly on
the side. He turned to look at Gu Fei in shock, “Yi Jing?”
Gu Fei nodded and asked a few more questions before hanging up.
“You’re not going to console him some more?” Jiang Cheng said. “The way he’s crying.”
“…… I don’t know how to console him.” Gu Fei sighed.
That much was true. It was rare for Gu Fei to give someone a warm expression, let alone
provide consolation. Jiang Cheng frowned, “I wonder what’s going on with Yi Jing. No
wonder Lao-Xu looked upset just now.”
“You and Yi Jing are his biggest hopes,” Gu Fei put his phone back in his pocket, before
turning to him. “But you shouldn’t worry about this, don’t think about……”
“Don’t worry,” Jiang Cheng quirked a smile at him. “It’s not going to affect me.
I just think it’s too bad for Yi Jing.”
“Too much pressure probably,” Gu Fei said. “Since she’s always wanted to get into a good
school……”
“And leave this place, right?” Jiang Cheng smiled. “So she gave it everything she got, all of
her effort and energy, on top of all the pressure.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“You don’t have to worry about that for me.” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a moment,
then turned to him, saying in a very low voice. “Since in my case, I’ve people depending on
me, hm? I need to stand on solid ground, and make sure that every step is steady.”
Footnotes
[1] Humanities exams: language arts, mathematics, foreign language (English),
and one comprehensive Humanities (history+geography+civics). Read more
here. ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6035
TL word count: 4476
TL time: 6:45:31
Edit time: 55:59
Curse words: 4x fuck, 2x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Poor Yi Jing :'(((((
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: October 12, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 103
Ahahahhahahahahahaa!
That evening, Jiang Cheng continued his habit of ‘meditation’, and in his head, combed
through everything he had reviewed and memorized for the subjects being tested on the
next day. He did not touch the books, notes, and other study materials on his desk, and
instead focused only on the material that was already in his mind.
Gu Fei did not follow along with the meditation this time. There was nothing to
‘meditate’ on. Today’s exam was already a surprise to him; it would probably be the best
mark he got in his three years of high school. He only had to keep up with this feeling.
After shutting the bedroom door, he went into the living room and called Wang Xu to ask
how Yi Jing was doing.
Yi Jing was carted off to the hospital before she finished her math exam. When she woke up,
she cried her eyes out and refused to stay in the hospital for a second longer—she wanted
to go home and review for the next day’s exams.
“She still got a high fever,” Wang Xu said. “I feel like her emotional state is a mess right now,
if she goes to the exams like this tomorrow… who knows how she’s gonna do.”
“You’re at her house right now?” Gu Fei asked.
“What right do I have to hang around in her house at this time? Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu went up
there just now,” Wang Xu sighed. “I’ve been standing outside this whole time.”
“You should go home first,” Gu Fei said. “Or are you going to follow her and bomb your own
exams tomorrow.”
“There’s no difference whether I bomb it or not, I’m just here to go through the motions,
you know this. It’s just that,” Wang Xu said. “I wanted to tell you something, Da-Fei, if Yi Jing
bombed her exams this time and has to retake it, I’ll retake it with her.”
Wang Xu said all this with a tone of determination very unlike the way he usually spoke
when he would boast and run his mouth; he sounded solemn and ceremonial. It made Gu
Fei think that this time, he was for real.
Oh the power of young love.
Gu Fei ended the call, lit a cigarette, and held it between his lips as he stood at the window
looking out at the scenery that was more serene than usual.
Compared to Yi Jing, Jiang Cheng was in a much more stable state of mind. It was an aspect
of him that Gu Fei had admired with all his heart. The stubborn self-confidence Jiang Cheng
exuded had a basis.
Even if he was an atypical overachiever, he had the capacity to achieve his goals.
If it was not for Jiang Cheng, Gu Fei figured he would simply go through the motions for the
university entrance exams just as Wang Xu did. He did not know what the point was for
him to take these exams.
Whether he got a high or low score, what difference would it make to him?
However, this whole way as he kept Jiang Cheng company, it seemed on the surface that he
was always coming up with new ways to give Jiang Cheng a peace of mind while he studied,
but more than that, was what Jiang Cheng gave him.
Perhaps Jiang Cheng had not been through as much as he had, perhaps those gaps and
trenches had not been in his way for quite as long, but the strong conviction that Jiang
Cheng had for facing any kind of setback head-on was something that Gu Fei never
possessed.
The more he saw this side of Jiang Cheng, the more sombre he felt.
He had been sunken at the bottom of the river for far too long, had swayed aimlessly along
with the current of sand and mud around him for far too long.
The more he wanted to get closer to Jiang Cheng, the more he could see the clear difference
between them.
It was the first time he approached a test with a proper attitude, and the first time he
genuinely searched his memories for answers before putting pencil to paper.
And what of after? What else could he do? He was suddenly at a loss.
Jiang Cheng went to sleep very early. It was not yet 10 o’clock when he finished combing
through the contents in his mind, and had showered and laid down on the bed. “Boyfriend,
why don’t you sing me a lullaby.”
“…… I’ve never even sung one for Er-Miao.” Gu Fei sat down on the edge of the bed,
considered for a moment, then started in a low voice. “Good little bunny, open the door for
me……”
Jiang Cheng started laughing with his eyes closed, but before Gu Fei was done with the first
round of the song, he was already asleep.
Gu Fei did not feel sleepy. He picked up one of Jiang Cheng’s notebooks, flipped
it open, and started to read it slowly as he leaned against the headboard. He was pretty
impressed with himself, since when reading through the notes, he realized there were a lot
of the things he remembered, and the ones he did not remember well, he at least had a
vague impression.
Who knew if this knowledge was subtly shoved at him by Jiang Cheng, or if he had
begrudgingly bitten it off himself.
He turned and stared at Jiang Cheng, with half his face buried in the pillow. Such an
adorable boyfriend……
After staring for a while, he reached out, picked up a tuft of hair on Jiang Cheng’s forehead,
and rubbed it between his fingers. Before he could rub it again, Jiang Cheng frowned and
retaliated with a slap. Half of the slap landed on Gu Fei’s hand, while the other half of it
landed on Jiang Cheng’s own face.
Then he grumbled to himself,rolled to the other side, and continued sleeping.
Such a badass boyfriend, Gu Fei smiled. So badass that he’s not against hitting himself.
In reality, Jiang Cheng did not sleep that soundly; he tossed and turned for the whole night.
Fortunately, Gu Fei was already used to not going into a deep sleep, so it did not affect him.
He was, however, astounded to find Jiang Cheng looking full of energy in the morning.
“Just one last fight today and we’ll be free.” In the taxi, Jiang Cheng picked out two ginseng
slices and handed one to Gu Fei. “Li Qian’s North American ginseng is not bad, it’s pretty
effective at waking you up.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Try to fill up all the spaces of the big questions on the Humanities Comprehensive Exam.
Even if you only remember one sentence, try to expand on it and drag a few more lines out
of it,” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Got it?
You have good handwriting, if you write more, it gives the teachers a better impression,
and they may just give you a point or two more based on that. Even half a point still
counts.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei chuckled. “How do you still have the energy to worry about me?”
“Not for anyone else,” Jiang Cheng said. “But for you, I have an abundance.”
Once in the exam center, Gu Fei sat down in his seat. This was the last day.
His academic career, something that he had never burdened with much hope,
was coming to a rest today.
Gu Fei never expected to one day have so many feelings about this particular event.
The papers were handed out and spread out in front of him. He picked up his pencil and put
it to the page. Every stroke and every line contained his memories of Jiang Cheng. All of his
memories associated with the questions had to do with Jiang Cheng.
When he encountered familiar looking questions, he would first recall the way Jiang Cheng
had looked when he was memorizing the texts. Some of the
questions he could not remember the details word for word, but he could remember very
clearly the way he quizzed Jiang Cheng on it that one time, or even every time.
It was fascinating really, to think that he would be able to remember so much content—
whether vaguely or otherwise—in this way.
Following Jiang Cheng’s instructions, he filled in as much as he could for the Humanities
Comprehensive Exam that morning, and even added more words when he went back to
check it over.
The English exam in the afternoon was not so easy to maneuver, especially the essay
question. However, he still tried his best to write the sentences at an elementary school
level, piecing together a complete essay of one short sentence after another.
When the last bell of the exams rang, Gu Fei let out a sudden breath of relief.
His heart felt all of a sudden emptied out, and in that instant, his brain was also completely
blank.
Ah, it’s over.
Wonder how the boyfriend is doing on his end.
All kinds of discussions started picking up when everyone crowded out the door together,
as some students began to compare and check answers. There was glee when they got the
right answer, and distress when they got the wrong answer.
Then, somebody started crying.
This kind of crying was very affecting. Within it were feelings of excitement, refusal to
accept one’s fate, loss, and a disorientation of not quite knowing why.
Jiang Cheng did not have so many feelings, he only felt light, as if he had springs under his
feet and balloons tied to his body; he wanted to bounce with every step.
He had done pretty well. According to Jiang Cheng’s astute judgment of himself,
this was at least the second best, if not the best, he had ever performed in all the tests since
the first practice exam. He did not dwell too much on the specific score, and did not plan to,
nor did he plan to check the answers. He had given his all in this fight, he had finished, and
that was that.
All he had left to do now was wait for the conclusion. Prior to its arrival, he would not spare
extra energy to overthink it.
The only thought that filled his mind at the moment was to hurry up and find Gu Fei among
the crowd.
Gu Fei would be waiting for him under the third tree along the road to the main gate every
time. He did not know how every time they came out, Gu Fei was able to walk faster than
him.
As expected, today was no different. He swept his eyes forward and spotted Gu Fei,
standing beneath the tree scanning against the current of the crowd.
Unlike the previous times, Gu Fei was not leaning against the tree today, but standing
upright, straight as a stick.
“How did it go!” Jiang Cheng squeezed past the herd of students, ran up to Gu Fei, and
clapped him and the arm.
“It was okay, I wrote a whole bunch of stuff for the essay too.” Gu Fei smiled as he rubbed
his arm. “English is your strong suit, gonna fly by with a perfect score?”
“Can’t fly,” Jiang Cheng answered with a smile. “There were two questions I still wasn’t sure
about even when I handed it in, but it’s enough.”
“We won’t worry about it then,” Gu Fei stretched. “Come on, Lao-Xu must be waiting for you
outside, going blind with anticipation.”
“I… wonder how Yi Jing did, she still went to her exams today, didn’t she?”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm, Jiuri said she still wanted to do it.” Gu Fei sighed. “She’s pretty stubborn, she
probably can’t just let it go like that. After all, she’s always been the good diligent student,
unlike you.”
“It’s not like I fooled around that much,” Jiang Cheng tutted, then smiled after thinking
about it. “Ayy… though I really wasn’t as hardworking as she was.
Other than my grades, there’s really nothing else that would put me in with the
‘good students’.”
“Says who?” Gu Fei glanced at him.
“I…” Jiang Cheng didn’t continue.
“Every single thing about you is great,” said Gu Fei. “Everything, is great. Your grades are
the last thing on that list.”
“Damn I wanna kiss you so much.” Jiang Cheng said.
“I feel like Lao-Xu will kiss you first.” Gu Fei directed his eyes forward.
“Jiang Cheng! Jiang Cheng!” Lao-Xu was at the front gates, madly waving his folding fan.
“Yeah! Coming!” Jiang Cheng answered, a little amused, and quickened his steps as he
walked up.
“How did it go! Your English is definitely nothing to worry about, it’s your strong suit,
teacher Lu said you’d get a high mark for sure!” Lao-Xu stared at him with sparkling eyes.
“It was pretty good.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Really, it wasn’t bad at all. I feel pretty good
about it myself.”
“That’s good! That’s good! Ayyyy, that’s good!” Lao-Xu repeated over and over, his hand
that was clutching the folding fan was shaking a little.
Jiang Cheng opened his arms and said, “Xu-zong, want a hug?”
“I thought you never let anyone touch you,” Lao-Xu had remembered this fact very well,
every time he patted shoulders and slapped arms he would skip over Jiang Cheng. “Wang
Xu said, if anyone touches you, you hit back.”
Without speaking, Jiang Cheng laughed as he went over and gave Lao-Xu a hug,
“Thank you, Xu-zong.”
“Hey! No problem! Just doing my job! As long as you guys do well on the exam, I’ll be happy
and content as can be.” Lao-Xu patted Jiang Cheng’s back, a little excited. “Good boy!”
Just as Jiang Cheng was about to let go, Lao-Xu suddenly cupped his hands on Jiang Cheng’s
head and landed a loud smooch on his cheek, “Good boy!”
“What the shit!” Jiang Cheng immediately sprang backward by at least a meter, almost
knocking over Gu Fei, who was standing behind him. “Xu-Zong, have you gone mad!”
“I’m just happy, overjoyed.” Lao-Xu laughed cheerfully.
“I… you stay far away from me!” Jiang Cheng rubbed his cheek with his hand.
“That’s enough from you!”
“You two get on that bus,” Lao-Xu grinned and pointed at a bus parked on the
side of the road. “We’ll head right back to school later, you can leave once you pick up your
application guide book.”
There were already some Fourth High students on the bus, which was loud with clamours.
Those who did not place any hopes in the exams were all chatting away at this point. After
passing this hurdle, they all wanted to let loose and have fun, regardless of whether the end
result was life or death. There were also several students who were quiet as they stared
blankly out the window, and a few whose eyes were red. But more than that, people were
comparing answers. When one question gave rise to three different answers, they were all
a little horrified.
“That’s why you can’t check answers right now, no matter how you check it, you can’t go
back to the exam center and change it.” Jiang Cheng sat down in the last row. “Who knows if
you were really wrong or if you just remembered wrong, or maybe it’s the other person
who remembered wrong. You’ll only be scaring yourself.”
“Mhm, Cheng-ge is right.” Gu Fei nodded.
“After all this checking, they can’t even let loose and play before the scores come out.” Jiang
Cheng said quietly. “Either way, I feel fantastic about myself.
I’ll ride this feeling out and enjoy myself first.”
“Mhm yep, Cheng-ge is right.” Gu Fei continued to nod.
“You looking to be smacked?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“If Cheng-ge wants to, Cheng-ge can smack. The logic is on Cheng-ge’s side, long live Cheng-
ge.” Gu Fei turned to him and smiled.
“You just have to run your mouth.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
There was some fatigue showing on Gu Fei’s face. Even though he had not exactly been
dedicating himself to studying for most of this year, he had spent his energy on taking care
of somebody else’s studies. It was only now that his closely wound up nerves suddenly
relaxed, and he started to show some weariness.
Jiang Cheng squeezed closer to Gu Fei and took his hand in the space between their legs.
Gu Fei’s hand was very warm. Even on the air conditioned bus, it did not take long for his
palm to get clammy.
When they arrived at school and back to their classroom, everyone was a little wistful from
the intensely familiar feeling that, because of their short absence, had turned a little
strange.
The classroom was noisy, everyone was talking. Jiang Cheng sat down in his seat and
looked at the classmates he had spent the past year and a half with, and realized that there
were still quite a few he could not remember the names of.
He had never paid attention to them before, and it was only at this moment, with all these
faces suddenly in front of him, that he realized he could hardly take it all in.
Yi Jing was not there. Apparently her parents had taken her home immediately after the
English exam; Jiang Cheng wondered how she was doing as he turned to look toward Wang
Xu’s direction.
Wang Xu was also chatting with the others, but he was obviously a little distracted, and in
low spirits.
Somebody nearby mentioned Yi Jing, and the lively rambunctious atmosphere all of a
sudden cooled down. At times like these, people’s emotions tended to become much more
sensitive, such that any tiny ripple would be magnified. Not to mention, this was their class
leader who always carried some authority among them. Several girls immediately started
crying over their desks.
Jiang Cheng’s face did not betray any emotion. He leaned back in his chair, and could not
figure out what exactly he was feeling at the moment. He only held onto Gu Fei’s hand
under the desk.
It was the first time in all this time that he was sitting there and not reading a textbook, not
working on questions, not taking notes. He simply sat there, quietly.
Lao-Xu entered the classroom and said something, but Jiang Cheng did not hear what he
said, only that they were going out for dinner together the next evening, and that he hoped
everyone could attend. It would be the last class-wide activity of their high school life.
“Ayy… it’s time for the farewell dinner.” Somebody said.
Jiang Cheng’s hand trembled ever so slightly. His heart suddenly clenched at that word.
That’s right. It’s over.
High school life was over just like that. He did not even get to stop and savour it properly
before it was already past. And by the time he looked back, it was all only a memory.
And this last year of it, was already starting to blur together.
Gu Fei must have felt it too, so he lightly squeezed the hand he was holding.
Jiang Cheng turned to face Gu Fei, who gave him a smile as he said, “How
nice.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked back at him, a little dazed.
“That I got to meet you during high school.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng snapped back to the present and smiled, “Yeah, how fortunate to have met you.
Lao-Xu gave each of them a guidebook that contained general information about various
universities and programs. Jiang Cheng gave it a cursory flip through before he closed it.
He almost felt a little dizzy upon seeing these large chunks of text now, he did not want to
spare it another glance, not that he could take any of it in anyway.
But no matter, he only had a handful of schools in mind, he just needed to wait for the final
score to come out before making a decision.
“Come on,” Gu Fei said. “Let’s go back.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng stood up. As they walked out of the classroom, he heard a few people
talking about visiting Yi Jing, so he nudged Gu Fei. “Should we maybe go check on Yi Jing?”
“I’ll go by myself,” Gu Fei said. “You… hold off for now, maybe give it some time.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Let’s go back, take a shower first and clean up. I’ll take you out for a big feast tonight.” Gu
Fei said. “Now that you’re free, you can eat whatever you want, however much you want,
no need to worry about food poisoning or getting sick anymore.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “I actually had a whole list of things I wanted to eat, but
when you put it like that, I suddenly don’t know what to pick.”
“No rush, let’s go to the downtown square, there’s lots of food there. We’ll walk around, and
if you see anything you want to eat, we’ll go in.” Gu Fei smiled.
“I’m also ready to let go and eat, I’m so sick and tired of eating my own cooking.”
“We should probably bring Er-Miao huh,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s also been a long time since
she got to feast with us.”
“We’ll bring her next time. It’ll be just the two of us today,” Gu Fei snapped his fingers. “No
third wheels allowed. She’s not only a third wheel, but a particularly large one too.”
“Alrighty.” Jiang Cheng giggled as he nodded, then a few steps later, suddenly whipped his
head around and stared at him. “Gu Fei!”
“Huh?” Gu Fei immediately answered and looked at him. “What is it?”
“So uh… later, when we get back…” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt embarrassed just as the
words reached the tip of his tongue. “Are… uh…”
“Do it first before going out, right?” Gu Fei asked.
“What the fuck,” Jiang Cheng said, looking at him. “How can you be so shameless? How can
you just come out and say it so smoothly like that, do you not have any shame!”
“… Was it you the other day who said you’re not doing anything but me this summer?” Gu
Fei stared back at him. “Now you’re going to turn around and act innocent? You’re the
shameless one.”
“Wait,” Jiang Cheng could not stop laughing once he started thinking about it. “I really was a
little embarrassed just now. I mean it’s been a while since we rolled around, so bringing it
up suddenly, I was just… a little self-conscious.”
“You just better not tell me please thank you and you’re welcome later.” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded while still holding in a laugh.
It had been a long time since Jiang Cheng felt so light on his way back from school. There
was not a single key point in his mind, not a single equation, historical year, geographical
landmark, or grammar rule… There was only Gu Fei.
Neck, shoulder, collar bone, abs, thighs, calves, and ass!
Ahahahhahahahahahaa!
As they went up the stairs, he genuinely could not hold himself back from grabbing Gu Fei’s
butt.
“Right here,” Gu Fei turned back to look at him, then pointed at the window at the side of
the stairwell. “You wanna bet that tossing you out the window won’t even require both of
my arms?”
“I believe you.” Jiang Cheng skipped past him and ran up the stairs, taking another swipe at
Gu Fei’s waist as he did. “But you wouldn’t do that to me, hoho.”
“Weirdo.” Gu Fei said quietly, then ran up the stairs behind Jiang Cheng.
As soon as he went through the door, Jiang Cheng flung his shirt off and launched himself at
Gu Fei, pelting him with kisses, before pushing him onto the sofa and running his hands
beneath Gu Fei’s shirt.
“Hey,” Gu Fei laughed as he responded in kind. “The remote control is poking at my back,
hold on…”
Jiang Cheng did not listen as he continued rubbing his face into the side of Gu Fei’s neck.
After pulling the remote control out and tossing it onto the coffee table, Gu Fei held Jiang
Cheng tightly, but Jiang Cheng suddenly propped himself up against the sofa and frowned
as he stared at Gu Fei.
“What’s up?” Gu Fei stroked his chin.
“Why do you feel so hot?” Jiang Cheng touched Gu Fei’s skin, it was burning.
“Must be the excitement of course,” Gu Fei thrusted his hips up. “When I get excited I…”
“You have a fever,” Jiang Cheng leaned down and pressed his lips to Gu Fei’s forehead, then
whipped his head up. “Fuck! I was wondering why your hand was so hot this whole time!
Where’s the thermometer!”
Gu Fei pulled on Jiang Cheng to stop him from getting up, “Cheng-ge, Cheng-ge, don’t get off
track.”
“Off your ass,” Jiang Cheng shook his hand off and stood up. He rummaged around in the
coffee table drawers, found the digital thermometer Gu Fei had bought to monitor his
health during the study period, and checked it against Gu Fei’s forehead, then froze. “Fuck,
it’s 38 degrees!”
“Hmm, 38 degrees… still fuckable.” Gu Fei smiled. “And you know, these digital ones aren’t
accurate.”
“Get out of here,” Jiang Cheng was frowning. He did not know why Gu Fei suddenly had a
fever, and he was immediately anxious even as his heart hurt for Gu Fei. “Did you catch a
cold? Or was it…”
He took Gu Fei’s temperature a few more times in a row, and ended up with 38-point-
something every time.
“I’m fine,” Gu Fei stroked Jiang Cheng’s face as he sat up. “Really, I don’t even feel anything.”
“Bull-fuckitty-shit!” Jiang Cheng glared at him. Gu Fei’s hand was burning hot, the sensation
of which was now as clear as day. “I was wondering why you didn’t seem that energized
since coming out of the exams! You haven’t been
feeling well for a while and just didn’t tell me, right?!”
“Ayy……” Gu Fei sighed even as he smiled.
“We have to go to the hospital,” Jiang Cheng grabbed his hand and tugged on it.
“Hurry up.”
“I’ll be fine with some rest, really.” Gu Fei did not move, then finally said very quietly. “I
don’t really have any energy right now, I don’t wanna move.”
Jiang Cheng felt a pang in his heart, it almost felt sore.
Perhaps it was because they had just gone through a major life event like the University
Entrance Exam, that even as an overachiever, his emotions at the moment were still prone
to fluctuations…
Jiang Cheng pulled Gu Fei into his arms and held him tight. His hands were trembling when
they touched Gu Fei’s burning body.
His heart was practically shuddering with pain for Gu Fei.
And just like that, tears came pouring out uncontrollably.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6220
TL word count: 4559
TL time: 5:28:19
Edit time: 17:52
Curse words: 5x fuck, 3x shits, 4x asses
TL’s Notes:
EXAM OVER WOOHOOOO~
If you haven’t yet, this is a good time to buy the novel on jjwxc; 撒野 is the title to search for if
you’re using the app, and here is a step-by-step tutorial from
Cuchallain to guide you through it! If you run into any problems, feel free to dm me on
twitter @amidstwoods :3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: October 25, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 104
“Hold.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng’s tears did not seep out, they gushed, without gaps and without pause, entirely
out of control, flowing madly down. He could even feel very clearly the tears making one,
and then two distinct tracks down his cheeks, which very quickly merged into a whole area
of wet tears.
All this time, Jiang Cheng felt like he had gotten rid of all distractions. Other than studying,
he had not thought of anything else. At most, he needed out of habit to be able to spot Gu
Fei in the corner of his eyes, to feel grounded.
Aside from that, he had no extraneous thoughts in his mind. It was only when listening to
his classmates’ conversations today that he found out that someone else had also fallen sick
in the class next door, and that there had been a fight that ranged all the way from the third
floor to the ground floor—causing quite a ruckus. But he did not know any of this.
All this time, his mind had been completely filled to the brim and his nerves tightly wound.
Until now.
All the heavy burdens had been set down, all the pressure thrown off, and all the emotions
let back into his body. It felt as though the closed container he had resided in suddenly
opened its lid. What he saw with his eyes, heard with his ears, experienced, felt, all of it
suddenly became clear—even clearer than before.
And it was with these renewed senses that he saw Gu Fei’s wearied countenance and heard
his weakened voice. It was as if Jiang Cheng had only just realized all the various,
compounded stress that Gu Fei had carried over these past several months.
He could hardly bear the remorse and ache he felt at this moment.
Day after day, Gu Fei had taken care of his own house, the store, while also looking after
him. He had to make time to spend with Gu Miao; make time to watch the store, to bring in
stock; he looked up recipes every day to make sure Jiang Cheng was getting the proper
nutrition in his meals, and kept Jiang Cheng company while he studied…
Jiang Cheng always thought that studying was hard work, he always felt tired, but never did
notice how tiring it must have been for Gu Fei—working round the clock every single day,
always keeping him company until midnight, only sleeping after he fell asleep, and always
waking up before he woke up.
Compared to his own, simpler kind of “tired”, Gu Fei’s fatigue was by far the
more difficult to bear.
“I’m sorry,” Jiang Cheng held Gu Fei, and felt his whole body burning up like a little furnace,
scorching waves of panic into his own heart. “I’m so sorry, Gu Fei.”
“I was afraid you would say that.” It could be that Gu Fei had finally relaxed, or it could be
that the fever really was getting to him, but his voice was starting to sound hoarse. “‘I’m
sorry’ and stuff, I was afraid you would say that.”
“I really…” Jiang Cheng lowered his head and wiped his tears against Gu Fei’s shoulder, but
as soon as he finished wiping, more tears rushed out almost without pause. “I really never
considered if you would feel tired all this time.”
“I didn’t even feel tired myself,” Gu Fei gently rubbed Jiang Cheng’s back.
“Besides, a lot of people fall sick after the exams…”
“Don’t be mad at me,” Jiang Cheng tried his best to curb his tears; he could hardly even
speak properly while crying like this, he could not stop trembling every time he opened his
mouth. He kissed Gu Fei’s neck, but when his lips touched Gu Fei’s burning hot skin, the
barely controlled tears broke out of its dam again. “Don’t be mad at me.”
“I’m not mad at you,” Gu Fei smiled. “Why would I get mad at you? I didn’t even connect this
to you.”
“Stop talking,” Jiang Cheng held him tight. “My heart hurts hearing you talk like this.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei answered, and did not say any more.
With eyes shut, Jiang Cheng held Gu Fei tightly in his arms, he only loosened his grip when
he felt his lower back getting stiff.
But Gu Fei did not move. Jiang Cheng turned and realized that Gu Fei had fallen asleep
against his shoulder.
Jiang Cheng braced one hand against the back of the sofa to keep steady, while he held Gu
Fei with his other hand and lowered him slowly onto the sofa. Then he ran into the
bedroom and brought a small pillow, stuffing it under Gu Fei’s head. He also brought a
blanket and draped it over Gu Fei, wrapping it tightly around his whole body.
Having done all this, Jiang Cheng stood in the middle of the living room, unsure of what to
do next.
He spaced for a while, then went to wet a towel before setting it carefully on top of Gu Fei’s
forehead.
He originally wanted to use an icy cold towel, but Gu Fei was sleeping so soundly that he
did not want to risk waking him up.
After walking a few circles around the room, Jiang Cheng brought over a little stool, set it
down in front of the sofa, and sat there staring at Gu Fei’s face.
Gu Fei’s face was still flushed, though Jiang Cheng could not tell if it was from the fever or
from being completely wrapped up. It could also be both. He reached back for the
thermometer and checked Gu Fei’s temperature again.
It was still 38.3 degrees, not much different than before. Of course, there would not be
much change in a few short minutes.
After a while, he removed the towel. In that short period of time, the towel already felt
warm to the touch. He went into the washroom and soaked it through with cold water
again before wringing it out, then set it back on Gu Fei’s forehead.
Gu Fei had always been very healthy. In Jiang Cheng’s memory, he had never really gotten
sick before, not even with a small cold. But for people who never got sick, when they did it
was with a colossal force.
Jiang Cheng checked Gu Fei’s temperature two more times, once it read 38.3, and the other
time it was 38.4.
Fuck. How is it still rising!
He was having trouble sitting still, when he remembered that Gu Fei said the digital ones
weren’t accurate, so he dashed swiftly out the door, jumped on his bike, and pedaled hard
toward the community clinic.
He needed to buy a mercury thermometer, and along the way go to the
community clinic to see if he could get some medicine.
He had just charged up to the clinic, when he saw Li Yan walking out of Gu Fei’s family’s
store, pulling out his phone and dialing as he crouched down on the front stoops.
“Li Yan!” Jiang Cheng called out to him.
“Huh?” Li Yan turned. “How come you’re here by yourself? I was just calling Gu Fei, is he…”
“Don’t call him!” Jiang Cheng hopped off his bike. “He’s sleeping right now, he’s got a fever!”
“Fever?” Li Yan hung up the call, a little surprised. “He has a fever? His constitution is as
solid as the Bull Demon God, how can he have a fever?”
“Who knows if the Bull Demon God never gets a fever?” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s not like
you’re the Iron Fan Princess…”
“And what if I am,” Li Yan tutted. “What’s his temperature?”
“Thirty-eight-point-something. I was worried the digital thermometers weren’t accurate, so
I came to buy one of those mercury ones.” Jiang Cheng said with knitted brows.
Li Yan went into the clinic with him. The doctor gave Jiang Cheng a mercury thermometer
and two pills for reducing fever, then said, “There’s quite a few people who fall sick after
the exams, it shouldn’t be too big of a problem. He can take the medicine later, but make
sure he gets plenty of fluids so he doesn’t get dehydrated. If his fever is still high tonight or
if it goes up, you can bring him back here to check and see if there’s any other problems.”
Jiang Cheng took the thermometer and medicine, and coming out of the clinic, finally
remembered to ask Li Yan, “So why did you come here?”
“Well, I thought we can all have a meal together now that you’re done with your exams,” Li
Yan said. “Who would’ve guessed that he would get sick.”
“Then…” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Oh don’t mind me, you hurry back and wait on him.” Li Yan checked the time.
“I’ll just keep watch here. I’ll lock the doors later.”
“Where’s his mom?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“As soon as I got here, she took Er-Miao out to buy clothes, with that little hubby of hers.”
Said Li Yan.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then asked again after he got on the bike. “So for steamed eggs…”
“What steam, what eggs? He probably shouldn’t have such high protein foods when he still
has a fever.” Li Yan cut him off, then said after some thought.
“Food wise, you can just go with plain congee, plain noodles, or something.”
“How horrible that must taste,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Will he be able to keep it down?”
“Don’t worry, he’s very good at bearing unpleasant things.” Li Yan said. “He’d even be able
to eat shit if it doesn’t stink.” [1]
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then let out a big sigh.
“It’s the truth,” Li Yan smiled. “You should hurry back.”
Li Yan’s words were gross, but he did seem to be telling the truth. Gu Fei really was good at
bearing unpleasant things. No matter what it was, he was able to bear it, and always
without making so much as a peep.
He could even imagine the way Gu Fei would look when faced with plain congee and
noodles—unhappy, but still calmly finishing a whole bowl.
And so he felt another surge of heartache.
“Do they have noodles in their store?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Like a really fancy, really tasty
kind?”
“… Wait here, I’ll get it for you.” Li Yan turned back into the store, and quickly brought back
a plastic bag containing a pail of noodles, as well as a few bottles of seasoning. “This one, I
made it a while ago, the texture is really smooth. And these seasonings, all kinds of sauce-
this and yum-that, you can throw them in to taste.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng hung the bag from the handlebar and flew back to his apartment on
the bike.
Gu Fei was still asleep. By the looks of it, he had not woken up.
Jiang Cheng set the things in the kitchen before coming out and wringing the towel out
again in cold water, and placed it on Gu Fei’s forehead.
The digital thermometer still read 38.2 degrees, which was not that different from before.
Jiang Cheng very carefully lifted the covers, trying to stick the mercury thermometer under
Gu Fei’s armpits. Just as his hand touched Gu Fei’s arm, Gu Fei groaned quietly, “Hmmm?”
“Keep sleeping. Sleep.” Jiang Cheng immediately said in a quiet voice. “I’m just taking your
temperature.”
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei mumbled his name incoherently.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng answered as he stuffed the thermometer in place.
“I don’t feel good.” Gu Fei murmured with his eyes closed.
His voice was still hoarse, and his tone contained a note of grievance. At the very sound of it
Jiang Cheng almost could not bear it anymore. His heart felt sore, as if something was
clawing inside his chest, and his nose twinged in waves.
“I know, I know,” Jiang Cheng tucked the covers under him and stroked his face gently. “Just
a little longer. I got medicine, later you can eat some food then take the medicine, and you’ll
feel better.”
“What food?” Gu Fei asked.
“I ran into Li Yan just now,” Jiang Cheng said. “He said when you have a fever you can only
eat bland foods, like plain congee or noodles.”
“That bastard,” Gu Fei said quietly. “Must be on purpose.”
“Then what do you want to eat? I’ll make it for you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei let out another couple of groans and murmured something unintelligible, then fell
asleep again.
Jiang Cheng figured Gu Fei was knocking his cooking skills. Although with plain congee and
noodles… he would not have any difficulty with those. After all, he used to cook noodles for
himself all the time.
However, Gu Fei never did say what he wanted to eat before he fell asleep again, so Jiang
Cheng got up, went into the kitchen, and put the congee on first. For plain congee, all you
need is to put rice and water together, then turn the rice cooker to the congee setting. It
was easy.
Just as he pressed down on the button, his phone rang in his pocket. In fumbling for it, he
did not even look at the screen as he pulled it out and picked up the call right away. He was
afraid that one more ring would wake Gu Fei up.
“Who is it?” He asked.
“The hell? Cheng-er?” It was Pan Zhi’s voice coming from the other end. “You deleted my
number?”
“Why would I delete your number.” Jiang Cheng closed the kitchen door.
“Then why did you ask who I am! Don’t you have call display!” Pan Zhi said.
“I didn’t look,” Jiang Cheng said. “What is it?”
“… Fuck.” Pan Zhi’s voice was tinged with grief and indignation. “Can’t I give you a call for
no reason anymore?”
“I was just asking.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Though it’s not like I’m calling for no reason, I do have a reason.” Pan Zhi said.
“How did it go? Do you feel particularly fantastic after finishing the exams?”
“It’s alright.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Have you checked your answers? Should be no problem getting into B.
University or something, huh?” Pan Zhi asked. [2]
“I didn’t check, but I’ll find out soon enough when the scores come out.” Jiang
Cheng said. “I just feel pretty good overall, can’t bother to waste my time worrying over the
other things.”
“Check out this overachiever energy.” Pan Zhi exclaimed. “I did a little calculation; I might
be able to crawl my way into a third-tier. Either way when the time comes, I’ll fight my
mom if I have to, to end up in the same city as you.”
“You don’t have a girlfriend these days, do you,” Jiang Cheng said. “That you’d wanna hang
around me instead.”
“I’ll have to prioritize you even if I have a girlfriend.” Pan Zhi laughed.
“Besides, how can I have a genuine romance at this time, who knows if there are better girls
waiting for me in university.”
“The way you act,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “None of the good girls will glance your way.”
“What if one just happens to be blind?” Pan Zhi cackled along without a care.
“Oh hey, how’s Gu Fei doing? I even sent him a message earlier to ask after him, and he
never replied. Is he in pain from bombing the exams?”
“How can he possibly be in pain from something like that,” Jiang Cheng said.
“He has a fever, so he’s sleeping right now… Oh yeah you’re right on time, ask your mom for
me, how can I make plain congee and noodles taste better?”
“Fever?” Pan Zhi paused. “I always thought if one of you is going to collapse after the exams
that it’d be you, how come he fell first? Give me a second, I’ll ask my mom and then message
you back.”
Right… If one of them was going to crumple after the exams, it should’ve been himself. No
one had expected it to be Gu Fei.
He was the only one who knew why Gu Fei had fallen sick.
Jiang Cheng felt terrible again at the thought of it, that he only realized why Gu Fei had
fallen sick after he already fell.
He went back to the living room, sat down on the little stool, and watched Gu Fei.
He had really never seen Gu Fei sick like this, it was a particularly pitiable sight.
The thermometer was about ready to be removed. Jiang Cheng hesitated for a long time; he
was reluctant to lift the covers and risk disturbing Gu Fei.
It was not until Gu Fei stirred on his own, that he seized the opportunity to quickly lift up
the covers and yank the thermometer out.
“Hmmm?” Gu Fei murmured again dazedly.
“Did I wake you?” Jiang Cheng hurried to tuck the covers back in. “I’m just grabbing the
thermometer.”
“How much is it?” Gu Fei was still in a daze.
“Let me see…” Jiang Cheng looked down at the thermometer he was holding.
The problem with these things was that, one never knew where exactly to look.
Jiang Cheng rotated it between his fingers about 7264 times, yet he still could not see
where the line of mercury was supposed to be. The thicker tubes were easier, but the
doctor had given him one of the thin ones.
“Ah fuck!” Anxiously, he lifted the thermometer up toward to the light, but after a while still
did not manage to find it. The more frazzled he got, the more trouble he had with reading it.
He said in a lowered voice, a little irritated, “I bet this thing was never designed to be read
by humans!”
“Give me.” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng handed the thermometer to Gu Fei in resignation, “Have I gone blind?”
Gu Fei smiled and did not say anything, still looking pretty weak. Holding the thermometer,
he casually turned it about half a rotation and said, “38.1.”
“Then the digital one is still fairly accurate.” Jiang Cheng let out a sigh and set the
thermometer to one side, before tucking Gu Fei back in. “You can sleep for a little longer. I
made congee, but if you don’t want to eat that, I’ll cook some noodles later when you feel
like eating.”
“It’s so hot.” Gu Fei said.
“You’re sweating, of course it’s hot.” Jiang Cheng half-kneeled on the sofa and gently
stroked Gu Fei’s nose with his finger. “You’ll be better once you sweat it out. Do you want
some water? The doctor said you have to drink lots of water so you don’t get dehydrated.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei closed his eyes and answered.
Jiang Cheng mixed a glass of warm water for him, then after some thought, put a straw in
there too. These straws were saved from containers of yogurt he bought.
Jiang Cheng liked to eat yogurt with a spoon, so Gu Fei removed the straws from the
packaging and saved it all, saying that they might come in use one day.
Well, that day has come.
“Here, hold this in your mouth.” Jiang Cheng knelt down beside Gu Fei and
lightly tapped the straw against Gu Fei’s lips.
“Sounds like you’re beckoning a puppy.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Drink,” Jiang Cheng also smiled. “Drink up.”
Gu Fei used the straw and sipped up more than half a glass of water, then let out a long
breath, “I can just have plain congee later.”
“Noodles wouldn’t be any trouble either,” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t you try to still consider
me when you’re like this.”
“It’s just that, the noodles you make,” With his eyes closed, Gu Fei’s lips twitched up.
“Probably taste worse than plain congee.”
“Shit,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Alrighty then. You can lie here for a little while longer, I’ll call
you when the congee’s ready.”
“Mmn.” Gu Fei answered, then quickly fell asleep again.
Pan Zhi had sent him a message:
- my mom said noodles aren’t as easy to digest, congee is better. After it’s cooked, you can
throw some finely chopped leafy greens in there, then mix in some oyster sauce and
sesame oil, and that’ll be good. Or get some fermented tofu to pair on the side.
- thank your mom for me
- I pre-thanked her already
Jiang Cheng smiled and set his phone to the side. After changing Gu Fei’s towel again, he sat
down on the little stool and continued staring at Gu Fei.
He was so used to seeing the stoic Gu Fei, who treated others coolly and smiled at him. And
now all of a sudden, seeing Gu Fei so weak with an indefinable sense of vulnerability about
him, he also felt an indescribable mushy feeling spread in his heart.
Jiang Cheng wanted to give Gu Fei a little kiss, and a little hug.
He leaned in, and very gently touched Gu Fei’s lips with his own.
Gu Fei had just drank water, and his lips were still a little moist. It felt very pleasant as he
touched it with the lightest contact.
Only when the rice cooker “dinged” in the kitchen did Jiang Cheng get up. He planned to
rework the congee according to Pan Zhi’s mom’s instructions.
But perhaps he had been sitting down for too long, and had gotten up too
abruptly, he almost fell over when he turned around. He had to brace against the table
nearby to steady himself and take a moment for the stars to disappear from his sight before
he could run on tiptoes into the kitchen.
To ogle at his boyfriend to such an extent must qualify as some kind of extreme dedication.
He washed a few vegetable leaves, finely chopped them, and scattered them into the
finished congee before giving it a stir. Then he put in a couple drops of oyster sauce and
sesame oil. It had to be relatively bland, after all, but just a little bit of flavour should be
enough.
Gu Fei opened his eyes when Jiang Cheng set the bowl of congee on the coffee table, “Smells
good.”
“You’re awake?” Jiang Cheng leaned close and touched Gu Fei’s face. It still felt pretty hot to
the touch.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei moved his hand. “Let me have a taste.”
Jiang Cheng helped him sit up on the sofa, then wrapped him up with the blanket again.
“How…” Gu Fei looked at him. “Am I supposed to eat?”
“I’ll feed you.” Jiang Cheng picked up the bowl with one hand and held the spoon in the
other, sitting down on the coffee table face to face with him.
Gu Fei did not answer as he started laughing. Due to his weakened state, even his laugh
sounded like a struggle.
“What are you laughing at,” Jiang Cheng scooped a spoonful of congee and took a little taste
first. To his surprise, it was actually pretty good, though he might just be hungry. “It’s not
bad. Here, you try it.”
“I just thought it was a little funny,” Gu Fei opened his mouth. “Hmm, not bad.
Did you add oyster sauce?”
“Just a tiny bit,” Jiang Cheng said, delivering another spoonful into Gu Fei’s mouth. “I didn’t
dare add too much, in case you don’t like the taste.”
“But honestly,” Gu Fei said as he ate. “It’s just a fever, it’s really not a big deal.”
“You’ve practically passed out, and your voice is hoarse,” Jiang Cheng frowned.
“What exactly counts as a big deal for you, mister?”
“I just needed sleep, that’s all.” Gu Fei said.
“You know what, Gu Fei?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “I don’t like seeing you
like this, the way you grit your teeth and hold it in like an ass.”
Gu Fei looked back at him without a word.
“What, am I wrong?” Jiang Cheng said. “I don’t care if you hold it in with other people, but
what are you holding it in front of me for? Can’t you just let yourself be vulnerable in front
of me? The way you’re burning up all over, I could get some thermal therapy just by holding
you in my arms…”
“Then hold me.” Gu Fei said.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“Hold.” Gu Fei said.
Gu Fei’s slightly hoarse, slightly nasally “hold”, tinged with the tiniest smidge of whininess
of someone asking to be spoiled, practically exploded in Jiang Cheng’s ears like a little
flower crackling with electricity. His heart instantly turned to mush, and he could hardly
hold the bowl in his hand.
“I’ll hold you after you finish this bowl.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Gu Fei was definitely still feeling pretty bad at this point. He was not usually a big eater, but
today, he only had half a bowl of congee before he was full.
Jiang Cheng finished the remaining half, then went to the kitchen and ate another bowl, and
finally felt his hunger somewhat sated.
By the time he went back to the living room, Gu Fei was still sitting on the sofa wrapped in
a blanket, though his eyes were closed.
Jiang Cheng checked his temperature again, this time it was only 38 degrees. It might be a
minuscule decrease, but at least it did not continue going up. Perhaps Gu Fei was right,
getting a fever was not an especially big deal. However, Gu Fei’s current condition was not
just a simple fever, it was the fatigue he had accumulated over a long period of time, finally
erupting. Otherwise, he would not be so weak and fall asleep so easily like this.
“Hey little cocoon,” Jiang Cheng touched his hand against Gu Fei’s forehead.
“Why don’t you lie down, or do you want to go sleep on the bed?”
Without a word, Gu Fei opened his eyes and looked at Jiang Cheng.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked back at him. “What’s wrong?”
Still Gu Fei did not speak.
Jiang Cheng held a staring contest with him for a long time before suddenly remembering,
“Ah, ahhhhhhhhhh! Hug hug. Coming right up, I’m coming.”
He sat down next to Gu Fei and pulled him, blanket and all, into a tight embrace,
“Cheng-ge hug.”
“Sing something for me, Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei leaned against him and closed his eyes again. “A
lullaby.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. “Good little bun-bun, open the door hun, hurry up
and open, I want to come in…”
Footnotes:
[1]: This is where my translation fails. The word here is 忍, which you may associate with
ninjas lol. The meaning of this verb can include holding back (emotions), bearing with
(unpleasant) things, including hardship, or tolerating (pain). For Gu Fei, I believe his 忍
includes all these things. The character 忍 is a blade [刃] over a heart [心]. ↑
[2]: To avoid disturbing real life places, Wuzhe avoids giving these places names, because
even if they make up a name, with China’s large population, it’s still a real possibility that it
will coincide with something else. Though it’s pretty much an open secret that “B.
University” is Beijing University. ↑
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6215
TL word count: 4510
TL time: 5:25:08
Edit time: 54:55
Curse words: 3x fuck, 2x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
As some of you who are on twitter may know, jjwxc has locked Sa Ye on their platform.
Here is some more information, this is along with Fake Slackers, TGCF, and 2Ha. Last
month jj also locked Priest’s Guardian, Shapolang, and Tianyake. The books are currently
completely inaccessible on jjwxc, which means you can’t read it, buy it, or even go to the
summary page. The thread I linked to also has Wuzhe’s own comment on the matter,
they’re basically trying to calm their fans and telling them not to worry. This gives me hope
that perhaps Wuzhe knows it’s a temporary lock that will be lifted at a later date. Or maybe
not. This comes on the heel of many censorship crackdowns on popular media by the
Chinese government this year, especially regarding BL and danmei

content.
That said, please use your own judgement when you see certain takes going around on
the social media claiming to know what exactly is happening with the lockdown and when
the ban will be lifted, nobody knows anything really (that’s the nature of that govt
administration), everyone is just guessing, so beware of theories that sound just a tad too
much like conspiracies. And please try not to speculate too much on the situation.
Sometimes wild theories become so widespread that people take it as the truth, even when
they don’t really know the country or the culture.
As for this translation—a couple of worried readers have already reached out to ask me if
this will continue—rest assured that it will; I have the uncensored hardcopies anyway
Finally, thank you to everyone who has bought Saye on the jj platform before it was locked,
thanks for supporting Wuzhe and Saye, especially now that it’s no longer possible.
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: November 4, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 105
“Wanna fuck?” Gu Fei suddenly spoke up.
Besides the fact that he was not very good at consoling other people, Jiang Cheng thought
that he was not very good at caring for other people either.
Perhaps it was the unusual way of caring demonstrated by his adopted parents throughout
his childhood. To him, any affection that came from them felt more like demands, a kind of
gracious and logical expectation.
He did not know if it was because of that, or if it was Li Baoguo’s genes in his blood, but
ultimately, he was not exactly an expert wielder of these ‘caring’
skills. Even Pan Zhi, his rock-solid best friend, the person he considered as the only close
friend, had never received much from Jiang Cheng in terms of sympathetic care when he
got sick or injured in the past. Jiang Cheng’s consolations would always sound a little stiff.
More than a few times Pan Zhi had said, “It’s probably better if you don’t ask. With how
awkward you’re acting, people might think we have some kind of unspeakable history
between us.”
But since meeting Gu Fei, a lot of things were different now.
He learned to care for another person, to have his heart ache for another person to such an
extent, with an affection he expressed earnestly, straight from his heart, without any
awkwardness or stiffness…
Ah, so this is the power of love. Tsktsktsk.
Jiang Cheng looked down at Gu Fei, who was asleep and leaning against him, and kissed
him on the top of his head.
Gu Fei’s hair was quite stiff. After he shaved it into a buzzcut, it felt scratchy whenever he
kissed it. But he kissed it again after the first time and, if he was not worried about waking
Gu Fei, he would even take a bite.
Gu Fei was the first person who made his heart ache so much that it trembled.
When sick, Gu Fei did not have the usual air possessed by the Supremo Gu of the Steel
Works. The way he lay in Jiang Cheng’s arms quietly with his eyes closed, made him look
just like a bullied cat.
A cat that was also a little wet.
If it was Pan Zhi sitting there drenched head to toe in sweat, he would get beaten up for just
coming near Jiang Cheng, let alone be held in his arms.
… Though of course, Pan Zhi was his bro after all, not his lover.
Oyoo, lover.
Jiang Cheng tutted quietly to himself. What is this cheesy flowery vibe. Lover eh.
Perhaps he was not quiet enough. Gu Fei’s head moved a little, accompanied by a small
moan.
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Am I supposed to take medicine?” Gu Fei mumbled.
“Ah, yes!” Jiang Cheng only just then remembered that he did not give Gu Fei the fever
medication. He frantically reached out a hand for the medicine.
However, the medicine was on the coffee table; he could not reach it. To get it, he would
have to let go of Gu Fei, who was at the moment leaning on him. If he moved away, then Gu
Fei the sick kitty would have to hold himself up… But really, he just didn’t want to let go.
After maybe a second of hesitation, Jiang Cheng reached out his foot, and with his toes,
picked up the little paper bag containing the two fever pills from the coffee table.
“Oh fuck,” Gu Fei turned away and said weakly. “I’m not eating that.”
“So fussy.” Jiang Cheng took the paper bag from his foot. “The medicine is wrapped up
inside. And besides, it’s not like I stepped on dog shit with my foot.”
“Ah…” Gu Fei sighed. “Then are you gonna fetch the glass with your foot too?”
“Crap.” Jiang Cheng looked at the water glass that was even further than the medicine, and
after a long deliberation, reached out with his foot again.
“Cheng-ge, please wake up,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng did not answer as he hooked his foot on the edge of the coffee table and yanked
it hard toward the sofa. After dragging the fairly hefty coffee table to within arms reach, he
pulled it with his hand and brought it right up to the sofa.
“Here, take your medicine.” He picked up the glass of water and placed one of the tablets in
Gu Fei’s mouth.
“Great wisdom comes from the lazy person huh.” Gu Fei took a few sips from the straw and
washed down the pill.
“It’s not laziness,” Jiang Cheng said. “I just didn’t want to let go.”
Adhering to the principle of not letting go, Jiang Cheng subsequently used his foot to pick
up the thermometer, a piece of candy, and the TV remote.
It was not until Gu Fei wanted to drink water and there was none left in the glass, that he
finally let out a sigh. The hot water thermos was on a table next to the TV. He would be able
to reach it only if he took off his left leg and connected it to his right.
“Hold yourself up for a second,” Jiang Cheng kicked away the coffee table. “I’ll get you some
water.”
“I’ll take a shower later and go lie down on the bed,” Gu Fei said.
“Shower?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “You’re running a fever, what do you mean shower?
At least wait until the fever goes down.”
“I can’t go on living like this without a shower,” Gu Fei said. “I’m covered in sweat.”
Jiang Cheng did not have a lot of experience taking care of a sick person. After all, Gu Fei’s
fever was not caused by something like a cold, so he really could not tell what he had to
watch out for. Therefore he was a little lost between the only folk remedy he knew of
“sweating it out”, and Gu Fei’s proclamation of
“can’t go on living like this without a shower”.
“I’m an overachiever when it comes to general knowledge of life,” Gu Fei said.
“You flunkie.”
Jiang Cheng thought he had a point, so he did not continue to hold Gu Fei back, and let him
go take a shower.
“And don’t cover me up either, I’m not feeling any chills right now.” After his shower, Gu Fei
laid down on the bed, spreading himself out languidly, and closed his eyes. “As long as you
hold me.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng gave him a thin towel blanket.
He then dashed to the bathroom and took a shower, before dashing back to the bedroom
and checking Gu Fei’s temperature again.
“It’s 38 degrees now,” Jiang Cheng turned off the lights and laid down beside Gu Fei,
wrapping his arms around him, “that means it’s going down, right?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered. “If the fever’s still there, I’ll feel cold.”
“Ayy…” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I was thinking just now, I’m going away to school, so what will
you do when you get sick and I’m not around to take care of you… But to be honest, even
when I’m here I’m only adding to the trouble, right.”
“How are you adding to the trouble,” Gu Fei smiled. “If you’re not here today, when I get a
fever, I’ll just pour a glass of water and sleep straight through it until the fever’s gone.”
“Wait, no,” Jiang Cheng said after thinking about it some more. “You won’t get sick again.
You only had a fever this time because of me.”
“I’m going to say it one last time,” Gu Fei stroked Jiang Cheng’s hand, “if you keep saying
things like this, I’ll…”
“You’ll what?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I… I’ll think about it first, I haven’t decided yet.” Gu Fei smiled. “I just don’t like it when you
say things like that.”
“Mhm, I won’t say it anymore.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
Neither of them spoke again, but Jiang Cheng knew that Gu Fei had not fallen asleep—he
could tell by the sound of his breathing that he was still awake.
This silence was different from their usual comfortable silence. Jiang Cheng did not even
need to ask, he knew it was because of what he said earlier: “I’m going away to school”.
They had never discussed this issue amongst the two of them before—the only time it was
mentioned was probably when he asked Gu Fei about what happens
“after”.
They would have to separate very soon, it was a reality that they were both avoiding. There
had been no discussions, not even regarding which school Jiang Cheng wanted to go to.
Jiang Cheng had always thought that even if they were apart, it would not be that big of a
deal. They still had phones and video calls… But now that the departure date was drawing
nearer by the day, and the excuse of “can’t have any distractive thoughts during studying”
can no longer be applied, he finally realized how scared he had been about this day.
As Gu Fei fell asleep, his breathing gradually slowed. Jiang Cheng grabbed his phone and set
a vibrating alarm.
He figured that once he let himself fully relax, he might not be able to get up the next
morning. And yet he must get up early to prepare breakfast for Gu Fei.
For a long time, Jiang Cheng had been waking up every morning to food that was already
there. Even if Gu Fei had not fallen sick, he would still want Gu Fei to experience this pig-
like life.
“Good night,” he leaned close to Gu Fei’s ear and said softly. Then he kissed the
tip of it.
It was a chaotic night.
For someone who had gone quite some time without having any dreams, Jiang Cheng
thought his dreams that night could amount to forty whole episodes, if he had remembered
them all. Although, by the time he was woken up by his vibrating phone, he could only
remember the highlights reel.
The highlights were taken up by scenes of the exams: a forgotten pencil here and an eraser
that turned into a block of wood there, or else his answer card was ripped…
He had never been that nervous about the exams, but turned out all his nerves were
collected right here.
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei beside him. Still asleep.
Very good. Jiang Cheng sat up very carefully. Gu Fei was lying prone on the pillow, still in
deep sleep. Fever really was something that took a lot out of a person. Jiang Cheng reached
out a hand to feel for Gu Fei’s forehead, but after a moment of hesitation, drew his hand
back again.
He got up and checked Gu Fei’s temperature with the thermometer: 37 degrees.
Much better. It might not be back to normal, but at least it had decreased by quite a bit, and
was not so scary anymore.
Breakfast, breakfast.
Jiang Cheng ran to the washroom with tiny hopping steps, then after washing up, hopped
his way out the door.
He did not know why he was hopping, but ever since he was very young, he thought that it
felt like he was practicing his qinggong every time he walked with a hop, as if his steps
would be lighter when he walked that way.
When he came back with breakfast, Gu Fei was still flopped against the pillow in the exact
same position.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the time, it was still early. There was no reason to wake Gu Fei now.
If he wanted to sleep, he could sleep for the whole day.
Jiang Cheng grabbed a chair, sat down on it backwards, and watched Gu Fei.
He no longer needed to open his eyes everyday to thoughts of studying. This life that was so
idle that it was almost ridiculous was incredibly blessed.
He could just sit here and spend the whole day staring at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei’s face could withstand it too. Even with half of it buried in the pillow, it was still
mesmerizing, especially on a day like today when he had his eyes closed, and a trace of
fatigue still mixed in with his relaxed state…
And as soon as he recalled Gu Fei’s husky, slightly whiny “hold” from the day before, Jiang
Cheng wanted to charge over and jump him right this very instant.
Sexy.
Just, incredibly sexy.
“Wanna fuck?” Gu Fei suddenly spoke up.
Jiang Cheng jumped. He sprang up from his seat on the chair and almost toppled over onto
the floor.
Gu Fei’s eyes were still closed. He did not even change position.
Jiang Cheng thought that perhaps he was too thirsty, to the point where he was hearing
things. He stared at Gu Fei for a few seconds, before quietly asking, “Gu Fei?”
“I’m asking, do you want to fuck?” Gu Fei opened one eye and curled up a corner of his lips.
“Been sitting here staring for at least 20 minutes, haven’t you?”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng stood up. “You were awake this whole time?”
“Your phone has such a strong motor for vibration.” Gu Fei propped himself up on his
forearms and, still hugging the pillow, rubbed his eyes. “It shook me awake as soon as it
went off.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him without a word. Not because of the fact that he still managed to
wake Gu Fei up despite being so careful, but because… Gu Fei’s pose at this moment.
With the upper half of his prone body propped up by his elbows, every line and every
curve, from his shoulder to his lower back to his ass, was sheer temptation.
Jiang Cheng walked to the bedside, all the while keeping his eyes glued to Gu Fei’s lower
back. To prevent himself from sounding too thirsty, he tried to forcibly clear his mind by
asking, “Why pretend to be asleep when you’re already awake?”
“I wasn’t pretending. I was just a little tired and didn’t wanna move. I thought I’d lie here
and chill for a bit.” Gu Fei turned his face to look at Jiang Cheng.
The word “tired” instantly snapped Jiang Cheng back to reality. Gu Fei’s fever was not
entirely gone, and because he was burning up the whole night, he must
still be very tired right now.
Jiang Cheng, you can’t have inappropriate thoughts about a sick person!
“Then you should… snooze for a little longer,” Jiang Cheng said with difficulty.
“I…”
“You really don’t want it?” Gu Fei put his head down and leaned his forehead against the
pillow. “Before I change my mind from all your dawdling…”
The contours of Gu Fei’s shoulders that became immediately defined when he bowed his
head blended perfectly with his scapula. The way Gu Fei looked at that moment, Jiang
Cheng felt that if he could stop himself from jumping on Gu Fei right this second, he should
probably bid farewell to sex forever.
He yanked off his shirt with a single fluid motion, jumped onto the bed and pressed himself
onto Gu Fei’s back, before biting down on his nape.
“Mnnhg…” Gu Fei moaned in a very low voice, but it was unclear if it was from the bite or
because he was being crushed.
Bewitching.
That was probably what the word was supposed to mean.
Jiang Cheng held Gu Fei as he sprinkled kisses and bites all over, letting his hands roam free
over Gu Fei’s body. He felt acutely Gu Fei’s elevated temperature as he brushed his hands
over the smooth and taut skin. It burned him until he could hear his own panting grow
heavier with every breath.
All of his salacious thoughts toward Gu Fei had been locked up deep inside for the last
several months. When left untouched, it was like a seed in hibernation, its existence
practically undetectable.
But as soon as it was exposed to the sun and rain, it would suddenly grow like mad.
Those memories of Gu Fei’s body which were locked away along with his lust: the scent, so
familiar that it was intoxicating; the voice, of which only one little whisper was enough to
land upon his most sensitive nerve ending; the touch that would send sparks flying even
with the most fleeting contact…
In this moment, those feelings swiftly proliferated, like branches unfurling throughout his
body and over his skin, rapidly engulfing the entirety of his being.
Perhaps he had gone too long without this kind of intimate contact, perhaps it was that he
had just been released from an immense pressure, or perhaps it was the impending
departure awaiting them in the not-so-distant future. Jiang Cheng
felt an especially strong urge to crush Gu Fei bit by bit into his own body, eager to be
enveloped by his warmth.
He did not even know how he managed to leave Gu Fei’s side, to lunge at the bedside table,
pull open the drawer, and take out the necessary supplies with speed comparable to
lightning; nor did he know how he jumped back to bed and returned to battle with the
force of thunder.
Eight hundred rounds was an aspiration, but to carry out one solid round was an
achievable goal worthy to be meticulously realized.
The mingled sounds of heavy panting and moans gradually died down in the room, and
Jiang Cheng laid on Gu Fei with his eyes closed. He took a minute to catch his breath, before
turning and planting another bite on Gu Fei’s neck, and propped himself up. He watched as
a bead of sweat fell from the tip of his nose onto Gu Fei’s chest.
“Do you feel any discomfort at all?” Jiang Cheng touched Gu Fei’s forehead with his hand,
but since he himself felt hot all over at the moment, he could not for the life of him make
out the temperature of Gu Fei’s forehead.
“Nope.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Will you get a cold from all this sweat?” Jiang Cheng frowned and brushed his hand over
Gu Fei’s skin again. “Hurry and go take a hot shower.”
“Worry about yourself first.” Gu Fei stroked Jiang Cheng’s belly with his finger.
“You look like you just ran five kilometers.”
“Come on,” Jiang Cheng smiled and got up from the bed, “let’s go shower.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei followed him out of bed and said as he walked out the door.
“Grab some clothes for me.”
“Turn the temperature higher,” Jiang Cheng called after him as he pulled open the closet
door. Gu Fei seemed alright; not like a patient who had just been taken advantage of.
As Jiang Cheng walked out of the bedroom with a change of clothes for the two of them, he
glanced up and saw the curtains in the living room, open with a foot-wide gap.
“The fuck?” He froze on the spot, then quickly lowered the clothes in his hands to cover the
key spot, then between the options of charging into the bathroom or running back to the
bedroom, he decided in a flash on the bathroom. After all, turning around would expose his
butt.
When he ran into the bathroom, Gu Fei had already turned on the shower head, and was
standing under it with one hand against the wall. He cracked up when
he saw Jiang Cheng run in. “The curtains were open.”
“You saw it and didn’t tell me?” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“I didn’t get a chance to, I just ran in here with my hands covering little Feifei.”
Gu Fei laughed and said. “It’s not a very big opening anyways, and no one’s windows are on
the other side, it’s fine.”
“You did it on purpose, didn’t you?” Jiang Cheng set their clothes on the rack and pressed
himself up against Gu Fei’s back under the water.
“No.” Gu Fei turned around and leaned against him, resting his chin on Jiang Cheng’s
shoulder.
“I know you did it on purpose even if you won’t admit it,” Jiang Cheng tutted.
“You haven’t even fully recovered, and still you’re so troublesome.”
Gu Fei smiled without a word.
It was not at all convenient to take a shower while huddled together with another person,
but Gu Fei continued to hang onto him, maybe out of fatigue, or maybe because Gu Fei just
wanted to be pampered. Rather than push Gu Fei away, Jiang Cheng spent a lot of effort to
wash both of them, all the while holding Gu Fei in his arms.
After breakfast, Gu Fei laid back down on the bed. Perhaps because he worked out a sweat
earlier, his temperature had dropped to 36.8 degrees at this point.
Jiang Cheng was greatly relieved as he laid down on the bed with him.
“Let’s get a little more sleep,” Jiang Cheng said. “Nothing else to do anyway.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei rolled over and put his arms around Jiang Cheng.
Even though Jiang Cheng did not feel very sleepy, he still fell asleep almost instantly after
closing his eyes.
Until the buzzing of an incoming call woke them up.
“Who’s calling?” Gu Fei asked, the muddle of sleep still thick in his voice.
“Dunno.” Jiang Cheng was also still in a daze. He felt around under the pillow for a while,
but even after the phone stopped vibrating he still could not find it.
“They hung up.”
“Are they calling you to go to the farewell dinner?” Gu Fei said.
“That’s in the evening.” Jiang Cheng finally found his phone and looked out the window. It
was pretty dark outside, similar to when they woke up that morning.
“Is it about to rain or… The hell?”
He was absolutely bewildered when he saw the time on his phone. “It’s six o’clock?”
Gu Fei lifted his head in surprise. “What?”
The call was from Lao-Xu. Everyone had already gathered for the farewell dinner and had
arrived at the hotel. Other than Yi Jing, they were the only ones missing.
“I overslept.” Jiang Cheng felt apologetic. “Sorry about that, Xu-zong. I’ll head over right
away.”
“Can you get in touch with Gu Fei?” Lao-Xu asked. “I called him but his phone’s off… I know
he never liked to participate in these group activities, but this is the last time, we’re just
going to have one last meal together. I hope that he will come.”
“I…” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei beside him, “I’ll contact him, we’ll go together.”
After hanging up, he touched Gu Fei’s forehead—it felt like an acceptable temperature.
“Lao-Xu’s afraid that you’re not going to dinner.”
“Going.” Gu Fei rubbed his face. “It’s the last time, after all.”
Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu had reserved a conference room on the second floor of the hotel, and
had ordered several tables. When Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei arrived, the roomful of people
were in the middle of heated shouts and laughter.
“They’re here, they’re here!” someone yelled upon seeing them.
“I knew they would come together,” one of the girls said with a laugh.
“Over here!” Wang Xu was sitting at the table furthest in. He stood up and waved at them. “I
saved seats for you! Come here!”
“Where’s Yi Jing?” Gu Fei sat down and asked quietly.
“Not coming, I called her already,” Wang Xu sighed. “Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu both tried calling;
she wouldn’t come, and now even her phone’s off.”
“Never mind, anyone would feel terrible if it happened to them,” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Wang Xu poured tea for both of them, and then poured them two
glasses of beer, “it’s fine if she doesn’t wanna come, or if she repeats the exams next year, or
whatever else. She’s still got me.”
Jiang Cheng shot him a glance and smiled.
“Don’t you doubt me, Jiang Cheng.” Wang Xu glared at him. “When I’ve set my sights on
someone, I will keep them company.”
“I believe you.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“On this point, you two should take a lesson from me.” Wang Xu looked at him with a
resolute expression.
“If anyone hears you, I will make sure to give you a makeover so that not even Yi Jing will
recognize you,” Gu Fei said.
“I was being quiet!” Wang Xu lowered his voice reluctantly. “Can you have a little more faith
in me?”
“Nope,” Gu Fei answered.
“… Damn it.” Wang Xu picked up his cup grumpily and took a big gulp of tea.
“Students! Students!” From across the table, Lao-Xu stood up from his seat, holding a glass
of beer. “I have something to say.”
Everyone’s voices dropped, but there was still a low buzzing in the room.
“Among the whole lot of you, some had listened to me go on for three years, and some for
two, but most of you don’t like to hear it. Today is the last time.” Lao-Xu tapped his
chopsticks against the glass. “So today, you all listen to me properly.”
Everyone quieted down and looked toward him.
“The University Entrance Exam is over, and so is your high school life,” Lao-Xu said.
“Regardless of how you spent these last three years, when you look back on it in the future,
this is the period of youth that belonged to you…”
Lao-Xu paused and took a drink from his glass, “After this summer break, some of you will
leave this place and go to school in another city, and some of you will stay here, maybe for
school and maybe for work. It will probably be very difficult for us to gather with such a
complete headcount in the future. And so—
today!”
Jiang Cheng looked at the shimmering tears in Lao-Xu’s eyes, and felt a little emotional.
“And so today!” Lao-Xu raised his glass over his head. “If we want to cry, or laugh, or have a
little drink—go ahead and do it. No matter what your paths are in the future, I am proud of
all of you, because you’ve brought me many pleasant surprises. And of course, a lot of
troubles too. But these are all precious memories, and should not be forgotten no matter
how much time has passed…”

With that, Lao-Xu tipped his head back and downed the rest of his glass, before booming
out, “Class-8, class-8! Dark horse at the gate!”
“Class-8, class-8! Dark horse at the gate!” Everyone raised their glasses and echoed the line,
until all the voices melded into one.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5982
TL word count: 4489
TL time: 4:22:55
Edit time: 55:22
Curse words: 3x fuck, 1x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
It was so nice and horny until Lao-Xu went and made me tear up
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: November 12, 2021
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Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 106
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei stared at the screen for a few moments, then turned to him,
“you’re really not gonna come see yourself?”
This farewell dinner had Jiang Cheng feeling a little melancholic.
Ever since Lao-Xu finished his speech, the roomful of people had been in a state of
emotional turbulence. A good number of people started crying together halfway through
the meal—first it was the girls, then they were joined by the boys too.
With one swig of alcohol, they huddled and bawled together. Those who had quarreled and
fought, in this moment all of their disagreements melted like ice.
Perhaps the conflicts would continue after they finish the meal and walk out this door, but
at this moment, they were all members of Class-8.
Though not much food had been eaten, the alcohol had already been topped off a couple of
times. Some of the teachers of other subjects made an attempt to intervene, but were all
forced back with one line from Lao-Lu.
“This is the last time—allow them to let go and drink,” Lao-Lu said. “It’s all coming back out
as tears anyway.”
Jiang Cheng only had two glasses of beer. Other than the feeling of melancholy, he did not
experience such intense emotions as the rest of his classmates.
After all, the time he’d spent with these people had not been long. Many of them he still
could not call out by name. In fact, part of the reason for his melancholy was that he didn’t
feel such intense emotions toward Class-8. And thinking back to his classmates at the old
Associated High, other than Pan Zhi, it was more or less the same.
The feeling of being unmoored on both ends made him feel a little lost.
The only person who evoked any intense emotions in him… He turned around and glanced
at Gu Fei beside him, who had his head down and was playing with his phone, with no
expression on his face.
Gu Fei was probably the only one.
After everyone finished crying to their hearts’ content, it was time to exchange contact
information and take photos together.
Gu Fei had actually added quite a number of their classmates already for the sake of playing
the idiotic Aixiaochu. Whereas Jiang Cheng had not added
anyone aside from the guys he played basketball with.
Now, they all started coming up to him one by one.
“Hey Jiang Cheng, let’s add each other.” One of the boys squeezed up to his side.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded and took out his phone.
Jiang Cheng was actually a little surprised. He did find the guy familiar-looking, but up until
a second ago, he’d thought the guy belonged to Class-7.
After adding several other boys to his contact list, the girls started coming over too.
Add contacts. Take photos.
Even Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu were excitedly poking their heads everywhere.
After holding the corners of his mouth up while taking photos with several girls, Jiang
Cheng noticed in his peripheral vision that Gu Fei was no longer beside him. Good Little
Bunbun is a very apt name, he thought, he certainly runs faster than anyone.
Finally, after being wrangled by the neck by Wang Xu and forced to take a picture together,
Jiang Cheng walked out of the room and found Gu Fei leaning against the wall in the
corridor.
“You certainly didn’t waste any time running away!” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“I always run from these things.” Gu Fei quirked his mouth at him. “Unlike some people
who used to have a girlfriend—times like these must be very enjoyable.”
“Bull-fucking-roundhouse-shit!” Jiang Cheng said.
“I want a photo together too.” Gu Fei said.
“Is there a lack of photos of the two of us?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“None like this.” Gu Fei pulled out his phone, then walked to the door and looked at him.
“Come on.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t know how he wanted to do it, but still he followed and went to stand
beside Gu Fei.
Gu Fei pulled him close so they both had their backs to the door. He held up the phone with
one hand and put his other arm around Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “Get ready, you’re gonna
give me a big smile.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng cracked his mouth wide and stretched his facial muscles.
“Alright, how do you want to do this? Isn’t it a little too dark here?”
“Shooting away from the light has its own beauty.” Gu Fei lifted one leg, and with hard
stomp, kicked open the door of the private room behind them.
“Smile!”
Jiang Cheng immediately cooperated and put on a very exaggerated grin, but as soon as he
saw the scene reflected in the camera screen, it promptly turned into a genuine laugh.
The people in the room were either wiping away tears, or still huddled together drinking.
Now, with Gu Fei kicking in the door, all of them froze in their spot still holding the same
position of whatever they were doing a second ago, with eyes collectively directed toward
the doorway.
Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu were caught in the middle of exchanging a cross-cupped wine under the
cheer-pressure of their students. They had already raised the cups in their hands, and were
looking in this direction with utterly flabbergasted expressions.
Gu Fei pressed down on the shutter. “OK. ”
“I was wondering where you went off to!” Wang Xu shouted as he lunged at them from
behind some chairs. He grabbed hold of Gu Fei and started pulling him in by the arm.
“Come on! Anyone who wants a picture hurry over here!”
“Oh fuck.” Gu Fei struggled a few times but didn’t manage to break free. A host of excitedly
drunk young people caught up and dragged Gu Fei inside. They threw him into a chair and
started to take turns snapping photos with him.
Jiang Cheng leaned against the doorway and laughed as he watched.
It was likely that after tonight, none of these people would have the galls to trap Gu Fei in a
chair to take pictures with them. After all, the guy was a notorious troublemaker with a
permanent frost face.
Jiang Cheng also took out his phone and snapped a few pictures of the chaotic scene before
him.
It would be a memory of sorts. Whether he was close with these people or not, they were
still a part of his high school life. They were the youths he passed by in the 18th year of his
life.
After dinner, everyone already had plans to continue on to karaoke. As usual, Jiang Cheng
fell behind at the back of the crowd with Gu Fei. After the crowd in front of them turned
onto another street—so filled with elation that they were swaying even as they walked—
the two of them turned onto another street that would lead them back home.
“You’re not gonna keep partying a little longer?” Gu Fei asked.
“Nah, my head’s already almost bursting from the partying.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Besides, the way you look, would be best if we just go back and rest.”
“What way?” Gu Fei touched his own face. “I thought I’d always been pretty good looking?”
“Spent the whole of yesterday with a fever, and then…” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat,
“exerted yourself so much physically. You should go back and rest well for a few days.”
“I have to go back home first thing tomorrow morning,” Gu Fei said. “Er-Miao’s looking for
me.”
“Is two days her limit?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not exactly—sometimes it’s three days. In the past when I went out by myself it’s always
been two or three days,” Gu Fei said. “If she gets anxious, she’ll start throwing a tantrum
and smashing things.”
Jiang Cheng sighed softly. “And she doesn’t listen to your mom at all, right?
She’ll only listen to you.”
“Pretty much.” Gu Fei pulled out a cigarette, lit it, and held it between his lips. “I can’t really
explain it. She’s not entirely like those kids who are born with autism or something —she
just didn’t like to speak very much when she was younger.
There was probably nothing seriously wrong with her.”
“It was… after her head injury?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm, but they didn’t find any problems in the brain scans either.” Gu Fei patted Jiang
Cheng on the back. “Don’t worry about this though—you should think about your
applications. Lao-Xu will probably start doing home visits in the next couple of days.”
“Home visits again?” Jiang Cheng sighed. “There’s really nothing to talk about with my
applications. I’d decided a long time ago. After they publish the minimum entry scores, if I
meet the requirement, I’ll just apply directly.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
They were quiet again after that. Gu Fei did not keep asking about the matter of schools,
and Jiang Cheng also didn’t want to go deeper into it. Questions of which school and what
major were things he really didn’t want to discuss with Gu Fei.
It was supposed to be an event that made him happy and a little trepidatious,
something that he couldn’t help but want to talk about with others. But because of the
inevitable departure that drew nearer day by day, it hurt him to even say a single word
about it.
They walked in silence down the length of the street before Gu Fei said, “When the time
comes I’ll travel there with you.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked, then quickly waved his hand. “That’s not… why I asked about
Gu Miao.”
“I know.” Gu Fei smiled. “I’m bringing this up only because I just thought of it.
I’ll go with you.”
Jiang Cheng leaned a little closer to him, rubbing up gently against Gu Fei’s arm.
“Okay.”
A few days of rest later, Gu Fei started to get busy again.
When he rested, he mainly slept—at home, or at Jiang Cheng’s place. And Jiang Cheng slept
alongside him, as if they were two people who had never slept in their lives. Aside from
eating, sleeping was all they did.
Jiang Cheng thought that it was a poor deal for the two of them to spend their time sleeping
when they were together. Since you couldn’t tell that you were still with this person while
you were asleep. Then upon waking up, several hours would have passed just like that.
Yet sometimes, he thought that only when they were lying beside each other, holding each
other, and listening to the sound of calm breathing next to their ears, did he feel the most
peaceful and grounded.
It was a wonderful pleasure.
Jiang Cheng had not made any fun plans for the summer. One reason was that he wasn’t in
the mood, and the other was that he didn’t have time.
Gu Fei’s summer break was his working days. He divided his time between home, the
convenience store, and photography gigs. In order to spend as much time together as
possible, and also to make some money, Jiang Cheng went along to the photography shoots.
He had completely gotten used to modelling for photos at this point. He no longer needed
to communicate verbally with Gu Fei the photographer—he usually understood what kind
of look Gu Fei was looking for.
Despite it being tiring work—he had to put on and take off the makeup, change into sets
upon sets of different outfits, and sometimes when they ran into more conceptual styles
like Ding Zhuxin’s designs, it took even longer to change into
—Jiang Cheng would still be in a pretty good mood. He could always look up
and see Gu Fei right away.
The job today was a first for him—an underwear shoot. Ding Zhuxin had introduced them
to it.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Gu Fei had asked him.
“It’s not like it’s for condoms,” Jiang Cheng said. “What’s there to be hung up about?”
“I was worried that you’d be embarrassed.” Gu Fei smiled.
“I’m fine if you’re the one taking the photos.” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “Though
you gotta tell them ahead of time, I have a tattoo, is that okay?”
“I asked, it’s not a problem,” Gu Fei said. “I can also hide it away in post.”
Despite knowing the model had a tattoo on his leg, one of the female staff from the
underwear company was still a little surprised to see Jiang Cheng after he changed. “A
teeth-mark?”
“If it’s not okay, I’ll hide it when I edit,” Gu Fei said.
“No no no no,” she waved her hand, “it’s fine. It’s pretty unique huh—very sexy.”
Having said that, she bent down and leaned a little closer. “There’s even two widdol
hearts?”
Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, a little embarrassed. “Yeah.”
“Ah, sorry sorry.” She started laughing. “Let’s begin.”
Almost twenty minutes into the shoot, she glanced at Gu Fei and said, “Xiao-Gu.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered, still holding the camera.
“That tattoo of his, it’s a matching set with the one on your collarbone, isn’t it?”
she asked.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. Jiang Cheng could see his eyes looking over at himself, so he nodded.
“It’s a set.”
“Couples teeth-marks?” she said with a smile. “Is your tattoo of Xiao-Gu’s teeth-mark then?”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng said.
“That’s pretty cool,” she said, then clapped her hands after another moment of thought.
“Ayy, I’m being nosy. No more talking, you two continue shooting.”
She was being nosy. The two of them also didn’t know her that well before this.
However, Jiang Cheng was not mad, nor did he feel any annoyance. He suddenly realized
that starting at some point, he no longer minded whether anyone knew about this little
‘secret’ of his.
Perhaps it was their impending separation, but the premature longing he felt even made
him feel happy about such nosy questions.
Yes—our tattoos are couples tattoos. It’s a set. A pair.
We’re a couple.
That very good looking young man with long legs is my boyfriend…
Of course, yours truly, the superduper unmatched in handsomeness that you’re looking at, is
his boyfriend.
Aside from commercial shoots, Gu Fei also continued to make all kinds of photography
creations. There were ones with people, and ones without, and occasionally a very
handsome young man would stride through the frame.
Jiang Cheng very much enjoyed showing up in the frame like this—in the rosy glow of
dawn, in the rays of the setting sun, in misty drizzles, and under the brilliant sunlight. He
stuck around in Gu Fei’s viewfinder, frozen in time in his photos.
Sometimes Gu Fei would set up his tripod, and the two of them would pass through the
frame together.
“You walk over from that side,” Gu Fei said from behind the tripod while looking through
the viewfinder. “And I’ll walk from this side. Then we’ll exchange a glance in the middle
before continuing on. I’m after that feeling of strangers brushing shoulders.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
As Gu Fei started walking toward him, he also started walking toward Gu Fei.
There was a breeze in the sunlight.
A dry, warm breeze.
Jiang Cheng watched as Gu Fei got closer with every step. His vision was like a 1.2 large
aperture lens—aside from Gu Fei, everything else was a blur.
It felt as though this little stretch of road, not even 20 meters long, had taken him through
the past year and a half. Finally, the two of them met in the middle.
According to Director Gu’s script, they were supposed to make eye contact, brush past each
other, and keep going.
Jiang Cheng knew that Gu Fei only wanted to capture the scenery with passersby in the
foreground. But in that instant, he suddenly didn’t feel like cooperating.
“I’m not turning my back on you,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Huh?” Gu Fei blinked, but he quickly understood. “Okay.”
Jiang Cheng took another two steps forward, then turned around. Gu Fei had already
turned to face him.
Jiang Cheng smiled. Gu Fei also smiled, then clicked the remote shutter. “Very good.”
“I want to keep the last few for myself,” Jiang Cheng said as he walked back to the tripod.
“Actually, I want all of them. Can you send me a zip file?”
“I’ll send you a zip as soon as I finish editing,” Gu Fei said.
Everyone was pretty busy during the summer. On his end, Pan Zhi had been forcibly
dragged by his family to a seaside vacation. It was obvious that he was very reluctant about
it—his WeChat Moments featured only pictures of his three meals every day, and had not a
single scenery photo. Their classmates on this end were busy too. Wang Xu helped out at
his family’s restaurant every day, and when he wasn’t doing that he was parked outside of
Yi Jing’s house. Others were either traveling or working part-time jobs, and those who were
redoing the exams next year had already started connecting with cram schools…
Jiang Cheng thought that compared to these people, he and Gu Fei were spending their time
entirely too leisurely in the dozen or so days leading up to the scores coming out.
It wasn’t until a day before that he started to feel a vague anxiety.
Gu Fei also appeared to have been shaken back to reality—he tossed and turned in bed for
the whole night and still wasn’t able to get to sleep.
“If you turn around one more time I’ll strip all your clothes off and spank you.”
Jiang Cheng slapped Gu Fei’s butt.
“If you wanna spank me I’ll let you just do it, but who knows what will happen if you strip
me down,” Gu Fei said with a laugh. “After all, I don’t have a fever at the moment.”
Jiang Cheng tutted, “How arrogant of you, little tyrant.”
“Hey,” Gu Fei rolled over again and put his arms around Jiang Cheng, “the scores are coming
out tomorrow, right?”
“Yes yes yes, didn’t Lao-Xu call earlier specifically to remind us?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Apparently we can check right after 12 noon.”
“Why do I feel a little nervous,” Gu Fei said.
“You definitely did better than usual. In any case, you’ve forcibly stuffed quite a lot of
information in there over the last few months.” Jiang Cheng stroked his hand. “Don’t be
nervous.”
“I’m not nervous about me, I’m nervous about your score,” Gu Fei said.
“Nervous your ass,” Jiang Cheng said. “Don’t be a nagging grandma like Lao-Xu.”
“Shall we do it?” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered without thinking, and then paused. “What?”
“Do it.” Gu Fei said.
“Do what?” Jiang Cheng was still lost.
“Fuck.”
Gu Fei had been shifting around since he started talking, and by the time Jiang Cheng’s hand
reached over, he discovered that Gu Fei was already naked.
“What the shit Gu Fei are you sure you’re okay?” He was more than a little shocked. “What
made you think of fucking while we were talking about
checking scores?!”
“I wanted to do it even before we talked about checking scores.” Gu Fei sat up and, with a
single movement, tossed aside the towel blanket that was covering Jiang Cheng. He sat
straddling Jiang Cheng’s body with a bottle of lubricant in his hand. “Take your pants off.”
“… Fuck!” Jiang Cheng was still in a state of shock.
“No problem.” Gu Fei immediately answered.
Jiang Cheng felt like laughing, but when Gu Fei’s hand wandered to his abdomen and
continued downward, his breathing suddenly hitched. He couldn’t laugh anymore.
“Or maybe I’ll take it off for you,” Gu Fei leaned in close to his ear and said
quietly.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. Every time Gu Fei spoke to him in this lowered voice, he would
instantly be overcome by desire. He turned his head to the side and swept his tongue over
Gu Fei’s earlobe.
Gu Fei’s breathing subsequently grew heavier as well.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei’s voice was still beside his ear.
“… Hm?” Jiang Cheng answered. His own voice sounded a little fluttery in his ears.
“I’ve held it in for too long,” Gu Fei said. “So I can’t be so patient with the preparations this
time.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng felt a little dazed. Every movement of Gu Fei’s hands felt like an intense
jolt of stimulation. He could only feel his breaths grow more and more desperate—there
was no more room in his brain to figure out what Gu Fei was trying to say.
It wasn’t until Gu Fei pushed in abruptly that Jiang Cheng came back to himself, and his
whole body stiffened all at once. He sucked in a sharp breath and grabbed Gu Fei’s leg,
letting out a very low moan.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei pressed Jiang Cheng’s legs down and bent down to kiss him.
It was the depth of night—there were no sounds of voices outside the window, only the
occasionally passing car and the sound it made when the tires rolled over the ground.
Jiang Cheng lay on the bed, the night breeze blown in through the gap in the curtains felt
soothing as it slid over his body. His eyes were closed. He didn’t want to move.
Gu Fei had cleaned up everything on the bed and had already come back from his shower,
but still Jiang Cheng laid there unmoving.
“If I didn’t know any better I’d think you were fucked until you passed out.” Gu Fei stood
over him by the side of the bed. “Should I carry you to the shower?”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded with his eyes closed.
Gu Fei tugged on Jiang Cheng’s arm and pulled him up. Before Jiang Cheng could open his
eyes, he felt Gu Fei’s shoulder dig into his stomach, and his body suddenly lift up in the air.
“My… my…” Jiang Cheng clenched his teeth and held his breath. “Stomach…”
Gu Fei laughed the whole way while carrying him to the bathroom, before setting him on
the floor.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng put one hand on his stomach as he leaned against the wall.
“It’s only because people who passed out can’t speak, otherwise they’d be cursing the
whole time from being carried like this.”
“Hurry and wash up,” Gu Fei said. “So you can get up pumped full of energy tomorrow to
check your score.”
“… Weirdo.” Jiang Cheng tutted.
He had already forgotten that trace of anxiety surrounding the score-checking, but with Gu
Fei’s words, the anxiety suddenly came back and started playing on loop.
“Now, why did you have to go and say that,” Jiang Cheng sighed as he flopped down next to
Gu Fei after a shower, “you just had to mention checking scores again.”
“Can’t fall asleep now?” Gu Fei smiled. “It’s okay, if you can’t sleep then you can’t sleep, it’s
not a big deal anyhow. Keep your eyes open until you check the score—you can sleep after
that.”
“That sounds about right.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
That was what he said, and Jiang Cheng also felt like he would probably be awake long
enough to see the sunrise, but life was always full of the unexpected.
He couldn’t remember exactly when he fell asleep, but when he woke up, it was from the
sound of Lao-Xu’s phone call.
Or more precisely, he was shoved awake by Gu Fei, who was holding Jiang Cheng’s phone in
his hand.
“It’s Lao-Xu calling.” Gu Fei also looked sleepy, but maybe a tiny bit more awake than Jiang
Cheng. “You overslept for the dinner, and now you overslept for score-checking too…”
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng was suddenly wide awake.
“It’s one o’clock, you can probably check now.” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng somehow felt a little trepidation from out of nowhere as he picked up
the phone. “Xu-zong?”
“Did you check your score yet!” Lao-Xu started off half-yelling into the receiver, almost as if
he’d been possessed by Lao-Lu. “Did you check your score yet Jiang Cheng!!”
“Not yet,” Jiang Cheng sat up, “I just woke up…”
“You overslept for such a crucial moment as this!” Lao-Xu’s shouts turned into laughter
midway through. “Hurry up and go check! Go!”
“… Did you already check my score?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah! I already checked!” Lao-Xu’s laughter came bubbling through the phone receiver.
“But I’m not going to tell you—go check it yourself! Hurry and check!
Then give me a call after! HAhahahahahaha…”
Jiang Cheng hung up and turned to look at Gu Fei.
“Sounds like it’s not bad.” Gu Fei hopped off the bed and turned on his laptop.
“Lao-Xu’s practically hysterical.” [1]
“You check it for me,” Jiang Cheng said. He could tell from Lao-Xu’s reaction that he had
gotten a pretty good score, but he was suddenly a little afraid to check. “I’ll tell you my
exam number.”
“No need,” Gu Fei looked at the screen, “I know your exam number.”
Jiang Cheng blinked at him. “I don’t even remember.”
“Your phone number; your ID number; your exam number; your student number
—I remember all of it,” Gu Fei said as he clacked away at the keyboard. “We slackers are
especially proficient at remembering these useless information.”
Jiang Cheng leaned in and kissed Gu Fei on the cheek before quickly retreating back to sit
on the bed. “Have you opened it?”
“Can’t log on onto the website,” Gu Fei said. “Don’t worry… let me just refresh… there’s
probably too many people trying to check their scores right now.”
“I’ll go get some water.” Jiang Cheng stood up.
Gu Fei smacked the desktop just as he was walking out. “I’m in!”
Jiang Cheng froze on the spot—he couldn’t even look back in that direction.
“What is it?”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei stared at the screen for a few moments, then turned to him,
“you’re really not gonna come see yourself?”
“Is it going to kill you to give me a number?” Jiang Cheng said.
“662.” Gu Fei immediately announced the score. [2]
It took several seconds for Jiang Cheng to recover from Gu Fei’s very abrupt

method of announcement. He turned, walked up to the laptop to take a look, before slowly
sitting back down on the edge of the bed. Then he closed his eyes and let out a long exhale.
Footnote:
[1]: Original: Lao-Xu’s practically laughing like Fan Jin.
Fan Jin: a sad and ridiculous character from the Qing Dynasty satire novel The
Scholars. This characters spends his whole life preparing, taking, and failing the official
exams. One day, he finally obtains a good result and acts out in a wild and ridiculous
manner in public out of sheer joy. ⤴
[2]: As I mentioned in the University Entrance Exams note, a full score is 750, and if you
didn’t know, 662 is REALLY HIGH for someone who just started getting serious about
studying in the last year and a half of high school. Check out that note again if you’re
interested as I’ve added a little more context with actual stats from 2020. ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6090
TL word count: 4368
TL time: 5:54:39
Edit time: 1:45:10
Curse words: 6x fuck, 3x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
Oh yeah, the bolded text is where the original is in English XD
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
First posted: November 20, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 107
“Let’s go,” Gu Fei said. “Son of a gun, let’s go get your admission letter.
662 points.
When Gu Fei announced the number out loud, Jiang Cheng’s brain emptied for a brief
moment from the sudden relaxing of tensions.
He sat on the edge of the bed and spaced out for almost twenty seconds before slowly
regaining his ability for thought.
It was enough—higher even than Jiang Cheng’s own estimate. After all, he had done his fair
share of skipping class, fighting, and general fooling around in the early days. All those
times he crammed in the days leading up to tests, he was only relying on some cleverness.
An atypical overachiever was no match for your stereotypical overachievers. A score like
this was entirely satisfactory.
Not to mention, based on the scores in their province from the past few years, it wouldn’t
be a problem to get into the school and program he wanted.
The words he’d said to Shen Yiqing, “I can prove myself, no matter where I am”, had finally
been realized. He wasn’t just talking out of his ass.
Even though Shen Yiqing wouldn’t know this—nor was he planning to let her know—it was
enough for himself that he knew this. It was what he wanted this whole time.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei called out to him, pulling his thoughts back to reality.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng lifted his gaze at him.
“Congratulations,” Gu Fei said. “Your efforts weren’t in vain.”
“Your hard work all this time wasn’t in vain.” Jiang Cheng reached over and gently caressed
Gu Fei’s face. “Thank you.”
“Don’t force me to say you’re welcome,” Gu Fei said.
“You’ve worked hard, boyfriend.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“All in the service of my boyfriend.” Gu Fei squeezed Jiang Cheng’s hand.
“Check your score.” Jiang Cheng looked at the computer screen. “Hurry, let’s see what you
got.”
“I’m probably somewhere in the 300s—doesn’t make a difference either way.”
Gu Fei turned to the screen and started typing in his examinee number. “I was thinking
before that mine is probably just your score divided by two.”
“I never heard of this kind of estimation.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Innovative, right?” Gu Fei typed in his number and clicked.
In the moment when the page was loading, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little difficulty
breathing. He felt even more nervous than when waiting for his own score. He could feel
through his elbow propped on his knees that his legs were shaking slightly.
Gu Fei’s score wouldn’t be very high—he had used his class time to play two whole years of
idiotic Aixiaochu. Even if he had spent the last few months accompanying Jiang Cheng in his
studies, it wasn’t a systematic review. A normal estimate would put his score in the 300s, if
he performed as usual…
Still, he was anxious. The page was loading—the laptop was a little laggy, and the display a
little slow. Jiang Cheng waited for a fraction of a second before he gave up and put his
forehead against Gu Fei’s shoulder.
He couldn’t bear to watch.
A few seconds later, Gu Fei’s shoulder shook a couple times.
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng didn’t move. He kept his forehead on Gu Fei’s shoulder.
Gu Fei didn’t speak as he continued to laugh.
“Gu Fei you ass!” Jiang Cheng yelled.
“I got over 400,” Gu Fei said. “It’s just that this number is kind of funny.”
Over 400? Jiang Cheng arched his brows. Based on last year’s statistics, this score was more
than enough to make it into any of the third-tier universities. He swiftly turned to look at
the total score displayed on the screen.
419? [1]
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Isn’t it?” Gu Fei laughed as he said.
“Your Language Art score is pretty good! And your Humanities Comprehensive isn’t too bad
either.” Jiang Cheng’s attention had immediately shifted away. “If it wasn’t for Math… and
this English…”
“I didn’t think my math score would go above 30.” Gu Fei smiled. “This is
already me overperforming.”
Gu Fei’s Language Arts score was 128, but the two subjects of math and English dragged it
down too much. These weren’t things that he could make up for just from a few months of
studying with Jiang Cheng.
Although as a whole, with everything else Gu Fei was busy doing in these months, it was
already pretty great that he was able to get this score from just occasionally quizzing Jiang
Cheng or flipping through his notes from time to time.
Jiang Cheng stood up, walked up behind Gu Fei, and bent down to hug him.
Then he nuzzled his head in the crook of Gu Fei’s neck.
“You should give Lao-Xu a call.” Gu Fei reached back and gently squeezed the back of Jiang
Cheng’s neck. “He must be waiting for you to call him. Or else he’s gonna call back real
soon.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng answered.
This year, the Number One Scholar of the Humanities Exams in their province had gotten
664. Jiang Cheng’s score of 662 didn’t allow Lao-Xu to experience what it felt like to be the
homeroom teacher of the Number One Scholar, though it was probably the highest score
he’d seen since he started teaching at Fourth High. Lao-Xu was so thrilled that he couldn’t
even speak properly. Every time he thought about it he would give Jiang Cheng a call to
marvel at the result. It almost felt like he could retire and end his teaching career right then
and have no regrets.
For the next few days, Jiang Cheng’s phone rang off the hook.
There were calls from his classmates, teachers, the principal, the school directors, the
school board, and from student enrollment offices. Even going out to get breakfast, he
would be recognized by the breakfast stall owner.
“Are you that student, Jiang Cheng? The one who got the highest score in the whole city on
the University Entrance Exams? The Jiang Cheng who’s the top five or top ten of the
province or something?”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng answered. “I’d like a tray of meat buns…”
“Hahahahaha, see that!” The owner gleefully rested his hands on his hips akimbo. “The
Number One Scholar in the city got there by eating breakfast at my stall every day! My
breakfast nourishes the brain!”
“And tofu pudding…” Jiang Cheng continued helplessly.
“That’s right! Tofu pudding also nourishes the brain!” The owner continued gloating. [2]
“Fried…” Jiang Cheng was cut off before he could finish.
“Fried dough fritters and fried pancakes are also…” The owner kept on.
“Double portions to go!” Jiang Cheng raised his voice and also cut him off.
“No problemo!” The owner started to pack up his food. “Today’s breakfast is on the house,
Top Scholar!”
When he came back to his apartment, Jiang Cheng took his phone out and turned it off.
“What if someone is looking for you?” Gu Fei asked.
“There’s not much left to do. It’s just the teachers at the enrollment offices who keep
calling. The entry scores are about to come out and it’s time for applications—they’re all
gunning for recruitment,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’ve already decided where I’m going a long
time ago, there’s no use playing tug-of-war with them at this point.”
“Have you told Lao-Xu?” Gu Fei asked.
“… I guess I’ll tell him now.” Jiang Cheng thought about it and turned his phone back on,
then looked at Gu Fei. “I want to go the the Law program at R
University.”
“Ah.” Gu Fei blinked at him.
Jiang Cheng stared at the power on screen on his phone. It was the first time he talked to Gu
Fei about the school he wanted to go to. For some reason, he felt an inexplicable sense of
anxiety after he said it out loud.
“You’d decided on this before?” Gu Fei asked.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I’d thought about it in middle school. It’s something I’m
interested in, and I like the idea of having a solid skill in hand.”
“Good.” Gu Fei pulled him into his arms. “A top program is better than a top school, right?”
Jiang Cheng smiled as he turned and kissed Gu Fei.
Lao-Xu had a hard time wrapping his head around Jiang Cheng’s decision—he attempted to
verify with Jiang Cheng multiple times, “You can get into B
University with this score. You really don’t want to go?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng said.
“But B University’s Humanities programs are the best in the country,” Lao-Xu
said. “You’re really not going to consider it?”
“R University has the best Law program,” Jiang Cheng said. “Really Xu-zong.
I’m not going to consider B University. If my score is over the entry threshold I’ll just apply
to R University directly.”
“Alright then, alright. The best program is certainly important.” Lao-Xu thought about it
some more. “You know what you’re doing, kid. Xu-zong supports you!
Either way, wherever you go, you’ll always be my most promising student!”
“Xu-zong,” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile, “I’m going to keep my phone off for the next little
while. If anyone else from other schools ask, can you talk to them for me?”
“Sure sure, alright,” Lao-Xu answered. Then he added after a little thought, “Ah Jiang Cheng,
you’re pretty close with Gu Fei, right?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei beside him, “what is it?”
“I checked his score,” Lao-Xu said. “He can get into a third-tier no problem. It’s just that…
third-tier schools all have high tuition. I’m worried about his family’s situation… If he has
any trouble, both Teacher Lu and I can help him think of something. If I talk to him, he’ll
refuse for sure. So I’m wondering if you can talk to him—see what he’s thinking.”
After ending the call with Lao-Xu, Jiang Cheng turned his phone off and set it on the table
before breathing out a sigh of relief. “All quiet now.”
“What does Lao-Xu want you to talk to me about?” Gu Fei asked.
“He said third-tier schools have high tuition rates, so if it’s difficult for you to bear… he and
Lao-Lu can help think of something.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“He thinks I’ll refuse, so he asked you to come talk to me first?” Gu Fei smiled.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng sighed. He had actually considered this problem before, but didn’t
manage to ask it out loud. Lao-Xu said he knew what he was doing, but Gu Fei was the one
who really knew what he was doing. For almost twenty years he had handled his own life.
How he wanted to do something and how to go about it—Gu Fei’s thought process on that
was clearer than anyone’s.
“Though I feel like it doesn’t make much of a difference whether I talk to you about it or
not.”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei pinched Jiang Cheng’s chin, “do you trust me?”
“I do,” Jiang Cheng answered without thinking.
“If I want to, I can also prove myself, no matter where I am,” Gu Fei said.
“Mmn.” Jiang Cheng looked at him and nodded.
Jiang Cheng didn’t ask about Gu Fei’s decision again. He didn’t know whether Lao-Xu had
gone to talk to Gu Fei again either.
Although he’d already guessed what Gu Fei’s decision was. With Gu Fei’s personality, he
would never accept any kind of “think of something”. In the last almost twenty years of his
life, he had only himself. If he could deal with something on his own, then he dealt with it
on his own—it was already a habit.
If he couldn’t handle a high tuition, then he would find a school where he could afford the
tuition.
Jiang Cheng knew that whatever choice Gu Fei made, he would not interfere, nor would he
feel sorry for him or lament his choice.
That was the sort of person Gu Fei was. If ever he was willing to open his eyes, he would be
invincible.
When it came to his boyfriend, Jiang Cheng felt like he needn’t even blink when singing his
praises—he could blurt out an entire essay with a perfect score without even missing a
beat.
Jiang Cheng didn’t turn his phone back on until after he submitted his application.
He spent every day with Gu Fei, just like before. They would take some jobs, take some
pictures, eat, sleep, and walk Gu Miao.
The days had gone by with nothing of significance happening. The peaceful days should’ve
gone by very slowly, except this time, time felt more like a gust of wind—he only scrunched
up his eyes as it came, and already it had passed.
There was no suspense to Jiang Cheng’s application—he went with where he wanted to go.
Gu Fei’s application made Lao-Xu a little sad. He had foregone the third-tier universities
and applied to a Normal School.
Jiang Cheng thought that there was nothing wrong with his boyfriend’s decision.
The tuition was low at that school, and there was financial aid to boot. He would also have a
stable job upon graduation. The most important point was that the school wasn’t very far
from Gu Fei’s home. They had even passed by a couple of times when they went prowling
around town—the campus was pretty large.
“How did you go about telling Lao-Xu?” Jiang Cheng asked. “He must’ve thought it a shame.
He must not have given up without a hundred rounds of back and forth, huh?”
“I said I want to be a good teacher like him,” Gu Fei leaned forward on the windowsill with
a cigarette in his mouth, “and he suddenly couldn’t go on.”
Jiang Cheng burst out laughing from his nest on the sofa. “You really are too much.”
“It’s true—words of utmost sincerity,” Gu Fei said. “A college diploma is enough to teach
middle school around here…”
“Teacher Gu will specialize in conquering all sorts of rebels.” Jiang Cheng cracked up.
The two of them laughed together for a while, then eventually they both fell quiet.
With his one sentence, Gu Fei had drawn two parallel lines.
Jiang Cheng slumped on the sofa with his legs on the coffee table, and his eyes staring
blankly at the TV. He wasn’t thinking about anything, his mind was completely empty of
thoughts. He didn’t even know what was playing on TV.
Though he could sense the slightest stir from Gu Fei’s side.
The guy had smoked three cigarettes, drank almost a whole glass of water, and went to the
bathroom once.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei sat down beside Jiang Cheng.
“I don’t feel like talking right now.” Jiang Cheng stared at the TV. “Don’t worry about me,
I’m just gonna space out for a while.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei didn’t keep talking. He sat beside Jiang Cheng and stared at the TV with him.
Jiang Cheng continued staring until his eyes started to feel dry, and he was so hungry that
he felt a little nauseous. He grabbed the remote, turned off the TV, and turned to look at Gu
Fei.
“Hm?” Gu Fei turned to him as well. “Hungry?”
“There will be a way.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Even if we can’t think of it right now, there will be a way in the future,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Even if there’s no way, even if we have to keep going back and forth between two places
for the rest of our lives, that’s also not a big deal.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Think of it as me being shameless if you want,” Jiang Cheng frowned, “but no one is
allowed to let go.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng knew the problem could not be solved with only a childish perseverance, it was
far from enough. However, the only thing they could do at the moment was childish
perseverance. And so they would persevere.
He did not continue discussing the matter any further with Gu Fei—nothing would come of
it anyway. Besides, the days were passing by way too quickly. So quickly that they only had
time to celebrate another joint birthday together before it was over.
His admission letter arrived.
Lao-Xu’s call came in on Gu Fei’s phone, “That son of a gun Jiang Cheng! Is he addicted to
having his phone off! Does he not want his admission letter!”
“Let’s go,” Gu Fei said. “Son of a gun, let’s go get your admission letter.
It was Jiang Cheng’s first time coming back to Fourth High after the exams.
There were red horizontal banners hung on both walls next to the front gate of the school:
Top Scholar of the City; Top 10 in the Province; Student Jiang Cheng. After all, it was an
incident worthy of being written into the history of Fourth High, so they pulled out all the
stops.
“What the shit.” After looking at the banners, Jiang Cheng froze upon entering the gate. The
glass display case inside the gates was also covered in a sea of red.
He had come to terms with the banners and posters, but there was a gigantic blown-up
photo of him inside the display case. “That’s me?”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei took one look and started laughing. “Yes, student Jiang Cheng.”
“What the shit, did they use the photo I gave them for my student ID? They could’ve used
the ones from the basketball games! Why use this one!” Jiang Cheng was instantly
extremely displeased. “It’s so fugly!”
“Not at all.” Gu Fei quickly pulled out his phone and snapped a bunch of pictures of the
display case. “Very handsome. The only ones who can manage to take such good looking ID
photos are the two of us, and no one else.”
“Do you have shame? You had to tag yourself along even when complimenting someone
else?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, then after a moment of thought, still couldn’t let it go.
“Can I talk to the school about switching out the picture?
Maybe get one of yours?”
“Cheng-ge how are you so… vain?” Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing. “Who in Fourth High
doesn’t know that you’re handsome?”
Jiang Cheng glared at him without a word.
“Alright fine, we’ll go talk to Lao-Xu about it,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll just blow up one of my photos
of you and give it to the school myself, how’s that?”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng said.
It might be summer break, but cram school had already started. The whole way from the
front gates to Lao-Xu’s office, Jiang Cheng received a great number of praises,
commendations, and looks.
It was only then, only in the moment when he accepted the admissions letter from Lao-Xu’s
hands, did Jiang Cheng feel a final sense of reality about his University Entrance Exams.
“Let me see… Good news! Congratulations on your admittance to our school’s law
program…” Gu Fei took the admissions letter and read it intently. “Law major… sounds very
impressive huh, Cheng-ge.”
“It’s very impressive in reality too!” Lao-Xu was a little excited. “Come on Da-Fei, why don’t
you take a picture of me and Jiang Cheng. Use my cell phone.
Here Jiang Cheng, hold your admissions letter.”
Despite thinking that taking a picture like this was more than a little silly, still Jiang Cheng
stood beside Lao-Xu and held up his admissions letter in front of him.
Lao-Xu took a long time to smooth out his clothes. “Ready.”
Gu Fei took a photo of them with Lao-Xu’s phone.
“Xu-zong, it’s about time for you to get a new phone,” he said when he handed the phone
back to Lao-Xu. “I take a picture with your cell phone, and it looks like it was taken with a
wired phone.”
“Oh you nag, I was just about to buy a new phone. It’s a joyful occasion after all!” Lao-Xu
thought about it for a second. “How about you take another one with your phone and send
it to me.”
“Ah…” Jiang Cheng sighed. He had no choice but to hold up the admissions letter once again
and crack open his mouth.
Coming back to the apartment after getting his admissions letter, Jiang Cheng lay on the
bed and breathed out. Everything seemed to be settling into place.
Gu Fei sat down beside him with the admissions package, looked through it multiple times
backwards and forwards, and still didn’t put it down. Before that, he’d even set up some
props and took a few pictures with his camera.
“Little bunbun,” Jiang Cheng touched his leg, “what exactly are you looking at?”
“I’m looking at how fucking impressive my boyfriend is,” Gu Fei said. “This admissions
package from your R University even looks extremely fancy.”
“Your boyfriend is right here.” Jiang Cheng pointed at himself. “To see how fucking
impressive I am, wouldn’t it be great if you’d turn around and look at the real thing.”
Gu Fei put down the admissions package, turned to look at Jiang Cheng, and after a long
time finally smiled and said, “Cheng-ge.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng put his leg on Gu Fei’s and rubbed them together.
“Have I ever told you,” Gu Fei said. “That you are my pride.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him. He stared for at least two minutes before he finally spoke, “Come
here, let me have a bite.”
Gu Fei lay down beside Jiang Cheng, who rolled over and hugged Gu Fei tight before giving
Gu Fei a very intent bite on the shoulder. He could feel like it was a hard bite. Gu Fei sucked
in a breath.
“I can just hand you a knife so you can cut it directly—saves you the trouble of biting,” Gu
Fei said.
“You are my back.” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei’s admission letter came much later. Jiang Cheng only had a few more days to go
before he had to register at the school, when Lao-Xu finally called,
“Your admissions letter! Is here!”
Jiang Cheng also looked through the admissions package backwards and
forwards multiple times. He finally understood why Gu Fei did the same that day. It was
satisfying. Anything related to the boyfriend was endlessly satisfying to look through.
“Chinese major.” Jiang Cheng took a bunch of pictures of the admissions letter with his
phone. “Amazing, Teacher Gu.”
“Li Yan said to go out to eat together tomorrow,” Gu Fei said as he laughed. “He mentioned
it before when the scores came out, but I didn’t say yes. Now that the admissions have
arrived and you’ll have to go register soon, shall we go eat together?”
“Mhm.” At the mention of the word “register”, Jiang Cheng felt a complicated mix of
emotions. However, since they had come to a decision already, he didn’t continue to think
about it further. “Let’s go. I feel like I haven’t seen him and the others this whole summer.”
“Seeing me is enough,” Gu Fei said.
“That’s right.” Jiang Cheng leaned in and kissed the tip of his nose.
This meal was something of a two-in-one deal: a celebration of them receiving their
admissions letters, and a send-off party for Jiang Cheng.
Compared to the farewell dinner before, there was no atmosphere of emotional parting
during a meal with Li Yan and ‘Not A Good Bird’. They ate meat, drank alcohol, and were
generally merry. Jiang Cheng felt like the meal satisfied his body and mind.
Li Yan and the others had come together and bought a very nice looking suitcase for Jiang
Cheng as a gift. There was even a very thoughtful bow on top.
Jiang Cheng rolled the suitcase back to his apartment, and once again felt a sense of panic at
the parting.
“What am I gonna do?” He looked at Gu Fei.
“What do you mean what are you gonna do?” Gu Fei blinked.
“I’m a little… scared.” Jiang Cheng wrapped his arms around Gu Fei. “I suddenly don’t
wanna go to registration.”
“Fine, you can redo the exams next year,” Gu Fei said. “Let’s have another year of endless
studying days and nights?”
“Fuck off.” Jiang Cheng tutted.
“Don’t be scared.” Gu Fei smiled and held Jiang Cheng tight, rubbing his hands over his
back. “Cheng-ge’s the best. Cheng-ge’s not scared of anything. I’m still right here, when
you’re scared you can reach back and touch me.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
“Besides, I’ll be taking you there,” Gu Fei said. “What’s there to be scared of? I can beat up
your roommates to start, then you won’t be scared anymore.”
“Dumbass.” Jiang Cheng started laughing.
Gu Fei laughed idiotically along with him.
Jiang Cheng rested his chin on Gu Fei’s shoulder as he gave into the laughter.
But slowly, he started to feel a twinge in his nose. Then all of a sudden, he accidentally let a
careless tear slip down his face.
Footnote:

[1]: Eh, I had to look this up. It’s a silly English pun: 419 = for one night, as in one-night-
stands.. ⤴
[2]: Tofu pudding [豆腐脑] translated literally is “tofu brains” ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5855
TL word count: 4126
TL time: 4:44:39
Edit time:
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x shits, 3x asses
TL’s Notes:
Just checked what the rumoured “R University” minimum entry score for Humanities
exams was for 2019, and it was 651.
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: December 6, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 108
“Cheng-ge, I miss you so much. Right here, right now.”
The admission letter listed the registration date as the 9th. Gu Fei suggested that they
should arrive a couple days early to get familiar with the surroundings, but Jiang Cheng
neither agreed nor disagreed. Since Jiang Cheng said that he would buy the tickets, Gu Fei
did not continue to bring it up.
Jiang Cheng procrastinated until the moment when if he didn’t buy the tickets right then,
he’d probably not be able to get any. Under the threat of that deadline, he finally bought the
tickets for the 8th.
Looking at the reservation information sent to his phone, Jiang Cheng felt a little dispirited.
At that moment, the misery of his looming departure was so overwhelming that it
completely and utterly vanquished any joy of finally getting to go to his preferred school.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei was standing in front of the closet as he took out Jiang Cheng’s clothes
one by one, “you really don’t want to pack your own clothes?
What if I packed something you don’t like…”
“I don’t care.” Jiang Cheng was sitting cross-legged on the bed, playing the idiotic Aixiaochu
on Gu Fei’s phone. He hadn’t really helped Gu Fei play this game for a long time, and Li Yan
had surpassed him by more than a few levels.
The game had even updated three more levels already.
“Then don’t yell at me later when you don’t like the clothes you took,” Gu Fei said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Why don’t you pack me that t-shirt of yours, the dumb
one that says ‘F U C K’ on it.”
“That dumbass shirt is really old though,” Gu Fei said.
“I’m gonna wear it to sleep.” Jiang Cheng put his head down and went back to the game.
“Alright then. I’ll go home later to get it.” Gu Fei gave a little smile.
“And those track pants of yours with the stripes down the sides, and the black hoodie,”
Jiang Cheng said. “Oh yeah, and the grey jacket… Oh and uh, why don’t you grab a few pairs
of your… underwear, for me to take with.”
“How about this,” Gu Fei looked at him with one hand on the closet door, “we stop packing
here, and mister can come get it straight from my house?”
“That’s all.” Jiang Cheng thought about it and also laughed. “Leave me alone, it’s not like
you’re going to miss a few pieces of clothing.”
“The ones that mister ordered are all ones I wear on the daily,” Gu Fei said.
“Oho,” Jiang Cheng gave him a sideways look, “nevermind then. If I took them I guess you’ll
just have to run around naked, huh?”
“Geez.” Gu Fei cracked up laughing. “Anything else you want? I’ll grab it all in one go when I
go home later.”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Hm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Huh?” Gu Fei answered again.
“Gu. Fei.” Jiang Cheng said. “What, have you suddenly gone dumb?”
“… Oh,” Gu Fei started laughing, “got it.”
He walked to the bedside and planted a kiss on Jiang Cheng’s forehead. “You don’t need to
take Gu Fei with you. Gu Fei is already yours—can’t be lost—he’s yours no matter what.”
Jiang Cheng swiftly reached up and bit Gu Fei on the chin.
“Fuck.” Gu Fei flicked Jiang Cheng’s head. “You better fix this problem of yours. I’m
probably the only one who can…”
“What, who else?” Jiang Cheng tutted. “Should I bite Pan Zhi? Or Li Yan, or Wang Xu?”
Gu Fei laughed the whole way back to the closet and continued packing Jiang Cheng’s
clothes. When he got to the underwear, he picked one up and asked,
“How come this one has a hole? Did you blow a hole in it with your farts?”
“I hung it on the hook the other day when I was showering, and it caught on something and
ripped a hole when I pulled it off,” Jiang Cheng said. “You could’ve asked if you were the one
who poked a hole in it.”
“I’m not that powerful,” Gu Fei laughed as he said. “Or maybe we can try it tonight.”
“Oh yeah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him and smacked his hand on the mattress, “I just
remembered something extremely important.”
“What?” Gu Fei asked.
“Since we don’t have any plans for the next few days, let’s hurry and use our remaining
time to roll around.” Jiang Cheng’s brows were furrowed. “Otherwise when I go away to
school, we’d have to wait until October 1st before we have time again.”
“… Ah, that truly is a very serious and very important matter.” Gu Fei nodded.
An activity like rolling around, once started, would have no end. They would sleep when
tired, and keep going once they woke up. Young people were filled with the fire of life—if
ever they felt emptied out, all they needed was a night’s sleep before feeling pumped full of
energy again.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei was lying on the bed holding his phone, going through the ticket
information from the other day, “since we’re leaving for the train station tomorrow
morning, in order to get up on time, should we hit pause on the great and important work
of rolling around? It’s just that we’re also running out of lube and condoms and stuff…”
“Why are you so shameless.” Jiang Cheng turned to him. “Do you not feel at all embarrassed
when you say things like this?”
“… You’ve done it like a hundred and eight thousand times already and you wanna tell me
you’re embarrassed?” Gu Fei laughed out loud. “As if your voice wasn’…”
“You bastard!” Jiang Cheng lunged over and covered Gu Fei’s mouth. “Even if I’ve done it
two hundred and sixteen thousand times I’m still not as thickskinned as you, running your
mouth like this!”
Gu Fei continued to cackle beneath Jiang Cheng’s palm—his eyes turned into curvy slits.
“Tell me! Were you wrong!” Jiang Cheng glared viciously at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei mumbled something incoherently.
“Talk properly!” Jiang Cheng continued glaring at him.
Gu Fei didn’t make a sound this time. He stuck his tongue out and licked the center of Jiang
Cheng’s palm.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng immediately felt like his heart had been filled with a hundred bunny
plushies—it was full with soft fluffy tenderness. He removed his hand and also licked Gu
Fei on the lips. “Right this second, I already miss you so much that it’s killing me.”
“I’ll go visit you when I have time.” Gu Fei held him. “No need to wait until October.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng sprawled himself on top of Gu Fei and buried his face in Gu Fei’s neck.
They didn’t go out for dinner that day. After bringing Gu Miao to the store, they cooked
something to eat together.
Gu Miao didn’t know that Jiang Cheng would be going away to school. Gu Fei thought that it
was best that she didn’t know. She could go a long stretch of time without seeing Jiang
Cheng, but if they told her that Jiang Cheng was leaving, and that she wouldn’t be able to
see him for a long time, she would find it unacceptable and throw a fit.
“Would be great,” Jiang Cheng sighed gently, “if this was also her attitude toward you.”
“I’m her big brother after all.” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
Gu Miao also has a mom, but you’ll never see her throw a fit just because she doesn’t see her
mom.
He knew though, that these words were futile.
Gu Fei was definitely a unique kind of presence to Gu Miao. There were likely only two
kinds of people in Gu Miao’s world: her brother, and everyone else.
This place where she’d lived since she was born, and the only support she had all this time
—these were things that must not change, and must not be lost.
Gu Miao took Jiang Cheng’s hand and drew a green bunny on the back of it.
Then she coloured it in.
“That looks great,” Jiang Cheng said.
This praise put Gu Miao in a pretty good mood, so she drew another one exactly like it on
his hand, and coloured it in just like the last one.
Just as she was about to draw a third, Gu Fei intervened from the side and said,
“Hey, that’s an oil based marker. How’s your Cheng-ge supposed to go out tomorrow like
this.”
“It’s pretty cool.” Jiang Cheng looked at the back of his hand.
Gu Fei had to take Gu Miao home in the evening, so Jiang Cheng returned to his apartment
first.
He wasn’t planning to terminate the lease here, since he still had to come back during the
summer. Besides, this way Gu Fei would have a place to come to if he
wanted to be by himself.
Jiang Cheng pulled open a drawer, took out an envelope and counted the money inside,
then repacked the bills into a lucky envelope.
He had told Gu Fei previously to not rush about giving him the modelling money, and Gu
Fei had been keeping it safe for him. A few days ago, Gu Fei had withdrawn all of it and
given it to him.
Jiang Cheng took 8000 yuan out of that to leave for Gu Fei.
It wasn’t a lot of money, and there was no way Gu Fei would accept more.
Though he wasn’t sure either why he wanted to leave money for Gu Fei.
Maybe it was because he was reluctant to leave Gu Fei, or maybe he only wanted to do
something for his boyfriend—to share a little of the burden.
He opened the closet and put the lucky envelope in the pocket of one of Gu Fei’s jackets.
Jiang Cheng stood there and giggled into the closet for a long time as he imagined Gu Fei’s
face when he would put on this jacket one day and find the red envelope inside.
Gu Fei’s worry that they might oversleep and miss the train the next day was proven by
reality to be a rather unnecessary one.
They would definitely not miss the train, because neither of them slept very much the
entire night.
Jiang Cheng kept a pretty good tally on the number of times Gu Fei tossed and turned. Gu
Fei even turned to him several times in the middle of the night to gently stroke his cheek.
When that happened, Jiang Cheng would try his hardest to clench his teeth and hold still—
he didn’t want Gu Fei to find out that he couldn’t sleep, and worry. Just like how his heart
ached for Gu Fei, knowing that he didn’t sleep the whole night.
When the sun was almost up, Jiang Cheng finally could not bear it anymore. He rolled over
and pulled Gu Fei into his arms.
“You’re awake?” Gu Fei asked him quietly.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng hummed.
“You should sleep for a little longer. It’s not time yet.” Gu Fei patted his back.
“I’ll wake you when it’s time to get up.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes.
He finally fell asleep at sunrise.
Though the feeling was more akin to closing his eyes, just to have Gu Fei shake him awake
immediately after. “Cheng-ge, get up and come eat breakfast.”
Get up. Get dressed. Wash up. Eat breakfast. Check luggage. Leave.
They were silent throughout this whole process. Even knowing that Gu Fei would get on
and off the train with him, would travel to the school with him, still Jiang Cheng felt
extremely down.
Gu Fei could only stay with him for two days. Registration was tomorrow, and the day after
that, Gu Fei would have to come back first thing in the morning.
And take the train back by himself.
Just thinking about it was unbearable—to leave as two, and return as one. He didn’t dare to
imagine how Gu Fei must feel.
There were lots of people at the station. The station that was old, forever rundown and
dirty with hints of desolation, that seemed like it would never change, was looking lively
due to the start of the school year. In and out of the station were throngs of students with
suitcases.
Anticipation was written all over their faces. At this point, regardless of whether they had
done well on the exams, and whether they were going to their preferred schools, all of that
took a backseat. Most of their hearts were already filled with the excitement of the new and
unknown life ahead of them.
It wasn’t too long of a train journey to the school, so Jiang Cheng had purchased seater
tickets. Frankly, even if it was a longer trip, he still would’ve wanted to buy seaters. This
way, the two of them could sit side by side, arm pressed against arm, and leg against leg.
They could lean against the other’s shoulder with just a tilt of the head. If they had sleepers,
these actions wouldn’t be as natural.
If two boys with their own bunks insisted on squeezing together on a single one, it would
no doubt look suspicious.
They found their seats in the noisy car, put their luggages away, and sat down, before
breathing sighs of relief.
It was only then that Jiang Cheng felt a little regret for buying the tickets so late.
If he had gotten them sooner they might’ve been able to choose a two-seater row.
Now, they were sitting in a three-seater row, and neither of them were next to the window.
“This isn’t bad at all.” Gu Fei leaned close and pressed his arm against Jiang Cheng’s. “It’s
already fortunate that we’re not separated by the aisle. Look at those two in front of us.”
Jiang Cheng glanced ahead—there was a young couple in front of them. It was clear that
they were just like themselves. The boy was taking the girl to school.
They sat one each on either side of the aisle, and held hands across the walkway.
If someone was passing by, they would let go, and rejoin their hands after the person
passed, repeating the actions ad infinitum.
“If we had to sit like that, would we hold hands?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“It’s a little cheesy,” Gu Fei said. “We can intertwine and linger with our eyes.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he looked at Gu Fei.
“Am I wrong?” Gu Fei looked into his eyes and giggled as he said. “Just like this, two pairs of
eyes meeting across space and time. I see your longing, and you hear me say: I’ll be by your
side… Thank you for listening to the Gu Feifei Love Poetry Mini Broadcast.”
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng was shaking with laughter. “Don’t copy me.”
“That is wrong of you, Contestant Jiang Cheng. You shouldn’t corner the market,” Gu Fei
said seriously.
They continued joking around until the auntie in the window seat arrived, and finally
stopped.
Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone and took a photo of the platform to share to his WeChat
Moments.
Very quickly, there were a bunch of replies under it, wishing him well and saying goodbye.
Wang Xu left the first comment: Come back for October 1st, we’ll eat pie.
Jiang Cheng chuckled for a while at that before putting his phone away. Then he leaned
back in the seat and closed his eyes.
Not long after that, the announcement notified them that the train would be departing
soon.
Jiang Cheng opened his eyes. In the instant when the train first stirred, his heart stopped
for a brief moment.
He swiftly directed his gaze out the window. There was no one left on the platform. The
scenery started to shift backwards.
The train really was departing.
The window was like a screen, displaying the changing view like slides in a
Magic Lantern. The train station quickly disappeared from sight, and the view was replaced
by stretches of worn-down shacks and taller buildings in the distance.
These houses gradually grew sparser, then eventually also disappeared. The view now
showed swathes of farm fields.
Jiang Cheng’s heart also felt a little hollowed out.
What he felt back then, as he came here all by himself, dragging his suitcase behind him,
was completely different from how he felt right now. At the time, he had hardly taken more
than a couple of glances out the window.
It was a tiny city that he was once reluctant to spend another day in—a place that he only
wanted to escape from. But now that it faded out of sight behind him, he was actually
starting to miss it.
He was still adamant on leaving this place—there was no way he could stay—
but also true was that it contained precious memories that he would never in a million
years forget, as well as a person he would never in a million years let go of.
Jiang Cheng finally drew back his gaze when his phone rang. It was a call from Pan Zhi.
The guy really put his words before the exams to action. Even though he didn’t exactly do
well, he still convinced his parents to throw in the money that would get him into a
university in the same city as Jiang Cheng.
“Is that Pan Zhi?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng picked up the phone, “he insisted on picking me up…”
“If I really don’t go to pick you up, wouldn’t you be very disappointed?” Pan Zhi heard Jiang
Cheng’s voice from the other end and voiced his displeasure.
“Cheng-er, don’t get me wrong, but the way you’re treating me right now is just like a
scummy playboy.”
“As an actual authentic playboy,” Jiang Cheng said. “You dare to be so thickskinned as to
accuse your gramps of being scummy?”
“Can’t I? Can you find fault in my single-minded devotion to you?” Pan Zhi said. “You two
don’t arrive until the afternoon, and I’m already walking around your campus.”
“Hold on,” Jiang Cheng said. “When you said you were picking me up, did you mean at the
train station or at the school gates?”
“The train station of course! How do you not know me at all, are we even bros
anymore?” Pan Zhi tutted a couple of times. “I’m just here for an early tour, there’s lots of
pretty girls at your school… Oh yeah, did you tell Gu Fei that I’m picking you up?”
“I mentioned it,” Jiang Cheng said. “Why?”
“Nothing, I just wanted him to know that he has no choice but to tolerate this third wheel.
Since you pretty much ignored this third wheel for the entire summer, as if you’ve never
known me,” Pan Zhi said. “Though I am still fairly considerate. I won’t watch if you two
want to hold hands or make out or something…”
Jiang Cheng pressed the phone to Gu Fei’s ear so he could listen in. Gu Fei cracked up, “We’ll
have to present you with the Best Giant Wheel Award then.”
They didn’t talk much for the rest of the way, choosing instead to lean against each other
with their eyes closed.
Jiang Cheng was certain that he and Gu Fei both fell asleep, and very sloppily too. More than
a few times their heads would knock into one another, and they would open their eyes,
exchange a look, and go back to sleep.
The train was very punctual. About 20 minutes before its scheduled arrival, many people
were already waiting at the door with their luggages.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei yawned and rotated his shoulder, “did you not sleep well last night?”
“Nah. I slept pretty well.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his face.
“You were snoring just now,” Gu Fei said.
“Bull—” Jiang Cheng started but broke off halfway to turn and glare at Gu Fei.
“Really?”
“No,” Gu Fei said.
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng breathed a sigh of relief. Wherever he was, it was always important to
maintain his image. A handsome guy snoring with his mouth open on the train would
definitely be a tragic phenomenon that could not be redeemed even by his good looks.
The auntie at the window seat was also about to squeeze past them to the door with her
luggage. Jiang Cheng stood up with one leg curled on the seat and looked up and down the
train car.
Gu Fei reached his hand discreetly into Jiang Cheng’s shirt and caressed his belly.
Just as he was about to take his hand out, Jiang Cheng leaned forward against the back of
the seat and trapped his hand there.
“Bold, aren’t we?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“This is the time to give oneself over to passion.” Jiang Cheng smiled at him.
“It’s not like anyone knows me here.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. His fingers curled and scratched Jiang Cheng’s belly.
It wasn’t until everyone else left the car that they finally got off the train with their luggage,
walking toward the exit gate where Pan Zhi was waiting for them.
Halfway there, Jiang Cheng got a call from Pan Zhi.
“Gramps! Be honest, are you two exacting vengeance on me! Everyone else from your train
have all fucking gone! Are you two coming out or what!”
“Almost there.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but laugh. “Who has the time to exact vengeance
on you. I just didn’t want to rush out with the crowd, is all.”
“Hurry up,” Pan Zhi said. “I’ve already booked you a hotel room. We can go eat after you set
your stuff down. I got us a table too.”
“A hotel room?” Jiang Cheng didn’t quite understand.
“Were you two going to sleep under a bridge tonight? Or were you going to sleep in your
dorm, and Gu Fei under a bridge?” Pan Zhi asked.
“No, I mean, I can just do it myself,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m begging you gramps, give me a chance to show my affection please. Gu Fei’s pretty
much taken all my parts,” Pan Zhi said. “We second male leads—or supporting male role
number-whatever—have it hard, you know?”
“I’ll give you extra scenes in a bit—we can have a proper hug,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You should ask the male lead first if that’s allowed,” Pan Zhi said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t think it had been that long since he’d last saw Pan Zhi, but coming out of
the station and seeing Pan Zhi standing there with a new hairstyle and an outfit that
positively screamed “playboy scum”, Jiang Cheng couldn’t help the sincere grin from
surfacing on his face.
“Grandpa!” Pan Zhi cried out in extreme enthusiasm.
“Grandson!” Jiang Cheng shouted back.
The passersby nearby all looked in their direction, bearing witness to this
intergenerational reunion.
Pan Zhi dashed over and gave Jiang Cheng a hug. “Fuck! I really have missed you.”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he patted Pan Zhi on the back.
Pan Zhi let go of him and turned to give Gu Fei a hug too. “Long time no see.”
“You’ve gotten a whole eight degrees handsomer than the last time I saw you,”
Gu Fei said.
“Good eyes.” Pan Zhi gave him a thumbs up, then gestured. “Come on let’s go let’s go, we
can get there directly by subway.”
“Did you get here really early?” Gu Fei asked.
“Well of course,” Pan Zhi said. “I’ve been repressing myself and spending time with my
parents all summer—I had to escape as soon as I could. I’ve already been here for two
weeks, just wandering around all day every day waiting for you two to arrive.”
Pan Zhi was already very familiar with the various subway lines, and took them straight to
the university. The room he booked was at a hotel next to the school.
“You two go put your stuff away and get ready. We’ll meet in the lobby in half an hour,” Pan
Zhi said. “Don’t be late—they’ll cancel our table reservation if we’re not there on time.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng went into the room and closed the door. He sat on the edge of the bed,
watching Gu Fei set the luggage down before going into the bathroom to make sure that
there was hot water.
The joy of seeing Pan Zhi again and the ease of chatting the whole way after so long, was
slowly dissipating after he entered this room.
And now, seeing Gu Fei walking back and forth around the room, the reluctance of parting
that erupted in this single instant filled him up until he was ready to combust.
One night today, and one day tomorrow.
Then the day after that, Gu Fei would leave.
Meanwhile, Jiang Cheng would be starting a new life here alone. A new environment, with
new people. A new life, without Gu Fei by his side.
For a very long period of time, he and Gu Fei would have to stay in contact through their
ubiquitous yet not nearly adequate cell phones.
Whenever he got an urge to hug Gu Fei, or kiss Gu Fei, he would only have a screen…
As soon as thoughts like these began to rear their heads, it was impossible to push them
back down.
“Gu Fei,” he called out.
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered from the bathroom, but didn’t come out.
Jiang Cheng stood up and walked to the bathroom door. He saw Gu Fei standing there with
his hands braced against the sink, staring at himself in the mirror.
When he heard Jiang Cheng behind him, Gu Fei quickly turned on the tap and splashed
some water on his face.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng called out again. His heart had twisted itself into a giant knot.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei turned and gave him a little smile.
His eyes were a little red.
“You were crying.” Jiang Cheng walked up to him. There was a tremor in his voice. He
cupped Gu Fei’s face in his hands and gently wiped away the drops of water. “Were you
crying?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei answered. He closed his eyes for a moment. “Cheng-ge, I miss you so much.
Right this second.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6009
TL word count: 4369
TL time: 4:07:36
Edit time: 1:01:41
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
*sniffs*
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!

First posted: December 13, 2021

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 109
“there will never be a second Gu Fei.”
Jiang Cheng thought his hands were warm, but when Gu Fei closed his eyes and a very
small drop of tear fell from the corner of his eyes onto his fingertip, he still felt its warmth.
It was a tiny warmth that carried with it Gu Fei’s emotions.
Jiang Cheng felt like somebody had grabbed his heart and squeezed it. It was throbbing
with pain.
He didn’t say a word, nor did he know what else he could say. Gu Fei never let his emotions
show. Even in front of Jiang Cheng, he would control himself as much as possible.
This was the second time.
The first time, Jiang Cheng saw Gu Fei at the bottom of a dark river. His eyes closed.
The second time, he saw Gu Fei stricken down by the imminent separation and longing, just
like he was.
Jiang Cheng had nothing else to say. If he opened his mouth, he would surely devolve into a
puddle of tears along with Gu Fei.
He couldn’t cry right now. He couldn’t add to the weight of Gu Fei’s longing. He only wanted
to hold Gu Fei. To let him feel his existence, lively and warm in his arms.
It was what he wanted at this moment—to have the solid weight of Gu Fei in his own arms.
It was very quiet in the bathroom. The only sound was the low whirring of the fan.
Gu Fei’s tears didn’t make a sound, but his heartbeat did. Jiang Cheng didn’t know if the
heartbeat was real or just a part of his imagination. Nor could he tell whether the heartbeat
belonged to Gu Fei or himself.
He closed his eyes and held Gu Fei close, gripping tightly on his clothes, as if he was trying
to hold onto time itself, slowly trickling away.
Every minute and every second.
Time was a very annoying thing.
Lively, yet cruel.
After a while, Gu Fei bowed his head and nuzzled against Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “I’m fine
now. Do you wanna take a shower? Or eat first and then shower when we come back?”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng hadn’t yet calmed the angst that was making waves in his heart. Once
again, Gu Fei’s control of his emotions was god-tier.
Gu Fei was already patting his shoulder again. “Do you want to shower right now?”
“I’ll just wash my face for now,” Jiang Cheng sniffled, “and shower when we come back. I
can’t sleep anyways if I don’t shower before bed.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei let go of him, then turned around and switched on the tap.
Gu Fei splashed some water on his face, and by the time he wiped it dry and turned back
around, he was already back to normal.
“Do you want to take a shower?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Nah, let’s shower together tonight.” Gu Fei smiled. “A couples bath.”
Jiang Cheng tutted and laughed, “You’re the most shameless person I’ve ever met in my
life.”
“What do you mean ‘ever’,” Gu Fei said. “You’ll meet plenty of people in the future; lots and
lots of ‘most’ whatevers.”
“You are the most,” Jiang Cheng nudged him aside and said while washing his face. “The
most handsome; the most intelligent; the most cool; the most adorable; the most talented,
and… the one I’m most reluctant to part with.”
“Then I can only say a-fucking-men,” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck what?” Jiang Cheng’s mind was still a little groggy and didn’t quite comprehend.
“You of course,” Gu Fei said with a laugh and walked out.
“Fuck off!” It finally clicked for Jiang Cheng. “Fine if you wanna fuck but men?! What men!”
Gu Fei couldn’t stop laughing. He walked to the window and pulled out a cigarette to hold
between his lips.
He wondered what time it was, but was too lazy to take out his phone and check.
However, it was already dark outside.
Looking up, he could see the vague contours of the night sky, and looking down, a brilliance
of lights filled his view. There were fields of light made up of individual buildings and
shimmering neon signs, both near and far.
“Whatcha lookin’ at?” Jiang Cheng walked to his side.
“The great bustling metropolis,” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah, it’s the capital after all,” Jiang Cheng said. “If it was the Steelworks neighbourhood,
it’d probably be pitch black by now.”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei smiled. “Not even the streetlamps would be on.”
“Have you been here before, when you used to run out and travel by yourself?”
Jiang Cheng asked.
“No.” Gu Fei shook his head. “If it wasn’t because of you, I might not ever come here.”
“What do you mean ‘ever’,” Jiang Cheng copied what Gu Fei said earlier. “We’ll go to many
other places like this in the future: big cities; small cities; on the mountain; by the sea; on
the other side of the mountain and other side of the sea…” [1]
Out of nowhere and halfway through his sentence, Jiang Cheng’s words made an
inexplicably smooth segue into song.
“There lives a group of blue smurfies…” Gu Fei continued the line even as he giggled.
They finished changing their clothes and got ready to go to dinner.
Jiang Cheng went to knock on Pan Zhi’s room next door, but there was no answer.
“He’s definitely not in his room anymore at this point,” Gu Fei said. “I bet he’s in the lobby
waiting to yell at us.”
“What time is it?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m scared to check my phone,” Gu Fei said. “I think Pan Zhi’s reservation’s probably
cancelled. How are we going to face him?”
“Tsk, head on and honestly,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Pan Zhi was sitting in the lobby swiping at his phone in absolute boredom.
When the two of them walked up, he was taking selfies as if he was the only one
in the room.
“Hey handsome,” Jiang Cheng called to him.
“Fuck.” Pan Zhi stood up with an expression of relief, which proceeded to change into a
more inscrutable one. “Okay alright, aren’t you two trying a little too hard to milk every
minute and second? You still got a long night ahead of you after dinner. But you just had to
rush things now?”
“What do you mean?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“The condoms in hotel rooms are so overpriced,” Pan Zhi said as he pulled out his phone
and started dialling. “Don’t you feel scammed? Wouldn’t it be better to go buy a box after
dinner…”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng turned to Gu Fei with a stunned expression.
“Head on and honestly,” Gu Fei reminded him.
“Head on your honest ass.” Jiang Cheng turned back to Pan Zhi. “We didn’t…”
“Hello?” Pan Zhi’s call connected. “I reserved a table today… yes for Pan An!
I’m… don’t cancel it! What do you mean cancel I’m heading over right now! I even called
earlier for you to hold the table!”
“My image is completely ruined,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Why do you need to maintain an image in front of your own grandson?” Gu Fei laughed as
he slung an arm around Jiang Cheng’s shoulders.
“Jiejie!” Pan Zhi, who a moment ago was assertively loud, suddenly changed his tone. “Jiejie,
don’t cancel it, alright? I promise I’m coming. I’ll be there in ten minutes, really. Please help
me, ask the other group to wait for another table. I have guests here—very important
guests. It has to do with my honour…”
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei stood outside the hotel, watching the traffic stream by, and waiting
for Pan Zhi to turn the tide on the cancelled reservation that was going to go to a group of
diners who were already at the restaurant.
Two minutes later, Pan Zhi waved at them. “Hurry, let’s go. It’s right up ahead.”
“They’re saving it for us?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“For ten minutes.” Pan Zhi checked the time. “You two are really testing my social skills.”
“We…” Jiang Cheng wanted to say they really didn’t make use of the condoms in the hotel
room, but upon further reflection couldn’t find a way to explain why they had taken so long,
so he didn’t continue.
“Wait for me for one second.” Pan Zhi suddenly ran into a flower shop nearby.
When he came back out, it was with a stem of very beautifully wrapped rose in his hand.
“What’s this for?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“It’s not for you two,” Pan Zhi said.
“I wouldn’t want it even if you kneeled down and begged me to take it,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Not even if you kowtow,” Gu Fei said.
“Why would someone so principled and moral as me ever kneel down and beg you!” Pan
Zhi said before glaring at Gu Fei. “You two sure are a good match!”
The restaurant was not too far away. It was a Szechuan restaurant, and business was
booming. No wonder they would cancel the reservation once the time had passed. It was a
rarity for such a hotspot to accept reservations at all.
“Hello, for how many people?” the host asked with a smile.
“I have a reservation, under the surname Pan,” Pan Zhi said.
“Ah Mr. Pan—your table is on the second floor. If you’ll please follow…” The host didn’t get
to finish before Pan Zhi interrupted.
“Who’s the one who answered my call before?” Pan Zhi asked.
“That would be our receptionist at the counter.” The host pointed to the side.
“The one on the phone over there?” Pan Zhi glanced that way.
“Yes.” The host nodded.
“You two go up first,” Pan Zhi turned back to Jiang Cheng, “I’ll be just a minute.”
“You…” Jiang Cheng glanced over at the counter. The young woman currently on the phone
did look kind of pretty. Jiang Cheng sighed and turned back to the host. “Second floor,
right?”
“Yes. Second floor, table 35. There will be a server on the second floor to take you to your
table,” the host said.
As they walked up the stairs, Jiang Cheng turned his head again for another look.
Pan Zhi was already at the counter, extending the rose in his hand toward the young
woman who answered his call earlier. The young woman blinked at him in surprise, but
after Pan Zhi said something to her, she suddenly started smiling
timidly.
“Is he always like this?” Gu Fei was also looking back that way. “Like he’s got it down to a
T.”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng cracked up laughing, “he’s been like this since middle school—
extremely shameless.”
“Don’t learn from him,” Gu Fei said very seriously.
“This isn’t something to be learned,” Jiang Cheng also replied very seriously.
“This kind of ability is innate and from the womb. He’d experienced a broken heart as early
as in kindergarten.”
“Damn.” Gu Fei laughed.
Pan Zhi finally came upstairs after adding the young woman as a WeChat contact, and sat
down across from them. “Have you ordered?”
“Waiting for you to order,” Jiang Cheng said. “We don’t know this place.”
“Did you see that girl just now?” Pan Zhi flipped through the menu. “Really cute. And the
way she talks too, all staccato like.”
Neither Jiang Cheng nor Gu Fei said anything. They just looked at him in unison.
“Right, that was a girl,” Pan Zhi said.
“I also don’t have the habit of staring at guys wherever I go.” Jiang Cheng took a sip of his
tea.
“Okayyy, I know you’re both hyper-focused on each other,” Pan Zhi sighed.
“But that only comes after the first encounter. If I don’t look around, how will I meet the
person I want to focus on, right?”
“Perfect logic, I can’t even rebut that.” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“Am I wrong? Take him for example.” Pan Zhi pointed at Gu Fei. “How far did you have to
go, just to run into him.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei and didn’t answer.
“Although,” Pan Zhi waved the server over to order, “I do have a one-up on you guys at the
moment: I don’t have to experience the angst of separation. If I’m not serious, then I won’t
be upset. Better to just enjoy myself first.”
“It’s not up to you to decide when and if you’re going to get serious,” Gu Fei said.
“You looking down on me?” Pan Zhi looked at him.
“I’ll be waiting to see.” Gu Fei looked back at Pan Zhi through a circle he made with his
fingers.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know when Pan Zhi would feel upset, but he knew that he himself had
already been upset for a long time—from a faint sense of unease, to intentional evasion, to
waves of panic when he could no longer hide from reality, to now.
He didn’t even want to glimpse the time on his phone, didn’t want to see with his own eyes
how time had taken away the shared moments he had with Gu Fei bit by bit.
After dinner, and after returning to their room and taking a shower, the two of them sat in
bed and watched TV.
Most of the time was spent in silence, with the occasional exchange on some unrelated
topic.
When finally Gu Fei turned off the TV and the lights, Jiang Cheng laid down and wrapped
himself around Gu Fei, with one leg on the other’s body, and closed his eyes.
Perhaps because of their shared sleepless night the day before, they quickly fell asleep as
soon as the lights were off.
Jiang Cheng was even a little annoyed when he opened his eyes in the morning.
He almost felt like he had wasted the night.
“Pan Zhi said there’s breakfast. They can bring it to the room,” Gu Fei said. “Do you want to
eat now? If you do, I’ll call for room service to bring it up?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng snuggled up to Gu Fei and plastered himself to him.
“After breakfast is just in time for your registration. We can walk over,” Gu Fei said again.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng answered with his eyes closed.
The hotel was very close to the school. Pan Zhi did not tag along with them to registration.
He went back to his own school after checking out, and said helpfully before he left, “Your
train is tomorrow morning, right Gu Fei? The subway entrance is right there—you can take
the subway over.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
“I won’t come see you off then,” Pan Zhi said. “And you two, try not to be too…
you know. It’s less than a month until the next holiday.”
“Hurry up and go,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Scum-boy,” Pan Zhi said.
“Go already, supporting male number whatever.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
After Pan Zhi left, Jiang Cheng let out a small sigh.
His mind had been filled with the thought that Gu Fei was leaving “the day after tomorrow”.
The words “tomorrow morning” coming from Pan Zhi’s mouth gave his heart a little quake.
Not the day after tomorrow—but tomorrow. First thing tomorrow morning, actually.
Starting the next morning, he would be by himself. In this strange city and amongst a
strange crowd.
Jiang Cheng didn’t talk much. Meanwhile, Gu Fei couldn’t find anything to say either, and so
opted for silence.
They walked down the street, and didn’t take long before they reached R
University. Gu Fei suddenly felt a little anxious—an unsettling feeling that he didn’t belong.
Very rarely would he ever feel like that, but in this moment, he experienced it with a sharp
clarity.
There were many new students and parents all around them. Joy and pride was written on
every one of their faces. They were just like Jiang Cheng—
overachieving students of various kinds.
Gu Fei glanced at Jiang Cheng, whose face was very calm. He must be feeling very different
things than I am right now, Gu Fei thought. This was the place where Jiang Cheng would
begin his new life—in an elite program at one of the top universities.
Jiang Cheng was his pride, and also the source of a nagging sense of panic beginning to
emerge in him.
“Let’s go over there and ask how registration works,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei nodded and followed him through the crowd.
It was bustling and lively in front of the law school building. There were tables set up under
a ring of temporary sunshades, where many volunteers stood answering questions from
incoming students. Beside them were various posters and display boards to welcome the
freshmen, many of whom were taking
pictures in front of the displays.
Gu Fei didn’t squeeze to the front of the tables with Jiang Cheng. Instead, he stood at the
edge of the crowd and looked in.
Very quickly, one of the girls led Jiang Cheng to a nearby table. Jiang Cheng looked back in
Gu Fei’s direction as he walked away, and Gu Fei lifted a hand at him.
Jiang Cheng gave him a little wave, beckoning him over.
“This is where you register?” Gu Fei walked to his side.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “There’s a lot of things to prepare though. Gotta show them my
ID, my acceptance letter, my exam card… Then I have to pick up my check-in slip and use
that to do the rest of the paperwork.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei looked around at the people beside them.
“Don’t get too far from me,” Jiang Cheng said quietly as he pulled documents out of his bag.
“No more than five steps away.”
“What’s wrong?” Gu Fei smiled at him.
“Nothing’s wrong,” Jiang Cheng said. “I just feel more settled when I can see you.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei squeezed Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
Jiang Cheng turned back and continued his registration process while Gu Fei stood behind
him and watched. Every time Jiang Cheng moved, Gu Fei would follow.
Whether it was verifying his information, checking in for registration, or paying his tuition,
all of it went fairly quickly and painlessly with the help of the volunteers. When all that was
done, Jiang Cheng walked up to Gu Fei with a pile of things in his arms and said, “Hold this
for a second.”
There were receipts, the campus passcard, student ID, school coat of arms… and a few
invitations from campus clubs as well as promotional cards from the other colleges. It was
a lot of stuff. Gu Fei put all this into a separate compartment in Jiang Cheng’s bag. “What
now?”
“To the dorm. My room’s on the first floor, which is nice—I won’t have to climb stairs
anymore.” Jiang Cheng grinned. “A senior student will take us there in a bit.”
“Can I go in?” Gu Fei asked.
“Sure. Normally we’d need to tap the passcard, but this week there are a lot of parents
around, so everyone’s allowed inside.” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Hey,
you’re my parent.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, only gave a little smile.
One of the senior students who might also be a volunteer walked over to them, with a few
other male students and their parents in tow.
“Jiang Cheng,” the senior called to him, “let’s go. I’ll take you to your dorms.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng answered.
The other guys were all students in the same program as him. They started chatting easily
along the way, with common icebreakers such as where everyone was from and what score
they had gotten. Jiang Cheng wasn’t much for small talk, but the others were chatting up a
storm.
“Oh hey,” one of the guys looked at Gu Fei, “let’s introduce ourselves. My name is Zhang
Ping, what about you? Where are you from?”
“I’m… not a new student.” Gu Fei suddenly felt a little awkward.
“Our senior?” Zhang Ping continued asking.
“My friend,” Jiang Cheng said. “He came with me.”
“Oh, your friend.” Zhang Ping nodded with a smile, then asked again, “What school are you
going to?”
Gu Fei wasn’t sure how to answer this question. He didn’t mind telling anyone the name of
his school, but in this group of R University students, only Jiang Cheng would recognize the
name of the Normal School he was going to.
He was suddenly at a loss as to how to deal with this kind of situation.
“A Normal School in our hometown,” Jiang Cheng said. “He came all this way just to keep
me company.”
“Ah, that’s real solid friendship right there,” Zhang Ping said.
Jiang Cheng nodded with a smile, and slowed his steps until he was walking with Gu Fei at
the back of the group.
The senior took them to the dormitory building, and helped each of them find their rooms
before he left.
The two of them walked into Jiang Cheng’s dorm. Apparently this building was one of the
ones with the nicer amenities, and this was proven true in person. All of the beds were
bunks on top and a desk on the bottom, and there were four to a room.
Someone had already arrived in their room—a young man and his mom and dad were in
the middle of wiping down the desks.
“Hi,” Jiang Cheng greeted them, “I’m Jiang Cheng.”
“Zhao Ke.” The guy turned his head and pointed at a bunk by the window. “Your bed’s over
there, I already wiped it clean for you.”
“Oh, thank you,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You’re welcome,” Zhao Ke said before directing his gaze over to Gu Fei.
“I’m his friend,” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Zhao Ke nodded, then said to his parents, “I said I’ll come by myself. See, other people
didn’t have their parents come along with them.”
“We’re just treating this as a getaway trip,” his mom said. “You guys be good, okay? You’ll
be in the same dorm from now on, so please take care of one another. If there are any
problems, don’t hit each other, just fight it out verbally.”
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Where’s your stuff?” Zhao Ke asked.
“I won’t be moving in until tomorrow. I’ll bring everything then,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh.” Zhao Ke went back to wiping the desks.
After looking around the room, Gu Fei went with Jiang Cheng to look around and outside
the dormitory building, to get familiar with the surroundings.
“There’s a supermarket,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’ll be convenient for buying food.”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei smiled. “Your first reaction is about the food? It’s not like they sell the great
pork belly there.”
“Don’t mention pork belly, I’m hungry…” Jiang Cheng pressed on his stomach.
“Come on, let’s go find something to eat.”
“Not gonna walk around campus some more?” Gu Fei asked.
“I can do it later. Lots of time for that, years even,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei nodded.
As they walked back the way they came toward the main gate, Jiang Cheng kept looking
around them. Gu Fei could tell that though Jiang Cheng wasn’t in the
best of moods, he still felt excited and curious about this long-anticipated university
campus.
Gu Fei was looking too. It was the place where Jiang Cheng would be spending many years.
Every glance he took, every frame he seared into his mind, would make his eventual
imagining of Jiang Cheng’s campus life all the more real.
However, with every detail he took in, it also increased the lurking panic in his heart.
Difference.
This kind of practical difference shown right before his eyes was much more obvious than
anything he’d imagined before.
It was in the loftiness exhibited by the not-so-aesthetic but clearly aged buildings on
campus, and the innate confidence so naturally exuded by the senior students walking
about.
Gu Fei had been in low spirits ever since registration earlier. Jiang Cheng could feel it
acutely in his diminishing smiles and growing silence.
It might’ve been due to their imminent parting, or maybe… Jiang Cheng suddenly regretted
having Gu Fei come with him all this way. Any kind of reaction from Gu Fei tore at his heart.
He glanced at the person beside him. Gu Fei had his head turned away to look at something.
“Boyfriend,” Jiang Cheng bumped gently against his shoulder, “what do you want to eat?”
“Whatever my boyfriend wants.” Gu Fei turned to him and smiled.
“I don’t know either.” Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone. “Let’s see what’s around here?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng said as he swiped away on his phone. “Can you tell me what you’re
thinking about?”
“Hm?” Gu Fei blinked.
“You’re unhappy. Aside from the fact that you’re leaving tomorrow,” Jiang Cheng stared
intently at his phone, “is there some other reason?”
“… Yes,” Gu Fei said.
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng cocked his head to look at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was quiet for a few seconds before turning to look back at him. “That Zhao Ke.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng was caught off guard.
“He’s very good looking huh,” Gu Fei said.
“Who?” Jiang Cheng was still very confused.
“Zhao Ke,” Gu Fei said.
“Zhao Ke?” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “What the shit. Where did you meet someone new in
such a short span of time? And ‘good looking’ too??”
“… You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Gu Fei couldn’t help laughing. “Cheng-ge, can your
overachieving brain spare some IQ points to the ‘unimportant things’?
Your roommate! Zhao Ke!”
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng was still glaring at him. “His name is Zhao Ke? I don’t even know if I
forgot or if I never even remembered it in the first place!”
“Well hurry up and remember, otherwise how awkward would it be when you go back
tomorrow and not even remember the guy’s name,” Gu Fei said.
“Oh, Zhao Ke… Zhao Ke.” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a moment. “Was he good
looking… To be honest, I didn’t really take a close look…”
Gu Fei sighed amidst his laughter.
“Is this you getting pre-jelly?” Jiang Cheng asked him.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Bull-hoppity-shit.” Jiang Cheng’s brows were furrowed.
“Come on, be civilized. Don’t forget, you’re a student of an elite university.” Gu Fei put his
arm around Jiang Cheng’s shoulders.
“I know what you’re thinking, but fine, bottle it in if you don’t want to say it.
You’re like that anyways,” Jiang Cheng said. “Just remember this.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei looked at him.
“I don’t like that shitty little city, and I can’t stand the people in that shitty neighbourhood,”
Jiang Cheng said. “But I still can’t bear to leave that place—the city, and the Steelworks—
because that’s where I picked you out.”
Gu Fei was quiet.
“Wherever I go, I will always be able to pick you out with a single glance,”
Jiang Cheng said. “You’re not like the others—I’ve said it before—you’re not like anyone
else. I know you said that I’ll meet lots of other people, but no matter how many new
people I meet, there will never be a second Gu Fei.”
Footnote
[1] The Chinese theme song for The Smurfs … ⇡
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6491
TL word count: 4501
TL time: 4:33:20
Edit time: 1:04:13
Curse words: 7x fucks, 4x shits, 1x ass
TL’s Notes:
HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE! Sorry for the long wait, it took a long time to crawl out from
under a mountain of work :<
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: December 25, 2021
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 110
Look! Back!
After lunch, the two of them spent some time around the outside of the campus, as an after-
meal-stroll. Gu Fei said Jiang Cheng should familiarize himself with the surroundings, but
Jiang Cheng didn’t think that was necessary.
Based on his current state of mind, he wasn’t even in the mood to walk around inside the
campus, let alone go out to explore the neighbourhood. He could already imagine his daily
timeline for the foreseeable future: go to class; eat; and sleep.
And think about Gu Fei.
They were going from spending every day and night together, seeing the other person as
soon as they opened their eyes in the morning, to not being able to see nor touch each
other.
The distance between them would be much more than a mere hours long train ride, and
much more than the twenty or so days from now until October 1st.
They went back to the hotel after the walk. On the way back Jiang Cheng made a total of
three wrong turns.
“I think it’s best if you try not to go off campus unless you have to,” Gu Fei said while lying
on the bed swiping at his phone. “Or you’d risk getting lost.”
“Can’t I just ask someone for the way back.” Jiang Cheng flopped down beside Gu Fei.
“Besides, I’m really not in much of a mood to go out.”
“It’ll be better once you adapt. You’ll get used to it eventually. So many people cry their
hearts out from homesickness when they first go to school, but don’t they all turn out fine
in the end?” Gu Fei pulled Jiang Cheng’s shirt up a little and caressed his back. “It’ll get
better once you get closer with your classmates.”
“You think I’m the sort of person who will easily get close with other people?”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Well, you’ll at least get closer to the people in your dorm room.” Gu Fei smiled.
“You might have a hot temper, but you are very reasonable under normal circumstances.”
“Hopefully.” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes. “Massage my lower back, boyfriend.”
“Nope,” Gu Fei refused. “I’ll probably feel something if I do, but I’m not really
in the mood to roll around at the moment. What if the psychosomatic rollercoaster ends up
affecting my sexual prowess…”
“What the fuck shut your mouth.” Jiang Cheng pushed himself up in bed and glared at Gu
Fei. “If I call you shameless right now, would you have a problem with that?”
“I’ve never had a problem with that,” Gu Fei laughed. “I’m only saying that you’re just as
shameless.”
“Oh piss off.” Jiang Cheng flopped back onto the pillow. “Me—a pure and innocent young
man.”
“Hey, have you ever seen this cartoon—I don’t remember what it’s called, but I remember
how the song goes,” Gu Fei said.
“Sing it for me, I might know it,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei cleared his throat and began: “Little mousy little mousy wears a blue shirt, squeak
squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak…”
“Big face kitty cat with long whiskers, meow meowmeow meow meowmeow meow…” Jiang
Cheng immediately continued the next line. “How can you not know this—it’s The Big-
Faced Kitty and the Blue-Skinned Mouse.” ▶
“One has a tail that’s long and thin, squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak; one has a face
that’s larger than life, meow meow meow meow meow. ” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng. “Is it
Big-Faced Kitty? It’s really not called Jiang Chengcheng and the Blue-Skinned Mouse?” [1]
“Fucking… shit!” Jiang Cheng finally made the connection, and was shaken to his core. “Gu
Fei I really have got to hand it to you! To go to such a roundabout length just for an insult.
Why don’t you go and fly a lap around the sun before coming back here?”
“The sun’s not out right now,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help cracking up, then collapsed into laughter on his pillow. “Fuck.”
While Gu Fei wasn’t in the mood for rolling in the sheets, Jiang Cheng felt like he was the
same, despite still wanting very much to hold Gu Fei; to kiss, bite, lick, and knead… But
more than giving in to that kind of wild abandon, he wanted them to lie peacefully beside
each other, and talk, or just stay quiet.
Even though staying conscious meant he could clearly feel the pain that came before a
parting, the consciousness also allowed him to better savour the minute details of the time
he had with Gu Fei.
Some things were already engrained deeply into his memory, yet he couldn’t help but try to
hold on even tighter to it, afraid that it would be forgotten in an instant once he turned
around. And to forget even a tiny fraction of a moment would certainly be most unbearable.
Neither of them really slept that night. This time, Jiang Cheng didn’t try to put up a front
and fake his slumber. As soon as Gu Fei moved, he would move too: when Gu Fei rolled to
the right, he would also roll to his right side and hold him; when Gu Fei rolled to the left, he
would quickly roll to his left side, then pull Gu Fei’s arms from behind to wrap around
himself.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei chuckled quietly, “I can sleep for a while on the train tomorrow, but will
you be able to sleep in your dorm? With people going in and out all the time?”
“I don’t need to sleep,” Jiang Cheng said. “I only slept four to five hours each day while I was
studying for the exams, and I didn’t die then. Don’t you worry about me.”
“I’ll switch my phone plan when I get back for one with more data,” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah, I’ll get a different plan too,” Jiang Cheng said. “That’s all we have to rely on in the
future… Oh right, can you discuss this with Gu Miao? Change your WeChat icon to your own
photo so I can see your face whenever you send a message.”
“Alright,” Gu Fei said.
“Oh yeah.” After another second of thought, Jiang Cheng pulled out his own phone.
“Hey,” Gu Fei said as he lifted a hand to block the light from the suddenly lit screen. “There,
you’ve successfully chased away the last trace of my sleepiness.”
“Is good sir not going to sleep on the train tomorrow?” Jiang Cheng tapped open his
WeChat. “I’m gonna change my chat background. Here, can you pick a photo for me?”
Jiang Cheng’s banner on his WeChat Moments was already a photo of the two of them. Gu
Fei picked the selfie he took that day on the rooftop and set it as Jiang Cheng’s chat
background.
“Super hot,” Jiang Cheng said. “Change yours too.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei reached for his own phone. “I only have my icon left to change.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng turned to him. “When did you do the rest?”
“The other day when I was with Gu Miao. Didn’t have anything else to do so I
changed all my display pictures. I have more photos here than you do anyways,”
Gu Fei said. “And I take better pictures.”
“Shit.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I never complained about your looks.”
After changing out the pictures, they both lost any desire for sleep completely and
proceeded to chat on and off, while holding each other until the sun came up.
It wasn’t wholly accurate to say that Jiang Cheng wasn’t sleepy. He must’ve been a little
muddled, because after getting out of bed, washing up, and having breakfast, Jiang Cheng
once again felt the emotions that had been kept at bay all of last night.
Now that he was totally awake, the unbearable longing was finally starting to slowly wash
over him like a rising tide.
Since Gu Fei’s train was early in the morning, it might be disruptive to the others if Jiang
Cheng went to put his luggage back in the dorm at this hour, so he stored it with the front
desk at the hotel to fetch once he came back.
“Let’s go. To the train station.” After thanking the front desk, Jiang Cheng grabbed Gu Fei’s
bag and walked out of the hotel.
Gu Fei only brought one set of clothes to change, so his bag was very light, just like Jiang
Cheng’s steps right then, airy and ungrounded.
“I’ll hold it.” Gu Fei caught up to him.
“No.” Jiang Cheng slung the bag over his shoulder.
Gu Fei didn’t pursue the matter.
Neither of them spoke again as they entered then exited the subway.
There was still so much to say to each other, but nothing was said the entire way.
They didn’t get to the train station too early. After finding the right departure gate, they
didn’t have to stand there for very long before the announcement came for the passengers
to enter.
“Go on in.” Jiang Cheng handed the bag to Gu Fei.
“I can wait a little longer.” Gu Fei checked the time. “I’ll go after this group goes in, so I
won’t have to squeeze with them.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“I’ll have to go register too, when I get back there, and see what the school has
planned. If there’s nothing else, then I’ll pick a weekend to come see you,” Gu Fei said.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Honestly, it’s not that much trouble to come here,” Gu Fei said. “Start first thing in the
morning and I’ll be here just after noon. Then I can leave in the evening of the next day.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his nose.
“The guy from yesterday is named Zhao Ke,” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng started laughing, “I didn’t forget. He’s also rather good looking, right?”
“Yes,” Gu Fei said. “Very good looking.”
Jiang Cheng tutted and said, “I’ll hurry back to the dorm later to check it out.”
“What’s the rush?” Gu Fei tutted as well. “You’ll be able to watch him for years to come, and
might even catch a nude version.”
“You ass.” Jiang Cheng burst out laughing.
There were a lot fewer people going through the gate at this point; the announcement was
still repeating the departure information.
“You should go,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei turned and glanced in the direction of the gate, but didn’t make a move.
“You should go,” Jiang Cheng said again.
“Don’t you fucking rush me,” Gu Fei said.
“I’m about to have a fucking breakdown,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei sighed softly. “I’m going in then. I’ll message you once the train starts moving.”
“Message me as soon as you sit down,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Okay,” Gu Fei answered.
“Don’t look back at me when you go,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Understood.” Gu Fei nodded.
They didn’t say anything more. Gu Fei paused for a few seconds, then turned and walked
toward the departure gate.
Jiang Cheng stared at Gu Fei’s receding figure, watching as he took one step after another.
Look back.
I can’t believe you’re not looking back.
Ahhh fucking look back. I’m still standing right here?
Don’t look back.
Out in the public like this, what if I break down in tears once you look back…
It’d be way too embarrassing.
Look! Back!
Gu Fei’s backpack carrying figure disappeared from view.
Jiang Cheng hastily walked a few steps to the side, and was only in time to catch a glimpse
of the bag Gu Fei carried just as he turned the corner.
Gu Fei never once looked back—didn’t even give him a side profile—and had walked very
briskly. Jiang Cheng felt like he’d only blinked three times before he could no longer see
him anymore.
So obedient.
He really didn’t look back.
But I didn’t tell him to walk so quickly. Why did he have to walk so quickly?
Jiang Cheng let out a quiet sigh and turned to walk away.
It was quite a long way from the departure gate to the entrance of the subway station. Jiang
Cheng hadn’t noticed on the way there, but coming out now he realized that try as he might,
he still couldn’t find his way.
Looking at the direction arrows… He’d gone in the opposite direction.
Jiang Cheng immediately turned to go back, but after walking for what felt like four
kilometres, he still didn’t manage to get to the right place.
His phone vibrated once—a message from Gu Fei.
– I just sat down, there’s a very fat uncle beside me, I feel like his flesh is spilling over to my
seat
Jiang Cheng laughed for a long time at his screen. When paired with Gu Fei’s backlit side
profile in his chat background, he could practically see the way Gu Fei looked as he said
this.
– are you in the subway yet
Gu Fei sent him another message.
– I haven’t found the way out
A second later, Gu Fei’s call came in: “Looks like a sense of direction and short-term
geographical memory really has nothing to do with intellect huh?”
“I’ve come all the way back to the departure gate,” Jiang Cheng said with a laugh.
“Look down,” Gu Fei said. “Are there arrows on the floor?”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng said as he looked down.
“Follow the arrows then, young man,” Gu Fei said.
The phone call from Gu Fei made Jiang Cheng’s rock-bottom mood much
lighter.
In the past, whenever Gu Fei didn’t spend the night at Jiang Cheng’s apartment, they would
also call each other all the time, and for a long time. Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a sense of
familiarity, as though Gu Fei was still by his side.
He threw his head back and took in several large breaths, then shook his arms.
Back to campus.
Time for his new life to start.
“When will you arrive?” Li Yan asked.
“One-thirty probably,” Gu Fei said. “Are you taking Liu Fan’s car?”
“Yeah,” Li Yan answered. “He wanted to go too, so he’s driving.”
“Wouldn’t it be too uncomfortable to squish four people in that crappy car?” Gu Fei sighed.
“Er-Miao doesn’t take up any room,” Li Yan said. “We’re going straight to the restaurant
after picking you up. Called ahead and everything.”
“Can’t it be tomorrow?” Gu Fei glanced out the window. The platform was already empty,
aside from a single train attendant still standing there.
“Cannot,” Li Yan said. “I worry that without some kind of intervention, you’re not going to
make it past tonight.”
“You think I’m like you?” Gu Fei said.
“I know you far too well,” Li Yan said. “Aren’t you just gonna keep it all bottled up inside, let
the pressure build up until you die.”
“… I’ll call you when I’m almost there,” Gu Fei said.
“Okay,” Li Yan answered.
Gu Fei had just hung up and put the phone back in his pocket when the train started
moving slowly forward.
He was a little surprised, and wondered if the announcer didn’t mention that the train was
departing, or if he just didn’t hear it.
It could only be the latter.
A phone call with Li Yan wasn’t enough to distract him to such an extent that he didn’t hear
the announcement.
His jumbled mess of a mind was the only reason.
Don’t look back at me when you go. Jiang Cheng had said.
Even if Jiang Cheng hadn’t said that, Gu Fei still wouldn’t have looked back. He was afraid
that if he did, his boyfriend with the hyperactive tear gland would start bawling at the
departure gate.
Then, he might also fail to hold it in.
Imagine two big-ass dudes, each situated on either side of a departure gate, crying at each
other… It would certainly be a captivating scene.
He didn’t want people to see this.
From the moment he stepped onto the train, to calling Jiang Cheng, to receiving Li Yan’s
call, until the train started moving just now, Gu Fei had been in a state of partial numbness.
Stifling.
No idea what he was even thinking about.
He didn’t know if what he felt right now was longing, or anguish, or if it was something else.
Stifling. To the point of hollowness.
On the way here, he had Jiang Cheng on his left hand side. Now when he turned his head
left, he saw only the large uncle and his cheek that almost completely eclipsed his nose.
Gu Fei could only keep his head turned to the right to look out the window.
The scenery outside started retreating backward at an increasing speed. He felt a little
dizzy after staring at the nearby view for too long.
After dragging over the curtain to stuff under his head, Gu Fei leaned against the window
and closed his eyes.
The train shot forth at high speed, and the distance between him and Jiang Cheng widened
little by little.
There and back. Two opposite directions. He had accompanied Jiang Cheng to where he
wanted to go, then turned around to run back to the little city where he had lived for 19
years. And where he would continue to live.
He couldn’t pinpoint exactly what this feeling was. Though in reality, it didn’t feel like
anything at all.
Nor were there any emotions. All his emotions: happiness; anger; sorrow; joy; dejection;
loneliness; all of that disappeared the moment he turned around and walked into the
departure gate.
I step onto thin air, I feel like I am flying.
Upwards is the unknown, I look down and hear you tell me this is an empty world.
He reached into his bag and rummaged for a long time before finding a milk candy in a side
pouch, which he unwrapped and put in his mouth.
Then he took out his phone and sent a message to Jiang Cheng.
– the train’s moving, boyfriend
– pay attention to your bag when you’re catching up on sleep
Jiang Cheng’s reply came very quickly. He probably kept his phone in his hand the whole
time.
– alright
– tell me when you get there
– mm, Li Yan and Liu Fan are coming to pick me up with Er-Miao, I’m going to have lunch
with them
– I’m going to the school cafeteria for lunch, see how the food is
– alright, I’ll snooze for a bit then
– okayy
Jiang Cheng had his phone in his hand the entire way, in case Gu Fei sent him a message
and he didn’t hear it. He only put the phone back in his pocket after their little chat.
It was only then that he had the presence of mind to look around him. It had been a long
time, he felt, since he’d seen so many people.
The skyscrapers; the busy roads with streams of cars; the throngs of people that squeezed
past him on all sides—it had been quite some time since he walked away from this kind of
prosperity and bustling.
Jiang Cheng had spent all his time around the Steel Works neighbourhood for the past year
and a half. It wasn’t as obvious during the day, but after dinner, the people and cars on the
street would gradually vanish at a visible rate. After that, the only things enshrouding that
place seemingly forgotten by time was quiet and desolation.
But now, thrown back into the midst of all this noise as if suddenly seeing the sun again for
the first time, he was having trouble adjusting.
There were too many sounds in his ears, and too many things in his view. It was moments
like this when he would subconsciously worry that he would turn around and not see Gu
Fei anymore.
… Though that was indeed the case now.
After picking up his things from the hotel, Jiang Cheng slowly walked himself back to the
dorm, as if dragging a suitcase full of gloom.
It would seem that his roommates had all arrived. Except for his desk and bunk, there were
things on all the other beds and desks. However, he didn’t see anyone other than Zhao Ke,
who was on his computer.
After greeting him, Jiang Cheng glanced at the computer screen and was surprised to find
that Zhao Ke was playing a desktop version of Lian Lian Kan.
[2]
“You…” At that moment, Jiang Cheng’s brain was so slow he felt like it was filled with glue.
He was barely able to stop himself from blurting out the word
“idiotic”. “Like playing this?”
“Mhm,” Zhao Ke answered, probably too focused to say much else. His hand clacked busily
away at the mouse, as though he was participating in some
international e-sports competition.
After putting his stuff away, Jiang Cheng was at a loss as to what he should do next.
Gu Fei was probably catching up on sleep just then, so he didn’t want to message and wake
him… After spacing out for a long while in front of his desk, Jiang Cheng opened his suitcase
again and took out his laptop.
He could organize all the photos Gu Fei had taken.
Having set the laptop on his desk and sat down, he noticed there was something stuck
between the screen and the keyboard. He was stunned when he opened the lid and saw
what it was.
A red envelope?
What the shit?
Gu Fei left the lucky money I’d given him here?
When did Gu Fei find the red envelope?
How is that possible!
Jiang Cheng hastily picked up the red envelope. Once it was in his hands, he realized it
wasn’t the one he left for Gu Fei. That one had the words “Best of Luck and Fortune”
written on it, whereas the writing on this one said…
“Wishing You a Long Life”.
Gu Fei had left this for him.
His fingers trembled hard as he opened the envelope, though he didn’t know what there
was to tremble about.
There was a stack of bills inside.
He counted it—a total of 8000 yuan, just like what he had left for Gu Fei.
How synchronous of us, boyfriend.
He could hardly describe how he felt at that moment: an urge to laugh, but after staring no
more than three seconds at the stack of bills, tears poured out instead.
Nearby, Zhao Ke turned to give him a glance, but didn’t say anything as he turned back to
his game.
Jiang Cheng stuffed the money back into the envelope, and without regard for his
appearance, grabbed a tissue and pressed it to his eyes. After he forcefully pushed the tears
back, he used it to blow his nose too.
Zhao Ke quickly reached out a leg and kicked a small wastebasket over.
Jiang Cheng tossed the tissue inside, then as he recovered, finally felt a little embarrassed.
Based on the way he acted just now, Zhao Ke probably thought he had gone mad for want
of money.
“A windfall?” Zhao Ke asked.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng answered. It was certainly unexpected.
“Must be quite a large sum,” Zhao Ke turned and looked at him, “to be moved to tears like
that.”
Begone.
Jiang Cheng turned to face him as well.
“You weren’t moved to tears?” Zhao Ke asked.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
“Before I came, my older sister stuffed 2000 yuan into my hands,” Zhao Ke continued
playing the idiotic Lian Lian Kan, “and moved herself to tears.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t really plan on saying any more, but he couldn’t help but laugh at that.
Zhao Ke started a new round of clack-clack-clacking, and didn’t continue the conversation.
Jiang Cheng took out his phone, snapped a picture of the red envelope, and sent it to Gu Fei.
– thanks boyfriend
He didn’t want to ask Gu Fei why he had given him money, nor did he want to be so
pretentious as to say something like “I don’t need the money, why don’t you keep it for
yourself”. No matter what reason Gu Fei had for giving it to him, and regardless of whether
he actually needed it, the money felt like a little warm furnace placed in his heart.
Gu Fei had probably been sleeping. It was a few minutes later when he sent back a reply.
– don’t hold yourself back when you’re craving the great pork belly
– mhm, are you catching up on snooze?
– not too much, I’m drifting in and out, there’s a kid behind me who keeps crying
– poor baby
– are you in the dorm?
– yeah, just me and Zhao Ke, the other two aren’t here
– ooooooh
– ooooooh your ass
– did you get a good look at him?
– I would’ve forgotten if you hadn’t mentioned it, I’ll check it out later They chatted like this
for more than an hour. By the time the crying child on Gu Fei’s end fell asleep, Jiang Cheng
finally put down his phone and let Gu Fei go back to his nap.
He leaned back in the chair and stretched his back.
This was his life now, stealing moments whether free or not to send messages.
And if he really couldn’t bear it anymore they could video-call…
“Wanna go have a walk around?” Zhao Ke finished his battle with the idiotic Lian Lian Kan
and stood up.
“Where to?” Jiang Cheng asked.
It was only then that he saw what Zhao Ke looked like. Not bad. Not as handsome as the
way in which Gu Fei kept going on about, but enough to qualify as a good looking guy one
could pick out from a crowd with two or three glances.
Still not comparable to Gu Fei.
“Around campus,” Zhao Ke said. “Check out places like the cafeteria, the general store, the
café, and the library; see what they all look like.”
Frankly, Jiang Cheng didn’t much feel like going out for a walk. Based on his current mood,
he was not interested in any of these things. Besides, he didn’t know Zhao Ke that well, and
had nothing at all to say to him. Two silent strangers walking around campus together
seemed nothing but awkward to him.
“Let’s go.” Zhao Ke put his laptop in the drawer and walked briskly out of their room.
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng called out to him once, but didn’t get any response.
Finally, he had to stand up, put his things away, and walk out as well.
“Let’s go to the cafeteria first,” Zhao Ke said as he looked at his phone. “We can go there for
lunch.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng didn’t have much of an appetite. His mood at the moment didn’t allow
him to make any positive associations at the mention of the cafeteria. Still, it was to be a
very important place, and there was no harm in checking it out.
“There’s many cafeterias,” Zhao Ke said. “Let me look up the best way to get to all of them.”
“You…” Jiang Cheng glanced at his phone. The guy had saved a huge map of the school, on
which was labelled all the different buildings. “Have this prepared?”
“Yeah, and all sorts of descriptions and guides. It’s convenient for exploring new lands,”
Zhao Ke said.
Jiang Cheng chuckled. A guy who played Lian Lian Kan, what did he know of exploring new
lands.
“Let’s add each other.” Zhao Ke waved his phone. “So we can contact each other easily.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone.
There are times when people will encounter completely unexpected situations.
Jiang Cheng’s lockscreen and homescreen were full of Gu Fei. These were freshly changed
as of the night before. At the time, he didn’t think much about it at all, just barreled ahead
and changed all of it. It wasn’t until now, in front of Zhao Ke, when Gu Fei’s face showed up
again and again on his phone, that he realized he had never thought about how he would
manage this awkward
scenario should it ever happen.
He glanced at Zhao Ke, who was also looking at him.
Footnote
[1] Big face is similar to thick-skinned. Here it means he’s basically making shit up and
talking out of his ass. Jiang Cheng innocent and pure? Ha. Ha. Ha. ⇡
[2] A very simple puzzle game about linking identical shapes/items together ⇡
Some Stats

Raw character count: 6243

TL word count: 4674
TL time: 04:33:13
Edit time: 00:42:52
Curse words: 6x fucks, 4x shits, 3x ass
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: January 6, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 111
“It is a little hard for me to accept”
After leaving behind the two people he needed to silence, Wang Xu and Zhou Jing, Jiang
Cheng never thought in such a far away place, that he would run into yet another person
who needed to be put down. Not to mention, this was only their second encounter.
Since Zhao Ke was holding out his phone for Jiang Cheng to scan, the two of them were
standing rather close to each other. From this distance, even nearsighted as Gu Fei would
be able to see it. The giant lockscreen and homescreen pictures were so in Zhao Ke’s face
that he was forced to get a crystal clear look even if he hadn’t planned to look.
In that moment, Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure whether he should say something, or continue to
open his WeChat like nothing had happened.
But perhaps due to the recent reminder of Gu Fei’s photos, his longing for Gu Fei was
currently stirring up quite the storm within him.
“This is my…” he began.
This is my boyfriend. A very handsome, cute, and composed young man.
He hesitated for a second before finishing the sentence.
This was an unfamiliar environment. He was face to face with his roommate who was
practically a stranger to him. He didn’t know what kind of personality this person had, or if
he could accept something like this… Moreover, recklessly blurting it out like would only
make him look like a brainless gay who only ever thought about telling the whole world
about his romance.
“Schoolmate?” Zhao Ke offered an answer for him during his hesitation.
Schoolmate is true.
But to go behind Gu Fei’s back and refer to him only as a schoolmate was unacceptable to
Jiang Cheng.
“Friend?” Zhao Ke asked again. “Hero? Idol?”
In the brief pause during which Jiang Cheng’s brain had stopped working, Zhao Ke quickly
gave out several answers for him to choose from. Jiang Cheng was sincerely grateful in that
moment for Zhao Ke’s high emotional intelligence.
If he hadn’t started it, Zhao Ke would certainly not ask.
“This is my boyfriend,” Jiang Cheng said.
An ease spread throughout Jiang Cheng’s body as he spoke that word.
To hell with consequences. If he said it now, he wouldn’t have to keep sneaking around in
the future. After all, they’d have to spend a few years together in the same room.
“Oh,” Zhao Ke answered. “He’s the guy who came here with you yesterday, right?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. Zhao Ke sounded calm enough, but his facial expression
betrayed his surprise. Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, “Sorry, if you mind…”
“It is a little hard for me to accept,” Zhao Ke said.
Jiang Cheng’s heart skipped a beat, and he got ready to turn around and head back to the
dorm.
“But I don’t mind,” Zhao Ke said. “It’s none of my business anyhow.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You can scan mine.” Zhao Ke cut the subject decisively, swiped a few times on his own
phone, and held it out to Jiang Cheng. “Do you want a campus resource sheet? I can send it
to you.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng scanned the QR code and added Zhao Ke as a contact.
Zhao Ke’s WeChat display name is simply “Zhao Ke”, which saved Jiang Cheng the trouble of
footnoting his name.
Jiang Cheng wanted to tell Gu Fei that he just came out to his roommate under completely
unforeseen circumstances, but didn’t get a chance.
Zhao Ke was like a tour guide—for every building they came across, he would introduce it
to Jiang Cheng. This included everything from the featured dishes on the cafeteria menu to
each building’s history—he even had a few things to say about the development history of
their dormitory.
Jiang Cheng was impressed. Despite wanting to come here since middle school, he himself
was never so detail-oriented as to research the architectural make-up of the campus.
“It’s almost like you’ve been at this school for years,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ve just been looking into things whenever I’m bored and got some time, and if I’ve read it,
then I’ll remember,” Zhao Ke said. “The library is up ahead, wanna check it out?”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“This library is new. Apparently it was hard to even find a seat in the old one, you had to
line up…” Zhao Ke paused midway through his sentence as he looked forward.
Jiang Cheng also glanced forward, he could see ahead of them some students walking
through the door into the library. There were a few people in that group; he wondered
which one Zhao Ke was looking at.
One of the long-haired girls facing them lifted a hand to brush her hair and at the same time
glanced this way. Zhao Ke acted so fast it was as if he suddenly received a Flash Magic spell.
Before Jiang Cheng knew what was happening, Zhao Ke was already standing behind a tree
two meters away. [1]
“Huh??” Jiang Cheng was floored by Zhao Ke’s speed as he stood frozen in place.
The long-haired girl in front of the library was still looking their way. From this distance it
was hard to tell if she could spot Zhao Ke standing behind the tree, though it was easy
enough to see Jiang Cheng standing there stiffly like a moron.
With one hand above her eyes to block the sun, the girl laughed and waved in their
direction after a couple of glances.
Jiang Cheng turned to look at Zhao Ke.
Zhao Ke was standing with his side to the tree trunk as he exchanged a completely blank
look with Jiang Cheng, as if he was a stranger, and a physically stunned one at that.
Jiang Cheng pretty much understood what was going on. As a returned favour to Zhao Ke
showing respect to his sexual orientation, he toughened up and waved back at the girl.
She practically doubled up with laughter.
Jiang Cheng powered through the awkwardness and continued standing there until the girl
walked into the library, still laughing. Then he finally turned to Zhao Ke. “She went inside.”
Zhao Ke finally walked out from behind the tree, and turned to walk back the way they
came. Meanwhile, he pulled out his phone and said, “So that’s what the library looks like.
We’ll probably be there every day from now on, so there’s no need to go in today. Let’s go
check out coffee shops now, there’s quite a few of
them…”
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to follow after him in resignation.
“That was my older sister’s high school friend,” Zhao Ke said.
“… Oh,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“She’s in the law program too—first year of grad school,” Zhao Ke said. Then added after a
second, “My dream girl.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Do you think she saw me just now?” Zhao Ke turned to him and asked.
“Well she doesn’t know me. Do you think she would wave at me and laugh like that if she
didn’t see you?” Jiang Cheng was a little at loss for words.
“She was laughing?” Zhao Ke continued his questioning.
“Mhm, very cheerfully too,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Really very cheerful?” Zhao Ke asked again.
“You should know,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, “that people are usually pretty cheerful
when they’re laughing at a moron.”
“Sounds good.” Zhao Ke nodded. “Coffee’s on me.”
The train station was just like it had always been. Gu Fei followed the current of the crowd
outside as he sent Jiang Cheng a message.
– just got off the train.
Jiang Cheng’s response came swiftly. It was almost instantaneous.
– are Li Yan and the others there?
– they’re waiting for me outside, have you eaten yet?
– almost done, ate at two different cafeterias with a classmate
– classmate Zhao Ke?
– that’s right, the handsome classmate Zhao Ke
Gu Fei laughed and sent him a voice message, “What to do if my boyfriend bullies me?”
“Your boyfriend has something to tell you later” was Jiang Cheng’s low and
mumbled response to him.
“What is it? Is it something that can’t be said in front of the handsome classmate Zhao Ke?”
Gu Fei spotted Li Yan standing outside the station exit, with Gu Miao crouched next to him
looking grumpy.
– mhm, i just came out to him, i’ll tell you about it later, you should go eat first
– ！！！！！！！？？？？？？？
Gu Fei was more than a little shocked. It had been less than a day since Jiang Cheng
officially moved into his dorm, and already he’d come out to his roommate? What is this
new age new speed?
He was immediately a little worried. His boyfriend was impulsive, and a little reckless at
times. If his roommate was someone he didn’t get along with, then judging by that fiery
temper of his…
– everything’s fine, it was unexpected but he doesn’t really have a problem with it. I’m
going with him to the general store now to buy some stuff, don’t worry
– okkk
– kiss me
Gu Fei lifted his phone, turned a little toward the wall, and smacked his lips hard against
the mic on his phone, then sent it as a voice message to Jiang Cheng.
“Don’t think that I don’t know what you’re doing just because you’re facing the wall!” Li Yan
had been pointing at him from more than a dozen steps away.
“I’ve been watching you!”
Gu Fei ignored him as he bent down and opened his arms.
Gu Miao jumped up from beside Li Yan’s legs and dashed toward Gu Fei while dragging her
skateboard behind her. As she leapt into his arms, the skateboard knocked into his leg hard.
“Hey,” Gu Fei sucked in a breath and held her, “how many times have I told you, put down
whatever’s in your hand first.”
Gu Miao turned and started dragging him away, skateboard still in one hand.
“Where’s Liu Fan?” Gu Fei asked Li Yan.
“In the car. There’s nowhere to park,” Li Yan said. “So he stopped at the side of the road and
stayed inside.”
“I see,” Gu Fei answered.
“So how was it?” Li Yan glanced at him.
“How was what?” Gu Fei also shot him a look.
“Jiang Cheng… ’s school,” Li Yan said.
“It looks the way you expect renowned universities to look,” Gu Fei said. “Very prestigious.”
Li Yan started laughing, “Alright then.”
While walking across the square outside the station, Gu Miao suddenly stopped.
“What is it?” Gu Fei stopped too.
Gu Miao looked back at the station, then turned in a circle as she looked around at
everything else.
“You’ve come here before.” Gu Fei crouched down. “This is the train station.”
Gu Miao set her skateboard on the ground, stepped onto it, and with a couple of kicks
slowly glided forward and away.
Gu Fei followed behind her.
“She won’t start yelling, right? She’s been here before by herself.” Li Yan looked after her
worriedly.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei also glanced back at the station, “this is where she first ran into Jiang Cheng.”
“Right.” Li Yan stared at Gu Miao’s back and sighed, “Ay…”
Liu Fan’s car was parked just a few metres in front of the bus stop. When Gu Miao got there,
she stopped again and spaced out for another few seconds before opening the door and
getting in.
Right here.
Gu Fei looked at the stone stump beside the bus stop sign. The first time they met, Jiang
Cheng was sitting there with his back to him.
At that time, he didn’t think he would share so many memories with this guy who had
found his sister and who was waiting for him on a stone stump, so he didn’t pay much
attention to Jiang Cheng’s appearance.
However, he could still remember vividly the lost and somewhat annoyed expression on
Jiang Cheng’s face when he turned around.
That young man was now in a university campus several hours away by train—
back to the bustling metropolis where he belonged.
Gu Fei felt the reluctance of parting intensely, but what emptied out his mind even more
was the fear of reaching out and holding onto Jiang Cheng, no matter how reluctant he was
to part.
He got into Liu Fan’s crappy little car and sat with Gu Miao in the back seat. Gu Miao leaned
against him as she spaced out at the view outside the window.
It was her usual state—to stare out the window when she was in a car.
It wasn’t because of curiosity, but to make sure that she was still within the border of her
own world.
Gu Fei sometimes felt that the little lass had a superpower. It was as if she possessed a
radar that could accurately deduce her distance from the centre of her world.
Perhaps it was due to fear.
Just like how he could sense his father’s presence when he was younger. Without hearing
or seeing, he would descend into a state of intense fear when his father was still
downstairs.
That was also a kind of superpower.
Attendance was good at their get together today, and everyone all arrived ahead of time in
the private room.
When Gu Fei got there, they had already finished ordering the food.
“Da-Fei, when is your registration?” Luo Yu poured him a drink.
“Tomorrow,” Gu Fei said. “I think.”
Luo Yu glanced at him. “Would you be a little more attentive to your own affairs? You did
manage to get into a school.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei replied.
“Ha, so compliant today?” Chen Jie said with a laugh.
“Haven’t quite come around yet I bet,” Liu Fan said. “Just came back from a sending away,
he’ll probably be dazed for the next couple days.”
“Oh fuck off,” Gu Fei said.
“Alright let’s eat!” Li Yan picked up his cup and knocked a few times against the table. “A
toast, to this group finally producing one—no, two—university students. Bottoms up!”
Gu Fei knocked his cup against the others and downed his liquor.
He might not be the most talkative when he hung out with these guys in the past, but his
thoughts would never wander like this. These were his friends of many years. He was
always very relaxed whenever he was with them.
Today was a little different though.
These guys were the same guys, and the atmosphere was the same atmosphere, but he
couldn’t bring himself to fully relax.
The reason was Jiang Cheng.
He was not used to not having Jiang Cheng by his side, sitting where he could readily see
with a turn of his head.
Gu Fei didn’t regret starting this relationship, even if he knew long ago that he would have
to face this situation, that he would fall into a pit of agonized longing. Still, he had no
regrets.
Though it didn’t make it any less difficult to bear.
Especially when he came to the realization that there was something else mixed into the
longing. The feeling of being tortured on both ends became even more unbearable.
Jiang Cheng would report to him from time to time his journey around the campus: ate a
meal; went to the store; met all the roommates, none of whom were annoying; dragged to
take a walk around the outside of campus by his roommates; didn’t get lost…
Gu Fei took Gu Miao home, and after watching her draw for a while, went out by himself to
Jiang Cheng’s apartment.
He had to stay home to eat dinner with Gu Miao, but he planned to spend the hours before
that here by himself. Perhaps it was simply the difference between people, but to him, the
only way to ease his longing when he missed Jiang Cheng was to see things that reminded
himself of him. Only when he was immersed in the space that contained Jiang Cheng’s
presence, looking at the traces of himself that Jiang Cheng left behind, could he be calm
again.
Everything in the apartment looked the same as before, as if trying to prove a point. Other
than some clothes and his keys, Jiang Cheng hadn’t taken anything with him.
Standing in the living room now, Gu Fei almost felt like he could go into the bedroom and
find Jiang Cheng there.
He took a shower, walked into the bedroom, and laid down on the bed.
He had just closed his eyes when his phone chimed with a message from Jiang Cheng.
– I’m back in my room, where are you?
– lying on your bed
Jiang Cheng’s call came immediately: “You went to the apartment?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei smiled.
“Don’t you have to spend time with Er-Miao?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m going home to have dinner with her,” Gu Fei said. “And I’ll come back here again after
she falls asleep.”
“Are you going to move in?” Jiang Cheng sniffled.
“I don’t know, I’ll just come over and hang out whenever I miss you.” Gu Fei could hear
something was off in Jiang Cheng’s voice. “Hey Cheng-ge, you’ve really become a pussy now
huh. How many times have you cried in the last couple of days?”
“Oh fuck off,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’re not a pussy, you’re a bussy.”
Gu Fei laughed out loud at that. Jiang Cheng also laughed for a long time before he stopped
long enough to continue, “I’m outside the dorm now. I want to talk to you about
something.”
“Is it about you coming out to Zhao Ke today?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yeah, it’s just bad luck. He wanted to add me on WeChat, so I took my phone out,” Jiang
Cheng said. “Turns out your big face is plastered all over my phone… Good thing it wasn’t
your nudes, otherwise he would’ve had a scare.”
“How did he react?” Gu Fei asked as he laughed.
“Calm enough. He said he finds it hard to accept, but that it’s none of his business how I am,
and he didn’t bring it up again,” Jiang Cheng said. “I think this guy’s okay.”
“That’s good.” Gu Fei paused for a moment, then said, “Maybe you can change out the
photos of me, at least on your lockscreen and homescreen…”
“No.” Jiang Cheng replied decisively. “It’s my phone, so I do what I want. It’s not like I’m
putting photos of my boyfriend on other people’s phones.”
“Alright, your call.” Gu Fei didn’t press on. Jiang Cheng was like that.
“You’re registering tomorrow, right?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Right,” Gu Fei said. “It’ll probably be pretty quick, and then the military training after that.
Liu Fan has a mate who used to go there, apparently the training is only three days… We
had a whole week of training back at Fourth High.” [2]
“Our training isn’t until second year.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Don’t forget to take pictures.”
“Pictures of what?” Gu Fei asked.
“You, of course,” Jiang Cheng said. “Selfies. I’ll stock up and savour them slowly over time.”
“I thought you were gonna use it to rub it out slowly over time,” Gu Fei said.
“The rubbing is assumed, since I am a youth in my prime after all,” Jiang Cheng said. “But I
probably won’t be in the mood in the near future. And besides, it’s an unfamiliar
environment…”
“Alright so, who’s shameless now?” Gu Fei laughed.
“Me,” Jiang Cheng admitted snappily this time.
“See, couldn’t you have admitted it sooner,” Gu Fei said. “Are you going to eat dinner in the
cafeteria too? How’s the food?”
“Not bad, we’ll continue to eat cafeteria food for dinner,” Jiang Cheng said.
“These guys in my room all like to eat. They’ve already figured out and memorized what the
featured dishes are and what tastes the best in all of the cafeterias. They have a plan to go
through them one by one in the next few days.”
“After months of eating my cooking, you finally get to let go and frolic,” Gu Fei said. “Watch
that you don’t get fat.”
“If it was up to me, I’d rather eat your cooking all day every day,” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Where your food is, so there you’d be.”
His words made Gu Fei’s heart clench. He was just about to divert the subject when
someone called for Jiang Cheng on the other end: “Jiang Cheng, let’s head to the library!”
“Again?” Jiang Cheng said. “Didn’t we just go earlier today?”
The guy said something else that Gu Fei couldn’t make out, but Jiang Cheng sounded
reluctant. “You guys go, I’m on the phone…”
“You should go, Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said.
“I don’t really wanna go,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “They said they’re going straight to
dinner after studying.”
“You should go,” Gu Fei said. “You’ve only just met; would be good to do things as a group.
You can head off on your own later when you’ve become more acquainted, that way they
won’t think you’re a loner.”
“… Alright,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei did not want to hang up, but he did it anyway.
He laid on the bed for a long time before he managed to pull free from the overwhelming
emotions.
Then he got up and walked to the window, where he lit a cigarette and held it between his
lips.
The one calling for Jiang Cheng just now was probably Zhao Ke. The two of them had gone
to the library today at noon. Jiang Cheng had reported it to him.
They were a dorm room full of overachievers. It was only the second day after arrival, and
they had set the library as the location of their first group outing. Gu Fei smiled.
This was the ‘something else’ aside from the yearning that he couldn’t quite sort through.
From now on, everyone who appeared at Jiang Cheng’s side would be an
overachiever like him. Everyone would be very exceptional. Those people would all be of
his kind. Only those people, who belonged to a different world from the people of the Steel
Works, were of his kind.
The feeling had emerged when he first saw Zhao Ke. The guy didn’t even need to say
anything. Just standing there and saying hello was enough to showcase very clearly the
contrast between him and the local products of the Steel Works.
Gu Fei had felt the same thing when he’d first laid eyes on Jiang Cheng.
Even if he hadn’t immediately connected Jiang Cheng to the term
“overachiever”, even if Jiang Cheng wasn’t a real overachiever in the traditional sense, he
was still able to tell with a single glance that Jiang Cheng came from an entirely different
world.
He might be the one and only Gu Fei, that Jiang Cheng was able to pick him out from an
environment like that, but how much appeal would this “one and only”
quality hold in the world where Jiang Cheng belonged? And for how much longer…
Have you considered… getting a boyfriend?

The uneasiness and sense of being unmoored that he had felt when Jiang Cheng first asked
this of him once again returned.
Footnote
[1] It’s an Honor of Kings (game) thing. ⇡
[2] In China, there is mandatory military training for new students entering the first year of
university and first year of high school. It takes place before the semester officially starts,
and typically lasts for a few days. Depending on the school, some places also have it in the
beginning of middle school, and in rare cases elementary school as well. The training
mostly consists of marching exercises and physical conditioning, the intensity of which
varies by age and school. ⇡
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5550
TL word count: 3854
TL time: 04:31:23
Edit time: 00:53:18
Curse words: 2x fucks??
TL’s Notes:
There’s a new ongoing Spanish translation up. You can check it out here.
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: January 17, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 112
It was in that moment that he suddenly understood how those annoying people who
couldn’t stop showing off their kids must’ve felt like.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Jiang Cheng hadn’t looked at another textbook since the exams—even the application guide
had only received a cursory glance from him. He wasn’t sure what he should be reading in
the library.
Zhao Ke and the others weren’t here to read anything either. They came only to
‘check in’, and to familiarize themselves with the environment.
The library was a very motivating place, after all.
Jiang Cheng was rather stunned when he first walked in. His completely relaxed nerves
were suddenly pulled tight in a single instant.
The library was large and beautiful. Borrowing the words they often used in elementary
school writing: it was spacious, bright, and clean, with tables and chairs laid out in orderly
rows… And sofas. Jiang Cheng went and sat down in one. It was comfortable.
Everyone in the library was very quiet. Jiang Cheng’s group switched their phones to
vibrate, and as they walked around touring the place, they didn’t say a word either, only
moving their heads on a swivel as they looked around.
In this moment, the various kinds of books that sat neatly upon endless rows of shelves did
not make Jiang Cheng feel irritated. Instead, he only felt a vague sense of pressure.
Almost a whole year of toiling away through days and nights had gotten him the acceptance
letter he was after, but that was only the first step. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t even a step.
“C’mon, let’s go have some coffee, and then dinner.” Zhao Ke had borrowed a few books to
familiarize himself with the lending process.
“What did you get?” Jiang Cheng asked quietly. He himself had no idea what he could
possibly borrow at this point.
“… Novels.” Zhao Ke showed him the cover.
“I thought you were getting reference books in our field.” Jiang Cheng was a little surprised.
“There’s enough readings in our future to make you sick,” Zhao Ke said. “All I want to do
right now is read fiction.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Zhao Ke was a pretty big fan of coffee. He had only just treated Jiang Cheng to coffee in the
morning, and already he was suggesting they go again. The guys wanted to pay each for
themselves, but Zhao Ke didn’t relent. He said that it was his idea, so he should pay the bill.
After another coffee, Jiang Cheng had pretty much lost all inclination of eating anything
else. He was not hungry, and had no appetite.
However, in order to fulfil the mission of familiarizing himself with the campus food, he still
followed the group through two more cafeteria crawls. By the time they finished eating and
got back to their dorm, he was in so much anguish that it felt like he could puke it all out at
any second.
– i ate too much
He laid down on his bunk and sent Gu Fei a message.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. Around this time, he was probably eating dinner with Gu Miao.
Aside from him and Zhao Ke, the other two people in their room were both on the phone. It
sounded like they were calling their respective girlfriends; their voices were dripping with
affection.
The guy who slept on the bunk across from Jiang Cheng was named Lu Shi.
Jiang Cheng thought the name was very visually evocative of a solid bridge stump. In
reality, Lu Shi did not sound like his name at all. He was lanky and tall, the kind of build that
would easily snap in half if Gu Fei were to so much as push him. [1]
“It’s fine, you can come visit during the October 1st holidays.” Lu Shi’s voice was very
gentle. “We’ll play for a few days, then I’ll accompany you home…
Well I’ll come back by myself… it’s fine, the trip is nothing. You made the trip too, didn’t
you…”
It was pretty sweet. Jiang Cheng smiled and glanced at Zhao Ke beside him. As the only
single dog in their dorm room, Zhao Ke was click-clacking away as he dedicated all his
attention to Lian Lian Kan.
Across from Zhao Ke’s bunk was Zhang Qiqi. He not only had a cute name, but was also a
cute person; his face was round like a middle-schooler’s. This whole time he had been
talking quietly on the phone, but just now suddenly he raised his voice and said anxiously,
“Don’t cry, no don’t cry, if you cry then I’ll feel like crying too. And we can’t even hold each
other right now as we cry…” [2]
“You can hold a pillow,” Zhao Ke said. “If one’s not enough I can lend you more.”
That made Jiang Cheng laugh.
“Hey Jiang Cheng,” Zhao Ke put down his mouse after failing a level, “are there any clubs
you want to join?”
“Clubs?” Jiang Cheng remembered the stack of flyers he never got around to look through.
“I… don’t know. Not really.”
“Some of them sound pretty interesting,” Zhao Ke said. “I want to join one that involves
physical exercise.”
“I’ll just go for a run or something in the morning,” Jiang Cheng said. “What clubs are you
looking to join?”
“I…” Zhao Ke turned to glance at Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi, then said quietly, “I want to knit a
sweater for my dream girl.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand.
“There’s a knitting club.” Zhao Ke made a knitting gesture with his hands. “All kinds of yarn
crafts.”
“I thought you wanted to exercise?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“I do,” Zhao Ke said. “But the dream girl is more important. I can join both clubs.”
“So you want to go make sweaters?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Knitting, not just make sweaters,” Zhao Ke corrected him. “My dream…”
“You should go then.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“It sounds pretty interesting, I think,” Zhao Ke said.
“I think perhaps you shouldn’t set your goals too high,” Jiang Cheng said. “You can start
with something simple.”
“A scarf?” Zhao Ke thought about it. “That’s too ordinary.”
“And a sweater isn’t ordinary?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Is there something in between the two?” Zhao Ke pondered as he leaned back in the chair.
“For example…”
“Let me show you something.” Jiang Cheng stood up. It was in that moment that he
suddenly understood how those annoying people who couldn’t stop showing
off their kids must’ve felt like.
A certain annoying person who wouldn’t stop showing off his spouse climbed onto his bed
and picked up the sunny doll from beside his pillow.
Jiang Cheng didn’t bring very much luggage with him when he came here. He wanted to
bring the maze that Gu Fei made for him, but it was too heavy. In the end, he only brought
the sunny doll.
“A sunny doll?” Zhao Ke held it in his hands in shock. “It looks really good.”
“This should be easier than a sweater, right?” Jiang Cheng said.
“This is a crochet.” Zhao Ke looked at it for a while then handed the doll back to him. “You
made this?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng put the sunny doll back next to his pillow, stared at it for a while and
patted its head before coming back down.
“Your…” Zhao Ke glanced at the other two guys nearby—they were both still fully
immersed in their phone conversations, “boyfriend made it?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile.
“Great,” Zhao Ke nodded, “now I’m not worried.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng blinked at him.
“I was wondering if it’d be too girly for a guy to join the knitting club,” Zhao Ke said. “Now
I’m not worried anymore.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “He’s certainly not girly, but I can’t say for sure if you’d
become girly just from joining a knitting club.”
Zhao Ke looked back at him wordlessly.
“Probably not,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I think so too,” Zhao Ke said.
Gu Fei did not text him back, which made Jiang Cheng a little restless the whole night.
He knew that Gu Fei must’ve been busy. Every time Gu Miao spent two days without seeing
Gu Fei, he would have to play with her for a long time when he went back.
Today however, felt different than usual. Jiang Cheng had to clench his teeth to keep from
sending Gu Fei more messages.
He laid on his bunk and listened to Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi talk about their girlfriends. It
wasn’t a conversation he could necessarily join in on, since what he had was a boyfriend.
Zhao Ke also didn’t join in on that conversation, since he only had a dream girl.
After more than an hour of conversation, the other two started to share photos of their
respective girlfriends.
“Finally starting to compare photos,” Zhao Ke said out of nowhere.
“What?” Zhang Qiqi asked.
“Nothing.” Zhao Ke continued playing his game.
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes and laughed to himself for a long time on the bed.
It wasn’t until after 10 o’clock, that his phone finally chimed with a reply from Gu Fei.
– asleep yet?
– nope
The speed of his reply was probably the fastest he had ever typed in his life. His fingers
were mere flitting shadows over the keyboard.
– Er-Miao was making a fuss today, I only now got a moment of break
– what’s going on with her?
– after dinner she finally realized that Cheng-ge isn’t here anymore, and was pretty
unhappy about it, ripped up her books and drawing pads, threw a fit Jiang Cheng glanced at
the time—it had been a while between dinner time and now. He didn’t dare imagine the
kind of tantrum Gu Miao threw, or how Gu Fei was able to finally calm her down.
– better now?
– ya, she’s fine now, already asleep
– you must be tired?
– not particularly, I’m used to it
– can you take a picture and send it to me, I’m missing you more than ever right now
Gu Fei didn’t reply, but shortly after he sent over a picture. Jiang Cheng took one glance and
laughed, though the laughter didn’t last more than a second.
In the photo, Gu Fei was shirtless and sitting on his bed, leaning against the headboard. The
big grin on Gu Fei’s face made Jiang Cheng’s repressed longing burst out of its dam in an
instant.
– fuck. What should I do. I want to buy a ticket back there right now
– don’t, I’ll go see you after my military training
– really?
– how could I lie to you about this, our training is the day after tomorrow, only 3
days, the Friday night after that I’ll be able to go see you
– okay
After chatting for a while, Jiang Cheng felt much more grounded. Then he pulled up Gu Fei’s
photo again and looked at it for a while. Gu Fei might be beaming in the picture, but Jiang
Cheng could still see the fatigue in his eyes and the dark circles beneath them.
– go to sleep, you haven’t been sleeping properly for days
– I actually am pretty sleepy. Are you going to sleep? Or gonna stay up and talk to your
roommate?
– haven’t been talking, two of them are talking about their girlfriends, I can’t exactly join
– hahahhaha
– if they keep on talking about their girlfriends nonstop tomorrow, then I’ll have to start
talking to them about my boyfriend
– noooo don’t~
– will too
– nooooo mister donnn’t~
– … go away you pussy
– pussy’s insulting the bussy
– are you sleeping or not, I thought you were really tired
– sleeping now
– g’night boyfriend
– boyfriend g’night
After Gu Fei went to sleep, the lights in their dorms also shut off.
Jiang Cheng continued playing on his phone for a little longer, swiping left and right, and
finally went through his entire collection of Gu Fei’s photos, before settling down.
Sleepy. Gu Fei hadn’t been sleeping well for the last few days, and neither did he.
Nevermind that it was a new environment, with all sorts of new people and new things. To
someone like him who never paid much attention to his
surroundings, getting used to a new environment was a very weary task.
Except Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi were still chatting quietly to each other. Jiang Cheng figured
the two of them would no doubt become bosom buddies who would tell each other
everything.
“Let’s go to sleep,” Zhao Ke said from where he was lying on his bunk, his voice steady and
his tone even. “Or you wanna bet that I’ll roast you two alive in the next minute.”
“The fury of a single dog,” Jiang Cheng said with a laugh.
“Quite furious.” Zhao Ke seemed to have found a lighter from somewhere, and with a
“click”, ignited it and waved it in his hand.
The two across the room ended their conversation amidst laughter, and the room
descended into silence.
“Where are you?” His mom asked anxiously on the phone. “I can’t calm Er-Miao down!
Hurry and come back!”
“Okay, I’ll be home in five minutes.” Gu Fei jumped out of bed. It was just past six o’clock in
the morning and he was still a little dazed with sleep, but hearing Gu Miao’s angry screams
through the phone, even for a second, was enough to thoroughly wake him up.
From going out the door to arriving back at home, it took him less than ten minutes.
The first thing he heard as he stepped through the door was Gu Miao’s no longer shrill but
instead a little hoarse screams—she had clearly been at it for quite a while.
“Your brother’s back!” Their mom clutched Gu Miao’s shoulders and turned her around to
face the door. “Er-Miao look, your brother’s back!”
Gu Miao stopped screaming and stood unmoving in her spot.
“Er-Miao.” Without even changing his shoes, Gu Fei went and crouched down in front of
her. When his hand touched Gu Miao’s arm, he could feel that her whole
body was tense and stiff. This wasn’t a temper tantrum. Gu Miao would only tense up her
whole body when she was nervous and anxious. He rubbed Gu Miao’s arms continuously as
he spoke to her: “Er-Miao, Er-Miao—big brother’s here—Er-Miao…”
After a dozen more of this, Gu Miao slowly relaxed and threw her arms around him.
Gu Fei picked her up and walked into her bedroom. “Ah, you’re so heavy. Let’s go out and
weigh you later, shall we? Brother almost can’t pick you up anymore.”
Gu Miao still wouldn’t let go even after he set her down on the bed—her hands still
clenched tightly around his arm.
“Want breakfast? I’ll take you out for some breakfast?” Gu Fei asked.
“No go,” Gu Miao said very quietly.
“Yeah, no go.” Gu Fei patted her back. “See, not going. I’m right here, I didn’t go.”
Gu Miao’s verbal expressions were limited. Aside from simple phrases
composed of one or two characters, in all these years, Gu Fei had never heard more
complex expressions from her, nevermind other people. To everyone else, and even in their
mother’s eyes, Gu Miao was effectively a mute.
Their mom had brought back breakfast. Gu Miao pretty much went back to normal after
eating breakfast, but when Gu Fei got ready to go register at his school, she followed him
out with her skateboard under her arm.
Gu Fei knew that she wanted to tag along, and didn’t stop her. The area around the school
was part of Gu Miao’s territory—she had gone often in the past when picking out yarns.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei stepped on the pedal and dashed out, before letting out a whistle.
Gu Miao immediately returned a whistle, then caught up on her skateboard. Gu Fei slowed
the bike down and let Gu Miao race ahead of him.
Gu Fei watched her short hair flutter around in the wind and let out a gentle sigh.
“Left!” He called when they came upon a turn.
With a quick push of her foot, Gu Miao bent at the waist and turned with a flourish as she
swerved onto the road to their left.
This was a scene that was all too familiar to him. His little sister, zooming on her
skateboard all around him. It was the biggest joy he could give her, within her small world.
He had never thought much of it. Everything was like that, it had been like that ever since
he realized that Gu Miao had an unusual knack for skateboarding.
Today, as he followed after Gu Miao, for the first time he felt an unspeakable emotion
within him: something tart; a little bitter.
“I’m going in now.” Gu Fei stopped outside the gates of the Normal School, bending down to
look at Gu Miao. “Wait for me at the store at lunchtime.”
Gu Miao nodded while looking back at him.
“Skate on the sidewalk on your way back, make sure to keep to the side of the road when
there’s no sidewalk, can you remember that?” Gu Fei said. Gu Miao was not as familiar with
this area compared to their own neighbourhood.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Alright, go on.” Gu Fei straightened up.
Gu Miao turned and rolled away with a kick, then let out a whistle.
Gu Fei returned one with a smile.
“Wow,” a few girls who had been watching them from the gates started yelling quietly to
themselves, “what a cool little girl!”
As Gu Fei headed inside, one of them walked over to him. “Hi.”
Gu Fei turned to look at her. The girl was a little too close to him, he instinctively stepped a
little to the side.
“Was that your little sister?” The girl asked with a smile.
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered.
“She was awesome,” the girl said.
Gu Fei pulled the corners of his mouth up a little before turning back to continue walking.
The girl followed after him. “Nice to meet you. My name is Luo Jiaojiao.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything.
“You must be Gu Fei?” Luo Jiaojiao said as she turned to point behind them.
“My best friend is from your Fourth High. She knows you.”
“Oh.” Gu Fei nodded.
“Oh hey, do you…” Luo Jiaojiao began to say something else, but Gu Fei cut her off.
“No.” With that, he quickly walked away.
“Ah—” Luo Jiaojiao didn’t continue chasing after him as she drew out her voice, likely
lamenting with the other girls.
“I told you that…” one of them said something quietly, but Gu Fei didn’t hear the rest.
The Normal School looked rather large on a usual day, but walking in for registration now,
he realized that it wasn’t very large at all.
Compared to Jiang Cheng’s registration, the process of new student reigstrations here did
not take very long. There weren’t as many students, for one thing. His major had only one
class, and there were a little more than 20 people in it.
He didn’t know what the dorms were like here, as he didn’t apply for on-campus living, and
when his classmates were gathered around to exchange names and contacts, he turned and
walked out of the school.
There was nothing else to do after registration, and not much to see about the school. He
was not interested in a tour of the campus or in getting to know his classmates. That was
how he had always been.
When Jiang Cheng was there, Gu Fei would reluctantly join certain group activities because
of Jiang Cheng. But now that Jiang Cheng was gone, he naturally returned to the habit he
had maintained for all these years.
His phone chimed.
– registered yet?
– yeah, it’s all done, I’m going back to the store now
Jiang Cheng’s call came right away: “You’re done already?”
“Yeah, it’s not like I’m living on campus, so I don’t have to worry about the dorm stuff.” Gu
Fei smiled.
“You didn’t tour the campus or anything? The sports fields, the library, things like that,”
Jiang Cheng said.
“No,” Gu Fei said. “Our school doesn’t have a library.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng paused for a moment, “not like you’d go even if there is one.”
Gu Fei started laughing, “My boyfriend does know me best after all.”
“How are your classmates? It’s a Normal School, and Chinese major too, so there must be a
lot of girls?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“We only have one class, twenty-six people in total,” Gu Fei laughed as he said.
“And twenty-one of them are girls.”
“This ratio,” Jiang Cheng tutted a few times, then started to laugh, “is very reassuring.”
“Reassuring how?” Gu Fei asked.
“Since you have no interest in girls, you’d rather stay far away.” Jiang Cheng’s laughter was
positively gleeful.
“What if there’s someone good looking among the other four guys?” Gu Fei said.
“No way that they’re better looking than me,” Jiang Cheng said with great certainty, and not
even a trace of hesitation.
“Now that’s true,” Gu Fei said.
This extremely adorable confidence was his favourite thing about Jiang Cheng.
Whatever the case, Jiang Cheng was always able to maintain this kind of confidence. Even if
his confidence might have stemmed from growing up with the disapproval of his adoptive
parents, still, his head was always up.
After chatting for a while, the foodies of Jiang Cheng’s dorm were once again setting out on
a crawl of the tasty eats around campus, so Gu Fei ended the call.
Coming out of the school gates, Gu Fei immediately spotted Gu Miao across the street. She
was sitting on her skateboard, looking intently in his direction.
Upon seeing him walk out, Gu Miao shot up from her perch, kicked the
skateboard with her toes, and made to dash over, only stopping when Gu Fei lifted a finger
and pointed at her.
Gu Fei retrieved his bike and rode over to her.
“Didn’t I tell you to wait for me at the store?”
Gu Miao didn’t answer, only stared at him.
“If brother said I’ll be back for lunch, then I’ll definitely be back,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao frowned a little and patted the back seat of the bike.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei stepped on the pedal.
Gu Miao hopped onto her skateboard and grabbed the back seat.
Gu Fei suddenly felt a little guilty. He turned a little and glanced at Gu Miao, who was
staring straight ahead with the most solemn expression.
He would always tell Gu Miao whenever he wasn’t spending the night at home
—when he was leaving, and when he would be back. The few times he’d left on short trips,
he also told Gu Miao what would happen today, tomorrow, and the day after. But he didn’t
tell her this time, when he went with Jiang Cheng to his school, because he didn’t know how
he could make her understand the fact that Jiang Cheng was leaving. He also was in no
mood to explain to her the today, the tomorrow, and the day after.
It made his heart ache a little that Gu Miao now refused to let him out of her sight. In her
eyes, and in her heart, he was her only safe harbour. It was the first time that he had
neglected her feelings.
No go.
That was what Gu Miao asked of him.
Only then did he feel a sudden wave of panic. His hand even shook a little on the handlebar.
Just last night, he had promised Jiang Cheng that he would go see him.
This wasn’t just something that Jiang Cheng was anticipating, it was what he himself
wanted as well. He missed Jiang Cheng. He longed to see him—to see him in the flesh with
his own eyes, to touch him, and hear his voice that didn’t have to come out of a speaker.
But now—he glanced at Gu Miao—under these circumstances, how could he make Gu Miao
accept the fact that her brother was going to disappear for two days and two nights?
And if Gu Miao couldn’t accept it… then how should he tell Jiang Cheng?
Back at the store, his mom was on the phone. Gu Fei went to sit behind the counter and
watched Gu Miao scribble on a paper as he spaced out.
Jiang Cheng sent him several messages in a row.
Gu Fei tapped open the chat. The first thing he saw was a selfie, still in the style that stood
only on the foundation of Jiang Cheng’s good looks.
Next was a plate of food. Gu Fei didn’t get a clear look at what it was, because he was
simultaneously faced with the message right below it.
– very delicious, I can eat two all by myself, we’ll come here together when you
visit
Gu Fei frowned and exited out of the chat. He tossed the phone onto the counter,
leaned back in the chair, and let out a long sigh.
“I’m going out for a bit,” his mom finished her phone call and said as she
walked over to him.
“Don’t go out,” Gu Fei said. “I want to sleep in the afternoon. You watch the
store.”
“You can just nap for a while in the store,” his mom said. “Or get Li Yan to
come…”
“Are you paying Li Yan a salary?” Gu Fei asked.
His mom rolled her eyes at him. “Then you…”
“I SAID YOU’RE NOT GOING ANYWHERE!” Gu Fei exploded as he kicked
the counter with one foot. “You’re watching the store this afternoon!
Understand?!”
Footnote
[1] As a surname, Lu [鲁] gives off a more grounded, hefty vibe, while his first
name Shi [实] literally means solid. ⇡
[2] Qiqi [齐齐] is the cute part. Generally speaking, doubling up of the same
character is cute-making. ⇡
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5963
TL word count: 4248
TL time: 03:49:43
Edit time: 01:06:18
Curse words: 1x fuck
TL’s Notes:
The password will not change for now, but if you haven’t yet, join the server for
the next password update.
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post

with listed stores!

First posted: January 25, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 113
“Out out out!
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
His mom froze where she stood and stared at him in surprise.
“I’ll say this for the last time,” Gu Fei stood up and pointed at her as he said in a lowered
voice. “You’re not going anywhere. This afternoon, you’re watching the shop.”
“What are you doing!” His mom finally recovered from her shock. “You
nutcase! What the hell are you yelling for! Just yell at me for fun whenever you feel like it,
what kind of son yells at his own mother like this!”
“What kind of mother behaves the way you do!” Gu Fei kicked the counter again.
It was a very hard kick this time. All of the pent up frustration and despair that was
scrambling up his insides looking for a way out were encompassed in this one
extraordinarily hard kick.
As his foot landed, the counter tipped over and toppled to the ground, and everything that
was on the countertop also scattered all over, making a string of loud noises, even bringing
down the little table in front of Gu Miao.
Gu Miao lifted her head and looked in their direction with her eyes wide and staring, even
while her expression remained blank.
Gu Fei turned to look at her, then lifted his hand in front of his face. Gu Miao closed her eyes
accordingly. She wasn’t especially sensitive to sound, because in most instances, she could
not understand other people’s conversations. It was easier for her to understand what she
could see with her own eyes.
“Da-Fei, have you gone mad?” His mom looked at him. Her voice was barely above a
whisper, and there was a tremor in it.
The edge of the counter had hit her foot when it crashed to the ground. She held onto a
nearby shelf for support as her brows furled up in a knot—she was in so much pain that it
was a little hard for her to speak.
“Who in this family isn’t mad?” Gu Fei looked back at her.
Somebody wandered in through the front door just then. The racket had been so loud that
two grannies rushed over from the community clinic beside them.
“What’s wrong, what’s wrong? What happened? Whoa! What’s going on here!
Whoa!”
Gu Fei turned around. The signature animated expressions on the grannies’ faces that was
typical of the Steel Works mob made him feel a sense of crushing suffocation. He gritted his
teeth as he squeezed out the words, “Get out!”
“Whoa!” The grannies were stunned.
“Get out! Get out! Get out!” His mom started screaming as she lunged toward the door. “Out
out out! The hell are you looking at! The hell does it have to do with you!”
After the two grannies were chased away, she crouched down in the doorway and started
crying.
“You get out too,” Gu Fei said.
The kick did not manage to release much of his irritation and despair, but it did draw all the
strength from him. His legs felt weak as he fell back into the chair, as though there was
nothing supporting his body anymore.
His mom didn’t get out. She stayed crouched in the doorway, rubbing the top of her foot as
she cried.
Gu Miao pushed her little table back up, picked up her notepad and pencils, and put her
head down and continued what she was doing. She wasn’t drawing today
—she was writing.
This tiny little shop was not Gu Fei’s only source of income. It wasn’t even his primary
source of income.
But he would eat here and sometimes rest here. He hung out with his friends or listened to
them chat here. Gu Miao would soar around on her skateboard outside, and when she was
tired or thirsty, she would come in for water or to space out. This was where Gu Miao had
grown up, and it was part of the idea of home he had held in his mind all these years.
Now, it had become a burden. As much as he’d hate to admit it, ever since he was little,
many things were burdens to him. Many many things that he saw as simply a part of life
were actually burdens.
They held onto him, firm and unyielding.
He had shut his eyes, and closed his ears. If he couldn’t see nor hear, then he could simply
follow the path under his feet and continue on like this.
But now, everything had changed.
Jiang Cheng had smacked him wide awake. He had nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide.
But even though he had once unleashed his temper on Jiang Cheng, Gu Fei never truly
blamed him. In his heart, in some corner of it, a corner that he himself had almost forgotten
about, perhaps he had once hoped—
—that someone would appear.
Someone astride a grand rainbow coloured horse, with a large rainbow coloured sword,
and long rainbow coloured hair that fluttered in the wind, crying tears made of diamonds…
And then he would probably have to go and beat this guy up.
This person eventually did show up, and in a very unusual way. He’d first picked up Gu
Fei’s little sister, and then face-planted himself into Gu Fei’s life.
Ever since meeting Jiang Cheng at the train station that day, Gu Fei’s life had come undone.
And yet he didn’t fight it. He allowed Jiang Cheng to hack numerous cracks, large and small,
in the walls of his world, so that rays of light could shine in.
Warm sun on spring grass.
There was the sound of a motorcycle outside, followed by the sound of a motorcycle falling
to the ground.
Gu Fei frowned and sighed.
“What’s wrong?” A man was heard yelling in a panic. “Xiao-Jin, what’s wrong, Xiao-Jin?”
To be honest, if Gu Fei didn’t already know that the man was his mother’s boyfriend—Liu
Li, the one Jiang Cheng called “Ponytail Boi”—and that the guy was calling out for his mom,
he really wouldn’t have known who this “Xiao-Jin”
was referring to.
His mother’s name didn’t contain the character “Jin [锦]”. It must’ve been her 108th
nickname, or something.
“Feifei, your mom…” Liu Li charged into the shop.
“Shut the hell up.” Gu Fei’s face was cold. “Who the hell are you calling for?”
“Da… -Fei?” Liu Li hesitated. “What’s wrong with your mom? Was there… a robbery?”
Gu Fei stared at him wordlessly, and Liu Li looked back at him.
After a few seconds of eye contact, Gu Fei stood up, took two strides over to Liu Li, and
grabbed his collar just as the other guy instinctively tried to shrink backward.
“Da-Fei, what are you doing!” His mom started shouting in a panic.
“All good all good.” Liu Li waved his hand backward as he lowered his voice,
“Da-Fei, let’s sit down and talk calmly about…”
Gu Fei didn’t make a sound as he started dragging Liu Li out to the back courtyard.
“Da-Fei!” His mom anxiously hopped after them on one foot.
Gu Fei turned back and gave her a cold look. He didn’t need to look in the mirror, he could
tell by their reactions alone that he must’ve looked terrifying in that moment.
His mom froze in her spot.
Meanwhile, Liu Li was dragged to the courtyard and shoved until he stumbled a few steps
and backed up against the outer wall.
Gu Fei walked up to him. Liu Li immediately lifted his hands and crossed them in front of
his face. “Don’t go for the face.”
“Did you say that you wanted to take over your boss’s restaurant?” Gu Fei pulled Liu Li’s
hands aside.
“Huh?” Liu Li blinked at him.
“I’m asking you a question, just answer it,” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah, I wanted to.” Liu Li stood up straight. “But I haven’t got enough money.
And besides, my boss isn’t planning on selling yet…”
“How much money have you saved up?” Gu Fei asked.
“Thirty thousand yuan,” Liu Li said.
“Give it to me,” Gu Fei said. “And this shop’s yours.”
“Wait… what?” Liu Li was stunned.
“This place can be remade for food service, and you can take down the walls separating the
inner room, that’ll make it big enough. But if you want to do it, you have to save a little of
the original store shelves, because my little sister will still come by, and she’ll be angry if
there are no more shelves,” Gu Fei said.
“Ah,” Liu Li was still stunned, “ah?”
“If you break up with my mom, I’ll be taking the store back, with no refund,” Gu Fei said.
“And if you won’t leave, I’ll beat you out the door.”
It couldn’t be said for sure whether Liu Li had understood all that, because his face up until
then was an unchanging stunned.jpg.
“Go withdraw the money,” Gu Fei said. “Electronic transfer is fine too.”
Gu Fei backed up a couple of steps, stuck his hands in his pockets, and looked silently at Liu
Li.
It took Liu Li another two minutes to come back to himself. “You mean, you’re transferring
your family’s store to me for thirty thousand?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei answered. A store like this, in a neighbourhood like this, wouldn’t be worth
thirty thousand even with all the stock thrown in. But at this moment, at the height of his
irritation, he was in the mood to force this sale.
“I’ll… have to talk this over with your mother,” Liu Li said.
“No need,” Gu Fei said. “You can talk it over with yourself. If you think you’re not going to
be with my mom for much longer, then we can just forget this whole thing.”
“No no no, I’m set on her.” Liu Li waved his hand. “Your mother… is a very lovely woman.”
“Alright then,” Gu Fei turned to walk back inside, “let me know when you’ve decided.”
Back in the store, his mom was still holding onto the shelves for support. Seeing Gu Fei
come in, she immediately pushed past him to the courtyard. “Are you okay?”
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei walked to Gu Miao’s side and flicked her on the head, “let’s go eat, then
we’ll go home.”
Gu Miao gathered her cup and pencils into her own little bag and, holding her skateboard in
one hand, followed him out the door.
Gu Fei could tell that Liu Li was not like his mother’s other “true loves” of the past. For one
thing, this guy had a relatively steady job. Whether or not his idea of taking over his boss’s
restaurant was realistic, he was at least someone with a plan for the future. And most
importantly, he was her longest lasting boyfriend to date.
If the store went to Liu Li, he could do whatever he wanted with it. Gu Fei hoped that it
would be the first step to the settling of his mom’s teenage heart. If they wanted to spend
all their time together, then let them do it all day every day
in the store.
If they were to break up, Gu Fei wouldn’t necessarily insist on keeping the money.
However, he needed to put it out there, so that Liu Li would consider the decision carefully.
The store was something that he truly had no more energy to keep up with, if he didn’t
transfer its ownership to someone else.
Liu Li turned out to be a decisive man, or maybe the power of love really was strong
enough. Gu Fei got a call from Liu Li that afternoon while he was napping at home.
“There really is no room for bargaining?” Liu Li asked.
“No,” Gu Fei said.
“Then… should we maybe sign a contract?” Liu Li continued.
“Up to you, why don’t you draft one,” Gu Fei said.
“But I don’t know how,” Liu Li said.
Gu Fei sighed, “We won’t sign one then, I don’t know how either.”
“A college student like you…” Liu Li started laughing.
“I haven’t started school yet,” Gu Fei said.
“Alright then, let’s just write a simple agreement,” Liu Li said. “I trust you—
you’re Xiao-Jin’s son after all.”
Gu Fei suddenly wanted to laugh. Based on this one point alone, he would probably be very
untrustworthy.
Liu Li was waiting for him in the store, and so was his mom, her face sulky even as it
revealed a trace of anticipation.
Gu Fei wrote up a very simple agreement, which he and Liu Li both signed and thump-
printed.
“You get all the money?” his mom asked.
“Yes,” Gu Fei said.
“Wouldn’t that leave him without any startup capital?” She frowned.
“Come on,” Gu Fei ignored her as he stood up and looked at Liu Li, “let’s go make the
transfer.”
It wasn’t until the two of them were out the door did Gu Fei ask him, “Will you still have
money left over?”
“Yeah,” Liu Li nodded, “I do.”
“If you’re not in a rush to open a restaurant, you can continue with the store first.
There’s no other variety store or grocery store in this neighbourhood, it’s very doable if you
manage it well,” Gu Fei said. “You can ask my mom about ordering and stuff, she knows
everything.”
“Okay, alright.” Liu Li continued nodding.
“My sister is used to hanging out in the store,” Gu Fei glanced at him, “so don’t let her know
that the store was transferred to you.”
“Don’t worry, she can come whenever she wants, up to her,” Liu Li said. “We’re all gonna be
one family anyways.”
Gu Fei looked at Liu Li, who giggled a little.
“Don’t let my mom manage the cash in the store,” Gu Fei said. “Otherwise don’t say I didn’t
warn you when you start losing money.
Liu Li kept laughing.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else. He took Liu Li to the ATM on the corner and completed the
transaction.
After coming out of the bank, he didn’t go back to the store with Liu Li, but instead squatted
on a cement stump on the side of the street with a cigarette, and spaced out for a very long
time.
The three days long military training at the Normal School that didn’t even involve a
uniform change was very simplistic indeed. All they had to do was stroll back and forth on
the field. Back, and then forth.
The instructor started out incredibly aggressive, but gave up the act halfway through the
first day, because no matter how fiercely he pushed them, it didn’t make a difference with
any of the students.
During break, Gu Fei sat on the edge of a flower bed and took out his phone to snap a
couple of selfies.
His selfies were much better than Jiang Cheng’s, whether it was the angle, the lighting, or
the composition. Jiang Cheng’s reply came instantaneously after he sent the photo.
– oh fuck, hot
– try to learn from me
– nope, I only need my boyfriend to do it for me
Gu Fei smiled.
– now that’s true
– is training tiring?
– nah, feels the same as our usual strolls
– loool that sounds a little too chill
– have you guys started your classes yet?
– started today, there’s a lot of classes, and lots of orientation events, and a seminar this
weekend
Before Gu Fei could respond, Jiang Cheng followed it up with another message.
– it’s on saturday afternoon, we can go and walk around in the morning, then you rest in
the afternoon, and we can go out together after my seminar is done Gu Fei stared at the
message for a long time and did not respond.
He didn’t know how he should respond to it.
Jiang Cheng was waiting eagerly for him to visit, but with the way things were going here, it
wasn’t very likely that he could make his way over. He was originally planning on talking to
Jiang Cheng to see if he had time to come back… but that also seemed unlikely now.
Jiang Cheng’s school was unlike his—the new students were busy immediately after school
started. Gu Fei had gone online and secretly done some research himself. In a place where
overachievers converged, many people would maintain a high intensity pace of studying
starting from first year. He really did not wish to put Jiang Cheng in a difficult position.
That said, he didn’t know how to come straight out and say that he had to cancel this trip.
But before he could think of a suitable solution, Jiang Cheng’s call came in.
Gu Fei gritted his teeth and picked up, “Boyfriend.”
“Boyfriend,” Jiang Cheng was laughing on the other end, “how come you suddenly went
quiet?”
“Somebody was talking to me just now,” Gu Fei said.
“Did you see the message I just sent?” Jiang Cheng asked. “I have a seminar Saturday
afternoon, but I’m free on Sunday, so we can spend the whole day together.”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei furrowed his brow, “um…”
“Hm?” Cheng-ge answered.
“It’s just, you know how I didn’t tell Er-Miao, when I went there with you,” Gu Fei struggled
to get the words out, “so now she’s a little unhappy…”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng was immediately worried. “Then, is everything alright with her?”
“Yeah, she’s fine now,” Gu Fei pressed the spot between his brows over and over, “but she
was very upset yesterday, and kept screaming, because I slept at your place and not at
home.”
“But she wasn’t like that before, when you came over?” Jiang Cheng said.
“I didn’t tell her this time. And besides, she also realized that you had left.” Gu Fei closed his
eyes for a few moments. “The way she is right now, wherever I go she just… follows, I…”
Gu Fei didn’t continue his sentence. He could already imagine Jiang Cheng’s expression
right then.
Jiang Cheng was a smart and sensitive person, he’d said enough for Jiang Cheng to
understand what he meant. Moreover, he really couldn’t bring himself to continue.
“Then I’ll go back,” Jiang Cheng said right away without thinking. “I…”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei’s heart warmed when he heard this, but still he interrupted,
“let’s do October 1st. School’s just started and there’s so many things to do, you shouldn’t
be absent.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
What he said just now was only his impulsive response: you can’t come, so I’ll go to you.
However, after the words were out of his mouth, even he knew that it wasn’t right.
Even though it had only been a few days since the school year started, Jiang Cheng could
already feel the tense atmosphere and the time crunch on a visceral level. Zhao Ke had also
dragged him to the library a few times over the last couple of days. No matter what time of
day they went, there were always lots of people inside, all the way until 10 PM, when the
library closed.
Whether it were events or seminars, they were all necessary components of integration
into the school, and the school life. If he wanted to one day treat Gu Fei to 800 yuan of
vermicelli with 200 yuan of extra meat, then he had to start now.
In theory, at least.
If they had agreed on October 1st from the start, he wouldn’t have minded so much. But
now, having his expectations suddenly fall through, he couldn’t help but feel a little
crushed, in an undefinable sort of way.
“Alright then,” Jiang Cheng said after a few moments of silence. “I’ll go back on October 1st.”
“It’s all my fault, Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said. “I didn’t consider everything in the beginning.”
“Bullshit,” Jiang Cheng felt a wave of heartache for Gu Fei, “what does it have to do with
you, when this was beyond our control in the first place. It’s normal to have some
unforeseen circumstances. Besides, there’s not long to go before October.”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei smiled a little.
“But you’ll have to plan well,” Jiang Cheng said. “Eat, drink, fun, and fuck—it’s gotta be all-
encompassing.”
“Sure, no problem,” Gu Fei said. “But are you sure you don’t want to reverse the order?”
“What?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“Eat, drink, fun, and fuck,” Gu Fei said. “Should we perhaps reverse the order?”
“… Shut up,” Jiang Cheng laughed, but after a moment of thought, tutted in agreement.
“You’re right, reverse order then. You arrange everything.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei answered.
“So… alright then, that’s decided.” Jiang Cheng turned and glanced back at his classroom,
where Zhao Ke happened to be waving at him. “Gotta go, I have to get to class.”
“Go on,” Gu Fei said.
“Hurry,” Jiang Cheng said quietly as he walked back to class. “Give me a kiss.”
Gu Fei gave him a kiss on the other end, and Jiang Cheng smiled in satisfaction,
“Loud enough, not bad.”
After their plan to meet up fell through, Jiang Cheng did not bring it up again or expressed
too much disappointment, but Gu Fei could feel that he was feigning.
It would be difficult for anyone to get used to a major change of going from spending every
day and night together to not being able to see each other for a whole month.
However, Jiang Cheng probably didn’t have too much time to mull over these things
anyway. Gu Fei had seen Jiang Cheng’s course schedule. In comparison, the courses at the
Normal School were practically a holiday, and much more lax.
Gu Fei was a lot freer after forcing the store onto Liu Li, but while he was free, Jiang Cheng
was very busy between going to class and going to the library.
Every night, it would be past 10 PM before he could finally send the first text of the evening.
– why doesn’t it feel any more chill than third year of high school
– it’s a prestigious uni after all
– it feels a little scary to be surrounded by overachievers, i feel like a slacky slacker next to
them
– no way, your score is all the way up there
– it’s not about the score, more like, how can these people have such a passion for studying?
So disciplined and willing and taking initiative, i feel like i never had that kind of aspiration
Gu Fei laughed for a few seconds, before sighing. Jiang Cheng really didn’t seem like the
kind of person who loved to study—he must be under pretty immense pressure, being in
that environment.
They chatted until 11 PM, when Jiang Cheng went to sleep.
Gu Fei didn’t feel sleepy. He sat on the bed holding his phone, and wasn’t sure what he
should do. He didn’t feel like playing a game, since he had fallen behind Li Yan by way too
many levels, and without Jiang Cheng here to help him catch up, it was no fun to continue
playing.
After spacing out for a while, the door to his room was pushed open, and Gu Miao stuck her
head in.
“Why are you doing up?” Gu Fei asked in a quiet voice.
Gu Miao didn’t say anything, only walked to his bedside and looked at him.
“What is it?” Gu Fei lifted her up and sat her on the edge of the bed.
Gu Miao still didn’t say anything, nor did her face show any reaction.
“Can’t sleep?” Gu Fei smiled. “Sit here for a while then, I’m probably going to have insomnia
too.”
Gu Miao braced her hands on the edge of the bed, put her head down, and swung her legs
back and forth.
“Our Er-Miao has grown up, that she’s even developed insomnia eh?” Gu Fei leaned back
against the headboard and put his arms behind his head. “Got something on your mind?”
Gu Miao kept swinging her legs for a while, then turned and looked at him for a long time
before saying: “Cheng-ge.”
“Mhm, Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei reached out and stroked her head. “Er-Miao misses Cheng-ge,
right?”
Gu Miao looked at him without answering or offering any other reaction.
“I miss Cheng-ge too,” Gu Fei sighed. “Very very much. But… we gotta wait.
Cheng-ge’s very busy now, not like before.”
Gu Miao couldn’t understand any of this, though she kept looking at him.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei gave her a smile, “say, what should I do?”
Gu Miao put her head back down and continued swinging her legs.
“I always thought that, being apart won’t be a big deal. I also thought that if we’re apart for
a long enough time, Cheng-ge and I may just gradually drift apart. After all, he’ll get to know
lots of other people—all very good people. He will learn so many things, and see so many
things, and all of them things that I don’t know,” Gu Fei said. “I used to think that, if one day
he and I don’t have anything to talk about anymore, then that’s probably it… but now…”
Gu Fei took Gu Miao’s hand into his own. “I’m scared, and anxious. Cheng-ge’s not going to
wait forever. He’ll keep moving forward, Er-Miao, do you understand? He keeps going, and
I can’t catch up—do you know what I should do?”
To Gu Miao, these words were practically non-existent. Gu Fei figured he was only talking
to himself anyways.
Certainly, he didn’t know how he should get through the rest of his days, but he really could
not keep his eyes closed any longer.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5987

TL word count: 4243

TL time: ???
Edit time: 00:42:35
Curse words: 3x fuck, 1x shit
TL’s Notes:
Gu Fei’s POV is heartbreaking </3
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: February 4, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 114
“I’ve missed you way too much.”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
“Jiang Cheng,” Zhao Ke patted his bedside, “let’s go to the library later.”
“You go ahead with Qiqi,” Jiang Cheng was sitting cross-legged on his bed and looking down
at his phone, “I’ll be in a bit.”
“He’s in a bad mood, don’t know where he went off to be depressed,” Zhao Ke said.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng glanced at Zhao Ke. Zhang Qiqi’s personality was like his face—always
easygoing and carefree. He was surprised that a person like that would feel down.
“The grading didn’t go the way he hoped,” Zhao Ke said. “Come on, to the library, if you
want to play on your phone you can do it there. If we go late we’ll have to wait for seats
again.”
“Just for that?” Jiang Cheng hesitated for a moment before getting off the bed.
“The test wasn’t that big of a deal, was it? I went into it with zero prep and I’m not even
upset.”
“But even with zero prep you got a higher score than him,” Zhao Ke said.
“… Oh,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Well, I gotta have one strength, don’t I? This just happens to be
my strong suit.”
“Well other people call it having a sense of urgency.” Zhao Ke walked out of their dorm
room. “Lock the door.”
Jiang Cheng locked the door and walked to the library with Zhao Ke.
Urgency.
He had it too. He didn’t even need to look around at his other classmates or at the more
senior students here, he only needed to look at the three other people in their dorm room
to feel a sense of urgency.
He would go out too—for a walk or to eat and take a break—but he would always leave
large blocks of time for studying.
Jiang Cheng had never been like this before. To a last-minute crammer like him,
it was only in this kind of environment that he could feel this sense of urgency.
Everyone around him was marching forward, so he did not dare to stop.
Though he was starting to experience a different kind of urgency as well, which was…
He felt his pocket for his phone. Just now he had checked his accounts, the amount on the
card wasn’t as abundant as before. He needed to start considering the matter of making
money.
He could theoretically start worrying about it next semester, but Gu Fei knew his financial
situation very well. He needed to create some income before Gu Fei started sending him
money.
Zhao Ke’s phone rang. “Jie?”
“Hey little good-for-nothing——” Zhao Ke’s older sister’s voice sounded loudly from the
other end. Even from beside him, Jiang Cheng could hear her drawn out voice calling out
his… nickname?
“What.” Zhao Ke must’ve been very used to this name already, his answer was calm.
Jiang Cheng gave Zhao Ke a little more space and pulled out his own phone, looking down
at it as he walked.
There weren’t any messages from Gu Fei, who was already very familiar with his daily
schedules. He would usually wait until after 10 o’clock at night to contact Jiang Cheng, and
during any other time, Jiang Cheng was the one who messaged first whenever he had free
time.
He wasn’t yet used to this kind of life, but the unbearable feeling he had in the first few days
of being roasted on an open flame, which only made him want to hop back to where he
came from, had subsided somewhat. However, he could not quit the addiction of looking at
photos of Gu Fei every single day.
“I don’t want to go, I don’t like little girls… Of course, you’re not a little girl.
Huh? You’re a big girl,” Zhao Ke said. “And by the time you finish grad school you’d be an
old girl. I think maybe you shouldn’t go on to do a Doctorate, you’ll… I really don’t wanna
go, I don’t want to tutor, it’s not like I need the money… I don’t need this kind of
experience… Maybe you can refer someone else…”
“Tutoring?” Jiang Cheng turned.
“Hm?” Zhao Ke looked back at him. “You?”
“Can I?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Okay wait, my roommate is interested—yeah he’s in the top three of my year, why don’t I
call you back later.” Zhao Ke hung up the call and turned to Jiang Cheng. “You’re really
interested?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “What kind of big deal tutoring job is this that it has to go back
and forth on referrals?”
“A kid from my sister’s friend’s family, a little girl in her second year of high school. They
specifically asked for someone who’s a student at an elite school,”
Zhao Ke said. “They pay pretty well. Usually you won’t find one that pays so well on your
own. If you want it, then I’ll let my sister know.”
“Why not just hire a teacher directly from an elite school if they have the money?” Jiang
Cheng couldn’t understand what the parents were thinking.
“The little girl doesn’t want it of course, she wants someone closer in age. Her parents dote
on her, and don’t refuse anything she asks for,” Zhao Ke said.
“Besides, elite school teachers don’t necessarily want to do one-on-one tutoring,”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment, “I’ll do it.”
“Then I’ll tell my sister,” Zhao Ke said.
Jiang Cheng felt like he hadn’t yet caught up with this development. There was suddenly a
solution to his money making problem… It was a little unbelievable.
This meant that Zhao Ke was a Fuwa—no—it meant that Jiang Cheng himself was a Fuwa.
[1]
Fuwa Chengcheng.
“It’s a deal then. I’ll give you my sister’s number, you can contact her directly.”
Zhao Ke sent Jiang Cheng his sister’s contact information. “You sure you have time for all
this?”
“Yep.” Jiang Cheng glanced at the contact card Zhao Ke had shared with him.
The name he had given his sister was… “an old lady”. Jiang Cheng sighed,
“What’s your sister’s name?”
“Zhao Jin,” Zhao Ke said.
“Zhao Jing?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Jin,” Zhao Ke repeated.
“… ‘Jin’ as in fun?” Jiang Cheng asked. [2]
“Mhm,” Zhao Ke nodded. “The name’s wasted on her, since she’s not much fun.
She’s only lively when she’s making fun of me.”
Jiang Cheng chuckled as he saved Zhao Jin’s number to his phone.
“Is your allowance not enough to cover expenses?” Zhao Ke asked him.
“It’s not that.” Jiang Cheng hesitated for a moment. “I’m on my own.”
“Oh.” Zhao Ke glanced at him and didn’t say anything else.
“Well, not on my own exactly,” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a second and realized what
he said wasn’t entirely accurate, “I…”
“Yeah I got it, there’s two of you,” Zhao Ke cut him off. “Dude, can you guys have some kind
of bottom line when you’re abusing single dogs? No need to seize every opportunity like
this.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t continue, and instead laughed for a long time.
“Tutoring?” Gu Fei was surprised. “Aren’t you really busy with school? I thought you’d just
finished with that grading or something a couple days ago?
Don’t you have the College English Test Level 4 next semester?”
“I don’t need to prep for Level 4,” Jiang Cheng’s voice was its usual arrogance as he said
this, “and this tutoring doesn’t take up very much time. It’s just twice a week on the
weekend.”
“How much money do you still have left?” Gu Fei asked.
Gu Fei had a pretty good idea of Jiang Cheng’s finances. He figured Jiang Cheng should still
have some left, and he was planning to send some to him before October, out of the amount
he got from selling the store.
He hadn’t expected Jiang Cheng to get a part-time job so soon.
“I’ve got money,” Jiang Cheng said with a smile. “I’ll wrap you a big red envelope at New
Year’s.”
“You can just wrap yourself,” Gu Fei said.
“Shameless.” Jiang Cheng cackled his response. Gu Fei could tell that Jiang Cheng was in a
pretty good mood today. There were only a few days left until the break.
When he remembered that fact, Gu Fei’s mood also lifted.
“Have you not gone out to take photos lately?” Jiang Cheng asked him. “The collection about
the Steelworks?”
“No, the ones from before are enough. I’ll work on processing them in the next
few days then send it off for them to choose,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll continue with the model
shoots after the holiday.”
“I see.” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment, then laughed again. “I’ll buy my ticket tomorrow,
remember to come pick me up.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei smiled.
“On your motorcycle,” Jiang Cheng continued.
“Okay,” Gu Fei agreed.
October 1st was approaching, and the days leading up to it were grueling, but not
impossibly so.
Gu Fei opened up Jiang Cheng’s closet and looked inside. By the time Jiang Cheng would
leave again, he’d need to take some warm clothes with him.
The days were already getting cooler.
Gu Fei ran his hands over the clothes in the closet and pulled out one of his own jackets.
Jiang Cheng had taken two of Gu Fei’s jackets, and of the ones he wore often, had only left
this one behind.
When this one needed to be washed, he would have to wear one of Jiang Cheng’s.
Just as he was about to hang the jacket back, the bottom hem brushed against his leg, and
he felt that there was something in one of the pockets.
He reached his hand inside and touched what felt like an envelope. He took it out and, upon
glancing at it, was stunned.
It was a rather thick red envelope.
“Best of Luck and Fortune”
He opened the envelope and pulled out a wad of bills.
At this point he didn’t need to guess to know that this was money that his boyfriend,
Contestant Jiang Cheng, had left for him. And perhaps out of worry that Gu Fei wouldn’t
take it, he had even used the same method to deliver it to him.
Gu Fei smiled and counted the money. Even the amount was the same.
He took a picture of the money and envelope and sent it in the chat, along with a message
that he had copied from Jiang Cheng:
– thanks boyfriend!
– muackmuack you’re welcome!
Jiang Cheng’s reply came swiftly, followed immediately by another message from him.
– say, don’t you think that this “best of luck and fortune” is way more sincere than “wishing
you a long life”!
– super sincere!
Gu Fei laughed for a long time. He was a little out of it that day, and had gotten the red
envelope from their store, all the while thinking he grabbed one that said
“Academic Accomplishment”. It wasn’t until Jiang Cheng sent him a picture did he realize
that he had grabbed a “Wishing You a Long Life”.
– you just wait, in the future i’ll give you an even bigger red envelope!
– alrighty!
Jiang Cheng gave Zhao Jin a call and arranged to start tutoring the high school girl after the
October holiday. He did, however, have to go and meet the family in the next few days.
“I won’t go with you this time,” Zhao Ke said. “I don’t wanna see my sister.
Here, why don’t you give this to her for me.”
Zhao Jin was in her first year of grad school at B University. Standing outside the gates of B
University with the box of cake that Zhao Ke had asked him to bring, Jiang Cheng gave Zhao
Jin a call.
Not long after hanging up, he saw a girl walk out from inside the gates. He could tell from a
glance that it was Zhao Ke’s older sister. They looked alike—both tall and fair-skinned.
It wasn’t until he saw the clothes she wore did Jiang Cheng really believe that the abstract
style of clothing Ding Zhuxin had designed actually did have a market. It looked pretty good
on Zhao Jin.
“Jiang Cheng?” Zhao Jin walked up to him and asked.
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng nodded and handed her the cake. “Zhao Ke asked me to give this to you.”
“What the hell.” Zhao Jin opened the box and peered inside. “I heard that in your dorm
room, he’s closest to you?”
“Probably,” Jiang Cheng said. It was probably true, since at least Zhao Ke didn’t have a
girlfriend.
“With taste like this,” Zhao Jin showed him the cake inside, “how could you possibly be
close to him? Are there only two of you in your room?”
Jiang Cheng glanced at the cake that had a very ugly panda drawn on it. “He might have…
made this himself. He mentioned a few days ago that there was a DIY bakery by the
campus.”
“I set the meeting for 3 o’clock, you’ll be right on time going there by car.” Zhao Jin skipped
the fork and took out the cake with her hand, forcing it into two halves and handing him
one. “Here.”
“Thank you so much for going to the trouble, but I could’ve gone there myself.”
Jiang Cheng took a bite of the cake, which tasted alright.
“It’s no trouble, one of my seniors is heading that way so he’ll give us a ride,”
Zhao Jin said. “I’ll take the chance to go shopping.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Spent all that effort doing my makeup, can’t go wasting it,” Zhao Jin added.
“… Ah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
A car drove up and stopped beside them.
“Get in.” Zhao Jin stuffed the cake into her mouth, sucked her fingers clean, and got into the
front passenger seat.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a second, then took out a tissue and wiped his fingers before
getting into the back seat.
“My little bro’s classmate, Jiang Cheng,” Zhao Jin introduced him. “This is my senior, the
hunkiest of the three hunks in our program, Xu Xingzhi.”
“Hello,” Xu Xingzhi sighed before he turned and nodded at Jiang Cheng.
“Hello senior,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m sorry for the trouble.”
“It’s along my way,” Xu Xingzhi said.
It was the first time Jiang Cheng had gone more than a kilometer away from campus since
registration. Looking out the car window, the view seemed strange to him, he felt as though
he could blink and get lost in the next second.
He decided that when he got back to his dorm, he really needed to check how to get here
from campus.
It wasn’t too far and there was not much traffic along the way. The trip took them just over
twenty minutes.
“We’re here, come on.” Zhao Jin opened the car door. “Thanks.”
“Thank you,” Jiang Cheng said as he opened the car door.
“You’re welcome.” Xu Xingzhi turned back to face him.
Only then did Jiang Cheng see his face. Xu Xingzhi wore glasses, and looked…
either way he wasn’t as handsome as Gu Fei. Gu Fei also looked extremely handsome when
he wore glasses, and grew even better looking as time passed.
The family that was looking for a tutor seemed like a rather wealthy one, going by the
appearance of their home. And looking at their daughter, it was apparent that she had been
pretty spoiled as well, and belonged in the category of older brats.
Her mother called for her twice, yet she didn’t so much as make a sound of
acknowledgement. Jiang Cheng had been chatting with her parents for more than 10
minutes when she finally came out of her room.
“Do you get really good grades?” The girl plopped lazily onto the sofa and asked Jiang
Cheng, without so much as a greeting.
“Depends on who I’m comparing with,” Jiang Cheng said.
“What about compared to me,” she said.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t understand where this girl got her entirely baseless confidence from.
He picked up a set of test papers from nearby and flicked it with his fingers. “I have never
gotten such a low score in my whole life.”
The girl blinked, then started laughing out loud in delight. She laughed for a long time
before finally saying, “Is it that low? This is the highest score I’ve gotten so far.”
“Very low.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Whatever.” She stood up and walked back to her room, turning to look at her mom before
closing the door. “I don’t have any problem with it, but just twice a week and no more.”
“She’s been like this ever since she was little,” her mom’s face was for some reason filled
with contentment, “a real character.”
“… Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“I’m just glad she’s willing. I’ve known Zhao Jin for two years now, so I trust the people she
recommends,” the content mother said. “Besides, she said that your grades are even better
than her brother’s.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng wasn’t sure how to continue this conversation.
“Here,” she took out an envelope, “this is one month’s pay. The subsequent months will also
be paid in advance. Thank you for your hard work.”
“Thank you auntie.” Jiang Cheng accepted the envelope.
“We are here,” Gu Fei pointed at the map laid out on the table and said to Gu Miao. “Right
here—I’ve told you before, remember?”
Gu Miao was splayed out on the table looking at the map, the expression on her face
indicated that she didn’t really understand.
“We are here,” Gu Fei drew a circle on the map with a pen, then drew another line along the
railroad track, “and Cheng-ge is here.”
The word “Cheng-ge” briefly attracted Gu Miao’s attention, and her eyes lingered for a
moment on the map.
“This map is too big, so our Er-Miao can’t comprehend it just yet.” Gu Fei pulled out a map
of the city from the drawer and spread it out, pointing with his finger. “Here, is the
Steelworks.”
Gu Miao stared at the map.
Gu Fei wanted to check whether she was looking at the map or at his finger, so he moved
his finger. Gu Miao’s eyes moved with it. He then lifted his finger. Gu Miao’s gaze quickly
shifted up as well.
Despite feeling a little disappointed, he couldn’t help but be amused at the same time. “How
come you’re just like a cat.”
Gu Miao looked at him and gave a little smile.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei rested his chin in one hand and looked back at her, “Cheng-ge will be back
in a few days, are you glad?”
Gu Miao nodded.
“But Cheng-ge still has to go back to school. One, two, three, four, five,” Gu Fei curled up his
fingers as he counted. “If we don’t count the arrival and departure days, he will be here for
five days before he has to leave.”
Gu Miao’s smile disappeared.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei continued tentatively. “Cheng-ge went to a place that’s really far away, a
long way from the Steelworks. He has to keep going, and going, and take a train…”
“No go,” Gu Miao said.
“He has to go,” Gu Fei said. “Cheng-ge won’t always be here, he has to go. Er-Miao has to go
too.”
Gu Miao let out a sharp scream almost as soon as he finished the sentence.
Gu Fei sighed. He didn’t go to console her right away, and instead sat there and looked
across at her.
He didn’t know what he should do to make Gu Miao learn how to express herself in the
right way.
Anger, discontent, fear, and nervousness—Gu Miao expressed all of that by screaming.
At the end of the day, they lived in an unprivileged place, where there were no professional
institutions. The psychiatric department in the hospital couldn’t compare to that of a big
city, and it had no systematic treatment protocol when it came to cases like Gu Miao’s.
Although she at least was in a good mood every time she went to that rehab class from
before. It was also why, despite the rehab class not necessarily being very standardized, he
still wanted Gu Miao to keep going there. It was a thread of hope at least, especially since
Gu Miao wasn’t born like this.
It was, however, not cheap. Going there long term would put some strain on him financially,
so he needed to get his accounts in order.
There were quite a number of students staying on campus during the October 1st holiday.
To Jiang Cheng’s surprise, aside from him, none of the other three people in his dorm room
were going home.
“My dream girl isn’t going home.” Zhao Ke’s reason was very touching.
In Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi’s case, their girlfriends were coming to spend some quality time
with them and do some sightseeing on the side. They had both left for the train station first
thing in the morning to pick up their significant others.
Jiang Cheng was very excited too, but he held on and didn’t go with them to the station two
hours early just to sit there and wait.
“Do you have a lot of stuff to take back?” Zhao Ke asked. “If you do, my sister can get
someone to give you a ride.”
“Not much, just one bag.” Jiang Cheng remembered the guy who drove them before, Xu
Xingzhi. “The senior who gave us a ride last time, is he your sister’s boyfriend?”
“My sister’s single,” Zhao Ke said. “There is no one in this world, male or female, who can
pique her interest. I guess she’s the kind of celibate person who isn’t interested in
anybody.”
“Are there other kinds?” Jiang Cheng asked as he laughed.
“There’s also the kind that doesn’t interest anybody,” Zhao Ke said. [3]
Jiang Cheng blinked for a moment, then burst out laughing. He was in way too good of a
mood.
As he wrapped up the laughter session, he patted his bag and said, “Why don’t you walk me
to the subway entrance.”
“No.” Zhao Ke was decisive in his refusal. “I can walk you to the entrance of our dorm, then I
have to go to the library.
“Let’s go.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
After leaving Zhao Ke outside the dorm, Jiang Cheng took out his phone and sent a message
to Gu Fei.
– I’M LEAVING I’M LEAVING I’M LEAVING!
– ON THE TRAIN YET ON THE TRAIN YET ON THE TRAIN YET?
– no, currently running to the subway station with my lorge backpack!
– you got your ID with you?
– got it got it got it!
– i’m getting ready to leave for the train station
Jiang Cheng was surprised for a moment, then gave Gu Fei a call. “You’re going now? You
don’t need to go several hours early even if you’re crawling to the station.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei said with a smile. “It’s not like I have anything better to do. Er-Miao’s out
playing with Li Yan. There’s no difference to me between waiting at home or waiting at the
station.”
Jiang Cheng arrived at the train station, and managed to not get lost when walking inside.
After all, taking Gu Fei to the station last time left a deep impression on his mind. He sent
another message to Gu Fei after he sat down on the train.
– ahh i can hardly wait to go baaaaaaaaaack!
– ahhhhhhhhhhh longing for my man’s return!
Gu Fei had attached a photo with his message. In it, he was wearing a helmet, looking like
he was ready to ride his motorcycle to the station.
Jiang Cheng stared at the photo for a very long time.
Back then, when he was on that train, heart full of anger and feeling lost, he never could’ve
imagined that one day his heart would be so filled with anxiety and eagerness to hurry back
to that little city.
– on the train yet? scumboi!
Pan Zhi sent him a message dripping with grievance.
– I’m seated now, we’ll hang out once I get back here
– yeah right, we’ll talk about it when you come back, you’re so busy these days that you’re
off your feet, and not missing me at all
Jiang Cheng put his head down and laughed for a while.
After registration, he had only squeezed out time to meet Pan Zhi once to eat out together.
To be fair, he wasn’t the only one who was busy. Pan Zhi was also busy, especially since his
primary occupation was not studying.
The train started. Jiang Cheng stared out the window and let his thoughts wander.
The view outside the window changed constantly, but he felt like he didn’t see any of it. His
mind was entirely occupied by Gu Fei. He practically checked his phone for the time every
five minutes exactly on the dot.
Finally, when there was still 20 minutes before arrival, he got up early and stood by the
door with his bag. When the attendant came to get ready to open the door, he almost didn’t
want to get out of the way.
When the door opened, he was the first one to hop out.
“I’m here!” As he walked, he called Gu Fei on the phone. “I’m here! I got off the train and I’m
walking out now!”
“I’m right at the exit gate,” Gu Fei said. “You can see me as soon as you come out.”
Jiang Cheng walked briskly, then after a while, started running.
The train station was small. There was only a few hundred meters between the arrival
platform and the exit gate. Even so, as he ran, Jiang Cheng still thought the distance felt way
too fucking long, as though he would never reach the end.
When he saw the door of the exit gate, he could no longer hold himself back, and didn’t
bother to look out of it, but instead hollered, “GU FEI!”
“Don’t run, no running!” A staff member at the exit pointed at him. “No running!”
Someone outside raised a hand and waved. It was Gu Fei.
When Jiang Cheng passed through the gate and saw the smile on Gu Fei’s face, he suddenly
felt an extreme ease, as though he was seeing the sun for the first time in a long time.
Clutching his bag and ignoring the fact that there were people all around them, he raced up
and pulled Gu Fei into his arms.
“Fuck.” He held on tightly. “I’ve missed you way too much.”
“Me too.” Gu Fei hugged him back.
Footnotes
[1] Fuwa [福娃] means good-luck dolls, and are the mascot of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Colloquially, the word has come to mean lucky charm. ⤴
[2] Jin4 [劲] is a versatile word that can mean strength, energy, spirit, drive, interest etc. To
have “jin” can either mean the person is strong or the person is fun, depending on context.
As a whole, it is a more masculine/neutral/rough character that is not very commonly used
in names for girls.
In comparison, Jing4 [静] means quiet or still, and is a more ‘elegant’ character that’s more
commonly used in female names as well as male names. ⤴
[3] Fun fact, in Chinese, 谁(anyone)也看不上(no interest) can mean both
“uninterested in anyone” and “does not interest anyone”. The ambiguity comes from the
absence of a clear subject in the clause, which means the subject could for example be an “I”
added to the beginning to form 我谁也看不上 = “I’m not interested in anyone”, or the subject could be
the 谁(anyone), in which case the object is “me”, aka 谁也看不上我 = “no one’s interested in me”. ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6036
TL word count: 4414
TL time: ???
Edit time: 00:51:48
Curse words: 2x fucks
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!

AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: February 23, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 115
“There’s no way you can hold it until after the shower.”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
A live Gu Fei.
A live! Gu Fei!
A real, live! Warm! Warm and fuzzy!
A Gu Fei that could be felt, smelled, and taken in one bite.
It had been a while, and Jiang Cheng seemed to have gotten used to this life—no longer
missing Gu Fei so much that he couldn’t fall asleep at night. Nor did everything he saw
remind him of Gu Fei. Being swarmed on all sides by bustling overachievers, he couldn’t
help but hurry his steps as well. And eventually the longing didn’t feel as crushing as it did
before.
Upon seeing Gu Fei’s waving arms however, he felt a rush of levity, as though he could take
off into the air if only he had enough of a running start.
Sure enough, whether he really was used to a certain lifestyle, and whether he really was
happy, it was something that could only be felt most viscerally in comparison.
Just as he tilted his face and aimed a kiss at Gu Fei’s cheek, Gu Fei grabbed the back of his
head and gave it a little tug. “Cheng-ge! Cheng-ge! Calm down.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng paused for about two seconds before he came back to himself and pushed
Gu Fei away with one hand. With his peripheral vision, he quickly scanned their
surroundings. “Fuck.”
“The level of your thirst is rather shocking.” Gu Fei laughed as he took Jiang Cheng’s bag.
“Don’t tell me you were hard the whole way here.”
“Oh shut up,” Jiang Cheng laughed. He remained unmoving after saying that, just stood
there and stared at Gu Fei.
It had been only less than a month. The short buzz cut Gu Fei had gotten before he left
hadn’t even grown out. And yet, when he looked at Gu Fei now, it felt like they hadn’t seen
each other for a whole year.
Not to mention that this refreshing feeling of seeing Gu Fei live and in person was
impossible to replicate, no matter how good the photos were or how high
definition the video call.
Every little detail was crystal clear in front of him: Gu Fei’s neat eyebrows; the lashes that
flitted by when he blinked; the corners of his lips curved up; and himself, reflected in Gu
Fei’s eyes.
He’d missed Gu Fei to the point of insanity when they couldn’t see each other, but this
feeling didn’t dissipate now that he was here. He still missed him.
“Shall we go?” Gu Fei came closer and bumped Jiang Cheng’s shoulder with his own.
“Wanna eat something first or do you want to go back?”
“Go back first.” Jiang Cheng didn’t hesitate for a second. “Did you buy condoms and lube?”
“… Yes.” Gu Fei looked at him. “Cheng-ge, are you good? Can you hold it until we get back?
It’s about a 20 minutes ride from here.”
“I can.” Jiang Cheng nodded solemnly. “I can even hold it until after I take a shower.”
“Let’s go then.” Gu Fei turned and started walking as he laughed. “I parked the motorcycle
under that tree there.”
“You look really good,” Jiang Cheng said. “With a helmet on.”
“Then I’ll keep the helmet on while I fuck you,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng turned and looked at him.
“What?” Gu Fei laughed.
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng said. “You can even put silk stockings on your head while you fuck me—
as long as it’s you doing it.”
Gu Fei laughed and put his arms around Jiang Cheng’s shoulders, “What, what happened to
your aspirations of fucking me?”
“That’s on hold for now.” Jiang Cheng sighed and ran his hand over Gu Fei’s waist. “To be
quite honest, I really didn’t understand until we were apart but, nothing else matters
anymore as long as I can see you right now; to hell with aspirations too.”
Gu Fei continued to laugh.
The motorcycle was not very far. Gu Fei walked over and straddled the seat, put his helmet
on, then handed another one to Jiang Cheng.
“Why is yours black,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the helmet in his hands, “and
mine red?”
“Because that one is Er-Miao’s—she picked a red one,” Gu Fei said, looking at him.
“I want the black one,” Jiang Cheng said. “The black one looks cooler.”
“Cool people look cool no matter what colour they’re wearing.” Gu Fei exchanged helmets
with him and put on the red one. “What’s cool is the person, not the helmet.”
Jiang Cheng stared at him.
It was true—Gu Fei not only looked cool with a stony expression, he looked cool even when
he was smiling with glasses on. It was an innate air that was one part roguish, one part
murderous, and one part something else.
No. Not innate.
It was honed, sharpened by the years of living here.
“Get on,” Gu Fei ignited the engine and handed Jiang Cheng’s bag back to him,
“cool Chengcheng.”
Jiang Cheng tutted.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei called to him.
Jiang Cheng slung the bag over his shoulders and got onto the back seat, wrapping his arms
around Gu Fei’s waist.
Gu Fei cranked the engine and the bike shot out.
There was a tiny mini-square in front of the train station. It was left alone by regulators for
the most part, and was usually littered with parked cars and food carts.
Compared to the train station Jiang Cheng departed from only a few hours ago, there was
no order here—chaos reigned. And yet as he sat on the back seat with his arms around Gu
Fei, he didn’t feel any annoyance or revulsion. On the contrary, there was the faintest hint
of affection.
No matter how bleak the life or how unkempt the surroundings, they were all filled with
joyful familiarity because of their connections to Gu Fei.
Beside the mini-square was a street that would take them directly to the main road, but Gu
Fei chose to cut slowly across the square instead, through the disarray of cars and carts.
“Why are we going this way?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He guided the bike diagonally across the square, behind the bus stop
on the other side, then with a roar of the engine, onto the waiting platform.
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng looked at the people on either side jumping out of the way and said
quietly. “Watch that the traffic police don’t come to arrest you.”
“When have you ever seen a traffic cop around here unless there was an accident,” Gu Fei
said as he rode the bike forward until they came to the end of the platform, where he put
his foot on a stone stump. “Look, Cheng-ge, here.”
“You…” Jiang Cheng started laughing. This was where he sat while he waited for the guy
whose little sister had been taken out by the kidnapper to come and piece her back
together. He couldn’t help but look down at the ground—Gu Miao had written her name
there. But of course, there wouldn’t be any trace of it left.
“How did you feel back then, when you first saw me?” Gu Fei rode the bike off of the
platform and joined the stream of traffic flowing in the direction of the Steelworks.
“This guy’s got real long legs,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Really?” Gu Fei turned and asked with a smile.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Hurry up and gloat about it, long-legs.”
It had been less than a month, yet when Jiang Cheng watched the scenery along the way
from the back seat of Gu Fei’s bike, it felt to him like a long time had passed.
Perhaps that was true. After all, it had been almost two years since he first arrived here.
Two years was not a long time in his 19 years of life so far, but his experiences in these two
years had taken up almost all of his memory.
Jiang Cheng pressed forward a little and tugged open Gu Fei’s collar.
“Hey,” Gu Fei turned his head slightly, “didn’t you say you can hold it until we get back, and
even until after a shower? It’s been less than five minutes and already you’re tearing at my
clothes.”
“I’m checking out my bite mark.” Jiang Cheng stroked the tattoo on Gu Fei’s collarbone. “I’m
surprised that you didn’t get tanned from the military training.
The tattoo is still so clear.”
“Our training only lasted three days,” Gu Fei said. “It didn’t even add up to eight hours a
day. The three days altogether was even less sun exposure than one of my outdoor shoots.”
“Oh hey,” Jiang Cheng said with a laugh. “Let’s go check out your school tomorrow. I’ve
never even gone in.”
“My school?” Gu Fei hesitated. “What’s there to see? Now that you’ve seen U of R, you’ll be
disappointed by what’s in there.”
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng said. “I just want to see the places you walked by every day, where you
sat and rested.”
“Alright then,” Gu Fei smiled, “we’ll go for a tour tomorrow… Let’s go get meat pies for
lunch after. Wang Xu asked a few times already—told us to go as soon as you come back.”
“Sure, and we can visit Lao-Xu and Lao-Lu together.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Okay,” Gu Fei agreed.
“Is Wang Xu repeating the year with Yi Jing? I hardly ever see his WeChat Moments
anymore,” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm. Yi Jing is wearing herself thin again. I don’t know if Wang Xu has been crushing
himself studying, but he certainly is crushing himself to keep her company,” Gu Fei said.
“Last time I saw him, the guy even lost weight.”
Jiang Cheng smiled. He didn’t say anything else, just put his chin on Gu Fei’s shoulder and
closed his eyes.
The wind was chilly, strong enough to pierce through his clothes. It carried a strong
autumnal flavour when it breezed past Jiang Cheng’s ears. And yet pressed against Gu Fei’s
back, his chest and belly felt warm.
This kind of warmth that existed within a slight frost was especially pleasant.
They soon arrived back in the Steelworks neighbourhood. Jiang Cheng opened his eyes. He
felt a little wistful looking at the streets that looked the same a month later, that probably
would remain the same even after years.
When they passed by the old convenience store, Jiang Cheng glanced inside and was
surprised to see Ponytail Boi there.
“Huh? Ponytail Boi is in your store?” He asked.
“It’s not my store anymore,” Gu Fei said. “It’s his store now. I sold it to him.”
“How come you haven’t mentioned it?” Jiang Cheng blinked. “For how much?”
“Thirty thousand,” Gu Fei said.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng was still a little stunned. The image of Gu Fei wielding a metal bat
while forcing 30,000 yuan out of Ponytail Boi flashed through his mind. “Gu Fei, did you
beat him up?”
“It was a forced deal, but I really didn’t beat him,” Gu Fei said. “It’s good that the store is in
his hands, this way I don’t have to keep minding it day after day.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng put his head down and nudged it against Gu Fei’s shoulder.
When the two of them arrived back at Jiang Cheng’s building, they ran into the landlady
coming out for a stroll. As soon as she saw them, she started yelling,
“Oh hey Number One Scholar, you’re back eh?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng gave her a smile.
“You’re on break, right?” The landlady asked.
“Yep, for National Day.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“That’s good, that’s good,” the landlady said. “It must be tiring though, to make the trip and
come all this way, just to go back to school a few days later.”
“It’s alright,” Jiang Cheng said.
He sighed as they walked into the building. It was true that he had to leave in only a few
days. After this, he wouldn’t be able to come back until just before New Year’s.
He dared not think about how long this period would be. A few months? How many days is
that?
Walking up the stairs, however, the familiar feeling from before rapidly spread through
him. As he followed Gu Fei’s footsteps up one step at a time, it felt as though he’d returned
to those days when they would come back together after school.
Jiang Cheng smelled a faint lemony scent as the door to the apartment opened. It was a
habit of Gu Fei’s, to spray the air with diluted lemon juice after tidying.
He said it made the place smell clean.
“Looks like nothing changed at all?” Jiang Cheng said after walking through the apartment
and taking a good look around.
“It’s only a little more than 20 days, what changes can there be?” Gu Fei smiled.
Jiang Cheng pulled Gu Fei into his arms, staring intently for a few moments before leaning
in for a kiss.
It was just the gentlest touch on the lips, brushing ever so lightly back and forth, before
sweeping over it with the tip of his tongue. The desire and longing in him intermingled as
they slowly expanded beneath his skin.
Jiang Cheng thought he would be ravenous. During his time away, he had conjured up
countless scenes of himself and Gu Fei rolling around between the sheets together—each
instance filled with an intense desperation.
But now—now that he could actually touch Gu Fei, now that he could hold him and kiss
him, all of those wild imaginings fell away. In this moment, he wanted nothing more than to
exist between Gu Fei’s lips, to slowly and meticulously savour his every breath.
Gu Fei’s response was just as tender. Desire was lingering in the swirling of his tongue. But
like Jiang Cheng, he tasted so carefully it was as if time itself had stopped within this one
kiss.
They carried on this way until Gu Fei said into Jiang Cheng’s ear, “Shower?”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng answered, looking at Gu Fei. “Together?”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei looked back at him.
They quietly held each other’s gaze for a few seconds, before turning at the same time and
racing for the bathroom.
Jiang Cheng was the first to charge into the bathroom. He immediately reached out and
turned on the showerhead.
“Hey!” Gu Fei shouted behind him.
“Ah, ah! Fuck!” The cold water that sprayed out shocked Jiang Cheng so much that he
almost fell back against the wall.
“You didn’t even turn the water heater on!” Gu Fei walked over and closed the tap.
With one swift motion, Jiang Cheng yanked his own shirt off and tossed it onto the floor.
And before Gu Fei could turn around, Jiang Cheng lunged over and grabbed him, biting
down on his shoulder as he kicked his pants off.
“Hey,” Gu Fei started laughing as Jiang Cheng reached a hand into his pants,
“Weren’t you pretty calm just now?”
“That was then,” Jiang Cheng managed to squeeze out a reply between his frenzied nibbles.
“But now I’ve awakened. It’s the spring awakening!”
Gu Fei grabbed Jiang Cheng’s arm and turned around, running his hands all over Jiang
Cheng’s body, before reaching back and turning the showerhead on again.
By the time the steam slowly filled the room, their panting breaths were almost loud
enough to drown out the sound of the water.
“Go get lube.” Jiang Cheng had both his arms and one leg wrapped around Gu Fei’s body,
nudging it up and down. He said what he said, but his arms and leg showed no intention of
releasing Gu Fei.
Nor did Gu Fei untangle him either, only reaching out a hand behind Jiang Cheng. A few
seconds later, Jiang Cheng felt his slightly cold fingertips extend downwards.
“What the fuck, you keep this thing in the bathroom?” Jiang Cheng said amidst heavy
panting.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei took Jiang Cheng’s shoulders and turned him around, pushing him against
the tiles, before pressing up and licking his earlobe. “Based on my understanding of you,
there’s no way you can hold it until after the shower.”
The almost scalding drops of water rained down over Jiang Cheng’s face and body, each
drop like a little blossom of lust blooming on his skin.
“You…” Jiang Cheng didn’t get to finish his sentence when Gu Fei suddenly grabbed his hips
and pulled it back.
Jiang Cheng’s hands were propped on the wall, his eyes obscured by the cloudy mist, and
his ears filled with the scattering sounds of water. The only thing he felt acutely was Gu
Fei’s hands on his hips, and the familiar pleasure of being penetrated that made him tighten
every muscle in his body.
……
“Did you change the sheets recently?” Jiang Cheng was flopped over on the pillow as he
flicked his fingers against the bed.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei opened Jiang Cheng’s bag, pulled out a set of clothes, and tossed it onto him.
“Put these on, or you’ll catch a cold.”
“I’m not gonna catch a cold.” Jiang Cheng rolled over, sat up slowly, and put the clothes on.
“I feel hot all over right now, like I just ran ten kilometres.”
“You must be pretty fit these days.” Gu Fei leaned over the edge of the bed and kissed him
on the cheek. “Didn’t you say before that you were going running with Zhao Ke, how long
did that last?”
“Three days.” Jiang Cheng said, before laughing in amusement. “I really couldn’t get up. But
aside from Zhao Ke, I kept with it the longest. Lu Shi gave up after two days, and Mr. Zhang
Qiqi never successfully got up even once.”
“You should continue when you get back,” Gu Fei said. “It feels like you guys
are pretty intense about studying. You’ll get sick easily if you don’t stay in shape.”
“It’s alright, actually. Most first years haven’t really gotten into the flow of studying yet.”
Jiang Cheng pulled Gu Fei onto the bed to lie beside him. “Those senior students though,
they’re the real grinders.”
“Can you really keep up with tutoring on the side? I really never imagined that you’d get a
part-time job.”
“Did you always think that I was sheltered?” Jiang Cheng tutted. “I’m actually pretty good at
withstanding adversity. Besides, tutoring is only twice a week.
Lots of my classmates have a part-time job. One even arrived in the summer, two weeks
before the first day of school, and started working as soon as he got here.
These are all impressive people.”
Gu Fei smiled and smoothed his hand over Jiang Cheng’s back. “I just feel for you.”
“I feel for you too,” Jiang Cheng said. “But I don’t tell you not to take on any jobs.”
Lying in bed with his arms around Gu Fei, they drifted in and out of
conversation.
Prior to this, they also talked every day—through texts, voice messages, and phone calls,
including the occasional video chat. But those forms of
communication were like a distant well unable to quench an urgent thirst, and only treated
the symptoms instead of the root cause.
It was only like this, when holding Gu Fei in his arms, when Jiang Cheng could feel
viscerally the warmth of Gu Fei’s body, the beating of his heart, the vibration in his chest
when he spoke… and the rumbling of his stomach.
“Your stomach is calling,” Jiang Cheng giggled as he smacked Gu Fei’s belly.
“Listen to this noise, it must be completely empty in there.”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei said. “I’ve come to realize what a shameless person you are.
Your stomach has been going off for at least four whole bars, and I never said a thing. But
you laugh at me as soon as my stomach grumbles.”
“Your stomach sounds cuter than mine,” Jiang Cheng said as he kneaded Gu Fei’s belly a
couple times.
Gu Fei’s belly felt very good to the touch. It was taut yet supple, showing pleasant ab lines
when he contracted his muscles, but was soft with no excess flesh when he was relaxed…
Jiang Cheng rolled over and leaned in.
Just as he was about to chomp down, Gu Fei’s finger flicked the bridge of his
nose with a “snap”.
It was a pretty hard strike. Jiang Cheng could feel a sore twinge rush up to his nose. He
turned and sneezed. “Fuck, why would you hit so hard!”
“If I didn’t go hard, you’d only bite down even harder.” Gu Fei grabbed the covers and
pulled it over Jiang Cheng. “Told you to put your clothes on earlier and you wouldn’t listen.
See—who’s sneezing now!”
“Please, you flicked the sneeze out of me!” Jiang Cheng gave him a side-eye.
“You hungry, boyfriend?” Gu Fei checked the time on his phone. “Whoa, no wonder I was so
hungry.”
Jiang Cheng leaned over for a look, and was instantly taken aback.
Neither of them ate lunch today. After coming back from the train station and throwing
themselves straight into battle, they’d been snuggling on the bed chatting. They didn’t
realize how long they’d been talking for, and suddenly it was already 5 o’clock.
“Let’s take Er-Miao for barbecue?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded, “I’ll ask Li Yan if he’s brought her back yet.”
Li Yan had already taken Gu Miao back to the store. When the two of them rode up, Jiang
Cheng could see even from a distance Gu Miao playing outside with her skateboard.
Certainly he’d missed Gu Fei, but when he saw Gu Miao there, Jiang Cheng realized that he’d
missed her too. Seeing the haughty little girl jumping into the air with her skateboard, he
couldn’t help but break into a grin.
“Her hair’s grown longer,” he said.
“Yeah, I’m going to get Li Yan to fix it up. He wanted to give her some curls.”
Gu Fei parked his motorcycle before letting out a loud whistle in Gu Miao’s direction.
With her back to them, Gu Miao suddenly stopped in her tracks. She spun in place on her
skateboard, then swiftly charged over.
“Er-Miao!” Jiang Cheng opened his arms and called out.
Gu Miao had been looking down this whole time, and upon hearing his voice, suddenly
whipped her head up. But the next second, she braked hard and stopped about five metres
away.
“Er-Miao!” Jiang Cheng grinned and called again.
Gu Miao looked at him, the expression of excitement when she first saw him only persisted
for a few short seconds before it turned into coolness.
“Er-Miao, Cheng-ge is back.” Gu Fei walked over to her and pointed back at Jiang Cheng.
“It’s Cheng-ge, remember? Didn’t you miss him a lot?”
Still, Gu Miao stared at Jiang Cheng, expressionless.
“What’s the matter?” Jiang Cheng was confused. He also stood still, not daring to take
another step toward her.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei crouched down and looked at her, “why won’t you respond to Cheng-ge?”
Gu Miao didn’t react. Gu Fei squeezed her arm before letting out a quiet sigh.
“Go on inside then.”
Gu Miao stared at Jiang Cheng for a few more seconds, then kicked her skateboard up into
her hands and turned back into the store.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng was a little upset.
To him, Gu Miao was just as much a part of his homesickness. She was Gu Fei’s little sister,
Gu Fei’s cherished and protected little sister. Jiang Cheng liked Gu Miao. He felt happy and
cheerful when Gu Miao smiled at him and played with him.
But now, the anticipated scene of Gu Miao lunging at him with a big smile on her face along
with a snap and a thumbs-up didn’t happen. The coldness in her eyes made him feel
terrible.
“Let’s go get barbecue.” Gu Fei came over and patted him gently on the cheek.
“Cheng-ge.”
“What’s the matter with her?” Jiang Cheng asked with furrowed brows. “Why won’t she
respond to me anymore?”
“It could be…” Gu Fei sighed, “because she knows that you’ll go away again, for a long time.”
“Is she angry? Is she angry with me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not angry.” Gu Fei turned and glanced back into the store. “She’s just…
protecting herself.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet. After a long pause, he turned and walked back to the motorcycle.
That’s right. Self-protection. Afraid of loss, so better to not want in the first

place.
He watched as Gu Fei strolled up to him. Gu Fei knew Gu Miao well. Or rather, he knew
himself well. After all, the old Gu Fei had more or less the same self-protection mechanism
as Gu Miao.
Gu Fei got onto the bike and handed the helmet to him. He climbed onto the back seat and
clutched Gu Fei tight.
There was too little he could do. Seeing Gu Miao’s reaction, that profound sense of
helplessness kept rising up within. But he knew that he had a direction—a way of helping
Gu Fei’s struggle. He already made the first step, and there was nothing stopping him from
continuing on, one step after another.
“It’s okay,” Jiang Cheng whispered into Gu Fei’s ear. “Wait till you see what Cheng-ge can
do.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5942
TL word count: 4200
TL time: ???
Edit time: 1:38:02
Curse words: 8x fucks
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: March 18, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 116
A few months… It was a very long time.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Grilled meat was the kind of food one could never get tired of. Despite getting the same
handful of things every time he went, Jiang Cheng looked very content nonetheless.
Gu Fei watched as he hovered exclusively between the pork belly, fatty veal, and lamb slices
with his plates in hand. This was also the reason why Jiang Cheng had no complaints about
eating Gu Fei’s home cooking for such a long time—all he needed was meat. Of course, it’d
be nice if it also tasted better, but even when the flavours were not there, he was satisfied
as long as it was meat.
Jiang Cheng turned and looked back at the table. Gu Fei waved at him.
Jiang Cheng said something Gu Fei couldn’t hear and pointed at the table.
Gu Fei looked down and realized that while he was busy ogling at Jiang Cheng, some of the
meat had burnt.
What amazing vision. Gu Fei smiled and picked the meat off the grill. For a guy who
practically lived at the library and worked his eyes all day long, Jiang Cheng surprisingly
never had any vision problems.
“Never mind getting the food, how can you be distracted just sitting here and cooking the
meat.” Jiang Cheng walked over with three stacked plates in one hand and a jug of fruit
juice in the other.
“Not like I was staring at someone else.” Gu Fei picked up the grilled meat and neatly placed
the slices on Jiang Cheng’s plate. “I was looking at you.”
“Oh please.” Jiang Cheng tutted before putting his head down to eat.
“Your butt is especially attractive.” Gu Fei continued grilling meat for him.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng choked, gave Gu Fei a look, and stuffed another piece of meat in his
mouth.
“Eat, eat away. Then we’ll go back and get a good night’s sleep first,” Gu Fei said.
“First?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“First, get some rest and recharge,” Gu Fei said.
“And then what?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“What do you think?” Gu Fei narrowed his eyes. “Since you no longer have any great
aspirations, I’ll finish your unfinished business for you.”
With meat still in his mouth, Jiang Cheng’s eyes swiftly and nimbly darted around and
scanned their surroundings.
“No need to be ashamed, no one can hear us. Even if they do, they won’t understand.” Gu
Fei started laughing. Jiang Cheng’s mystical combination of arrogance and dorkiness never
failed to delight him.
“Whatever.” Jiang Cheng swallowed the meat. “I’m serious. I really am down for whatever
at this point. Do with me what you will.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded with a smile.
When Jiang Cheng said “do with me what you will”, Gu Fei really didn’t think too much
about what he was going to do. But after the meal, when they put the bike back and were
about to take a stroll outside as per their routine, Gu Fei’s mind was inundated with images
of all the kinds of things he could do.
There was a strong sense of having been infected by the horny gremlin that was Jiang
Cheng.
However, Jiang Cheng could not stop yawning the whole time they were out walking.
According to Gu Fei’s rough estimation, there were about a dozen yawns at least. He
guessed that Jiang Cheng didn’t sleep very well in the days leading up to the break, so had
no choice but to keep his own wicked thoughts bottled up.
“Let’s go back and sleep for a while.” Gu Fei kissed Jiang Cheng’s cheek under the cover of
shadows.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded, then patted his belly. “It’s pretty much all digested… I’ve
realized that I have no self control at all when it comes to eating meat.”
“Go ahead and eat—I won’t resent you if you get fat,” Gu Fei said.
“I’ll resent myself,” Jiang Cheng said, then glanced at him. “I’ll resent you too, if you get fat.
I’ll dump you right away. We shallow bitches are cold like that.”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei laughed. “We herbivores don’t gain weight as easily as you carnivores.”
Back at the apartment, Jiang Cheng flopped onto the bed soon after washing up.
Gu Fei sat in bed, and they chatted for almost ten minutes before Jiang Cheng grew quiet.
Gu Fei glanced down—the guy was already asleep. He reached down and
pressed his finger to the tip of Jiang Cheng’s nose, but elicited no response. Jiang Cheng
didn’t even react with his usual reflexive slap at being touched while asleep.
“Cheng-ge?” Gu Fei called out to him.
No reaction.
“Sleep then.” Gu Fei glanced at the time on his phone. “I’ll give you… one hour.”
Who knows if Jiang Cheng heard in his dreams, or perhaps he hadn’t started dreaming yet.
Gu Fei had nothing much to do on his phone. He wasn’t in the mood to play games when
Jiang Cheng wasn’t by his side, and now that he was, he still didn’t feel like playing. He only
wanted to sit there, quietly.
Despite everything, Jiang Cheng’s mood had been affected today. He had looked a little
fatigued since before the meal. His old self would not have slept upon coming back either,
but would’ve been so pumped with energy that he’d be mistaken for a conquering stallion,
whether he was the one fucking or being fucked.
Gu Fei didn’t expect things to turn out this way. He himself never anticipated Gu Miao’s
reaction, he could only imagine how Jiang Cheng felt.
Just two days ago, Gu Miao had tried to trace Jiang Cheng’s name on paper. She might’ve
filled four whole pages and still didn’t manage to learn it, but Gu Fei was certain that she
missed Jiang Cheng very much.
Only, the moment she saw Jiang Cheng, her anxiety and unease got the
upperhand. Gu Fei was all too familiar with the stiff posture and cold eyes.
“Wait till you see what Cheng-ge can do.”
When Jiang Cheng first said this from behind his shoulder, Gu Fei felt touched, and filled
with warmth. As always, Jiang Cheng was bravely charging straight ahead, with an innocent
resilience that almost seemed invincible.
Now that they’ve settled down, however, Gu Fei felt a creeping unease start to emerge
again.
This conviction that stemmed from innocence was always something he liked about Jiang
Cheng, because it was what he himself didn’t possess. Sometimes he
felt like maybe he had never been innocent.
And he felt unsettled, precisely because of what he didn’t have.
No matter how much he wanted to be like Jiang Cheng—fearless and looking only at the
path beneath his feet—he couldn’t help but admit how difficult that was for him.
He didn’t know what Jiang Cheng was thinking, or “what Cheng-ge can do”, but he was
terrified that Jiang Cheng would take Gu Miao on as his own load to bear. That way, Jiang
Cheng really would be weighed down.
He wanted Jiang Cheng to enjoy himself in this romantic relationship, to not have any
reserves—like Wang Xu or Pan Zhi—to act like other people their age would in a
relationship, the only thing to think about being the romance itself.
It didn’t matter that Jiang Cheng was Li Baoguo’s son, or that he’d been born here. The
almost twenty years of growing in an entirely different environment had ensured that he
didn’t belong here. Everything in this place, whether decaying or flourishing, sad or happy,
was never supposed to have anything to do with him.
Yet he’d been flung back here. Gu Fei knew better than anyone just how Jiang Cheng had
made it through those days, from the disoriented and volatile beginning to the certainty at
the end.
Long-distance is a common mode of relationship. Some people hold on, and some people
give up—it’s all typical. But having to bear the load of his boyfriend’s family while going
through the ache of longing…
Gu Fei was still spacing out when Jiang Cheng’s hand crept over his belly. It startled him.
When he glanced over, he realized that Jiang Cheng wasn’t actually awake, but had reached
over his hand out of mere habit.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei might be in a somewhat low mood, but this gesture from Jiang Cheng
was no doubt very provocative to someone who had been
suppressing himself for the better part of a month.
Jiang Cheng was in a blissful slumber. Gu Fei didn’t try to keep his voice down, yet Jiang
Cheng only pushed his face deeper into the pillow, then stopped moving again.
Gu Fei hesitated for a moment before he gently moved Jiang Cheng’s hand away. Then he
got out of bed and went to the bathroom to retrieve the necessary tools for the crime.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei took off his shirt, leaned down over the bed, and looked at Jiang Cheng.
“The dog-fucker is about to fuck the dog. Are you going to keep sleeping?”
Jiang Cheng frowned and groaned quietly.
Gu Fei flung back the cover and pulled off his pants in one swift movement, then lowered
himself down.
“… Mmm?” Jiang Cheng groggily opened his eyes a slit.
“Mm.” Gu Fei kissed him on the cheek, then reached his hand down.
Jiang Cheng might still be hazy from sleep, but he was at an age when one day away felt like
three autumns apart, and one missed meal felt like three years of unquenched thirst. The
rate at which Jiang Cheng’s flag rose was almost in sync with how fast he woke up.
Gu Fei thought the way Jiang Cheng looked at the moment—dazed but gradually getting
excited—was incredibly alluring, from his breaths all the way down to the ends of his hair
strands.
When Gu Fei finally entered, his hands braced against Jiang Cheng’s lower back, Jiang
Cheng let out a very low moan and reached back to grab Gu Fei’s leg. Gu Fei took his hand
and held it down against the bed.
“This bed’s gonna be bust soon,” Jiang Cheng said, holding the pillow. His breathing had
slowly returned to normal. “Tell me the truth, Gu Fei.”
“What?” Gu Fei got out of bed and pulled the cover over Jiang Cheng’s body.
“You brought somebody else up here for a tumble, didn’t you?” Jiang Cheng’s gaze fixed on
him from the corners of his eyes. “This bed is practically falling apart. It’s squeaking at the
slightest movement.”
Gu Fei shot him a glance, but didn’t say anything.
“Listen.” Jiang Cheng lifted his butt and slammed it down a few times. The bed creaked.
“Hear that?”
“It’s been like that since before you left,” Gu Fei said. “Why don’t you reflect on how we
were going at it all day and all night?”
“Before I left?” Jiang Cheng thought about it and laughed. “Shit, really? I didn’t notice.”
“Want some food?” Gu Fei picked up his phone. “I’ll order a takeout for you?”
“There’s still delivery at this hour?” Jiang Cheng asked. “It’s like, midnight, isn’t it?”
“Not yet 11 o’clock, a few places are still open for delivery,” Gu Fei said. “What do you want
to eat?”
“Let’s see…” Jiang Cheng rolled over in bed and closed his eyes as he conjured up images.
“Baked wings—the kind with lots and lots of cumin.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
The days of hanging out with the boyfriend were pure bliss—they made love, ate, then
slept. It was wanton yet fulfilling. Jiang Cheng didn’t even feel anxious when he saw the
photos Zhao Ke posted to WeChat Moments of studying at the library.
Normally, whenever someone he knew went to the library, he’d feel as if he was wasting his
youth away if he didn’t go along.
But right now, youth was spending time with his boyfriend.
Just as he had promised, Gu Fei planned each day of their break very well. The main theme
of course, was love-making. This was followed by eating and drinking. There was nothing
really fun to do in this place, so other than meat pies at Wang Xu’s place or visiting the
teachers, everything else pretty much melded together with the love-making.
Wang Xu had lost weight alright, and his mom was quite broken up about it.
“I really didn’t wear myself thin from studying.” Wang Xu closed the door of the private
room and set a basket of meat pies on the table, then ladled some lamb soup for each of
them. “This is all because of unrequited love.”
“Why don’t you try the studying thing too, just on the side. It won’t take up too much time,
and it’ll impress Yi Jing to boot.” Jiang Cheng took a big bite of the meat pie.
“She won’t necessarily be impressed.” Wang Xu pointed at Gu Fei skeptically.
“Take him for example—we’re about the same, right? How did he impress you, huh?”
Neither Gu Fei nor Jiang Cheng answered. They stared back at him silently and in unison as
they ate.
“What?” Wang Xu was still holding a meat pie, but didn’t dare to even bite down. He asked
cautiously, “Was I wrong?”
“The fundamental difference between you two is not your grades. If you want to bridge this
gap, there’s quite a long way for you to go, and more effort,” Jiang Cheng said unhurriedly.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t know that Yi Jing used to like…”
“Okay, okay!” Wang Xu slammed on the table and forcefully cut him off. “I got it already.
Stop it.”
Gu Fei only smiled.
“Should we invite Yi Jing out to let off some steam?” Jiang Cheng considered it.
“It’s been a while.”
“She won’t agree to come out, especially when you’re here.” Wang Xu sighed.
“To be honest, if it wasn’t for you, she might not have pushed herself so hard.
She hasn’t gotten first place even once since you arrived here.”
Jiang Cheng chewed on the pie in silence.
“There’s still a long time to go. She may have another breakdown if she keeps being so
tightly wound,” Gu Fei said.
“This time around is a little better,” Wang Xu said. “She’s learned from experience. I think
it’s more that she doesn’t want to see Jiang Cheng—she’s probably a little embarrassed. It’ll
be fine after she gets accepted to a good school.”
“Then can you pass on a message for me?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Tell her good luck, and that
I’ll treat her to a restaurant meal when she gets in.”
“Sure!” Wang Xu nodded, then stopped to look at him.
“Treat both of you to a meal,” Jiang Cheng amended.
“Yes yes yes!” Wang Xu nodded his head a bunch more times.
Visiting the teachers, going out for a class reunion, listening to everyone excitedly relaying
their recent experiences—this series of activities took up a whole day of their break.
Jiang Cheng somewhat lamented the loss of this day’s time, but still, he enjoyed himself.
A number of people showed up for the reunion. Besides the ones who went away for school
and wanted to use the break to do some traveling, almost everyone else was present. Jiang
Cheng always had trouble recognizing his classmates, and two months later, he suddenly
felt as if there were a few more unfamiliar faces in the room.
It was as Lao-Xu said, after the farewell dinner, it would be hard to gather everybody in one
place again.
Jiang Cheng looked at the smiling faces around him. After beginning his new life, once again
seeing the people who were witnesses to his disorienting 18th year, he suddenly felt
affectionate toward them.
Even months would slip by in the blink of an eye, let alone a mere handful of
days. About halfway through a holiday is when people start to get anxious.
After the gathering with teachers and classmates, Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei pretty much shut
themselves in the apartment. They would talk, watch TV, or find a movie to watch in bed
together.
Though once every other day, Gu Fei still had to go home in the evening. He had to hang out
with Gu Miao for a while, coming back only when she was in deep sleep, and go back to eat
breakfast with her every morning.
Jiang Cheng didn’t go with him back home or to the store again. He was a little hurt by Gu
Miao’s reaction, but at the same time, he also hurt for her. If Gu Miao needed to protect
herself, then he would let her be. After all, there were no immediately effective solutions at
present that would convince her to let down her guard.
Gu Fei was planning to take Gu Miao back to that rehab class. Jiang Cheng agreed that it was
the only viable thing to do at this point in time.
Gu Fei had fewer courses to attend at his school and he didn’t need to mind the store
anymore, so time was not an issue. Only—though Gu Fei might not have mentioned it—
Jiang Cheng knew that the cost was probably steep. It would be a burden for an ordinary
working family to bear, and Gu Fei was only a student.
Jiang Cheng’s focus swiftly shifted from Gu Miao’s reaction to the cost of the rehab class. He
did a mental calculation—if he started tutoring as soon as he returned to school, how much
money he could save up by New Year’s.
“Let’s go out later,” Gu Fei interrupted his train of thought. “I want to buy a warm jacket for
you.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “I have clothes.”
“I know you do. These days, clothes don’t really fall apart with wear either.
You’ll have no problem wearing the ones you have all the way until graduation,”
Gu Fei said. “I just want to buy you clothes, that’s all.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “Get me a parka then. I’ll wear it all winter.”
“Let’s go then.”
“How about we get two? Couples style, what do you think?” Jiang Cheng got out of bed and
pushed Gu Fei up to the full length mirror so they were standing side by side.
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng took out his phone and snapped a photo of their reflection.
The photos he took in the last few days were practically maxing out his phone storage.
Ever since getting packed up and shipped to this place, Jiang Cheng only went clothes
shopping once. It was the time he jumped out of Li Baoguo’s window without a jacket, and
so he went to buy a jacket.
He never bought more clothes because one, he was too lazy to make the trip and two, he
thought none of the clothes in this place looked good.
But now, with Gu Fei taking him around the mall, he suddenly thought that it was all
acceptable. No matter how ugly any particular piece was, it would still be something his
boyfriend bought him, not to mention it’d be part of a pair.
Even if it looked bad, at least they would look bad together.
Gu Fei’s fashion sense was on point though. There were a few jackets that didn’t look like
much on the rack, but looked much better when they tried them on.
At the end, they picked out a plain grey parka with no extra embellishments whatsoever,
but that looked quite handsome when worn. More importantly, it made their legs look long
—a very important point of merit in Jiang Cheng’s eyes.
However, he immediately tutted after taking a look at the price tag, “Now that’s pricey.”
“It’s not every day that we’re buying this,” Gu Fei said. “But you can wear it every day. It’ll
last three years, no problem, and if you spread it out to cost per day…”
“Ok ok ok,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “This one it is.”
By the time they brought the new clothes back to the apartment, he suddenly felt a little
down again. While Gu Fei packed the suitcase for him, filling it with fall and winter clothes,
he didn’t even have the energy to talk anymore. Staring at Gu Fei’s back, he started to space
out.
What the hell kind of break was this? It was practically over before it even started.
Once he left this time, there would be no more breaks until the Lunar New Year.
October, November, December, January… When is the Lunar New Year this year?
When does the Winter Break start?
“Don’t worry about tomorrow morning—I’ll wake you when it’s time to get up,”
Gu Fei said as he pushed down the clothes in the suitcase. “I’ll bring breakfast
too, after I check on Gu Miao at home. What do you want to eat?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Fei turned and glanced at him. “I’m asking, what do you want to eat for breakfast?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Have I fucked your brains out?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng nodded again.
“Jiang Cheng!” Gu Fei yelled.
“Oy!” Jiang Cheng was so startled that he hopped a little from his perch on the edge of the
bed. He stared up at Gu Fei. “What!”
“What do you want to eat for breakfast tomorrow?” Gu Fei asked with a smile.
Jiang Cheng thought about it briefly. “Beef vermicelli.
“Sure, I’ll go order the takeout.” Gu Fei reached out and stroked Jiang Cheng’s leg. “It’s only
a few months—not that long at all. We only need to turn on the phone to see each other.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng gave him a strained smile.
That’s right. Only a few months.
It’s only a few months.
If they were to go by months, he and Gu Fei had only been together for a handful of “few
months”, but it already felt like forever. It was only because they’d been together for so
long that he couldn’t bear even a moment of separation.
By that logic, a few months… It was a very long time.
Almost as if by habit, the kind of habit that formed after only a couple of occurrences,
neither of them were able to fall asleep the night before Jiang Cheng’s departure. They only
had a few hours left, what a waste it would be to sleep through it.
With eyes open the whole time, even without speaking, at least they knew that the other
person was right there by their side.
They held hands through the night, with arm pressed against arm, able to hold the other
with only a slight turn to the side.
When the sun came up, the alarm on Gu Fei’s phone sounded.
“Chirp.”
Jiang Cheng burst out laughing. “What’s the point of an alarm like this?”
“What’s important is that I can hear it,” Gu Fei said. “I was mostly concerned about waking
you, but I didn’t think you’d stay up all night.”
“How could I possibly fall asleep.” Jiang Cheng rolled over, put his arms around Gu Fei, and
rubbed against him. “Are you going home now?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei said. “You should sleep for a bit. I’m going to go home and then go get the
beef vermicelli—it’ll take about half an hour. I’ll wake you when I’m back.”
“I’ll go with you.” Jiang Cheng sat up.
“Huh?” Gu Fei blinked.
“Er-Miao isn’t happy to see me, so I won’t go upstairs. I’ll wait for you outside your
building,” Jiang Cheng said. “Then we can go eat vermicelli together. No need to get
takeout.”
“… Alright.” Gu Fei leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.
Jiang Cheng practically counted the time in seconds during the 2-3 hours before he was due
on the train. Compared to when he left for registration the last time, this departure after a
brief time together made the parting even harder.
It was the same for Gu Fei. After spending some time with Gu Miao through breakfast, he
practically bolted down the stairs. Just as he dashed out of the stairwell, he tripped over
something and stumbled the rest of the way until Jiang Cheng leapt forward and stopped
him.
“Holy shit,” Gu Fei giggled. “This is probably the first time in my life that I’ve embarrassed
myself like this. If you hadn’t stopped me, I’d probably charge into the street and do a
tumble roll.”
Jiang Cheng started laughing from the moment Gu Fei stumbled, and by now his cheeks
were sore. “And to think, this is the Mini Tyrant of Steelworks.”
“Alright, c’mon,” Gu Fei laughed. “Let’s go have some beef vermicelli.”
The noodles were the same exorbitant price. Jiang Cheng footed the bill and added five
yuan worth of extra beef for each of them.
“I feel like not even 800 yuan of vermicelli can satisfy my wrath,” Jiang Cheng glowered as
he ate. “One of these days, I’m gonna take over this place and turn it into a meat pie shop!”
“You have my support.” Gu Fei gave him a thumbs up.
After breakfast, they went back and retrieved Jiang Cheng’s suitcase, then took a taxi to the
train station.
They timed their arrival almost down to the minute, to avoid the tearful goodbyes at the
gate.
“I’m just going to head right in,” Jiang Cheng said. “You should go back and sleep. I’ll be
sleeping on the train too.”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei nodded. “Let me know when you’re in there.”
Compared to the previous time they said goodbye, they were much more
practiced this time around. But unlike when he saw Gu Fei off at the station before, Jiang
Cheng didn’t bring up the matter of turning back again—he simply walked backwards
through the gate.
Through the gate. Onto the train. Sit down.
Text Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng tried hard to calm himself. He needed to quickly get used to this kind of coming
together and parting. It was a scene that would play out over and over again in the
foreseeable future.
As the train started moving, he received a message from Pan Zhi.
– the train’s departing now, right?
– it just did, excellent timing
– no shit, I’m a person with the highest of morals, and I will not come in the way of lovers
saying their goodbyes. I’ll pick you up later
– nothing to do today huh?
– gramps! school starts again tomorrow! if we don’t see each other today, I feel like you
really will keep me away until New Year’s!
Jiang Cheng laughed out loud at his phone.
– I won’t, can I reserve you for next Sunday morning? Come with me to the hospital
– to get rid of the baby?
– shut up, I wanna consult a psychiatrist to ask about Gu Miao’s condition
– sure, I got time, what a model boyfriend you are

Some Stats
Raw character count: 6100
TL word count: 4456
TL time: ???
Edit time: 1:32:57
Curse words: 6x fucks, 3x shits
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is BACK TODAY – CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: April 21, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 117
“You have my respect as a grandpa.”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: a midstwoods
Perhaps he was getting used to leaving, or it could be that he had physically exerted himself
too much over the past few days and stayed up the whole night, but not long after texting
Pan Zhi and exchanging a few messages with Gu Fei, Jiang Cheng quickly fell asleep with his
arms around his bag.
It wasn’t until the auntie beside him prodded him a few times that he hopped straight up
into a standing position, with arms still wrapped around the bag.
“Oy!” The auntie was so startled by his reaction that she almost went splat onto the aisle.
“Young man! You’re gonna scare people to death with your sudden movements!”
“I’m sorry—I was out cold.” Jiang Cheng quickly felt around his face to check that there was
no sign of drool before sitting back down.
“Isn’t that right. We’re almost there, so if I didn’t wake you, were you planning to take this
train back again?” said the auntie.
Yeah.
Jiang Cheng smiled.
It wouldn’t be so bad if the train took him back there. He could imagine the pleasant
surprise that would await him the moment his eyes opened…
There were many messages on his phone, one of them was from Gu Fei.
– i’m going to sleep now, boyfriend
Jiang Cheng checked the timestamp. It was sent about two hours after the train departed.
Gu Fei must’ve gone back to play with Gu Miao for a while before taking his nap.
He would be sleeping soundly right about now, Jiang Cheng thought. He hesitated for a long
time. He didn’t want his message to rouse Gu Fei from sleep, but at the same time he was
worried that Gu Fei wouldn’t be able to sleep soundly if he was waiting for his message.
At last, he sent it.
– i’m here, Pan Zhi is picking me up, no need to reply to this, sleep well
– mmhm
Gu Fei ended up responding anyway, and within seconds too. Turned out, he really was
sleeping lightly, or maybe he hadn’t slept at all. Jiang Cheng smiled to himself, then started
reading the other messages.
They were all from Pan Zhi.
– where are you now gramps
– almost here?
– where are youuu is your phone battery dead?
– no signal?
– scumboi
– hellooo Jiang Cheng where’s your fucking humanity!!
– i’m terminating our friendship!
– no need to reply, we’re breaking up, go back to campus on your own, and you can go by
yourself to get rid of the baby next week too! don’t reach out to me again!
Jiang Cheng laughed as he read through them, then gave Pan Zhi a call.
“Hello,” Pan Zhi picked up and said very politely.
“Grandson,” Jiang Cheng said as he laughed. “I’m arriving in about ten minutes.”
“There is no grandson here sir, may I ask who you’re looking for?” Pan Zhi answered.
“Perhaps you dialed the wrong number?”
“I’m looking for Pan An, the most handsome, most poised, and most fabulous Pan Hottie in
the world,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Shit,” Pan Zhi said. “Don’t flatter me if you have any balls! Are you afraid that you’ll get lost
trying to go back by yourself? You directionally challenged man!”
“I was sleeping just now,” Jiang Cheng said. “I fell asleep as soon as I got on the train.”
“Check your pocket, see if your wallet and phone are still there?” Pan Zhi immediately said.
“Yep,” Jiang Cheng said even as he patted his pockets self-consciously. His wallet was in his
pocket, but— he checked again. “Shit where’s my…”
“Your phone is in your fucking hand you moron!” Pan Zhi cut him off with a swift
interjection.
“You fucking set me up, huh?” Jiang Cheng bursted out laughing at the sudden barrage of
insults.
“Yep! Apologies for being so transparent!” Pan Zhi said.
“I’m getting off soon.” Jiang Cheng glanced out the window. “We’re arriving at the station.
Which exit are you at?”
“Don’t you worry about which exit, you won’t be able to find it even if I tell you. I’m
standing right at the gate where I picked you guys up last time,” Pan Zhi said. “I’ll be
standing right in the middle, the most handsome and dashing guy—you should be able to
spot me at a glance.”
“… Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng said before hanging up.
The train stopped, but Jiang Cheng didn’t move. He watched as one by one the other
passengers in the carriage disembarked and walked past on the other side of the windows.
The carriage eventually emptied, and only then did he stand up and slowly walk out.
Indeed, it was easy to spot Pan Zhi, who always dressed like a foreigner on the cutting edge
of fashion.
Jiang Cheng waved at him, but Pan Zhi only stood there, with his arms folded and
unmoving. It wasn’t until Jiang Cheng was right in front of him that he finally spoke, “And
here I was thinking you got lost as soon as you stepped off the train. Why didn’t you just
wait to come out with the passengers on the next train?!”
“Ah, you still mad, sir?” Jiang Cheng said.
“It’s the dryness in the autumn air fueling my temper.” Pan Zhi backed up a step and looked
him up and down. “You don’t look too bad. After this trip back, do you feel an impulse to
ditch school for a year in favour of your love life?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng said. “Do I look like that kind of person? I have a very clear goal.”
“What goal?” Pan Zhi asked.
“One that’s unachievable for you,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Fuck.”
Study hard. Work hard. And whether or not there is hope, to hold onto Gu Fei and not let go.
Find a good doctor for Gu Miao… Perhaps there was very little about himself in these goals,
but to him it was all the same.
With Pan Zhi dragging him along, he didn’t get to go back to campus. Instead, they went out
to eat.
It had been a long time since he and Pan Zhi sat down like this to drink and eat.
Jiang Cheng missed those days of rambling on about nothing in particular, and if they
couldn’t keep up the rambling, they’d sit quietly together, or each played on their own
phones.
There was certainly no pressure weighing on him back then. Other than the occasional last-
minute studying on the weekends, most days were carefree. He skipped class whenever he
felt like it, and got into fights when he wanted to…
Now, other than the academic pressure, he also felt apprehensive about the uncertainty of
the future, as well as anticipation for an unforeseeable hope. All this was pressure that
didn’t feel like much when he wasn’t actively considering it, but felt it weighing down
whenever he stopped to think.
“Did you tell Gu Fei about you consulting doctors?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Not yet. Why?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Don’t mention it just yet. Wait ‘til you get a response, and a firm plan, before telling him,”
Pan Zhi said. “Even for a specific and known condition, it might not be helpful to consult a
doctor so far away from the patient, let alone a mental problem like this. If there’s nothing
to be done in the end, wouldn’t it be more disappointing to Gu Fei?”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He’d considered this already, which was why he never brought it up to Gu Fei this whole
time.
“I’m glad you’re my friend. Thank you,” Jiang Cheng extended his hand to Pan Zhi, “for even
considering all this for me.”
“You’re welcome.” Pan Zhi shook his hand. “After all, I have the invisible red sash of honour
around my neck.”
Jiang Cheng took a little box out of his bag—a gift for Pan Zhi that he made when he and Gu
Fei went shopping together.
There was a polymer clay shop beside the Perler Beads store. They went in and made two
flowers and a five-pointed star for Pan Zhi.
“How creative of you, gramps.” Pan Zhi cracked up as soon as he opened the box.
“There’s nothing you don’t have already,” Jiang Cheng said. “And it’s not like I can gift you a
girlfriend.”
“Just you wait.” Pan Zhi carefully put the box away. “I’m bringing a girlfriend home for New
Year’s, and I’ll run her by you before that.”
“The staccato receptionist?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Receptionist? Staccato who?” Pan Zhi blinked at him.
“Amazing.” Jiang Cheng bowed to him with hands clasped.
Occasionally he found himself envying Pan Zhi, who could walk through a flowery field and
still come out unscathed. And even when he would
occasionally get stung by a bee, he never let it get to him.
It could be that it’d been way too long since they last sat down like this. The two of them
talked and ate, and even when the food ran out, they were still talking.
Finally, Pan Zhi waved the server over. “Can I get the menu again? I want to add a couple
more dishes.”
“More?” Jiang Cheng was surprised.
Pan Zhi didn’t answer. He took the menu with one hand, and with the other, he held his
phone up for Jiang Cheng to see. “It’s dinnertime.”
“…Wow, fuck,” Jiang Cheng said with the utmost sincerity.
Gu Fei had been quiet in his messages, so he had not been paying attention to the time. Now
that he thought about it, Gu Fei must be in deep sleep.
For the past few days, in order to fulfil the unfinished aspirations on Jiang Cheng’s behalf,
Gu Fei had been doing endless physical labour. Jiang Cheng figured he must be tired.
Not just Gu Fei. Jiang Cheng’s legs also felt sore; his lower back too… He seriously
considered resuming the morning runs with Zhao Ke, if for this matter alone.
Halfway through dinner with Pan Zhi, he finally received a message from Gu Fei.
– good morning, boyfriend
– did you sleep well, boyfriend?
– the more I slept the more I want to keep sleeping, I made myself get up to eat before
going back to sleep
– I’m eating too, been sitting here with Pan Zhi and eating non-stop since lunchtime
– …not a bad idea, saves you the cost of another set of utensils
– hahahahah yep! You should go eat now, then back to sleep
– okkk
When he and Pan Zhi walked out of the restaurant at last with hands around their bellies,
he got another message from Gu Fei.
– I’m going back to sleep now
– mhm, do you feel all emptied out?
– yeah, if I masturbate right now I’ll probably shoot blanks
– fuck! Watch your language!
– I really am going to sleep now
– kk, goodnight, boyfriend
– goodnight babe
– babe
“Why don’t I go with you back to campus.” Pan Zhi handed him two mints. “I’m worried you
don’t know the way.”
“I’m really not that bad.” Jiang Cheng sighed and put the mints in his mouth.
“Then tell me, where is the subway entrance?” Pan Zhi looked at him.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a moment before pointing to the right. “Right up there.”
“That’s backwards,” Pan Zhi said. “We came from that way.”
“Over there.” Jiang Cheng immediately pointed in the opposite direction.
“Let’s go, gramps.” Pan Zhi turned around and started walking.
“Didn’t you say it was over there?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“I was just telling you that that way is forward, not that the subway is there,” Pan
Zhi said. “Quit dragging down U of R’s reputation.”
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng turned and followed him.
When he got back to his dorm, it was still before the library’s closing time, which meant
that nobody was in their room.
Jiang Cheng opened his suitcase and was about to start unpacking, when he heard Zhao
Ke’s voice from the next bunk over. “Jiang Cheng?”
“What the fuck.” Jiang Cheng was startled. He looked up and saw Zhao Ke’s head poking out
from the edge of the bunk. “You didn’t go to the library?”
“My sister dragged me to dinner today,” Zhao Ke said. “By the time I got back, there were no
more seats… You look pretty chipper after a trip back?”
“Yeah, not bad.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Was it excruciatingly painful when you parted again?” Zhao Ke asked.
Jiang Cheng glanced up at him.
“Every day you torture us single dogs,” Zhao Ke said. “Now do you feel the pain?”
“What—” Jiang Cheng started laughing. “How much resentment have you been keeping in
exactly?”
Zhao Ke motioned with his hands. “About this much.”
Jiang Cheng sighed and climbed onto the ladder of Zhao Ke’s bunk. “Hey I’ve been wanting
to ask you.”
“Shoot.” Zhao Ke nodded.
“Your dream girl—do you see her only as a dream girl,” Jiang Cheng said. “Or do you want
this dream girl to be your girlfriend?”
“Girlfriend,” Zhao Ke said.
“Then why not tell her,” Jiang Cheng said. “It doesn’t look like she despises you or anything.
Hasn’t she been smiling at you every time you see her?”
“You don’t understand.” Zhao Ke frowned. “She’s been best friends with my sister since
kindergarten. Can you imagine? She watched me grow up. She even knew that I peed my
bed when I was little.”
“You peed your bed?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“As a law student, can you focus on the point?” Zhao Ke looked at him.
“Do you still pee your bed?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Zhao Ke’s face swiftly alternated between multiple expressions in the span of a few
seconds, before he finally answered earnestly, “No.”
“If you don’t pee your bed anymore, then what are you afraid of?” Jiang Cheng jumped
down and continued unpacking his suitcase. “Looks to me like your dream girl is probably
the dream girl of more than just you. All these years in an advantageous position and still
you didn’t go for it. You pretty much procrastinated yourself into the friendzone.”
Zhao Ke was quiet for a while, then asked, “You and your, uh, boyfriend…”
Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“Who confessed first?” Zhao Ke managed to finish his question.
“Me, I think.” Jiang Cheng thought about it, then laughed. “Yeah, it was me.”
Those were very pleasant memories.
He didn’t think much about it at the time. The only things left in his mind after blurting out
his thoughts were chaos and anxiety. But thinking back on it now, he couldn’t help but be
glad.
Thank goodness he opened up back then.
Knowing Gu Fei, he definitely wouldn’t have said anything, to the extent that before Jiang
Cheng laid it out in the open, Gu Fei never initiated anything on his own. Everything that
came after hinged upon Jiang Cheng’s hotheaded
impulsive blabbing of his true feelings.
Thank goodness he did.
Or else they would’ve missed each other.
At the realization that he could’ve missed out on Gu Fei, he thought it was a brilliant
decision that he spoke up when he did.
Brilliant, and handsome.
“How did you say it?” Zhao Ke pressed on.
“Just asked him…” Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little embarrassed to answer. He had never
mentioned the details to anyone else before. He cleared his throat.
“Have you considered getting a boyfriend.”
“So…straightforward?”
“How else should I say it,” Jiang Cheng said. “Not like I know how to be
tactful.”
“Okay then.” Zhao Ke flipped over and laid down on his back. “Have you considered getting
a boyfriend. Have you considered getting a boyfriend. Have you considered…”
“You can try some different words,” Jiang Cheng said. “No need to copy my one line word
for word.”
“Have you considered…” Zhao Ke rolled over again, “being my girlfriend?”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“No.” Zhao Ke rolled back. “Still gotta keep some options open. What if she says I have
thought about it, with so-and-so? Then at least I can tell her congratulations.”
“Dumbass,” Jiang Cheng said.
Admittedly that was also part of his consideration back then, when he popped the question,
but it was mostly because they were both guys. He didn’t think there was any need for two
people of opposite genders to beat around the bush.
Just look at Pan Zhi—he would go straight for it every time, and the other person usually
ate it right up.
One week of holiday nonetheless flew by in a flash, whether for single dogs or coupled
dogs.
As soon as class started again, the others in his dorm jumped right back into the rhythm of
study they maintained from before the break—class, meals, studying, and readings. But
Jiang Cheng had two additional activities compared to before.
He had to tutor the unusually confident high school girl on the weekends, and go running
with Zhao Ke every morning.
Not even a week into the running, Jiang Cheng realized why Zhao Ke was able to get up
early every morning. It was because his dream girl went for a morning run every other day.
She would smile every time she spotted the two of them from afar, and even wave at them.
Whenever that happened, Zhao Ke would bolt away like a startled rabbit. It was a week
since their last discussion about confessing his feelings, and he was still too scared to go up
to her.
Jiang Cheng didn’t push him. It was kind of fun, being a bystander to somebody else’s one-
sided crush. He felt accomplished as a person who had already gone through it. And at
times it distracted him from missing Gu Fei too much.
If he continued on like this, the next few months wouldn’t have to be so unbearable. After
all, new things happened every day, and everything reminded
him of the happiest memories of the two of them.
The only not so great thing was that when he went to the hospitals to ask about Gu Miao’s
case, he didn’t get the answer he was looking for.
He and Pan Zhi spent two days going to two different hospitals, but the doctors they spoke
to were all reluctant to give a clear verdict based only on Jiang Cheng’s information alone,
without meeting Gu Miao first.
If there was no way to bring Gu Miao out, it would be difficult to get to the root of her
affliction, and even harder to create a more targeted treatment plan.
“How can I possibly bring Gu Miao somewhere so far away?” Jiang Cheng sat on the sofa
with a cigarette between his lips.
They were in an apartment Pan Zhi rented for himself. It was small but recently built, and
very comfortable. This was Jiang Cheng’s first time here.
“She’s totally unwilling? Can you bring her here by force?” Pan Zhi asked.
“She will scream for ten minutes if she has to sleep in a different bed. She gets really mad.”
Jiang Cheng’s brows were knitted. “Even if you disregard the screaming and let her scream
the whole way here, what if that makes her worse?
She was already ignoring me when I went back to visit this time.”
“Ignoring you?” Pan Zhi was surprised.
“Gu Fei said it was a form of self-protection. She’s afraid of loss, so she doesn’t let anyone
in.” Jiang Cheng took a hard drag on the cigarette before stubbing it out. “If I had money, I’ll
pay for a doctor to do an in-home visit. No. I’ll get a doctor to stay there long term.”
“You don’t even have enough money to pay a doctor for a normal treatment right now,” Pan
Zhi said. “These things don’t come cheap. Not to mention it has to be for a long term.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile. “That’s why I have to earn money.”
“Cheng-er.” Pan Zhi gave him a look. “You…”
Jiang Cheng waited for him to continue, but Pan Zhi was mute.
“I what?” He met Pan Zhi’s gaze. “Say whatever’s on your mind. There’s no need for that
kind of hesitation between us.”
“I just mean, is it worth it?” Pan Zhi asked. “Dating is dating. You’re in a romantic
relationship, with him, that’s all. You’re only nineteen…”
Pan Zhi didn’t finish his sentence, but Jiang Cheng knew exactly what he meant.
“I am in a relationship, with Gu Fei. It’s not that I must do something for Gu Miao.” Jiang
Cheng bit his lip. “But if Gu Fei has to look after her, then I can’t just stand by and watch.”
“At least think about the future. Things like this will only pull you deeper, and it’ll become
harder to free yourself from it. In one or two years, or three, or five
—if Gu Miao still doesn’t get better, are you going to keep on like this?” Pan Zhi asked him.
“Maybe I’m just being too pragmatic. It’s just sometimes I worry, that if one day you get
tired, but can’t walk away…”
“Pan-pan.” Jiang Cheng lifted a hand and flicked Pan Zhi on the lips. “I plan to stay naive for
now. After all, we don’t get to be naive for very long in our lives.”
Pan Zhi covered his mouth and glared at Jiang Cheng for a long time. At last, he gave a
thumbs up and said between his fingers, “You have my respect as a grandpa.”
There was no progress regarding Gu Miao’s case. Jiang Cheng knew that it was to be
expected. It was not a big deal. If progress was so easy, Gu Fei wouldn’t have to work so
hard.
He knew that, but he couldn’t help but be a little disappointed. It felt like he was trying hard
to prop Gu Fei up but couldn’t find a point on which to push.
Gu Fei took Gu Miao back to the rehabilitation class. He sometimes sent Jiang Cheng short
videos. In them, Gu Miao looked as pretty and cool as ever.
– it doesn’t seem to work as well this time
– I can tell. She had fun when she went there last time, but doesn’t seem very responsive
this time?
– mhm, she doesn’t really interact with anyone
– is it because of me?
– Cheng-ge, you need to stop trying to find fault in yourself as the first reaction
– ……
– I never think of it as my fault when she’s angry with me, she’s not a normal kid, you can’t
think about it in a conventional way
– okay, are you still taking her to the class then?
– for now, yeah, I already paid for it, let’s see if there’s any improvement Jiang Cheng
flopped over the desk cradling a textbook. He stared blankly at the black screen of his
phone, which reflected his trance-like expression.
It was fortunate that he was so handsome, so that the blank expression didn’t make him
look like someone with an IQ of 20.
Beside him, Zhao Ke flicked a little ball of paper at his face. He turned around and gave
Zhao Ke a middle finger.
“You’re wasting precious resources, dude,” Zhao Ke said quietly.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer him, just put his phone back in his pocket, before putting his
head down and resuming his reading.
He won’t think too much about it. The only thing he could do right now was to save more
money. Outside of his own expenses, he could put aside as much as possible. No matter
what kind of treatment Gu Miao would receive in the future, money would always be a big
problem.
Money money money.
Cheng-ge has money.
After the library, Zhao Ke suggested they go get something to eat. Jiang Cheng didn’t feel
like eating but went along anyway. His head felt a little stuffy. He wouldn’t be able to sleep
even if he went back to dorm.
“What’s up with you lately?” Zhao Ke asked after they walked for a while. “Did you run into
some problems?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Good.” Zhao Ke nodded.
Jiang Cheng turned and glanced at him. He suddenly felt like laughing. The guy was
sometimes very good at adhering to his principle of “no questions asked if it’s none of my
business”.
Only, at this moment, Jiang Cheng kind of hoped that Zhao Ke would keep asking. He had no
one to talk to about this except for Pan Zhi, and Pan Zhi clearly didn’t want him to involve
himself too much and be dragged too far.
Sure, he was good at keeping a lot of things to himself, and he didn’t have a habit of
confiding in people, but in this new environment, he also couldn’t help but feel repressed.
It was the way he felt when he first arrived at the Steelworks. The feeling of wanting to hold
onto something, without even knowing where to begin.
“You really don’t wanna talk about it?” Zhao Ke suddenly spoke up again.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng turned to Zhao Ke, who looked back at him. After a few
moments of eye contact, Jiang Cheng let out a quiet sigh. “To be honest…it might not seem
like such a big deal to other people.”
“Let’s hear it,” Zhao Ke said.
“It’s just…my friend’s little sister.” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows. “She might be autistic…
I think. All these years and there’s nothing he could do…”
“Does he want to bring her to see the doctors here?” Zhao Ke asked.
“Can’t,” Jiang Cheng said. “She won’t accept any change of environment—not even a
different bed. I’ve already consulted doctors, but they can’t give any solid answer without
the patient here.”
“That’s for sure,” Zhao Ke said. He thought about it for a moment, then stopped walking.
“My sis.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“If you want, you can ask her about it,” Zhao Ke said.
“Your sister…” Jiang Cheng felt himself suddenly getting a little excited.
“My sister is studying clinical psychology,” Zhao Ke said. “I was planning to sneak into her
lectures next semester. You wanna come with?”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6086
TL word count: 4325
TL time: ???
Edit time: 0:42:30
Curse words: 2x shits
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: June 1, 2022

0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 118
But he was willing.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: a mi
Gu Miao was walking quickly as she came out of the classroom, shoving aside another child
who wanted to talk to her.
“Er-Miao.” Waiting for her outside, Gu Fei crouched down and stopped her.
“Say good-bye to that little girl.”
Gu Miao looked back at him. She must’ve understood what Gu Fei was saying, though she
didn’t exactly want to carry out his request.
“She wanted to talk to you, but you ignored her,” Gu Fei said. “You don’t have to like her,
but you should still be polite. You shouldn’t push people.”
Gu Miao turned and waved at the other child who had followed her, before turning to leave
with a cold expression on her face.
Gu Fei sighed and walked after her.
The little girly was now reluctant to come to these group activities. Gu Fei had to spend a
long time convincing her before every visit.
It could be because the dozen or so kids who joined this time were all on the younger side.
Despite not being on the same level as her peers mentally, Gu Miao understood many
things. She wasn’t wholly incapable of fitting in at her old school.
But now, faced with these kids who were all five or six years old, or even younger, it was
hard for her to spend time with them.
What to do then?
As Gu Fei walked up to his motorcycle, Gu Miao was already standing there with her
skateboard in her arms.
“Hungry?” Before getting onto the bike, Gu Fei tucked the scarf around her neck, pulled her
hat lower, and fixed the mask over her face.
Gu Miao climbed onto the back seat and put her arms around his waist.
What to do?
Gu Fei put his helmet on and started the engine. The best thing to do in Gu
Miao’s current state was to participate in more group activities and increase her social
contact. Besides, in this city, this was the only place where Gu Miao could get any sort of
help at all, regardless of whether it was professional.
He had to skip class several times a week to bring Gu Miao here. It wasn’t like he wanted to
attend class that badly—after all these years, it was difficult for him to quiet his mind and
study the way other students did. However, he only got into this school because of Jiang
Cheng, and he didn’t want to waste it the way he had before.
Moreover, bringing Gu Miao to these rehabilitation classes did not only affect his class
attendance, but also ate into the time he could have spent doing freelance work. He had no
choice but to push a lot of the work into the evening.
On both time and money, he was struggling a little.
He didn’t complain though—it was no different than all the years before.
Somehow he would manage, if only Gu Miao could improve…
If only Gu Miao could improve.
But Gu Miao did not improve.
Having tasted way too much disappointment, it really was hard for him to be ever so
optimistic like Jiang Cheng.
Back at the store, Liu Li had already made dinner. Gu Fei’s mom was circling the table with
her phone, snapping photos of the dishes.
Business had gotten much better since the store was forcibly sold to Liu Li. He was diligent
in what he did, and most importantly, he was more reliable when it came to preparing food.
At the very least, there was always food on the table at every meal.
Gu Miao was also satisfied enough with the food Liu Li made. As soon as they entered the
store, she went to stand beside the table, waiting to start the meal.
“Er-Miao, you’re blocking the camera,” her mom said, holding the phone.
Seeing as Gu Miao didn’t move away, she sighed and walked to the opposite side of the
table and snapped a photo. “My little girl is certainly photogenic. She looks good in every
photo.”
“Let’s eat.” Liu Li came out holding the soup. “Da-Fei must be tired. You should go home and
rest after the meal.”
“I’m not tired.” Gu Fei clapped Gu Miao’s shoulder. “Go wash your hands.”
Gu Miao walked out to the back courtyard, and Gu Fei followed behind her. He watched as
she went into the kitchen but didn’t follow her inside, only watching
in the doorway.
These days, Gu Miao was fine with both hand washing and dishwashing. Most of the time,
she no longer screamed at the sight of water.
That must count as an improvement? It should.
And yet, in all those years between their father’s death and now, this improvement only
just appeared recently.
Gu Fei was afraid to count how many years had gone by in the interim.
Hope.
Of course there was hope, but it was too far in the distance.
After dinner, when he took Gu Miao back home, he got a message from Jiang Cheng.
– have you eaten yet
It was accompanied by a selfie, taken from the most baffling of angles. As usual, the photo’s
success relied solely on Jiang Cheng’s own good looks. Gu Fei could see the background
though, it was taken inside the prestigious university’s library.
Jiang Cheng would go to the library at around this time every day, to do readings or write
notes. Gu Fei wasn’t very clear on the specific details of what he did in the evenings he
spent there.
He only knew that during that time, Jiang Cheng was very focused, like the way he used to
be sitting behind his desk, studying for the exam. And just like back then, he would not
disturb Jiang Cheng.
Only, he sometimes felt a little lonely.
His evenings were relatively more free compared to Jiang Cheng; he usually spent it doing
photo editing for various kinds of product and model photography.
To him, these were flow work, and did not require him to focus, nor was he concerned
about being interrupted.
But whenever he was free and wanted to send Jiang Cheng a message, he’d worry about
interrupting him. Just a couple days ago Jiang Cheng had
complained to him about a girl sitting nearby, whose phone vibrated on the table every few
minutes, and how annoying it was.
However, Jiang Cheng would always call him immediately after the library closed at 10
o’clock.
“Today was so tiring,” Jiang Cheng said as he yawned. “And I didn’t take a nap after lunch.
Couldn’t even keep my eyes open when I was doing homework.”
“You really should balance work and rest, Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said.
“I do rest. I go back to my dorm at night and go right to sleep,” Jiang Cheng said. “Though
it’s not like I want to toil, there’s just that much to do. Do some reading, organize some
notes, work on assignments, and that’s about it for time.”
“Sounds like you don’t have any time for the great pork bellies.” Gu Fei chuckled.
“It’s there if I want it. There’s two whole barbeque restaurants on my way to tutoring.”
Jiang Cheng tutted. “Ugh no, can’t talk about it, I’ll get hungry, and there’s nothing to eat in
the dorm.”
“Maybe you can go buy something to eat?” Gu Fei asked.
“Nah.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “I don’t want to gain weight. See, horses can get fat just from
eating some extra grass in the evening, so how can I possibly eat meat at night all the time.”
Gu Fei laughed as he listened.
Jiang Cheng chatted on for a while longer, talking about the things that happened in his
classes during the day. Funny things, annoying things—he would talk about it every day.
Gu Fei liked hearing him talk about them. He could imagine how Jiang Cheng was at school:
how he went to lectures, the cafeteria, the library; the classmate he didn’t like; the way he
and Zhao Ke would gang up on the other two guys in their dorm who had girlfriends…
Jiang Cheng’s life was a busy one, with an immense amount of pressure, but it was also
interesting.
The things he talked about, the people he interacted with—all of that differed greatly from
his time in the Steelworks. Gu Fei could sense that his mood was generally lifted, even
when he complained of being overly tired.
How nice. That’s the kind of life Jiang Cheng should have.
Sometimes Jiang Cheng would also ask him: how was school, how are your classmates,
what classes are you taking? And he wouldn’t know what to say.
Compared to Jiang Cheng’s campus life, he had no idea what he could possibly talk about.
Once when he mentioned off-hand that he had a film appreciation class, Jiang Cheng even
recommended a few movies to him. The way he phrased his reviews
and thoughts were on a whole ‘nother level from the teacher who taught Gu Fei’s class.
Only, Jiang Cheng wasn’t taking a film appreciation class—his school would put on movie
showings, that was all.
Therein lies the difference, Gu Fei thought. Obviously there were biases here of the
“whatever my boyfriend says is absolutely right” kind, but still, the sense of distance
existed. It wasn’t something that could be wiped away with an excuse he found merely to
comfort himself.
Gu Fei was never one who talked much, he only liked to talk when he was with Jiang Cheng.
He liked teasing Jiang Cheng, liked the back and forth banter.
But now, day after day as time passed, there were less and less things he could say to Jiang
Cheng. “Mhm” “oh” and “haha” were his most frequently used forms of response.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said to Gu Miao, who was standing in her room, refusing to change clothes
so they could go out. “We have to go now to play with the teacher.”
Gu Miao leaned against the doorway to her room and looked back at him, expressionless.
“Come on, get changed,” Gu Fei said. “There will be new games today, don’t you want to
play?”
Still, Gu Miao gave no response.
“If you don’t like to play with the other kids, you can play with the teacher,” Gu Fei said.
“Last time the teacher said she likes you a lot. She said you were very smart.”
Gu Miao turned away.
She was pushing back hard today. She understood everything Gu Fei said, but refused to
grant any kind of response.
“Honestly, you don’t have to go,” Gu Fei said. “But can you let gege know why?
Is it because you don’t like the other kids?”
Gu Miao ignored him.
“Do you not like the teacher?” Gu Fei asked again.
Still, Gu Miao ignored him.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei bowed his head and looked down at the floor. “Gege knows that you’re
unhappy. And when you’re unhappy, then gege will also be unhappy, because gege feels
your pain. Can you try to feel gege’s pain too?”
“No go.” Gu Miao finally opened her mouth.
Again with this line.
No go.
Gu Fei closed his eyes.
Compared to some of the other kids, Gu Miao’s condition was probably a lot milder. She
might not be able to fully understand, but she certainly had her own thoughts on a lot of
things.
For example, at this moment.
No go.
This was her thought.
Despite not being able to fully comprehend, she must’ve already known that Cheng-ge, who
delighted in playing with her on the skateboard every day, was gone. And would not be
seen for a long time.
She certainly couldn’t understand the relationship between her brother and Cheng-ge, but
she could sense her brother’s emotions.
Gu Fei looked back up at her.
She was worried and afraid—that her brother would also leave.
No go.
Gege will not go.
Gege is not going anywhere.
Gege will always be with you, right here.
If it was a year ago, he would answer with these words without a second thought, to
console her.
But this time, he didn’t speak.
His heart ached intensely for Gu Miao, but for the first time, he didn’t go along.
Gu Miao began to scream. She screamed with her fingers digging hard into the door frame.
Gu Fei wrapped his hands around his head and closed his eyes.
There was no other sound in his ears other than Gu Miao’s screaming. His mind
was also blank.
He didn’t know how much time had passed, but eventually the sound of
knocking broke through Gu Miao’s screaming, and Gu Fei slowly loosened the hands that
had been holding his head.
“Hi Er-Miao!” Outside was a neighbour’s voice. “Are you home alone, Er-Miao? It’s alright,
auntie will call your brother for you!”
It was their downstairs neighbour. Gu Miao used to eat at her home all the time in the past,
when she had nowhere else to eat.
Gu Fei stood up and went to open the door. “I’m home.”
“Is everything alright? She doesn’t usually scream for this long,” the auntie asked outside
the door.
“Mhm, it’s okay. I’ll talk her down in a bit,” Gu Fei said.
He closed the door and turned to look at Gu Miao, who was still screaming, and slowly
walked over to her.
Gu Miao was digging at the door frame this whole time, and by now the pads of her fingers
were pierced through with splinters she had ripped off the wood.
Beads of blood pooled on her fingertips.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei pulled her hands away.
Gu Miao didn’t resist, but the screaming persisted.
Still holding her hands, Gu Fei tried to crouch down but his legs were suddenly a little
weak. He had to kneel on one knee to maintain his balance.
“Er-Miao.” He pulled Gu Miao into a hug and patted her gently on the back.
“I’m sorry.”
Gu Miao put her hands around his neck. Finally, the screaming slowly subsided, and
eventually faded from Gu Fei’s ears.
“What a great voice you have, Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said gently. “Screamed for so long and didn’t
even get hoarse.”
“Will it leave a scar?!” Jiang Cheng stared tensely at Zhao Ke’s hand.
“Depends on your constitution.” Zhao Ke was holding a piece of already peeled bandaid
between his fingers. “Though I think it may leave a little mark.”
“What mark?” Jiang Cheng asked, glaring.
“Well, there’s ink in there that won’t come out.” Zhao Ke stuck the bandaid onto
Jiang Cheng’s forehead. “Once the skin on the outside heals, it’ll probably retain the
pigment.”
“That’s right,” Lu Shi said from his perch behind his desk where he was busy staring at his
computer screen. “Not to mention, the black ink will change colour at some point, and turn
green.”
“Like your girlfriend’s tattooed eyebrows?” Jiang Cheng said.
“My girlfriend got the semipermanent kind. It won’t change colour.” Lu Shi turned to face
him.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded and pressed his hand against the bandaid.
It hurt a little. He had no idea how the point of a pen could be so powerful. He must’ve been
too drowsy, that the moment he dozed off, his head pitched forward with immense
momentum. He didn’t even wake up immediately as the pen jabbed into his skin. His head
had continued forward until the tip carved a gash into the skin above his eyebrow. Only
then did he jolt awake.
“A word of advice, Jiang Cheng,” Zhao Ke said to him quietly. “This is not how you master a
skill. It takes time, and you have to go step by step.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“You’re going through those psychology textbooks like one force-feeds a duck,”
Zhao Ke bent down and continued quietly. “But answer me this, do you
understand what it’s saying? Those cases you’re reading, with their treatment plans, do you
understand them? Why were two cases that look the same were treated differently? The
same mental illness may manifest in different ways, and different illnesses may look the
same on the surface…”
“Ahhh.” Jiang Cheng leaned back against his chair. “I got it I got it.”
“My sister has time next week. I already asked her for you,” Zhao Ke said. “You don’t need
to be in such a hurry.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Thanks.”
He was indeed anxious. He’d been anxious ever since he found out that the rehab program
Gu Miao was going to wasn’t really working. Even though Gu Fei told him not to blame
everything on himself.
But the truth was, he did leave. It was also true that Gu Miao was mad when she found out
that he’d left, and no longer responded to him. He wanted to help Gu Fei. He wanted Gu
Miao to get better. He couldn’t stand it if his desire to pull Gu Fei out actually led Gu Miao,
who should’ve been improving, to worsen, and sunk Gu Fei into even deeper despair and
fatigue.
It was a yet unknown variable how much Zhao Jin could help, and whether she’d have any
ideas on what to do. He only wanted to be more precise at describing Gu Miao’s condition
when talking about her case, and to better understand what the other person had to say
about it.
He only wanted to do everything he could possibly do.
The academic workload from day to day already kept him busy. Aside from the usual
studying for his courses and the tutoring, he also had to squeeze out time to read
psychology textbooks. No doubt it was tiring.
But he was willing.
The “willing” state of mind was one many people had. Even Zhao Ke, however earnestly he
advised Jiang Cheng, would have that moment of his own. They only expressed it in
different ways.
His willingness to squeeze out time to study a completely new field of knowledge for Gu Fei
was not that different in nature than Zhao Ke’s willingness to suck it up and join a knitting
club that only had one other guy in it.
– got time to video chat?
He got a message from Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng hesitated for a moment, then picked up a mirror nearby and checked his face.
The bandage was rather conspicuous, but even if he ripped it off, it wasn’t as if he could
make the wound disappear.
I ran into the door frame.
Jiang Cheng decided that was what he would say.
He walked out of the dorm room with his phone and sent Gu Fei a video request.
Gu Fei quickly accepted. As soon as both of their faces appeared on the screen, the first
thing Gu Fei said was “what happened to your face?”
“I ran into the door frame,” said Jiang Cheng.
“… How do you run into a door frame?” Gu Fei blinked in surprise. “Is it your dorm room
door or what?”
“My dorm room.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I stumbled and somehow bumped my head on it.”
“… Did it break the skin?” Gu Fei reached out his hand.
The gesture turned Jiang Cheng’s heart into mush. He smiled. “Are you trying to
touch it?”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei chuckled. “Poked the screen instead.”
“It won’t be much longer.” Jiang Cheng thought about it for a moment. “I’ll go back for the
January 1st New Year.”
“You shouldn’t bother with the trip,” Gu Fei said. “It’s only three days, and with the time
spent on the road you won’t even be here for a whole of two days.”
“So you don’t wanna see me.” Jiang Cheng tutted.
“I’m trying to not miss you too much,” Gu Fei said. “It was hard enough to get used to it, if
you come back for a flash visit, I’ll have to get used to it all over again.”
“It’s the same with me.” Jiang Cheng laughed. “Alrighty then, let’s hang tight for a while
longer. This way I can see if anyone wants to take me out for a meal during the New Year.”
“Hm?” Gu Fei paused for two seconds before his lips curled into a smile.
“Ooooh. Uh huhhhh.”
“I’m telling you, it may just happen,” Jiang Cheng said in a hushed voice. “Our school has a
confession wall on a WeChat public account, it’s the funniest thing.
There’s all sorts of confessions on there.”
“And you’re in some of them, right? Wanting to take you out for dinner?” Gu Fei laughed.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng said. “I only knew of the account’s existence when Zhao Ke told me
about it the other day.”
The U of R Confession Wall.
Gu Fei thought it was a little silly of him to look up the account immediately after Jiang
Cheng told him, but he couldn’t help it.
At first, he only wanted to take a look around, as a way of getting to know the things related
to his boyfriend’s daily life. If it wasn’t possible to see each other in person, it might satiate
him somewhat to see things related to him. The distance would seem a little bit closer.
He was surprised, however, to see Jiang Cheng’s name right away.
[confession] I sit behind you every evening, watching you bow your head, watching you
look up, your side profile and the silhouette of your back—until every word in front of me
turns into you. Yes, I’m talking about you! Jiang Cheng, you’re really not going to look back
even once throughout the whole
evening?!
Gu Fei chuckled. It was pretty funny.
He continued scrolling down for a couple more pages at most before he spotted the “meal”.
[confession] I’ve decided, I want to take Jiang Cheng out to eat! Jiang Cheng from first year
Law! Do you see this! Jiejie wants to take you out—not sure if you can handle your spice,
hopefully you like spicy food!
[confession] To the weird jiejie up there who wants to take Jiang Cheng out, there’s such a
thing called first come first served when it comes to asking someone out to dinner. I’ve
already expressed my intention of taking him out last week~ But to avoid any
awkwardness, maybe we can team up on the invite… Or maybe you can switch targets, the
guy who’s always with him isn’t too bad either, perhaps we can treat them all together!
[confession] Sooo you weird jiejies up there, are you here to confess or ask him out or
trying to gather a dinner party?
Gu Fei kept laughing as he scrolled down, but a few pages later he couldn’t bring himself to
laugh anymore—he saw several submissions of a guy
confessing to another guy.
The candid and sincere tone along with the reaction of the others (or rather, the lack of
reaction), and the open-minded atmosphere was completely unlike the environment
around him.
Jiang Cheng was no longer so nervous about his sexual orientation as he once was, but
when it came down to it, most of the time he would still put up a hard front of “none of your
damn business”. Meanwhile, this kind of open
environment was one where he could truly relax.
Gu Fei scrolled all the way to the bottom and made sure that at least in the visible date
range, there was no confession to Jiang Cheng from another guy.
Only then did he put down his phone.
He laid down on his bed and let out a breath of relief.
Why was he relieved?
Gu Fei laughed at himself.
“Can you ask Zhang Dantong to come along?” Zhao Ke was on the phone. Jiang Cheng sat
beside him, intently eavesdropping, because the call was to Zhao Jin to arrange for a time
and place for their meeting. Though it was obvious that Zhao Ke had lost the plot.
It wasn’t until today that Jiang Cheng found out that Zhao Ke’s dream girl was named Zhang
Dantong, and conversely, that the Zhang Dantong he’d seen mentioned countless times on
the confession wall was actually Zhao Ke’s dream girl.
In that case, Zhao Ke’s situation was certainly dire.
“Why won’t you… You haven’t even tried, how do you know she won’t go.”
Zhao Ke was still hung up on the runaway point. “You two haven’t seen each other in a
pretty long time, don’t you besties need to have a bonding session or something?”
“Zhao Ke,” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Ke…”
“Why is today not appropriate? Jiang Cheng just wanted to ask you questions about his
friend’s little sister’s condition, not like it’s a formal psychiatric consultation… You can’t
even conduct a formal one anyway.” Zhao Ke didn’t pay Jiang Cheng any attention.
“Besides… Yes I was asking you a favour, but you’ve already said yes to one so what
difference is two, either way I’ve been begging you ever since I was little…”
“Zhao Ke.” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but take Zhao Ke’s phone away. He said in a hushed
voice, “Give me Zhang Dantong’s phone number.”
“What are you going to do?” Zhao Ke looked at him.
“I’ll ask her out for you,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You?” Zhao Ke hesitated for three seconds, then swiftly wrote down a phone number on a
notepad.
“Go confirm the meeting details with your sister.” Jiang Cheng patted Zhao Ke’s shoulder
before walking out with his own phone.
When Zhang Dantong answered, Jiang Cheng laid out in very simple terms his reason for
the call. She started laughing uncontrollably on the other end.
“So that’s what’s happening,” Jiang Cheng said. “If you have time today, maybe you can
come out and eat with us. If you don’t go then neither Zhao Ke nor I will be able to leave our
dorm today.”
“Okay, I’ll give Zhao Jin a call.” Zhang Dantong was still laughing. “I’ll see you later then. You
two are hilarious.”
Jiang Cheng returned to the room to see that Zhao Ke had already finished his call. He stood
up as soon as Jiang Cheng walked in. “So? Did she yell at you?”
“… Do you have some sort of distorted perception of your dream girl?” Jiang Cheng didn’t
know what to say. “She agreed. We’ll see her there.”
“Really?” Zhao Ke immediately broke into a grin. He walked over and tried to hug Jiang
Cheng.
Jiang Cheng immediately lifted an arm to block him. “A verbal expression of thanks is
enough.”
“No thanks, we’re even,” Zhao Ke said.
“Oh, right.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Let’s go,” Zhao Ke said. “We’re going to have steak, we should probably leave now.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng got his bag and checked again that he brought his card.
If it was steak for four people, the cash he usually carried would definitely not be enough.
Zhao Ke was more than a little excited. When they got there, with Zhao Ke dragging him
along, they were ahead of their agreed upon meeting time by twenty minutes.
They found a booth seat where they could talk privately and sat down.
Zhao Ke was on such an emotional high that he could hardly speak, while Jiang Cheng was
too busy going over the summary for Gu Miao’s condition in his head to talk. The two of
them sat in silence, blankly facing each other, until Zhao Ke raised his hand and waved.
Jiang Cheng turned back and saw two people come through the door. The one in front was
Zhao Jin, behind her was not Zhang Dantong, but a young man.
“That’s her senior,” Zhao Ke said.
“Ah.” The word “senior” finally managed to jog Jiang Cheng’s memory. He had seen this guy
before.
It was the hunkiest of the three school hunks.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6369
TL word count: 4605
TL time: 5:43:19
Edit time: 0:53:46

Curse words:
TL’s Notes:
Hunkiest hunk first appeared in ch. 114
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
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First posted: July 7, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 119
“Hi, my name is Xu Xingzhi.”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Sure, Jiang Cheng remembered the glasses guy as Zhao Jin’s senior, who he’d met once
before, but already he’d forgotten the guy’s name.
“Ke,” Jiang Cheng quickly asked in a small voice. “What is the senior’s surn—”
“I thought Zhang Dantong would come with them,” said Zhao Ke. “How come she’s not
here.”
“Because it’s not time yet,” Jiang Cheng said. “The senior’s surna—”
“Should I give her a call to ask?” asked Zhao Ke. “Though we probably should’ve waited for
her to come together. Did she want to come separately because she didn’t want to walk
with me?”
“She said it’s because she has to go do something else first.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“That senior… Ah fuck it, never mind.”
“Xu Xingzhi,” Zhao Ke said.
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I thought you couldn’t hear.”
“I’m just a little nervous,” said Zhao Ke. “I haven’t eaten with Zhang Dantong since after my
second year of high school. My sister won’t even let me tag along when they go out.”
“Two girls going shopping together,” Jiang Cheng sighed again, “what good will it do to
bring you along except to get in the way.”
“Tongtong just called me.” Zhao Jin walked over to them. “She’ll be here in ten minutes.”
“It’s fine if she doesn’t come,” Zhao Ke said.
Jiang Cheng whipped his head around to look at Zhao Ke and in a hushed voice, said, “You
need a pump to drain all the water from inside your brain?”
“Don’t mind him, I’m used to it.” Zhao Jin waved her hand and gestured at Xu Xingzhi. “I
won’t bother with introductions. You all know each other.”
“Hello senior,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You can call me by name.” Xu Xingzhi smiled and sat down with Zhao Jin.
“Zhao Ke said just me alone is enough,” Zhao Jin took a drink of water, “but I figured I best
bring someone who knows what they’re talking about, since I’m just winging it as I go. Cao-
ge is the shit though, he’s our boss’s number one student.” [1]
… Cao-ge.
“So, your friend’s little sister?” Xu Xingzhi turned to Jiang Cheng and asked. He was
probably used to Zhao Jin’s introduction by now and hardly showed any reaction.
“Mhm, they live in the city where I’m from,” Jiang Cheng said.
“How old is she?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“Eleven,” Jiang Cheng gestured with his hand, “but smaller in stature compared to other
kids her age.”
“An eleven-year-old.” Zhao Jin glanced at Xu Xingzhi. “Doesn’t that fit with what you’re
doing?”
“Yeah.” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “Though I would have to see what her specific circumstance is
like.”
“Basically—she doesn’t speak, can’t accurately discern other people’s emotions a lot of the
time, and at the same time doesn’t know how to properly express herself either.” Jiang
Cheng tried his best to give a succinct summary of Gu Miao’s condition. “She screams
whenever she’s angry, or anxious, or nervous; really good at skateboarding; would draw
the same things over and over, and would write the same characters repeatedly, but has
trouble learning it…”
“Mhm.”
“It wasn’t always like this. When she was little, she just didn’t like to talk very much, but
after she was injured at two or three years old she’s just been… this way ever since.” Jiang
Cheng realized that he felt a kind of sadness when he described Gu Miao like this. What a
beautiful and adorable little gal.
“Injured how?” Xu Xingzhi asked. “By another person?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “She was thrown down. It was pretty bad.”
Xu Xingzhi looked at him, as if waiting for him to continue, but Jiang Cheng was a little
hesitant. After all, the one who hurt her was her own father…
“It’s okay,” Xu Xingzhi said. “We can talk about the details another time.
However, one thing I can tell you right now is that it will be hard to get her
language ability up to the average level. She’s already passed the age range for language
development.”
“Yeah, I know.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He had read a substantial number of books in recent
weeks. Gu Miao had gotten hurt right when she was in the middle of developing her
language skills, and coupled with the fact that she didn’t like to talk much to begin with, she
had refused to speak again after the incident. It would be next to impossible at this point to
ask her to communicate verbally like other kids.
But as long as Gu Miao had improvements in other aspects, even if she never spoke, it
would still be a whole different life for her and Gu Fei.
“As for the other things, I’ll only be able to tell after I see her in person,” Xu Xingzhi said.
This didn’t surprise Jiang Cheng.
“Here is the difficult part.” He frowned, and at the same time felt a little sheepish. “It’s just
that…she has a set routine for her day to day life, and gets angry whenever any changes are
made. She can’t even accept sleeping in a different bed so…we can’t bring her here.”
“Ah. I see.” Xu Xingzhi reacted rather calmly. “My grad advisor has a case like this, currently
undergoing therapy, though the child lives locally.”
“So for my friend’s sister’s circumstance,” Jiang Cheng sighed quietly, “is there no other
way?”
“There’s always a way.” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“Can you help?” Zhao Ke was blunt. “You’re working on a thesis proposal, right? This case
would be great.”
Xu Xingzhi glanced at Zhao Ke before leaning back in his chair and laughing.
“Yeah, I am working on my thesis proposal, but the little sister’s case… I’ll have to find out
more before I know whether or not I can help.”
Xu Xingzhi didn’t give a firm answer, and later added that he was only a grad student and
not up to par professionally. However, his feedback still gave Jiang Cheng some hope. Even
a tiny glimmer was enough for Jiang Cheng to lunge forward and give it everything he had.
They continued talking for a while before Zhang Dantong arrived. Zhao Ke nudged Jiang
Cheng’s leg in his excitement, and Jiang Cheng was only able to keep himself from shooting
out of his seat via his deathgrip on the edge of the table.
Thrown in a scenario where he could interact with his dream girl up close, Zhao
Ke was so nervous that he didn’t manage to say another complete sentence in the next five
minutes, aside from “one sirloin please”. Jiang Cheng worried that he would pee himself in
his excitement.
After ordering the food, they didn’t stay on the topic of Gu Miao’s condition, and the
conversation drifted elsewhere.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t in much of a chatting mood. His mind was full with thoughts about Gu
Miao’s illness, and what next steps he should take with this Xu Xingzhi to turn Gu Miao’s
case from a mere discussion into actual practice. He mostly jumped in from time to time to
help Zhao Ke out, whenever the latter was infuriatingly hapless in trying to start a
conversation with Zhang Dantong.
At the end of the meal, he added Xu Xingzhi on WeChat.
“If I may ask, what’s a convenient time for senior?” asked Jiang Cheng.
“Anytime this week is fine.” Xu Xingzhi thought for a moment. “Just let me know when
you’re available, but better in the afternoon or evening.”
“What about tomorrow evening?” Jiang Cheng immediately followed.
Xu Xingzhi smiled. “Alright.”
“We can meet for another dinner tomorrow then?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Don’t worry about dinner,” Xu Xingzhi said. “No need to break the bank. Let’s meet after
dinner.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “How does around seven o’clock sound? I’ll give you a call
before I head over to U of B.”
“I’m not on campus tomorrow,” said Xu Xingzhi. “I’ll be out, but let me tell you the specific
location tomorrow.”
“Sure,” said Jiang Cheng. “Thanks, senior.”
“If you can’t bring yourself to call me Xu Xingzhi,” he said, “maybe you can follow Zhao Jin’s
lead and call me Cao-ge.”
“To be honest, I can’t really bring myself to say Cao-ge either,” Jiang Cheng answered
earnestly.
“Whatever then.” Xu Xingzhi laughed. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you tomorrow,” Jiang Cheng said. “Thanks senior.”
Xu Xingzhi waved in exasperation. “You’re welcome.”
The meal today cost Jiang Cheng quite a lot of money. It wasn’t something he’d
pay attention to before, but things were different now. Now, he was an upstanding youth of
the new age, who recorded his expenses every day.
Back on campus, he and Zhao Ke didn’t go to the library today. There would be no seats at
this time anyway. Jiang Cheng carefully wrote down his spendings of the day, then sat
down beside Zhao Ke.
“Thank you,” he said.
“Thank you.” Zhao Ke spoke up at the same time. “Okay, we’re even.”
“Should I take a gift or something to see Xu Xingzhi tomorrow?” Jiang Cheng asked. “It’s not
good to go empty-handed, right?”
“That’s probably not necessary.” Zhao Ke thought for a second. “Not sure, I’ll ask my sister?”
“… Okay, ask,” said Jiang Cheng. “It’s probably fine if it’s just your sister, but Xu Xingzhi is
another degree removed from me. I still think it’s poor manners if I don’t show any
gratitude.”
“Sure.” Zhao Ke got out his phone and called Zhao Jin.
The theme of the call very expectedly veered toward the topic of Zhang Dantong. Zhao Ke’s
dear biological sister laughed at him for five whole minutes, gave him a premature
congratulation on his failed confession, and furthermore sent him a digital lucky envelope
after the call as an early consolation.
Fortunately, Zhao Ke was hardy against brutal attacks and didn’t forget the original
purpose of the call, even while under the barrage of violence from Zhao Jin.
“No need to bring anything. Zhao Jin knew Xu Xingzhi from her undergrad years,” Zhao Ke
said. “They’re pretty close, so this doesn’t count as a favour, more like friends helping each
other out. Bringing a gift will make things awkward.”
“So now she’s not your ‘jie’ anymore?” Jiang Cheng asked with a laugh.
“Not in the next two days at least,” Zhao Ke said. “I think at least half of Zhao Jin’s celibacy is
due to her brutal mouth.”
Zhao Ke went to work on his assignments. Meanwhile, Jiang Cheng sat down at his desk,
pulled out his phone, and tapped open Xu Xingzhi’s WeChat Moments.
Xu Xingzhi’s display name seemed rather sophisticated—“walk and know”—
while his display icon was the character “知” [zhī] written in brush calligraphy.
All of it gave off an old professorial vibe, which contrasted heavily with the actual content
of his Moments. [2]
They were almost all cat photos.
A wide variety of cat photos populated Xu Xingzhi’s WeChat Moments: his own cat; his
friends’ cats; the cats in cat cafés; the stray cats on campus. He even gave the familiar strays
he saw often monikers such as stray-a, stray-b, nomad-1, nomad-2, and so on.
Aside from the photos of cats, there was very little text content. Jiang Cheng did a cursory
scroll through and realized that they were all variations of the same message.
What an adorable kitty.
Cute.
My master is the most beautiful.
Whatever the master meows is right.
Kitty kitty cat cat so many cats.
Meow~
… The guy’s WeChat Moments might be a little different from the impression he gave off in
person, still, Jiang Cheng figured he would be easy to get along with.
He spun the phone in his hand. His mood was a little complicated at the moment.
He felt a little hopeful, and wanted very much to grab onto the tiny shred of hope, but at the
same time was fearful of being let down if he set his expectations too high.
It was times like this when he understood all too well how Gu Fei must have felt all these
years.
The biggest difference between them was probably as Pan Zhi said: naiveté.
Compared to Gu Fei, he was much more naive. He would fear disappointment on one hand
while stubbornly holding onto hope with the other, refusing to let go.
“Look at Er-Miao’s forehead.” As soon as Gu Fei returned to the store, his mom pointed
toward Gu Miao, who nimbly cruised through the aisles on her
skateboard. “She hit her head. I wanted to put some medicine on the wound, but she won’t
let me touch it. You better check it out.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei walked over. As Gu Miao rolled past, he stepped on her skateboard, picked
her up, and set her down in front of him. “Let gege take a look at your head.”
Gu Miao put her hand over her forehead.
“Did you run into a tree?” Gu Fei asked. He could see redness and swelling on the skin
where Gu Miao’s hand couldn’t cover.
Gu Miao shook her head.
“Did you bump against something?” Gu Fei asked again.
“Post,” Gu Miao said in a very quiet voice.
“A lamppost? Did you crash into a lamppost?” Gu Fei stifled his laughter.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Oh how our Er-Miao has progressed.” Gu Fei started laughing. “Forget trees, we’re
crashing into lampposts now. Amazing.”
Gu Miao put her hand down and looked back at him with pride.
The wound was small enough—a break in the skin, but it had swelled into a big bump. Gu
Fei took out the first-aid kit to disinfect the surface before sticking a bandaid on it.
After Gu Miao walked out the door, skateboard in hand, Gu Fei frowned to himself.
Judging by the area of skin the bandaid was covering, Jiang Cheng’s wound should be pretty
similar to Gu Miao’s. But if Jiang Cheng had bumped his head and broken the skin, how was
there no redness or swelling whatsoever?
Did his boyfriend have a forehead made of titanium, or was he not telling the truth?
Gu Fei sighed as he put the first-aid kit away and sat down behind the cash register. If ever
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to tell him something, that something most certainly had to do with
him.
He pulled out his phone, stared for a long time at Jiang Cheng’s name in his contact list,
before finally sending a message to Pan Zhi instead.
– Pan-handsome
– Yes?
Gu Fei suddenly hesitated again after seeing Pan Zhi’s reply. He wasn’t sure how to go
about asking this question. How to ask in a way that assured Pan Zhi that he was worried,
not merely checking up on his boyfriend?
– spit it out
– nothing, just wanted to say your name
Gu Fei thought he must be wound up a little too tightly these days. He might be worried
about Jiang Cheng, but asking other people about matters Jiang Cheng didn’t want to tell
him was something he never would’ve done before.
– you! bastard!
– pls forgive me Lord Pan
– I can’t believe you’ve been corrupted too!
Gu Fei chuckled and put the phone back in his pocket.
Jiang Cheng had just come from the cafeteria back to his dorm, wondering if he should take
the initiative and contact Xu Xingzhi first, when he got a call from the guy himself. “I’ll be at
your school in about half an hour.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng blinked. “Where are you? I’ll go to you. How could I trouble you to
travel all the way here.”
“It’s on my way,” Xu Xingzhi said. “I’ll tell you to come out once I’m at the west entrance.”
“Oh, alright,” Jiang Cheng answered. After hanging up, he turned to Zhao Ke beside him. “He
said it’s on his way, but is it really on his way or is he making a trip here especially? I feel a
little bad, like I’m troubling him.”
“It’s on his way,” said Zhao Ke. “Don’t worry. Zhao Jin and her friends aren’t that nice.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“What I mean is, if it’s not on his way, he’ll tell you to go to him for sure,” Zhao Ke said. “So
you don’t need to feel bad.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Jiang Cheng went to the west entrance before Xu Xingzhi could call him.
It only took about twenty minutes before he spotted Xu Xingzhi walking over while fishing
for his phone. He waved. Xu Xingzhi smiled and put his phone back in his pocket.
“Didn’t I say to wait for my call,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“It’s not like I have anything better to do after dinner,” said Jiang Cheng. “So…
should we find somewhere to sit down?”
“Let’s go to your school’s coffee shop,” Xu Xingzhi said. “This way you won’t have to go back
and forth.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Xu Xingzhi was a pleasant person to be around. However, Jiang Cheng never had the
occasion to ask anyone for a favour before, and couldn’t help but feel a little tense and
uneasy. He was afraid that any wrong gesture or word on his part would cause the other
person to not want to help.
“So, your friend’s little sister,” Xu Xingzhi said as they walked, “is she going to school?”
“She was in elementary school, but dropped out two years ago. She’s been home ever
since,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Special needs school or a regular elementary?” Xu Xingzhi asked. “Why is she not going
anymore?”
“It’s a regular elementary school. I don’t think we even have a special needs school there,”
Jiang Cheng said. “Then…she hit and injured another student, and dropped out after that.”
“Does she usually exhibit aggressive behaviour?” Xu Xingzhi continued.
“No. I’ve only seen her hit someone that one time, and it’s because those kids were
scribbling all over her notebook and insulting her,” Jiang Cheng said.
“So she is able to sense other people’s attitudes, whether it’s friendly or hostile,”
Xu Xingzhi said.
“Sometimes. But then a lot of the time, she doesn’t seem to understand what we’re saying.”
Jiang Cheng sighed.
They kept walking as they discussed Gu Miao’s case, and by the time they arrived at the
coffee shop, Jiang Cheng had gradually relaxed. Xu Xingzhi had simply been asking
questions this whole time to find out more information, but his even tone of voice and his
steady cadence of speech easily allowed Jiang Cheng to let down his guard.
It was probably a specialized skill of someone in this profession.
Although—Jiang Cheng remembered Zhao Jin, and thought that perhaps his judgement was
a little off.
The coffee shop was not busy at this time of day. The two of them found a corner table and
sat down.
“I’ll have the fruit tea—I’ve had way too much coffee these last couple days,”
Xu Xingzhi said just as Jiang Cheng was about to order a pot of coffee.
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng ordered a carafe of fruit tea instead. “Were you working
into the night? Zhao Ke said you’re about to submit your proposal.”
“It’s not that exactly. I wouldn’t want to stay up to work on a proposal,” Xu Xingzhi smiled
as he said. “It’s because my cat has been in a bad mood lately, so I was keeping her
company at night.”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng stared in surprise.
“I’ve spoiled her rotten,” Xu Xingzhi said. “If I don’t play with her she’d come onto the bed
and stomp on my face. Either way I don’t get to sleep.”
“… Oh.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “You really like cats huh. I saw that your Moments is full of
cats.”
“Yeah, as soon as I see a cat, I can’t take another step,” Xu Xingzhi laughed.
When the fruit tea came, Jiang Cheng first poured a glass for Xu Xingzhi. “Then am I keeping
you from playing with your feline master today? Would she be upset if you’re home late?”
“I’ve prepared the canned food in advance.” Xu Xingzhi pulled out a pen and notebook from
his bag. “I’ll take down some information first about your friend’s little sister. Why don’t
you tell me the cause of her injury when she was little?”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng cupped the glass with his hands. “She… was hurt when her dad threw
her.”
“Biological dad?” Xu Xingzhi looked at him.
Jiang Cheng nodded. “Her dad was always abusive; both siblings feared him.”
“And how are their relationships with their dad now?” Xu Xingzhi jotted down notes.
“Her dad is dead… Has been for years,” said Jiang Cheng.
Xu Xingzhi’s pen paused for a moment. “How did he die?”
“He got drunk and drowned to death.” Jiang Cheng frowned. He felt a pang in his heart for
Gu Fei whenever he recalled the incident.
“How long was the interval between her dad injuring her, and drowning to death?” asked
Xu Xingzhi.
“That…I’m not so sure.” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “My friend hasn’t mentioned it.”
“After that, has anyone talked to her about her dad?” Xu Xingzhi quickly wrote
in his notebook.
Jiang Cheng was a little dizzy from the series of questions. “It probably wasn’t brought up
again. My friend would rather not think about it himself.”
“I see.” Xu Xingzhi nodded. “Would it be possible for me to chat with your friend?”
“Ah?” Jiang Cheng was taken by surprise.
“No?” Xu Xingzhi looked at him.
In theory, it would be much more straightforward for Xu Xingzhi to contact Gu Fei directly.
But right now, with everything still up in the air, he was reluctant to let Gu Fei know—he
who had already experienced too much disappointment. Gu Fei never divulged the details
to him about Gu Miao’s regression, but he sensed it in Gu Fei’s mood, that kind of
disappointment. He didn’t want Gu Fei to be let down again.
Besides, Gu Fei never wanted him to carry Gu Miao’s condition around as his own load to
bear. All these things he’d done on his own, he had yet to think of a way to tell Gu Fei
without him thinking that he was holding Jiang Cheng back.
Upon hearing Xu Xingzhi’s question, Jiang Cheng was all of a sudden caught off guard. He
had no idea how to explain the nuances and complexities of his reason to someone he was
only lightly acquainted with.
Xu Xingzhi didn’t pursue the matter. He turned his attention downward and continued
filling in details in his notebook.
It was a while later when Jiang Cheng finally said, “I haven’t told my friend about this yet. I
just wanted to see first, if there’s any way…”
“You’re worried that he’ll be disappointed?” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng sighed softly.
“Must be a very good friend,” Xu Xingzhi said. “Understandable. It’s alright—
the truth is, I also can’t give a solid answer right now. I have to go back and think on it. I
have some ideas about the little sister’s condition, but I’d still like to discuss it with my
advisor first, see if my initial assessment was right.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“If I can help, then we’ll talk about how exactly to execute this in practice,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“Sounds good. Thank you so much.” Jiang Cheng wasn’t quite sure what else to say. He
wasn’t adept at conveying gratitude, and was at the same time worried
that he would appear lacking in sincerity if he didn’t express his thanks properly.
In the end, he only managed to repeat himself. “Really, thank you so much.
Thank…”
“You really don’t need to be so formal.” Xu Xingzhi laughed and took a sip of the fruit tea.
“You don’t seem like such a formal person in your Moments timeline.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng rapidly went through in his mind the contents of his WeChat Moments,
and suddenly felt a little embarrassed. There wasn’t much, but what was there was a lot of
boasting, things like “world’s most handsome man” and whatnot. “Ah.”
“You don’t need to be overly courteous with me. I’ve known Zhao Jin for a long time,” Xu
Xingzhi said. “She’s helped me a lot in the past, so it’s not a big deal for me to help out her
friend.”
“I’m…her brother’s friend.” Jiang Cheng corrected Xu Xingzhi without
thinking. He was still immersed in his mental audit of particularly embarrassing and
dumbass content in his WeChat Moments.
“Oh.” Xu Xingzhi was taken aback for a moment, and laughed again. “You’re pretty funny.
Alright then, we’re friends now.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Xu Xingzhi extended his hand. “Hi, my name is Xu Xingzhi.”
“Jiang Cheng.” Jiang Cheng reached out and shook his hand.
Footnotes
[1] heh, so. I don’t remember if I explained in 114 but roughly “school hunk”
from 校草/ xiao(school) cao(grass), and is a term coined after the more popular 校花/
xiao(school) hua(flower), aka prettiest girl in the school. Xu Xingzhi is the hunkiest of the
three school hunks (grass) at his very famous very prestigious school, so his nickname is
Cao-ge, which uh, is literally grass-bro/hunk-bro.
What makes it a little more ridiculous is that cao3 sounds like cao4 (fuck), and people have
adopted the use of the grass iteration of cao to curse. Anyways, introducting Xu Xingzhi,
aka school hunk aka Cao-ge aka fuck-bro ⤴
[2] The name Xingzhi/行之 means “to walk”, where Xing2/行 can also be
interpreted as “go” “act”. His display name “行而知之” is a play on his name, which is the first and
last character. 行而知之/Xing Er Zhi Zhi translated literally is “walk and know”. Variations on this
based on slightly different interpretations include:
walk and know
do and discover
fuck around and find out

action begets knowledge

live and learn
fuck-bro’s got one of those nice elegant names ⤴
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5935
TL word count: 4120
TL time: 6:07:26
Edit time: 00:56:44
Curse words: 1x fuck
TL’s Notes:
NEW UPDATE BECAUSE IT’S JIANG CHENG’S BIRTHDAY!!!
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: July 12, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 120
“GU MIAO!”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
It was very easy to get along with Xu Xingzhi, and conversation flowed without difficulty.
To avoid awkward silences, all one needed to do was talk about cats.
One “meow” and he could go on for the next three minutes.
For someone like Jiang Cheng, who usually felt awkward around strangers and didn’t know
what to talk about, a cat-slave like Xu Xingzhi was great.
“Alright, I’ve written down everything you told me. I’ll organize my notes when I’m home
and reach out to you if I think of something,” Xu Xingzhi said. “To be honest, the way we’re
going about this isn’t technically protocol, and makes it easy to misjudge the situation… But
let’s go with this for now. You can also contact me if you think of anything else.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded, and after a moment of thought, spoke up again hesitatingly,
“So… about the cost…”
“Cost?” Xu Xingzhi looked at him.
“I mean, if treatment is possible, then…approximately how much would it cost?” asked
Jiang Cheng.
“Super expensive,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng blanked.
“I’m kidding. If I’m able to help out, I won’t charge anything for it.” Xu Xingzhi chuckled.
“But other costs associated with the treatment won’t be cheap. You may not think so in the
short term, but it definitely adds up over time.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt an immense pressure over him. His brain whirred into
motion and started spinning rapidly: The tutoring job definitely won’t be enough, since he
had to account for his tuition and daily expenses. The usual textbooks and materials all cost
money, and he won’t be able to save much after that. Likely, he’d need to find another
source of income, but that would really put a squeeze on his already full schedule. As his
mind was busy turning, he asked, “Can you give me a rough estimate? I have to make a plan
for the money…”
“Your friend’s little sister,” Xu Xingzhi looked at him, “and you’re paying for it?”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng was suddenly pulled back down to earth. “Um… No it’s…
I…”
“Though this is more for the next step,” Xu Xingzhi said. “Whether treatment is possible,
how to approach it, and how far it’ll go—we’ll have to take it step by step. For now, don’t
worry about it too much. Hold onto whatever hope you have. She’s only eleven years old,
there’s a whole lifetime to go.”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng answered.
That’s right. Hold onto whatever hope there is. There’s a whole lifetime to go.
It wasn’t just Gu Miao’s lifetime, but Gu Fei’s as well.
Jiang Cheng checked the time as they walked out of the coffee shop—two hours had passed.
“Please excuse me for taking up so much of your time,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Xu Xingzhi. “I’m not busy today. You should go back to your
dorm.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Jiang Cheng said. “Are you going back to campus? How are you getting
there?”
“I live beside the school. I can just walk back.” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “No need to walk me.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Jiang Cheng said.
Xu Xingzhi glanced at him. “Alright then.”
“Will your little master scratch you,” Jiang Cheng said. “For being left alone the whole
night?”
“No, she’s very composed and doesn’t usually use her claws.” Xu Xingzhi laughed.
“Normally in these situations, she’d just ignore me. I have to placate her.”
“…Ah.” Jiang Cheng cracked up laughing. A cat that would stomp on your face if you didn’t
play with it—‘composed’? “You sure are loving.”
“Mhm.” Xu Xingzhi nodded. “Nowhere else to direct my love as a single dog.”
Jiang Cheng laughed in response. He felt a surge of pride well up at the mention of single
dogs. If he didn’t control himself, he might accidentally commit dog abuse.
It was important to control this impulse, especially since he was asking for help.
Immersed in the gleeful “hahahahahaha heeeheeheheehe I’m not a single dog I have a
boyfriend aheheh” mood for all of five seconds, he suddenly remembered what Xu Xingzhi
said before.
“Your friend’s little sister, and you’re paying for it?”
He all of a sudden felt a little awkward. He wasn’t sure if Xu Xingzhi had detected anything
else from it. Compared to the Steel Works, his current environment was mostly tolerant
and calm about this sort of thing. But on the other hand, he had only just met Xu Xingzhi,
and he was the one asking for help.
He didn’t want to expose himself so haphazardly for no good reason.
“You should go back,” Xu Xingzhi said when they reached the gates. “I’ll let you know if
there’s any news on my end.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
Jiang Cheng watched Xu Xingzhi slowly saunter away down the road, then turned and
headed back to his dorm.
His roommates were all still at the library. It was the month before finals, and aside from
eating and sleeping, everyone was making use of every free second to study—the
atmosphere was comparable to the last year of high school.
Jiang Cheng sat down at his desk and looked at the neatly stacked books in front of him.
Other than the books for his courses, there was also a stack of psychology textbooks,
including various case studies.
Better study first. Jiang Cheng sighed quietly. Looking at these books, he felt a sense of
anxiety and helplessness. How could he possibly arrange his schedule, and to what extent
did he have to grind, in order to hold onto Gu Fei and keep himself on track in the process?
He didn’t dare to think too much about it.
He knew that Gu Fei wouldn’t agree to him doing this. Gu Fei had said a long time ago that
he didn’t want other people to sacrifice for him. Doing all this, he thought, would surely put
pressure on Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng pinched the bridge of his nose. Never mind. He won’t think about this for now.
He would work on what was in front of him and worry about the unsolvable problems
later.
Study.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei crouched before Gu Miao. “Gege will ask you one more time
—you really don’t want to go anymore?”
Gu Miao’s head was down.
“Look at gege,” said Gu Fei. “Do you not want to go play at that place again?”
Gu Miao lifted her head, and Gu Fei repeated, “Have you made up your mind, you don’t
want to go anymore?”
Gu Miao nodded.
For a long time, Gu Fei was quiet as he looked at her. Then he patted her on the arm and
stood up. He poured himself a glass of water, gulped it all down, and finally said, “Alright
then. We won’t go.”
Gu Miao picked up her skateboard happily and followed him out the door.
“If you’re not going, then gege will go to class in the afternoon,” Gu Fei said.
“You can play by yourself. Gege only has one class this afternoon. I’ll come back right after,
so you don’t have to go wait for me, understand?”
She nodded.
Gu Miao went to Gu Fei’s school with him on her skateboard, before happily zooming back
the way they came.
Gu Fei looked up at the sky and let out a sigh, then slowly walked inside.
Gu Miao didn’t want to go to the rehab center again. He had already tried two times, and on
both occasions, she expressed her resolve via screams. Gu Fei had no way of forcing it. Her
increasingly frequent screaming exhausted both his body and mind.
If she wouldn’t go, then he could only let it be.
He’d dropped by in the morning to get a refund on the fee, but was unsuccessful.
The staff told him that the fee was charged by the term, and not by session, so they could
not give him a refund, but hoped that Gu Miao could continue to attend.
If this was Gu Fei with his old temper, he would surely get the money back, even if he had to
make a scene.
This time, however, he turned and left without saying anything else.
He didn’t want to say another word.
He couldn’t blame Gu Miao, so he blamed only himself. The center had trial classes that
charged by the session so people could try it out before committing.
He didn’t let Gu Miao do the trial class, because she’d been there before, and it seemed to be
good for her.
But now, after paying so much money, Gu Miao refused to go. Other than exasperation, he
didn’t even have the strength to feel angry.
“Gu Fei.” The class leader found him after class. “Do you have a minute?”
“Mhm,” Gu Fei answered as he gathered up his stuff.
“Here’s the thing,” the class leader said. “You know about the school event coming up?”
“I don’t,” Gu Fei answered.
He really didn’t know. Aside from coming to class, he wouldn’t spend an extra minute on
campus, and never interacted with any of his classmates. He would hardly know if
something happened in his class, let alone a school event.
“You don’t even know about the school event?” The class leader laughed. “Bit of a lone wolf,
huh.”
“Get to the point,” said Gu Fei.
“There’s an event along the lines of ‘a song for the school’,” said the class leader. “They’re
hoping that everyone will participate, and help to create a school anthem…”
“No.” Gu Fei cut him off and stood up. “I don’t have time, and I don’t know how.”
“What do you mean you don’t know how. You’re too modest.” The class leader also stood
up. “Your old schoolmate from Fourth High said you can write music.
That’s awesome.”
“Who?”
“It’s just—” The class leader was flustered.
“Whoever said that,” continued Gu Fei. “Tell them to come to me themself.”
“… Gu Fei.” The class leader sighed after a pause. “Every class has someone participating.
They all wish to bring glory to their class…”
“So am I the only one who can bring glory to our class?” asked Gu Fei.
“You don’t have to put it like that.” The class leader frowned. “If you don’t want to do it, just
say so. There’s no need to talk that way.”
“I said in the beginning—I don’t have time.” At that, Gu Fei picked up his things and walked
out of the classroom.
The class leader was not a bad person; he was honest and responsible when it came to class
matters. However, even if Gu Fei wasn’t in an irritable mood at the moment, he wouldn’t
have responded very differently.
Back then at Fourth High, all of the events and activities he’d attended, whether as a school
or as a class, competitions or outings, he had joined only because of Jiang Cheng.
Without Jiang Cheng, he didn’t want to join anything.
Without Jiang Cheng, he wouldn’t even attend this school.
Without Jiang Cheng… He pulled out his phone to check the time, and suddenly missed
Jiang Cheng very much.
Unlike him, Jiang Cheng had many classes at U of R. Now that it was close to finals time,
Jiang Cheng certainly had no time to chat with him. Even their conversations at night before
bed were shortened and filled with Jiang Cheng’s chain of yawns. Though these days, it was
mostly Jiang Cheng talking, and him listening.
As he approached the gate, Gu Fei finally sent Jiang Cheng a message. He couldn’t help
himself.
– nothing’s happening but I just wanted to tell you that I suddenly miss you a lot It might’ve
been three seconds at most after Gu Fei sent the message, before he even had a chance to
put his phone back into his pocket, when he received a call from Jiang Cheng.
“You’re not in class?” Gu Fei answered the phone.
“I don’t have class right now.”
He could hear the smile in Jiang Cheng’s voice.
“I’m about to collect my things and go spend the evening at the library.”
“Are you not going to eat?” Gu Fei asked.
“Of course. Zhao Ke and I will take turns going to eat, so one of us can stay and save the
seat,” said Jiang Cheng. “What about you? Done with class?”
“Mhm. I’m about to head back,” said Gu Fei. “Planning to go out later and shoot some night
scenes.”
“Where?” Jiang Cheng immediately asked.
“That place where you arranged the glowing bricks, on my birthday,” Gu Fei said. “The
grass is wilted now. I’ll go take some photos at sunset, and at night time too.”
“I want to see them,” said Jiang Cheng.
“I’ll send it to you after I finish editing.” Gu Fei smiled.
“Do you still have data?” Jiang Cheng asked. “I suddenly want to see your face, right now.”
“Of course there’s enough data to look at my face,” said Gu Fei. “But it might be pushing it if
you’re planning to rub one out while you look.”
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng laughed for a while. “Just your face is fine.”
Gu Fei hung up and sent him a video call request.
When Jiang Cheng’s face appeared on his screen, he suddenly felt an aching pang in his
heart.
It was a while since they last had a video call. Jiang Cheng only had time to chat at night
before bed time, but that wasn’t a good time to video call. It had been a month at least since
he last saw Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng had lost weight.
The weight loss was very obvious, and not just because he was his boyfriend.
Anyone with eyes could see that Jiang Cheng had gotten skinnier—even his chin was
pointier. He also looked exhausted.
“How did you lose so much weight?” Gu Fei frowned.
“Did I?” Jiang Cheng touched his face. “No way. I’ll weigh myself tomorrow in the cafeteria.
It doesn’t feel like I did.”
“What have you been eating every day?” asked Gu Fei. “You didn’t even lose this much
weight in the last year of high school, the way you were grinding back then. Didn’t you say
the food’s pretty good at your school?”
“It is pretty good. Besides, all three of my meals have meat in them…” Jiang Cheng took out
a mirror from his drawer, then turned around in his chair so he could lean against his desk.
“I look in the mirror every day, and never thought I look skinnier. Maybe it’s the camera
that makes me look thin?”
Gu Fei could see the books on Jiang Cheng’s desk. The small bookshelf was packed full, and
Gu Fei spotted at a glance one of the books behind Jiang Cheng’s ear.
Psychology something. Just as he narrowed his eyes to get a better look, Jiang Cheng moved
the phone closer until his face filled up the whole screen.
“Still skinny?” he asked.
“Yes.” Gu Fei nodded. “Have you been studying too hard? I saw all those books
on your shelf—are they all for your courses?”
“Yeah, though it’s not that bad really.” Jiang Cheng smiled and turned the camera toward
his shelf. “There’s only three and half shelves, it’s just that there’s a bunch of…materials.”
Jiang Cheng’s view shook violently, as if he suddenly noticed something, before the camera
was swiftly turned back to himself. However, Gu Fei was pretty sure
—though with a fleeting glance it was still hard to tell—that he saw the words
“psychology”, “psychiatry”, and “psychological therapy” in the titles of several books in a
row.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei gave him a little smile and said very quietly, “Please take care of yourself,
Cheng-ge.”
“Don’t worry,” Jiang Cheng said. “These days, I go for a run every morning.”
“I’m not saying you don’t exercise,” Gu Fei said. “But when it comes to…
studying, there should be a limit. Don’t work too hard. I’m not trying to scare you, but you
really do look a lot skinnier.”
“I got it.” Jiang Cheng smiled, then brought the phone closer and gave the camera a smooch.
“Don’t make me worried about you.” Gu Fei watched him on the screen. Jiang Cheng had
taken off the bandage above his right eyebrow, but up-close to the camera like this, Gu Fei
could see a very small scar.
No. It wasn’t a scar. A wound this small would’ve long healed—no way would it still be
visible.
Feilock Gulmes stared at the mark for less than two seconds before he figured it out.
Jiang Cheng had a habit of twirling a pen in his hand when he studied, and most of the time
the tip of the pen was pointed up. This scar must’ve been from the tip of a pen.
Furthermore, the tiny slash looked just like the dot left in his own palm from when he
poked himself with a pen in elementary school.
And as to how the pen got all the way up there, there was no need for Feilock Gulmes to
deduce that.
After ending the call, Gu Fei felt a tumult of emotions.
His mind was a scrambled mess as he rode his bike back against the chilly wind.
Jiang Cheng had sent him his class schedule before. Gu Fei wasn’t able to memorize the
whole thing, but he knew for a fact that Jiang Cheng wasn’t taking anything related to
psychology.
Jiang Cheng was reading psychology textbooks for Gu Miao.
The moment that was clear to him, Gu Fei hardly knew what he felt.
It was always his fear that Jiang Cheng would take Gu Miao on as his own weight to carry.
He couldn’t bear for Jiang Cheng to work himself to the bones for his sake.
Nobody had ever done something like that for him. A crushing pressure that not even direct
kin could share, and now Jiang Cheng had silently taken it on, just like that.
Gu Fei could no longer tell whether the sharp tartness in his heart was because he was
touched, or an ache for Jiang Cheng, or his own sense of helplessness.
Only that the air around him was full of restlessness.
Gu Miao was in the store. Gu Fei made a detour back home to pick up his camera before
coming here. Usually when he went out to take photos, he rarely took Gu Miao along unless
she was the subject. But he decided to bring her today.
He had been trying hard recently to let Gu Miao accept some amount of change.
For example, no more promises that gege wouldn’t leave. And for another example,
screaming no longer elicited immediate consolation from him.
The results of which, however, were not ideal.
He was planning to take it easy for a time, to first make up the funds he’d spent on Gu
Miao’s rehab classes, and then proceed from there.
But just now, seeing Jiang Cheng’s weight loss in the span of one short month and the books
on that shelf, he felt like he had no time to slow down.
Jiang Cheng would surely say that he didn’t mind, that he was willing, that there was no
problem and he could do it.
But Gu Fei wasn’t willing.
He couldn’t accept a romance that left no room for even a moment of levity.
As long as there was no change with Gu Miao, he and Jiang Cheng would never be able to
escape this life. And even if Jiang Cheng could hold on under the crushing pressure, what
would be the point of it?
Why should Jiang Cheng be the one to bear the pressure of his life?
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei set his camera bag on the counter and called out to Gu Miao, who was
hopping up and down the front steps on her skateboard. “Wanna come
take photos with gege?”
Gu Miao’s head quickly emerged from between the door curtains, looking at him with
glistening eyes.
“How did you work up a sweat on such a cold day… Hat, scarf,” Gu Fei looked at her, “and
mittens; put them on properly. It’s windy out—you’ll catch a cold if you go out all sweaty
like this.”
Gu Miao came into the store and armed herself according to his instructions, then looked at
him expectantly.
Perhaps it had been too long since he last took her out to play—she was surprisingly
obliging right now.
“Let’s go.” Gu Fei picked up his camera bag.
“Da-Fei.” Liu Li poked his head in from the back courtyard. “Get some yam vermicelli on
your way back later.”
“Don’t you have it in the store?” Gu Fei turned around.
“She won’t eat it.” Liu Li pointed at Gu Miao. “Just now, I asked if she wanted vermicelli, and
she nodded. Then I showed her the bag, and that little popcorn temper straight up threw
the bag on the ground.”
“… I see.” Gu Fei sighed. “I’ll bring some back.”
Once outside, he flicked the top of Gu Miao’s head with a finger. “Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao looked up at him.
“Don’t be so rude to Uncle Liu,” said Gu Fei. “Even if you don’t want to eat something, you
don’t throw it on the ground, okay?”
Gu Miao nodded.
“You’re so good today,” Gu Fei marveled.
The road was uneven around these parts. Gu Miao couldn’t skate on it, so she walked by his
side holding her skateboard the whole way.
By the time they reached the place where Jiang Cheng had arranged the glowing bricks,
there was finally some flat ground. She immediately hopped up on her skateboard and
zoomed ahead.
Gu Fei hadn’t been here in a long time. He’d only come back once after his birthday.
Standing here now, memories flooded him: That summer night, the breeze that
carried a slight warmth, and Jiang Cheng’s bright eyes and smile in the darkness.
“Follow the light. Go get your present.” Jiang Cheng’s voice was especially crisp in his
memory.
And then there was that swathe of colorful lights.
Gu Fei stood there in silence.
There was no trace left now, from that day when they were both eighteen. The scene before
him returned to its usual bleak desolation.
The mostly chipped paint on the abandoned outdoor exercise equipment was the only
colour in sight.
Aside from that, there were the withered weeds, yellow dirt, and the snow piled up on the
sides of the road. Fortunately, the sun was still out. There was good lighting at this time of
day, and it covered all this with a layer of warmth.
Gu Fei found a rock to sit on, took out his camera, put on a lens, and slowly scanned his
surroundings through the viewfinder.
A red blur flitted past in front of his lens.
Gu Miao was wearing a red puffer jacket today. She dashed across the stark landscape with
a bright and saturated vivacity.
Gu Fei didn’t press the shutter on time. He whistled to her.
Gu Miao quickly responded and flew by in front of him once more. He snapped two shots.
“Amazing, Er-Miao!” He looked down at the screen as Gu Miao still filled his peripheral
vision. “Like a little fairy!”
Gu Miao was in high spirits. It had been way too long since she came out to take photos
with her big brother, and now with these praises, she continued streaking back and forth in
front of Gu Fei.
“You’re making me dizzy.” Gu Fei laughed. “Go over there and—”
Before he could finish his sentence and as he looked up, Gu Miao zoomed past once again
like a gust of wind and snatched the camera out of his hands.
“Er-Miao!” Gu Fei called out to her, jumping to his feet. The camera was too heavy, and she
wasn’t holding it properly. “Stop!”
Gu Miao was overexcited. Perhaps because Gu Fei hadn’t been looking at her for a while,
she got a little impatient.

Gu Fei’s words didn’t make much of a difference. Still in her own excited little world, Gu
Miao kept going on her skateboard without stopping until she’d sped all the way to the side
of the road, then made a sharp turn.
It was too late for Gu Fei to chase after her. He watched as the camera slipped from her
hand and smashed to the ground, with the lens facing down.
“GU MIAO!” he yelled.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5889
TL word count: 4070
TL time: 3:26:08
Edit time: 00:45:09
Curse words: 1x fuck
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!
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First posted: July 21, 2022
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Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 121
“WHY!”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Perhaps it was the scare from the camera hitting the ground, or perhaps because Gu Fei
had shouted her full name for the first time, or both.
Gu Miao fell off her skateboard and landed on her bum, her eyes wide with fright.
“How many times have I told you!” Gu Fei walked up to her, not even bothering to check the
degree of damage on the camera. The rush of unsuppressable rage was shooting up inch by
inch within him. “You can’t do that!”
There was no visible reaction from Gu Miao, who only stared back at him with wide eyes.
“WHY CAN’T YOU REMEMBER!” Gu Fei bellowed once more. “WHY
CAN’T YOU REMEMBER!”
Silence.
This endless silence from Gu Miao made him feel suffocated, almost as though he was
locked in a soundless space for a long time. He could practically hear the sound of blood
coursing through his vessels.
“WHY!” Gu Fei shouted at her.
He put almost all of his strength into this word. He could see that Gu Miao shuddered
visibly.
His whole life, he had never yelled with such fervour, putting the whole of his being into it.
Let alone directing it at Gu Miao.
The hopeless rage had broken through his last line of defense.
All these years growing up, when confronted with his life, he had made a habit of restraint
and endurance, sealing himself off from the crowd.
Yet, in this moment, his bottled up emotions could no longer be restrained by reason. He
wanted to scream, to shout, to violently shatter something, to tear it apart.
Why?
“WHY!” Gu Fei could hear that his own voice was on the verge of breaking.
But it wasn’t enough. Not enough.
The anger and reluctance to concede, the despair and grudging resignation—
buried in his body was a trapped beast, roaring as it charged madly and desperately in all
directions.
“IS IT MY FAULT! IS IT MY FAULT?” Gu Fei cried out. “THE WAY YOU
ARE! THE WAY I AM! IS IT MY FAULT?”
“What did I do wrong?! Why do I have to carry all this! WHY!” Gu Fei stared at Gu Miao.
“Tell me, Gu Miao! Why! Why should I have to live like this?!
WHY?”
“WHOSE FAULT IS IT? WHOSE FAULT IS IT?” Gu Fei felt like he was about to explode. He
turned and kicked hard at a piece of brick on the ground.
The shattered pieces flew everywhere.
“WHY IS IT ME?” Gu Fei continued kicking at the rubble on the ground.
“WHY? WHY?”
Behind him, Gu Miao, who had stood frozen in place the whole time, began to scream.
“AHH—” Gu Fei turned around and joined her. “AHH——”
Sitting on the ground with her arms around her knees and her eyes tightly shut, Gu Miao
continued screaming.
“Scream! Go ahead and scream! AHHH—” Gu Fei yelled. “I want to scream too! Scream!
Gege will scream with you! AHH—”
“Do you have tutoring today too?” Zhao Ke was looking at Jiang Cheng, who was about to
head out the door with his backpack. “Don’t you tutor on the weekend?”
“Her mom introduced me to another classmate of hers—Friday after school and Saturday
morning.” Jiang Cheng stuffed a thermos of hot chocolate into his bag.
“I’m leaving. Save a spot for me tonight. I can make it back in time—it’s not that far.”
Zhao Ke didn’t answer. Jiang Cheng waved at him before running out of the room.
There was no time to eat. He made do with two fried drumsticks he bought on the way
there, and washed it down with the hot chocolate.
Gu Fei said he’d lost weight. He knew it was true, but didn’t expect it to be so obvious that
Gu Fei could tell with a single glance. When he went to weigh himself after, he found out
that he’d lost more than ten pounds.
Tsk tsk.
Jiang Cheng decided to start eating night snacks. Though to be honest, he didn’t get very
hungry at night. But if he didn’t gain back the weight, his boyfriend would surely worry.
Tutoring kids in and of itself was not difficult for Jiang Cheng. The annoying part was that
the kids all had such personalities. To have someone only a couple years older as a tutor,
they all started off recalcitrant, always looking for a way to take him down a peg.
Take today’s student, for example, wearing his sulk right on his face. The message was: You
think you’re better than me? Going to U of R doesn’t mean you’re all that, anyone can do it
with the question-banking strategy.
Jiang Cheng had no choice but to out-conceit them, dealing with the problem with a “take
your pick of any of your textbooks or materials, and if I can’t solve it, I’ll show myself out;
otherwise you can shut up”.
When he came out of the student’s home, he was right on time to make it to the library.
On his way back to campus, he got a call from Xu Xingzhi.
“I have a few case studies here that are similar to the little sister’s. I’ll go find you later,”
said Xu Xingzhi. “You can look over them, and I’ll get some more in-depth information and
tell you what I think about it.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng immediately answered. “Was treatment effective for all those cases?”
“Not all of them were effective. Therapy is a long process,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“These cases are also not exactly like the little sister’s, but some of the details can give you a
clearer idea of what these kinds of cases are like.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I’m almost there. I’ll see you outside the campus gate.”
Jiang Cheng hung up and quickened his steps.
It would appear that Xu Xingzhi was willing to help. They had been in constant contact
lately, and Xu Xingzhi asked a lot of questions about Gu Miao. If he could be certain after
today’s meeting that Xu Xingzhi could help, then he could finally break the news to Gu Fei.
If Gu Miao could improve…
“Not all of them were effective.”
Jiang Cheng’s footsteps halted briefly. If it wasn’t effective, he didn’t dare to think how
much of a blow would that be for Gu Fei.
He quickly shook his head. He had been reading quite a few psychology textbooks over the
last little while. Whether it was shutting herself off from the world, or the ability to relate to
the external environment, Gu Miao’s condition wasn’t the most serious.
Her biggest issue stemmed from the fact that she never received proper, systematic
treatment. Even worse, she never even had a precise assessment about her condition and
its pathology. It was possible that she had missed the optimal time frame for treatment, but
it would certainly not be ineffective.
The fact that Jiang Cheng’s appearance and departure elicited such a response from her
was the best proof of that.
When Jiang Cheng arrived outside the gate, Xu Xingzhi was already there, with half of his
face covered by a scarf.
“Sorry!” Jiang Cheng jogged up to him. “When did you get here? It must be cold!”
“Two minutes.” Xu Xingzhi took a look at him and pulled his scarf down a little.
“Were you out having fun?”
“Who’s got the time for that—I was tutoring.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Have you eaten?”
“Nope. Are you buying?” asked Xu Xingzhi.
“Sure, I’ll treat you,” said Jiang Cheng. “I haven’t eaten either.”
“Sounds good.” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “Let’s go to the cafeteria…”
“No no, let’s go there.” Jiang Cheng pointed up ahead. “I want a meaty meat pie.
Zhao Ke said a new one opened up there. They’re running a promotion—buy one get one
free.”
“Alright.” Xu Xingzhi nodded.
Jiang Cheng took a few steps before he paused, turned around, and looked back at Xu
Xingzhi. “I forgot to ask what you want to eat. Is there anything you want?
We can go there instead.”
“Meat pie,” said Xu Xingzhi.
The meat pies at this place were pretty good; they had a large variety of fillings.
It was a good complement to the ones at Wang Xu’s place. Jiang Cheng took a bite of one
and snapped a photo to send to Gu Fei.
– the kind of filling Jiuri doesn’t have at his place! I’m going to sell this secret recipe to him
when I go back for CNY haha
Gu Fei didn’t respond. Jiang Cheng checked the time. He was probably eating dinner or
keeping Gu Miao company right about now.
“So…” He figured he should probably wait to mention it until after the meal, but he was too
impatient. “Should I take a look at those cases now?”
Xu Xingzhi smiled as he took out a binder from his bag and handed it to him.
“I’ve printed them out.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng took the binder with barely contained eager
anticipation.
Inside the binder was a thick stack of materials. He did a cursory flip through and saw that
there were almost twenty cases in total, including autism, post-traumatic stress disorder,
and more.
“The little sister’s behavior so far doesn’t seem like it’s limited to one specific condition,” Xu
Xingzhi said as he ate. “If I see her in person, then I’ll be able to say for sure based on her
feedback. Also, her life before and after the injury, her daily environment, the relationship
with her family and with strangers, and how she reacts to things—these I have to see for
myself before I can give an assessment.”
“Okay. I’ll discuss it with my friend.” Jiang Cheng nodded, but then was still a little hesitant.
“So, his little sister’s case… You can help, right? You’re sure?”
“What?” Xu Xingzhi laughed. “We’re already here. I wouldn’t be talking to you about all this
if I can’t.”
Jiang Cheng was so overwhelmed that he almost stood up from his seat. “Thank you! Thank
you, senior!”
“You’re welcome,” said Xu Xingzhi. “Were you waiting to confirm with me before broaching
the subject with your friend? You’re afraid that he’ll be disappointed?”
“…Yeah.” Jiang Cheng was a little embarrassed. “My friend… He really does have a hard life.
I’m afraid that he’ll be disappointed again.”
“Sounds like a very important friend,” Xu Xingzhi said, one finger supporting his temple.
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. “Very important. Extremely important.”
“Understood.” Xu Xingzhi nodded.
Jiang Cheng realized something and swiftly glanced in his direction. There was a smile at
the corner of Xu Xingzhi’s eyes, but it was a smile that didn’t contain anything else, only a
simple “ah, I understand”.
I guess he really does. Jiang Cheng sighed to himself. He suddenly got a feeling that when
dealing with professionals in this field, he could be seen right through at any given
moment. Not to mention, he must’ve made it rather obvious.
“But,” after a couple gulps of soup, Jiang Cheng felt trepidatious again, “how should we
bring her here?”
“No need to bring her here,” said Xu Xingzhi. “Talk to your friend. I can make a trip there
over winter break.”
“Really?” Jiang Cheng could hardly control his eyebrows from rising all the way up his
forehead.
“Yeah,” Xu Xingzhi nodded, “really. I have my own considerations too. With the information
you provided so far about the little sister’s condition, treatment would be quite meaningful.
Besides, I’ve never handled a case like hers before.”
“Thank you.” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what else he could possibly say.
“You…seem to have lost quite a bit of weight?” Xu Xingzhi said, looking at him. “I don’t think
your chin wasn’t this pointy the last time I saw you.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng pinched his chin. “I guess the fillers are working? You can tell it’s
pointier?”
“Yeah.” Xu Xingzhi paused for a second before laughing out loud. “Don’t put so much
pressure on yourself. There’ll be a solution for the money issue.”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t even bring himself to feel embarrassed anymore at being seen through
once again. He just smiled and said, “I’m alright. Lots of my classmates are also tutoring on
the side.”
“The money is the next step,” said Xu Xingzhi. “Right now, you just focus on telling your boy
—”
Jiang Cheng lurched upright. Xu Xingzhi didn’t complete his enunciation of the word “boy”,
but quickly went on to finish his sentence with a composed expression and not so much as
a stutter: “Focus on talking this through with your friend. The trust and cooperation of
family members is key to the success of the treatment. Take the little sister’s case, for
example, we won’t be able to move forward if her family doesn’t cooperate.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng said, looking at him. “Yeah.”
Xu Xingzhi smiled. “You can ask me any time if there’s anything you don’t understand.”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng continued.
The semi-professional psychiatrist who could see through everyone just made a Freudian
slip.
For some reason, he felt like laughing.
He didn’t mind that Xu Xingzhi had noticed something. They didn’t really know each other
before, but now, after some time, Xu Xingzhi always gave him the feeling that he could be
trusted. When they were together, he found that he was able to quickly relax, even when he
felt awkward.
Which was why Xu Xingzhi’s smoothly glossed over slip of the tongue allowed Jiang Cheng
to suddenly drop his inhibition and loosen up.
It was a good thing. If he knew, then so be it. After all, Jiang Cheng had been running himself
to the ground on this matter for Gu Fei. It would be exhausting if he also had to hide their
relationship at the same time.
“Those meat pies were pretty good.” Xu Xingzhi rubbed his belly as he walked out of the
eatery. “Next time we eat here I’ll treat you.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “If you make the trip up there during winter break, I can
show you this other meat pie place. It’s one hundred percent guaranteed delicious.”
“Sure.” Xu Xingzhi laughed.
The meal didn’t take too long. After saying goodbye to Xu Xingzhi at the gate, Jiang Cheng
made a dash for the library, the new binder in his arms.
“I thought you weren’t coming. I even told people that you got diarrhea,” Zhao Ke
whispered. “It was getting a little awkward saving this seat for you.”
“Sorry about that,” Jiang Cheng also whispered as he sat down. “I’ll get you food later.”
“What were you doing?” asked Zhao Ke. “I thought tutoring only takes an hour?”
“Xu Xingzhi came to see me so we talked for a while,” said Jiang Cheng. “He agreed to help
my friend’s little sister.”
“Really? That’s great,” said Zhao Ke. “Though I honestly didn’t expect him to
agree so easily.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
“He’s pretty unreachable most of the time,” said Zhao Ke. “Usually, if anyone asked him
about therapy, he’d refer them to someone else. Besides, the little sister lives so far away.”
“He said her case is a little more unusual,” Jiang Cheng said.
“With such an impressive mentor, what unusual cases has he not seen,” said Zhao Ke.
“So…” Jiang Cheng looked at Zhao Ke blankly, suddenly a little disoriented at this new
information.
Zhao Ke looked back at him.
Then, it was as though they both had a sudden epiphany.
“You…” Zhao Ke was about to continue, when another student sitting beside them knocked
gently on the table.
“Sorry about that. Sorry.” They apologized to the other person at the same time,
immediately ended the conversation, and put their heads down to study.
After the library closed for the night, Jiang Cheng took Zhao Ke out for a night snack. He had
chicken wings, while Zhao Ke got deep-fried scorpions.
“How can you bring yourself to eat these things?” Jiang Cheng could never understand this.
Zhao Ke held a skewer of scorpion up to Jiang Cheng’s mouth. “These are the kinds of
puzzles you solve through actual practice.”
“I don’t need to solve this puzzle.” Jiang Cheng dodged out of the way.
On their way back to the dorm after eating, Jiang Cheng took out his phone for a quick look.
He messaged Gu Fei as soon as they came out of the library, but even after the food, Gu Fei
still hadn’t responded. He hadn’t heard from Gu Fei since the message he sent this
afternoon at the meat pie place until now.
This was something that never happened before.
Did something come up?
Was he too busy?
Did he fall asleep?
Jiang Cheng went back and forth on whether he should give Gu Fei a call, but after a long
time of staring at his phone, he still didn’t make the call.
If it was before, he wouldn’t have hesitated, but recently he always felt that Gu Fei was
under a lot of pressure. Or was it himself who was under too much pressure? He worried
that he would be calling at a bad time.
Would it distract Gu Fei from working on his photos?
Would it disturb Gu Fei from playing with Gu Miao?
Would it disrupt Gu Fei’s sleep?
“Did you tell Xu Xingzhi,” Zhao Ke glanced at him, “about you and your boyfriend?”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng turned to him.
As their eyes met, the apprehensive feeling from the library emerged again.
“He…” This time, nobody interrupted him, so Jiang Cheng finished his question.
“Xu Xingzhi, is…?”
“Yeah,” Zhao Ke answered.
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng blinked. “How did you know?”
“I used to think that he’s going out with Zhao Jin,” said Zhao Ke. “So I asked.
His sexual orientation isn’t a secret.”
“… Why didn’t you say so at the start?” Jiang Cheng was shocked.
“Why would I say that? It’s none of my business,” Zhao Ke said, looking at him.
“He was going to be treating the little girl, not going on arranged dates with you.”
“Ah. True.” Jiang Cheng was still unable to fully recover.
“Did you tell him that it’s your boyfriend’s little sister?” asked Zhao Ke.
“No,” Jiang Cheng said. “But I feel like…he’s figured it out.”
“Oh.” Zhao Ke didn’t say anything else.
Back in the dorm, Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi were both on their bunks, still studying.
Jiang Cheng put his stuff away before walking out into the corridor with his phone.
He still wanted to give Gu Fei a call. After all, it was unprecedented that Gu Fei would go a
whole day without contacting him.
He glanced at the clock. Usually at this time, Gu Fei would not be asleep yet. He made the
call.
It was followed by a long silence, so long that he almost thought that the call button hadn’t
been pressed.
Just as he was about to check, a voice came on the line.
“We’re sorry. The number you have dialed is unavailable at the moment. Please try again at
a later time.”
Jiang Cheng stared in confusion. Unavailable?
He hung up and called again.
Still, it didn’t go through..
Did Gu Fei’s phone run out of battery? Or was there something wrong with his own phone?
Jiang Cheng rebooted his phone and tried calling for a third time.
“We’re sorry. The number you have dialed is unavailable at the moment. Please try again at
a later time.”
What’s going on?
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a little anxious. Frowning, he hung up the call, opened WeChat,
and tapped into Gu Fei’s Moments.
The last post was from last week. It was a photo of the rising sun, the light shining through
the space between a few old buildings, the flare drawing out across the frame. The caption
was only two words: good morning.
Below that was a comment from Jiang Cheng, who replied with a sun emoji.
He couldn’t find anything wrong in Gu Fei’s WeChat Moments. Jiang Cheng didn’t know
what he should do.
Technically, there might be all sorts of reasons for the call not going through: dead battery;
broken phone; or the phone was placed in the pocket and then put in a closet somewhere.
But for some reason, in this moment, Jiang Cheng was panicking.
For at least five minutes, he stood in the corridor just spacing off, then he tried calling a few
more times without success.
He opened his contact list and tapped on Li Yan’s name, but after staring at it for a long
time, he closed the contact card.
A few minutes later, he tapped open the contact again, and once again closed it.
Li Yan didn’t live with Gu Fei, nor did they talk to each other every day. He wouldn’t
necessarily know if something had happened to Gu Fei. And besides, calling up his friend
after only one day of no contact seemed…a little strange.
He stayed outside until Zhao Ke poked his head out of their room to check on him. Only
then did he go back in, after sending another message to Gu Fei.
– is something wrong with your phone? I can’t seem to get through, I’m pretty free
tomorrow, call me okay?
“Da-Fei!!” Liu Li was outside, knocking on the bedroom door. “Come outside.
We have to talk.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He remained unmoving where he sat, leaning against the headboard
of the bed.
It was dark in the room—hard to tell what time it was, or whether ‘now’ was yesterday,
today, or tomorrow.
A tiny figure was scrunched up on the little sofa by the window. It was Gu Miao, who had
wrapped her arms around her legs and huddled herself into a ball.
He wasn’t sure how much time had passed. Maybe it wasn’t that long, or maybe it had been
a whole lifetime. Gu Miao had stayed huddled up in the little corner of the sofa, not moving,
not eating, and not drinking.
Gu Fei could not describe how he felt.
He couldn’t tell what kind of blow he had dealt to her with that round of shouting. The fact
was, Gu Miao, who was so frightened by his outburst of rage that she wouldn’t stop shaking
and screaming, still refused to leave his room.
And Gu Fei didn’t know what to do.
Liu Li was very angry.
Gu Fei could understand why.
His little sister had been shouted back into her shell. When his mom came to demand an
explanation from him, he shoved her to the ground. When Liu Li stepped up to stop him, he
turned and gave the guy a beating.
Gu Fei didn’t know what was wrong with himself.
At this moment, such appalling violence seemed to have become his best form of release.
When he exploded in rage, when he raised his hand, he could almost see the person who
once terrified him by the mere sound of his footsteps.
In that instant, he felt confused and horrified.
He didn’t know how long Liu Li was outside, knocking. It wasn’t until the voice on the other
side of the door changed to Li Yan’s, did he turn his head slightly.
“Da-Fei,” Li Yan said. “I’m not here to talk. I’m here to remind you.”
Gu Fei looked at the door.
“It’s been two days,” said Li Yan. “Jiang Cheng hasn’t been able to reach you for two days.
The least you can do is give him a call. Out of everyone who cares about you, he’s the only
one who has no idea what’s going on.”
Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei leaned a little further back, pressing his head against the wall.
Has it been two days?
In the midst of his numbness, he suddenly felt a little ache in his heart.
“I’m going in now,” Li Yan said. “I’m breaking the lock. And if you dare lift a hand against me
when I go in, then I’ll terminate our friendship.”
Gu Fei struggled to sit up a little straighter.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5864
TL word count: 4004
TL time: 4:56:52
Edit time: 00:47:03
Curse words: 1x fuck
TL’s Notes:
:(((((((
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT!

AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: July 27, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 122
There was no hurdling in the winter.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
It wasn’t clear what Li Yan used to pry the door open. He came in with two glasses of water
in hand, and turned on the light switch with his elbow.
The sudden flood of light that filled the room made Gu Fei feel suffocated. The throbbing
pain in his eyes rapidly radiated out, as his head, neck, and shoulder, all proceeded to feel
the soreness.
He lifted a hand to shield his eyes. “Turn it off.”
As he spoke, they were both taken aback. The voice was so raspy, he could hardly tell that it
belonged to himself. It felt like his mouth was filled with sand.
Li Yan set the water down before switching the light off again. Then he turned on the desk
lamp and turned the lampshade so that it faced downward.
The light dimmed in the room, and Gu Fei felt much better.
“Have some water, Er-Miao.” Li Yan crouched down in front of Gu Miao. “You must be
thirsty.”
It was a few moments later when Gu Miao finally stirred. She took the glass, threw her head
back, and started chugging. She downed the whole glass of water, then wiped her mouth.
“Are you hungry?” asked Li Yan. “Er-Miao, look at me. Are you hungry? If you want, there’s
cake on the table outside, and those jelly cups you like.”
Gu Miao didn’t move, only looked at Gu Fei.
“Your gege is fine,” said Li Yan. “He’ll be out soon. You go ahead and eat first.”
Gu Miao slowly slid down the sofa and, sticking close to the wall, walked out of the room.
Li Yan handed the other glass of water to Gu Fei. “So what exactly happened?
The camera broke?”
Gu Fei didn’t answer while he took a sip.
Maybe it had been too long since he last ate, drank, or spoke, but when the water slid down
his throat, it stung a little.
He felt slightly better after another few gulps, but the stuffy feeling didn’t go away. It was
then that he realized, his throat must be inflamed and swollen.
The dull numbness finally dissipated somewhat from Gu Fei’s body as he slowly finished
the glass of water, but this was immediately followed by a rush of fatigue and weakness.
It wasn’t physical. It was a deep sense of powerlessness that arose from the bottom of his
mind. He didn’t want to move ever again. Whichever way the wind blew, he would fall that
way; wherever the water flowed, he would go along with the current.
He didn’t want to struggle anymore.
“Has Jiang Cheng called you?” Gu Fei asked.
His voice was still raspy. It sounded terrible even in his own ears.
“Mhm,” said Li Yan. “I told him you dropped your phone and broke it.”
“Did he believe you?” Gu Fei asked.
“No,” Li Yan said.
“My phone really is broken.” Gu Fei lifted his hand. “Let me use yours for a sec.”
Li Yan took out his phone and placed it in Gu Fei’s hand.
As the cell phone landed in his palm, it felt as if the strength of his entire arm wasn’t
enough to support the little bit of weight. Or rather, in that moment, the phone felt like a
brick. His hand dropped limply onto the bed with the phone.
“Why don’t you go watch Gu Miao for a while,” he finally said after a few seconds.
“Da-Fei.” Li Yan looked at him as if wanting to say something.
Gu Fei didn’t look at Li Yan, who stood beside him for a while before turning to leave,
closing the door behind him.
The most recent entry in Li Yan’s call log was Jiang Cheng’s number, from an hour ago.
Gu Fei stared at the name until the screen blacked out.
He stared blankly for a long time before turning on the screen again, and tapping once on
Jiang Cheng’s name.
The phone gently vibrated before he even raised it to his ear, indicating that
Jiang Cheng picked up the call on the other end. “Li Yan?”
“Me,” Gu Fei said.
“Gu Fei?” There was an urgency in Jiang Cheng’s tone, along with a sense of immediate
relief from finally hearing his voice. “Fuck… Is your phone really broken?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei answered.
It felt like a lifetime since he last heard Jiang Cheng’s voice. He closed his eyes.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng paused. “Are you sick? Why is your voice so hoarse?”
“Sore throat,” said Gu Fei.
“Did…something happen?” Jiang Cheng asked.
The hesitant, careful line of questioning made Gu Fei’s heart clench, as if someone was
grabbing it and squeezing tightly.
“Er-Miao dropped my camera and broke the lens,” Gu Fei said.
“Ah. She probably wasn’t holding it properly, huh?” It took a second, but Jiang Cheng’s voice
quickly eased and lightened up. “Is that all? Which lens is it? I’ll get you one. Your Cheng-ge
just picked up the tutoring money today.”
“I smashed my phone to pieces,” said Gu Fei.
“No problem.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “You’ve been using that phone for a pretty long time,
haven’t you? Last time when I played Aixiaochu for you, it froze for like five seconds when I
played a boss move. Go ahead, Cheng-ge will get you a new—”
“Can you…” Gu Fei cut him off. The obvious disbelief coupled with a forced levity in Jiang
Cheng’s voice pained him, so much so that he could hardly catch his breath. “Stop worrying
about me?”
There was a sudden silence on Jiang Cheng’s end.
Gu Fei was also quiet.
After a moment of silence, Jiang Cheng spoke up, “What do you mean by that?”
“How many part-time jobs do you have?” Gu Fei asked.
“Just the two tutoring jobs,” said Jiang Cheng. “On the weekend—”
“No way that two is enough,” said Gu Fei. “With all the things that require
money.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“You’ll probably need three or four to make it work.” Gu Fei closed his eyes.
“You have to go to class, study, learn psychology on the side, work part-time, and on top of
that, ponder over your boyfriend and his little sister’s troubles.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet.
“Do you really look in the mirror?” said Gu Fei. “Do you not know how tired you’ve
become?”
“I’m not tired,” said Jiang Cheng, his voice a little hard.
“You’ve been at school for a whole semester now, and aside from tutoring, have you gone
more than one kilometer away from campus? You mentioned a few times that the other
students went out, why didn’t you go?”
Still, Jiang Cheng was quiet.
“You don’t have the time,” said Gu Fei. “Because you have to spend all of your leisurely time
on your boyfriend and his little sister.”
“Everyone is working pretty hard. I don’t think I’m all that different,” said Jiang Cheng. “I’m
not interested in going anywhere anyways.”
“What is the point of you being in a romantic relationship?” asked Gu Fei. “Do you not see
what this relationship has done to you?”
“There’s no standards for romantic relationships—everyone is different. Why do we have
to be like everyone else?” Jiang Cheng’s voice was starting to get a little hoarse. “I told you, I
don’t mind. I want to do it. I’m not tired. Besides, I already have some leads about Er-Miao
—”
“But I’m tired,” said Gu Fei.
The call suddenly became very quiet, the only sound heard was Jiang Cheng’s breathing.
After a long pause, he finally asked, “What?”
“I’m tired.” Gu Fei repeated.
“What did you say?” There was a tremor in Jiang Cheng’s voice, so raspy that the last two
words practically disappeared.
“I’m tired, Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei enunciated each word carefully. “Stop holding onto me. I don’t
want to be pulled along anymore. Forget it.”
It had gone completely silent on Jiang Cheng’s end. Even the breathing from before was
gone.
Gu Fei held the phone up to his eyes and tapped on the screen to hang up. Then he turned
Li Yan’s phone off.
“Are you alright?” Zhao Ke was standing in the washroom with Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, just waved a hand at him.
“You’ve thrown up what, three times, in one hour?” Zhao Ke checked the time.
“And lost your voice too. And you say you’re alright?”
Jiang Cheng coughed a couple times before turning to the sink beside him to wash his face.
It took more than a dozen splashes of water on his face before he was able to recover
slightly from the immense twisting pain in his stomach.
“You should go get checked in the hospital.” Zhao Ke followed him back to their dorm room.
“I’ve been eating and drinking the same things as you all day, so this can’t be from food
poisoning. Come on, go check it out. What if it’s serious?
Your voice can’t just suddenly disappear like that!”
Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone, opened the notes app, and typed:
– shock response
“Shock?” Zhao Ke looked at him. “What kind of shock did you have that you would respond
like this?”
– you should go to class, I’ll be fine after some sleep
Jiang Cheng gave him a little kungfu salute and turned to go back to their dorm room. He
climbed onto his bunk with clothes on, dived down into the pillow, and closed his eyes.
“Call me if you need anything.” Zhao Ke poured warm water into Jiang Cheng’s thermos and
placed it on his bedside stand, then climbed up the ladder to pull the covers over Jiang
Cheng. He then stood for a while by the bed before leaving.
Go to sleep.
Hurry and fall asleep.
Sleep now.
It’ll be fine once you’re asleep. You won’t know about anything once you’re asleep. You’ll feel
better once you’re asleep. You won’t remember anything once you’re asleep…
Go to sleep.
Don’t think about anything. Just sleep.
But I’m tired.
I’m tired, Cheng-ge.
Stop holding onto me.
Sleep.
Go to sleep.
I’m begging you Jiang Cheng, sleep.
Hurry and fall asleep.
Gu Fei gave up.
Gu Fei actually gave up.
Jiang Cheng could feel his teeth clenching tight. Not only that, his whole body was
extremely tense, even his toes were curled.
His hands too, were balled in fists.
His thumbs, clutched tightly in his palms, were starting to hurt.
His stomach was beginning to act up again, but he knew there was nothing left in there to
throw up, not even water.
He curled in on himself, trying hard to alleviate the waves of discomfort tossing about in his
stomach, but it was no use. The agonizing feeling soon spread up to his chest.
It felt as though someone had grabbed his heart and gripped it tight, squeezing.
He couldn’t breathe—every time he tried, the pain would escape from his chest and crawl
along his nerves to the rest of his body.
His chest; his back; his arms…
I’m having a heart attack.
Do you have a heart condition, Jiang Cheng?
He laughed.
He was laughing so hard that it got a little out of control.
But he couldn’t hear his own voice. There was no sound at all left in him, not even laughter.
Though the tears still flowed.
What a sight.
He thought that he wouldn’t cry. He was a little shell shocked, all over, and still hadn’t quite
come back to reality. He thought he could carry on this way.
But he ended up crying anyway.
Rather devastatingly too.
What a sissy.
There weren’t that many tears. Jiang Cheng wiped his hand over his face. Maybe because
there was no sound.
So this is what losing your voice feels like, he thought. Unable to laugh out loud, or cry out
loud.
His hand touched something soft.
He opened his eyes. The sunny doll beside his pillow was looking back at him, its dark eyes
bright.
In that instant, Jiang Cheng thought he really might have a breakdown.
He pulled the doll into his arms and hugged it fiercely.
AHHHHHH—
He wanted to throw his entire being into crying out, to do it forcefully and loudly. Perhaps
only a completely devoted weeping session could make him feel a little better.
But it was impossible.
He could only hear the raspy rustle in his throat.
How unsatisfying.
How frustrating.
Jiang Cheng spent the whole night curled up in his bunk, unaware if he was awake or
asleep. It was a chaotic night.
When he opened his eyes, he could see a small patch of sunlight on the wall by the front of
his bed.
He stared at it for a long time.
“Jiang Cheng.” Zhao Ke’s voice rang out from beneath. “There’s congee. Come down and
have some.”
Okay.
Jiang Cheng wanted to answer, but his voice still produced no sound. In fact, his muteness
seemed even more comprehensive today.
He sighed softly and slowly sat up.
His head was ready to burst. The moment he sat upright, it felt like everything, in and out of
his body, was weighing him down so much that he could hardly straighten his back.
The sunny doll was still in his arms, its eyes as bright as before.
He put the doll back beside his pillow. Then, as he withdrew his hand, thought for a second,
and reached out again to give it two pats on the head.
When he climbed down from his bunk, Zhao Ke, who never cursed, took one look at him
and exclaimed with utmost sincerity: “Fuck.”
Jiang Cheng touched his own face. It felt alright, he didn’t sense anything out of the
ordinary.
Or…could he have developed a head of stress greys overnight?
He swiftly pulled open his drawer and took out a mirror to check his reflection.
His hair was still dark. Very good.
Though it was certainly messy, and his eyes were swollen. And his face looked unwashed
with imprints from the creases on his pillow. Aside from that, he looked pretty terrible in a
general way, with a sallow complexion.
He tossed the mirror back into the drawer and wiped his face haphazardly with a wet wipe.
“Is your voice any better?” Zhao Ke opened a takeout container on his desk.
Jiang Cheng cleared his throat and attempted an “ah”, but no sound came out. He shook his
head and, sitting down at the desk, accepted the spoon Zhao Ke handed him before
scooping big spoonfuls of congee into his mouth.
“Do you still feel nauseous?” Zhao Ke asked, sitting down beside him.
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“Oh good,” said Zhao Ke. “You scared us the way you were vomiting yesterday.
Lu Shi and Qiqi ran out last night and bought a bunch of medicine, all kinds of nausea
stomach meds.”
Jiang Cheng turned and gave him a little smile.
“You should see the way you’re smiling right now.” Zhao Ke sighed, “If I took a photo and
posted it, I swear your name will never show up on the confession wall ever again.”
Jiang Cheng looked down and burst out laughing at his food.
In total silence.
“You should ask to be excused from class,” said Zhao Ke. “Take the morning off to rest.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“No time off?” Zhao Ke looked at him.
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“… A half day should be okay, right?”
Jiang Cheng tapped a few times on his phone and showed him the screen.
– I can’t stop
“… As you wish, I guess.” Zhao Ke glanced at him and stood up. “Hurry up and eat then. It’s a
big lecture today, we’ll have to squish in the back again if we’re late.”
It could be from the poor sleep he had the night before, Jiang Cheng was unsteady on his
feet as he went to wash up. The soles of his shoes felt fluffier than ever before.
As he washed his face, he started to feel much more awake, but when he straightened up
and the beads of coolness disappeared from his cheeks, he once again sunk back into chaos.
He followed Zhao Ke to lecture, and the entire way, felt like he was walking through a fog.
He couldn’t see clearly, hear clearly, and the ground beneath his feet was unsteady, as if he
was hungover.
“Do you need me to hold you steady?” Zhao Ke turned back and asked.
Fuck off. Jiang Cheng laughed as he mouthed the words.
“Even though I don’t like getting into other people’s business,” Zhao Ke slowed down and
walked beside Jiang Cheng, “if you really want to talk to someone about it, I’m here to
listen.”
Jiang Cheng pointed at his own throat.
“I mean when you can speak again,” said Zhao Ke.
Jiang Cheng nodded.
He didn’t want to talk.
He didn’t want to say anything.
Jiang Cheng didn’t want to tell anyone about this at the moment.
He couldn’t bring himself to think about it—refused to think about it.
Why Gu Fei did that.
What Gu Fei was feeling, when he said those words.
Why .
Why?
Why, would a person who once said “I’ll be your back”, all of a sudden say those words.
Cold and calm. Without leaving any room for negotiation.
Why?
I don’t have a home anymore, Gu Fei.
But it’s alright as long as I have you. You’re family.
The feeling of losing everything, of not having anything concrete within his reach, it wasn’t
something he could bear at the moment.
The lecture hall was already filled with students when they arrived. Lu Shi waved at the
two of them and they squeezed their way over to the seats.
“You sure you’re alright, Jiang Cheng?” Zhang Qiqi turned around from his seat in the row
in front of them. “You look terrible.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head. He took out his textbook, opened it, and started to read.
An Introduction to Economic Law. Jiang Cheng read the five words, but could
not bring himself to understand any more than that.
He closed his eyes.
He only opened them again when the professor started the lecture, forcing himself to
concentrate on the professor.
Normally, he’d be able to do this no matter what else was going on around him.
But he wasn’t so successful today. Within one minute of trying to listen to the lecture, his
mind would start wandering.
He had no choice but to close his eyes again, adjust his breathing, and reopen them.
It didn’t take very long for this sustained mental state to make him feel tired. He felt like his
body would sink straight down, through the chair, the floor, and into the deepest depth.
He was originally planning to stick it out for at least one class, and go back to the dorm to
sleep after if he had to.
But his stomach started hurting again.
How did he become so delicate? He pressed his hand against his stomach.
Contestant Jiang Cheng is so fragile right now! He can’t withstand any more damage! From
the looks of it, if he doesn’t adjust himself soon, it’s gonna be real bad!
Jiang Cheng didn’t make it until the end of class. The intense nauseating feeling once again
overwhelmed him, except at the moment, there were things in his stomach to be puked out.
He stood up with one hand on his stomach and, because he couldn’t wait for Zhao Ke to
make room, swung his leg over to the other side. Even as he landed in the aisle, he felt weak
from the movement in his guts.
“Do you want to throw up?” Zhao Ke gave him a hand, and asked quietly.
Jiang Cheng didn’t have time to answer as he doubled over and jogged toward the door.
He didn’t make it two steps before he realized that it wasn’t going to end well.
The feeling of total fatigue he’d felt the day before after vomiting his guts out suddenly
appeared again, and almost immediately, it felt impossible to take another step.
Fuck.
As his left foot tripped over his right and his whole body pitched forward and down, he
thought about how interesting his life was.
Look, everyone! What a rare sight! In a classroom full of people, Contestant Jiang Cheng
performed a beautiful axle twist mid-run!
“Didn’t you have an old cell phone?” Gu Fei’s mom rummaged through the drawers in the
living room. “Where’d you put it? Why don’t you use that one for now?”
“No,” said Gu Fei.
“Then what will you use?” His mom turned to him.
“I don’t need a phone anymore,” said Gu Fei.
“You…” His mom looked as though she was about to say something, but a few seconds
passed, and she still didn’t get it out.
Gu Fei had class today. He glanced at the clock on the wall. He’d be late unless he left soon.
So be it then, if he was late.
Or perhaps he should just skip the class.
Sitting unmoving on the couch, he watched Gu Miao as she leaned over the coffee table,
drawing.
Gu Miao had been very quiet in the past few days, interacting very little with other people,
whether through body language or eye contact.
She also hardly went on her skateboard, and instead made drawings all day—
rows upon rows of green bunnies. Already there was a pile of bunny-filled pages growing
beside her.
Gu Fei stood up and went back to his room.
There was a camera lens on his desk. Ding Zhuxin had bought it for him. It was even better
than the one before.
He still didn’t throw away the old lens with the shattered glass, though he wasn’t sure why
he’d kept it or what it was still good for. It was like that with many things, kept around
without knowing why, but kept nonetheless.
The stack of colorful phosphorescent bricks in the closet, for example.
Gu Fei closed the windows and door, and pulled the curtains tight. After his
room dimmed down, he opened his closet, the door closest to the wall, and pulled up a
chair to sit in front of it, with a lit cigarette between his lips.
He stared at the section of the closet that had been cleared of clothes, that now contained a
few neatly stacked piles of bricks.
Three cigarettes later, Gu Miao knocked on his door.
Gu Fei stood up, closed the closet door, and opened the curtains and the windows. As the
northerly wind swept in, he closed his eyes and took in a deep breath.
Gu Miao was standing outside the door with a sheet of paper in her hand. When he opened
the door, she handed the paper to him.
It was a recently finished page of green bunnies.
“How pretty,” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao turned and went back to her spot by the coffee table and continued to draw.
“I’m going out for a while.” Gu Fei carefully folded the sheet of paper and placed it beside
his pillow, then picked up the camera on his desk. “If I’m not back by noon, go eat lunch at
the store.”
Gu Miao didn’t respond. Her attention was focused on drawing.
Gu Fei glanced at her, then opened the door and walked out.
It was snowing.
Rather heavily too. By the looks of it, the snow had been falling for a while, he just hadn’t
noticed. No wonder Gu Miao didn’t go out to play on her skateboard.
He tugged on his scarf and buttoned the hood on his puffer jacket. His hand trembled ever
so slightly as he was pulling up the zipper.
“How about we get two? Couples style, what do you think?” Jiang Cheng said from beside
him.
After a few seconds of hesitation, Gu Fei turned to go back home. He dug out another jacket
and switched it on before going out again.
He didn’t take his bike or his motorcycle, or the little bun either. With the camera bag in his
hand, he let his footsteps carry him slowly down the street.
This place hadn’t changed much in the last few decades. The streets were never widened.
Every inch, every step, and every glance, was filled with countless marks.
These were marks left behind by the comings and goings of people.
But the marks you remember, they’re always from that one person.
He’s standing around the corner somewhere, watching your back.
He’s standing behind a window, holding a slingshot, pulled tight and aimed at you.
…
Gu Fei sniffed. He pulled his scarf open a slit so the chilly air could pour in from his chin,
down his neck, and into his body. He quickened his steps.
There was no hurdling in the winter.
Standing at the edge of the roof, there was a thick layer of snow beneath his feet, and the
sharp howls of the wind in his ears.
Looking out, everything was obscured by the whiteness of the snow.
Gu Fei held up his camera and looked through the viewfinder at this suddenly unfamiliar
world.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5924
TL word count: 4191
TL time: ???
Edit time: 00:51:01
Curse words: 4x fucks
TL’s Notes:
* hands tissues*
Chapter 123
“No one knows what the other person needs, only that you’re willing to give”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
“Do you have too much time on your hands?” Gu Fei crouched at the side of the road, a
cigarette in his mouth as he watched the cars drive by before him.
“Weren’t you always going out on dates before? Go. Date. What are you doing staring at me
day in and day out?”
“You think I want to be staring at you today?” Li Yan leaned against a tree nearby. “The way
you look like you’re one foot in your grave, it takes years off my life to even look at you.”
“Hurry up and fuck off then,” said Gu Fei.
“Do you want to check your WeChat?” Li Yan looked down at his phone. “Jiang Cheng would
leave you a comment every other day. Right under that photo you…”
“Don’t mention him.” Gu Fei took a hard drag of his cigarette.
“…Took, with a little sun emoji every time but not for a few days now.” Li Yan quickly
finished his sentence.
Gu Fei stood up and turned to face him.
“I told you, if you dare touch me then we’re done.” Li Yan pointed at him.
“And I said,” Gu Fei walked right up to Li Yan, staring him down, “don’t mention Jiang
Cheng in front of me.”
“I have one last question. After this question, I won’t bring him up ever again,”
said Li Yan.
Gu Fei glared at him in silence.
“Why? Even if you wanted to break up, couldn’t you have chosen a gentler way?
Besides, I’ve always thought that if anyone was going to let go between the two of you, it
would’ve been him,” said Li Yan. “Why would you let him go? Jiang Cheng’s a good guy.”
“This is one?” Gu Fei asked.
“Why don’t you just pick one to answer.” Li Yan tutted.
“So I should drag a good guy down into the mud?” asked Gu Fei.
Li Yan looked back at him for a long time without speaking, and finally, looked down at his
phone and started swiping fervently. “That asshole Liu Fan, where the hell is he!”
It had been a long time since the guys got together. None of them had anything serious to
do with their time on a normal day, but to gather everyone together for a meal still
required some planning.
When Liu Fan arrived driving his crappy little car, he’d already picked up everyone else. His
car was packed full.
“I’ll walk there.” Gu Fei took a glance inside and immediately turned to walk away. Every
time they squished six people in there, he’d feel like the car was going to burst into pieces.
“Get in!” Liu Fan stuck his head out the window. “You’re the lord master after all! Saved the
front passenger seat for you!”
Li Yan dragged him back and stuffed him into the passenger seat, before squeezing into the
back himself. “You’re all fucking lucky that I’m skinny!”
“Here’s an idea, why don’t you guys crowdfund me a new car.” Liu Fan started driving.
“Saves me the complaints when I’m the one who drives everybody.”
“You can remove the entire backseat and put some wooden benches in,” said Chen Jie. “We
can crowdfund you new benches, no problemo.”
“Oh fuck off. Next time you’re walking yourself there,” said Liu Fan.
Gu Fei was quiet the whole time, turning his face to look outside and listening as the others
prattled on.
Meeting friends, eating, drinking, blabbering about nothing, and taking jobs—a calm and
uneventful existence from day to day. He was familiar with this kind of life.
However, that trace of bitterness in his heart never did subside with the return to his old
trajectory, but rather grew even sharper.
It stifled him, until he couldn’t breathe.
The waves of pain that made him unable to sit still kept being pushed down and surging
back up again, over and over.
“What do you think?” Liu Fan turned to him and asked.
“Hm?” Gu Fei answered.
“Li Yan said no to Sichuanese, he said we should go have pork bone hotpot.
What do you think?” said Liu Fan.
“Sure,” Gu Fei replied.
“Let’s go to the one up ahead then. It’s closer, and no one to check us along the way if we get
something to drink,” said Liu Fan.
“Drinking and driving, huh?” Gu Fei blurted out.
Liu Fan glanced at him, but didn’t answer.
Gu Fei continued to stare out the window.
How many marks exactly did Jiang Cheng leave in his mind, and how many memories? Gu
Fei remembered many things as soon as he closed his eyes, things that lingered unable to
be chased away even after he opened his eyes. How much time did he need to begin again
—or rather, was it possible to get used to this new reality?
He used to think that there was nothing that couldn’t be endured, as long as he wanted to.
Everything could be forgotten. Now, he realized that perhaps love was an exception to the
rule.
“Breakup” was a word that meant not an end, but a beginning.
From now on, the first breath he took every day when he opened his eyes would be painful.
Every hour, every minute, and every second, it felt like a fire was burning inside of him. The
agony of being burnt to a crisp was fresh in every passing moment.
“Can’t you tell them you’re taking this weekend off?” Zhao Ke turned to talk to Jiang Cheng
from his seat at the desk. “You can’t even speak, how are you supposed to tutor?”
Jiang Cheng pointed at the laptop in front of him. On the screen was his mostly finished
Powerpoint presentation. He’d planned to go over civics and politics this weekend with his
two students, and the slides were sufficient to explain the material he wanted to cover.
Zhao Ke sighed as he looked at Jiang Cheng, then after a while, dragged his chair up and sat
down beside him. “I’ll go.”
Jiang Cheng blinked at him.
“You refused to stay in the hospital after you fainted two days ago, so at the very least, don’t
try to force your way through tutoring. I’ll go in your place for the sessions this week,” said
Zhao Ke. “Anyways, I’m an honour student too, I fit
the criteria.”
Jiang Cheng laughed and tutted.
“What? My score wasn’t that much lower than yours,” said Zhao Ke. “It won’t be a problem
to substitute a few sessions at the last minute.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head. Exam season was coming up, and everyone was seizing every
free minute to study. He couldn’t let Zhao Ke take so much time out of his own schedule to
tutor for him. It wasn’t right.
He didn’t want to do it even if they weren’t on a time crunch.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t allow himself to stop—he needed to maintain the rhythm he used to
have. No matter how fast it was or how much pressure he was under, he must keep it up.
Once certain tightly wound nerves relaxed, his entire being might fall apart.
It was his proprietary secret for keeping himself from crumpling.
Contestant Jiang Cheng’s secret was not to be used lightly, and when used, was not to be
easily known.
However, his miserly spirit of working his way through sickness effectively moved the
parents of the two students. Since Jiang Cheng claimed that he’d lost his voice due to a
throat inflammation, he received a pile of medicine and two little red packets for his
troubles, in addition to a whole day of paid sick leave.
Fuwa Chengcheng was his moniker for a reason.
When Jiang Cheng returned to the campus with the red packets in his pocket, he was
mighty impressed with himself.
His roommates should be in the library at this hour, so Jiang Cheng walked back to the
dorms as he pulled out his phone to send Zhao Ke a message, wanting to know if there were
any more seats. He was surprised when he found Zhao Ke sitting in their room, studying.
Hearing the door, Zhao Ke turned around. Jiang Cheng cocked his head to indicate a
question.
“How was it? Successful?” asked Zhao Ke.
Jiang Cheng nodded, pulling out the red packets and waving them.
“Oho,” Zhao Ke laughed, “compassion pay, huh?”
Jiang Cheng nodded. He set his things down first, then started tapping on his
phone.
– you didn’t go to the library?
“No,” said Zhao Ke. He paused for a moment before turning back to Jiang Cheng. “I don’t
usually butt into other people’s business, but…”
Jiang Cheng leaned against the bunk, looking back at him.
“You’re the only one I’m close to in this school,” said Zhao Ke. “And the way you’re… I’m a
little worried. If you don’t mind, do you want to tell me what happened? I’m not going to
ask about anything else.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
He always thought Gu Fei was very good at keeping things in, but now he realized he was
equally capable. He wondered if he’d been influenced by Gu Fei, or if a hidden skill had
been awakened within him.
It had been a week since Gu Fei contacted him with Li Yan’s phone, and he hadn’t
mentioned this to anybody.
Though to be fair, there was next to no one he could talk to about this in the first place. He
could tell Pan Zhi, but Pan Zhi never did think they were going to last, and at the moment,
he didn’t wish to let Pan Zhi know just yet.
Jiang Cheng wasn’t worried that Pan Zhi would say something to Gu Fei out of impulse; he
simply didn’t want Pan Zhi to worry. His grandson was always a worrywart when it came
to him.
And if he couldn’t tell Pan Zhi, then there was only Zhao Ke to tell.
Zhao Ke was a classmate he was the closest to in school, but not close enough to know
everything between him and Gu Fei. A connection like this was actually very suitable for
confiding.
The reason he’d been keeping it to himself was because even a single word of mention
would lead to a pain as deep as a chasm.
Jiang Cheng picked up his phone and typed out some words in his notes app.
– I won’t be able to abuse single dogs like you anymore
Zhao Ke leaned in to read the single line of text on the screen. He was taken aback, and
quickly shot Jiang Cheng a glance, before asking, “All of a sudden?
Wasn’t it going fine?”
– it’s a long story
“Was he the one who wanted to…break up?” Zhao Ke found it hard to believe.
Jiang Cheng was motionless for a long time. Then, he finally nodded.
“Why?” Zhao Ke frowned. “I genuinely thought that you two were getting on really well.
Why would anyone suddenly decide to give that up?”
It certainly was sudden. So sudden that Jiang Cheng now understood exactly what it felt
like to be blindsided, like a bolt from the blue.
“What if… Have you tried…” Zhao Ke struggled with his words. “I’ve never been in a
relationship, so I’m not really sure what to do, but, have you tried to, maybe, salvage it?”
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“Why?” asked Zhao Ke.
– he didn’t give up on me, or the relationship, he gave up on himself A person might give up
many things in life, and many people.
But to give up on oneself was the scariest of all.
For Jiang Cheng, it wasn’t so much that he’d toiled so hard and given everything he had just
to step into emptiness at the end. No, the pain that made it so difficult to breathe that he
needed to rely on his old routine and direction to take his mind off of it even a little, that
was because Gu Fei had closed his eyes again and sunken into the deepest darkness.
What kept him up all night was hearing Gu Fei’s voice in his ears saying “forget it”, every
time he closed his eyes.
Forget it, Cheng-ge.
Forget it.
Stop holding onto me.
Forget it.
There was no pain more intense or hopeless than watching the person you desperately
want to hold onto let go of your hand.
Jiang Cheng had no other choice but to continue to remind himself: I must not stop.
He mustn’t go and find Gu Fei. He knew exactly what Gu Fei must be like right now. Even if
he went back there, he might not even be able to see him.
The mini tyrant of the Steelworks was much harsher on himself than on anyone else,
otherwise he wouldn’t have made it through all these years.
If he was able to say “forget it”, then he wouldn’t have left any hope for himself or Jiang
Cheng.
Nor was Jiang Cheng planning on going back to see him either.
There was no point, other than to ask “why”.
It wouldn’t do any good.
He must not stop.
For Jiang Cheng, nothing had changed. Everything continued the way it was before—he
went to the library, studied and prepared for exams, perused psychology textbooks, and
tutored for money.
There was only that little bit of difference.
When he lay down in his bunk at night with his phone, there was no longer that half hour of
conversation.
That was all.
No big deal.
There are twenty-four hours in a day. Thirty minutes could pass by in just a blink.
It took the better part of a month for Jiang Cheng to be able to make some sounds with his
voice again, though it still didn’t sound very good.
“I’m heading over to see you. Stop trying to avoid me with your excuses, scum-boy!” After
finally being able to reach Jiang Cheng on the phone, the first sentence out of Pan Zhi’s
mouth was tinged with worry. “You’re fucking hiding things from me.”
“I’m not,” Jiang Cheng struggled to answer with his raspy voice.
“We’ve known each other for years,” said Pan Zhi. “You’re for sure not telling me the truth.
Something’s definitely wrong with you, it’s my eighth sense—”
“Sixth,” said Jiang Cheng.
“What?” Pan Zhi paused.
“Sixth sense,” said Jiang Cheng with difficulty. “Dumbass.”
“Well what I have is the eighth fucking sense. I have more senses than other
people,” said Pan Zhi. “And after I use my eighth sense, I’m going to use my ninth. If you
don’t tell me the truth, then I’m here waiting for you with my tenth sense.”
“I don’t want to talk,” said Jiang Cheng.
It was true. He didn’t want to talk.
He didn’t find it all that agonizing when he couldn’t talk, since he didn’t feel like talking
anyways. Bottling it all up actually made him feel a little better.
It was as though he was quietly sealed within a box. He didn’t move, think, or speak—shut
off from the rest of the world.
It made him feel safe.
“Is it Gu Fei?” asked Pan Zhi.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng’s heart skipped.
The name would linger in his mind every single day, like a tiny bone stuck in his throat,
unable to be swallowed or spat out. He didn’t feel it as long as he didn’t think about it, but
whenever he did, it was an ache that could not be ignored.
It had been way too long since he’d heard the words “Gu Fei”.
The instant Pan Zhi said the words, a gash appeared in Jiang Cheng’s carefully constructed
shell, ripping apart his not-yet-healed wound.
He then realized with a start that the wound had not changed one bit. It was exactly the
same as the first moment it appeared; just as fresh, and just as vivid.
“I was wondering why neither of you had posted any Moments lately,” said Pan Zhi. “Fine. If
you don’t want to talk, then I won’t ask. Just tell me when you’re going to be free, I’ll take
you out to eat.”
“After exams,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Cheng-er,” Pan Zhi sighed, “don’t be too sad. I told you, first love always hurts, because
we’re all still naive, and none of us knows how to maintain a relationship.”
Jiang Cheng tutted.
“But that’s also the most beautiful part. No one knows what the other person needs, only
that you’re willing to give,” Pan Zhi said. “And when we’re all mature, we’ll never have
something like this again.”
Jiang Cheng tutted again.
“Just look at it as a memory,” said Pan Zhi. “If nothing else.”
Jiang Cheng climbed into his bunk, sat down facing the wall, bowed his head, and closed his
eyes.
“Give me a call then, when you get there.” Xu Xingzhi said, “It only takes me a minute to get
downstairs.”
“Alright,” said Jiang Cheng, his voice splitting at the seams.
After arriving at the gate of Xu Xingzhi’s residential compound, Jiang Cheng gave him a call.
Xu Xingzhi didn’t pick up, but rather, hung up immediately.
Soon after, he walked out to the gate, looking a little stunned when he saw Jiang Cheng.
“What…happened to you?”
“Nothing,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Come on, let’s find somewhere to sit down and talk.” Xu Xingzhi turned and walked out.
Jiang Cheng followed him.
It had been a long time since he’d walked on the street like this, Jiang Cheng felt unused to
this feeling, and almost ran the risk of tripping over himself.
He didn’t know where to direct his eyes, and meanwhile there was nothing but noise in his
ears. Also, it was getting a little hard to breathe.
A number of twists and turns later, Xu Xingzhi led him into a small coffee shop, where they
sat down in a corner by the window. Only then did Jiang Cheng breathe a sigh of relief and
pulled off the scarf around his neck.
There was only one other seated table aside from them. At this point, Jiang Cheng could
only relax in an environment with no other people. He felt like a fragile old person, unable
to stand the slightest noise, or any form of disorder.
He was just about to set his scarf on the windowsill nearby, when the fluffy multicoloured
cushion on the windowsill suddenly moved.
“Ah!” Jiang Cheng yelped hoarsely with a start. His broken voice also startled the fluffy
multicoloured cushion into jumping right up, at which point he realized the cushion was
actually a cat.
“You’re not scared of cats, are you?” Xu Xingzhi picked up the tabby and set it on his own
lap.
“No, I like them,” said Jiang Cheng. “Do you come here often to play with cats?”
”Mhm, it’s destressing.” Xu Xingzhi picked up the tabby and put it on the table in front of
them. “Here, you can pet it.”
The tabby had a very mild nature, and liked to cling to people. As soon as Jiang Cheng’s
hand touched its head, it flopped down next to him and showed its belly.
Jiang Cheng gently stroked its belly. The cat was a shorthair, and its winter coat was dense
and soft. The pleasant sensation of the fur between his fingers allowed him to suddenly
relax.
He felt cozy.
Jiang Cheng leaned down and buried his face in the tabby’s belly, and the cat gently put its
paw on his ear.
“I was actually planning to ask about the little sister today, whether you’ve discussed it
with your friend yet.” Xu Xingzhi’s voice was slow and soft. “But now… If you want, we can
talk about you.”
“What about me?” Jiang Cheng smiled into the cat’s belly. “Is this your occupational
sensitivity at work?”
“How long have you been like this?” asked Xu Xingzhi.
“Like what?” Jiang Cheng tilted his face, showing one of his eyes.
“This…” Xu Xingzhi looked at him, “state of anxiety—how long has it been?”
“I’m not anxious.” Jiang Cheng put his arms on the table and hugged the cat.
“I’m as calm as water. Two more weeks and I’ll be able to ascend straight to heaven.”
Xu Xingzhi smiled without a word. The server came by, and he asked for a carafe of fruit tea
in a quiet voice.
When the fruit tea arrived, he poured a cup and pushed it beside Jiang Cheng’s hand.
As the warmth radiated out from his fingertips, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a twinge in his
nose.
He quickly grabbed the cup with his hands.
“Can you do a therapy session for me?” he finally said in a low voice after a while.
“Did you run into something that troubles you?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“I have exams next week,” Jiang Cheng said, “but I can’t seem to absorb
anything right now. I can’t focus when I study, and I can’t fall asleep at night. I’d stay awake
until sunrise, and only then get a little bit of sleep. I don’t feel like talking…”
HIs throat felt uncomfortable, so speaking was difficult. Jiang Cheng coughed a few times
before continuing, “Basically, I don’t feel like talking, eating, or moving.”
“When did it start?” Xu Xingzhi asked again.
“It started…” Jiang Cheng tightly clutched the cup, gripping it so hard his hands were
starting to shake. Finally, he said softly, “The day I got dumped.”
“Oh.” There was a note of surprise in Xu Xingzhi’s voice.
“I got dumped,” said Jiang Cheng.
The moment he said it out loud, he suddenly found it funny.
Dumped.
I was dumped?
For some reason, the term felt very foreign to him. He’d known that he and Gu Fei had
broken up; it started the very second Gu Fei said “forget it”.
However, he never connected himself with the word “dumped”.
Saying it out loud like this made him realize just how ridiculous the word was, so much so
that he wanted to laugh.
“Maybe you shouldn’t mention it to him this year.” Liu Li was talking to Gu Fei’s mom in the
back courtyard. “He’s been in a rut lately.”
“That’s why I was gonna go myself. I didn’t bring it up last year either, when he’s preparing
for the Entrance Exams,” she said. “I wanted to go a little earlier this time, just once before
the lunar new year. You think I want to go? It’s only for my peace of mind, otherwise every
year around his death I’ll dream of getting beaten.”
Gu Fei knew they were talking about his dad. It was only after hearing his mom’s words
that he realized with a start—he didn’t go to the lake last year.
He hadn’t even remembered.
Last winter.
He’d been with Jiang Cheng the whole time.
He remembered many things, and also forgot many things.
His mom’s mood was ever-changing. Gu Fei wasn’t sure if she would really go to the lake.
She might, or might not, it all depended on her mood.
However, Gu Fei decided he would pay a visit.
This time, he was early by almost two months. Before that, he’d always left it until the last
minute and reluctantly came at the behest of his mother.
Though it made no difference in this season anyhow, where there was only snow and
withered reeds.
It was a lonely path.
Gu Fei followed the path along the edge of the lake, walking further and further without
stopping.
Contestant Jiang Cheng decided to once again raise the stakes! He decided once again to raise
the stakes again! Wowww——
Aww, that’s too bad. Instructor X, do you think that was a lapse in judgement or were his
techniques not quite there?
I think he still has room to improve. Perhaps he needs to switch to a different mode of
challenge… Whether he should lower the difficulty at this time or continue…
Gu Fei stopped, a lost look in his eyes. It suddenly occurred to him why he kept on walking
deeper in, as though he had a destination in mind.
He turned and stared for a long time at the waist-high reeds by the lake’s edge.
But there was no Jiang Cheng here anymore.
Handsome Jiang Cheng, mumbling to himself while showing off his slingshot skills, would
probably never appear again.
The reeds were dense this year, stretches of yellowing grass glowed golden under the
sunlight. He couldn’t even find the exact spot where Jiang Cheng had stood that day, when
he fired his slingshot.
He couldn’t find it anymore.
That was alright. It was good, in fact, that he couldn’t find it anymore…
He was afraid of sensing Jiang Cheng’s presence. Gu Fei hadn’t been to the apartment since
after the phone call that day. He was afraid to see anything related to Jiang Cheng.
He was afraid to perceive anything that made him feel like Jiang Cheng was

gradually disappearing. Leaving.

Some Stats
Raw character count: 5927
TL word count: 4150
TL time: ???
Edit time: 00:36:21
Curse words: 5x fucks, 2x asses
TL’s Notes:
⊙▽⊙
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT! (before
everything is taken down
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: October 6, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 124
Without a destination, or a place to belong.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Jiang Cheng forced himself to believe that humans had a need for rants.
Even though a lot of the time, he’d feel unwilling to speak or move, wanting only to bottle
everything up and keep it inside. Because the smallest motion may disturb the sand and
grit beneath the already calm surface, stirring everything back up.
However, the same sentence or thought, tossed and turned over and over in one’s mind,
lingering, would no doubt leave a mark wherever it touched. And slowly, it would
accumulate into an untraversable mountain.
Open your mouth. Speak. Hear your own voice, clearly enunciating every word of every
sentence; every thought and notion; every grumble, injustice, anger, confusion… From the
moment it was spoken out loud, the words would be siphoned away one by one, leaving
only that direction you had buried way deep inside.
In the last week before the final exams started, Jiang Cheng went to U of B to see Xu Xingzhi
on three separate occasions.
“It’s not necessarily therapy. You can come and talk to me,” Xu Xingzhi had told him. “You
talk, and I listen.”
Some things could only be vocalized in front of a relative stranger. For the kind of venting
that Jiang Cheng was doing, Xu Xingzhi was a perfect listener.
He didn’t even give any advice, and instead only listened quietly, making the occasional
sounds of acknowledgment.
Jiang Cheng felt like he’d spoken more in the last week than he had the whole month. He
never thought he had so much bottled up inside.
“I’m not afraid of invalidation. It’s not like I grew up being validated. I trust myself when it
comes to these things. If I say I’m great, then I am.” Jiang Cheng was holding a cat in his lap
as he gently scratched its belly. “If everything I’ve done for him is wiped away one day, then
so be it. I don’t mind. I’m not doing all this so he can remember or appreciate me. I know
how great I am. I don’t even need him to know what I did—anything I do is only because I
want to.”
“A simple ‘I want to’ is worth more than a thousand gold,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng squeezed on a paw as he continued, “But I know what he’s thinking. At
first, I kept wanting to ask him why. Why did he do that? Why? But then I thought about it,
and there was no reason. The way he grew up, and under those conditions, what he’s most
afraid of is struggling in futility. Because he knows exactly what that feels like. Giving up is
a mechanism of protection he was best at, whether it’s protecting himself or others… Ah,
how many times have I repeated this already? I feel like I say the same things every time.”
“I didn’t notice.” Xu Xingzhi gave a little smile. “Important things must be thrice-repeated,
and the especially important things must be repeated ad infinitum. By the way, your voice
sounds better today.”
“It’s a lot better. It’s gone from cracky to quacky.” Jiang Cheng sipped on the tea and looked
down at the cat with its eyes relaxed into slits. “It should be all better by…by winter break.”
“You said the other day that you still want me to go see the little girl, right?” Xu Xingzhi
reached out and scooped up a black cat passing by on the windowsill and set it down in his
own lap to smooth his hand over its fur.
“Mhm. I know this must be a little…awkward for you.” Jiang Cheng bit his lips.
“It’s just that I really have no other way. I like that little girl a lot. Besides, even if it’s the
slightest improvement, it could allow her brother to see some hope.”
“I can certainly go, but what if he doesn’t agree?” asked Xu Xingzhi. “After all, you two are
like this now because he doesn’t want you to struggle in futility.”
Jiang Cheng frowned.
Every time he poured his thoughts out at Xu Xingzhi like a river without a dam, he’d
managed to avoid this detail.
Except it wasn’t a mere detail. It was the source of all his venting.
He never mentioned this fact, though he never intentionally shied away from it, his
subconscious had avoided it all the same.
Jiang Cheng talked about himself, about Gu Fei, explaining all of the “why”s: why I did this;
why he did that. Like a wise immortal who had been and seen through it all.
But when Xu Xingzhi pointed out the current state of “them”, Jiang Cheng’s mind was
abruptly pulled back to earth, once again forced to face the reality of Gu Fei and him.
No matter what he said or how much he explained, it didn’t change the fact that they had
broken up in the end.
Since that day, they’d not even had one second of contact.
Nor did Gu Fei update his WeChat Moments again either.
Jiang Cheng still posted updates from time to time, but he’d stopped posting things that had
subtext only Gu Fei could understand.
He hadn’t posted any more selfies either.
Jiang Cheng leaned back in the chair and turned on his phone screen.
Both his wallpaper and his lockscreen were still pictures of Gu Fei, and same with his chat
background. He’d just been ignoring them.
He had subconsciously blocked out the familiar face and the familiar photos from his mind.
He never again opened his albums full of photos and videos.
Until now, as a fresh torrent of pain was unveiled, did he sigh softly and realize that all of
those ploys he had once used to blind lonely bachelors with his happiness had finally come
back to bite him in the ass.
“I think you need to have a clear idea of a few things,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng set his phone face down on the table.
“Firstly, it’s possible that Gu Fei would say no to the treatment. Secondly, the treatment
may not work, because all my prior evaluations were made without seeing the patient,” Xu
Xingzhi said all this slowly and in a gentle voice. “And finally, if ever you have time and are
willing, I want to assess you for anxiety…”
“Are you worried that I’m depressed?” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“Not necessarily,” said Xu Xingzhi. “But you are exhibiting rather serious anxiety symptoms
at the moment.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“There’s another important point,” said Xu Xingzhi. “And this is me reminding you as a
friend, don’t put all your hopes of getting back together on the little girl.
That exchange mentality isn’t healthy for either of you.”
“I understand.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Thank you.”
He’d been chipping away at the psychology textbooks on his own for a while, and whenever
he had questions, he would ask Xu Xingzhi, who would always answer them helpfully.
Jiang Cheng knew he was in a bad place right now. He’d repressed everything deep inside,
despite the fact that he ranted to Xu Xingzhi for an hour at a time.
His state of mind at the moment was an embodiment of the saying: it all makes
sense logically, but why does my heart still hurt so much?
However, since his voice was working and he was sleeping again, he was content for the
time being.
Especially the sleep part. Continuous insomnia really was debilitating.
“Keep taking those capsules, at least until your sleep is back on track,” said Zhao Ke.
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Zhao Ke had told him these capsules were good for helping him sleep. He used to have
insomnia before the university entrance exams, and these were what he took back then.
Now that Jiang Cheng was having difficulty sleeping, Zhao Ke had recommended them to
him.
He was to take one every night before bed. They were supplements, not proper
pharmaceutical sleep aids. The possibility of placebo effect aside, it really seemed to be
working. At least Jiang Cheng was able to fall asleep before 2 a.m now.
He was glad as long as he could fall asleep. These days, he looked so terrible that even the
guidance counselor came to talk to him, asking if he was under too much academic
pressure.
Jiang Cheng was planning to return to the Steelworks over the Lunar New Year.
He didn’t want others there to think that he’d lost all this weight just from a breakup. That
would be embarrassing.
He wondered how Gu Fei was doing.
How was he doing at school?
How was everything at home?
Did he get a new lens for his camera, or could he afford a new one at all?
What about his phone? Gu Fei hadn’t updated his Moments this whole time. Was that
because he was in a bad mood, or was his phone really broken and he never bought a new
one?
Was he still taking photographs? Did he still take Gu Miao out to skateboard?
Did he still smile or laugh?
As soon as one of these thoughts reared its head, the rest would come rushing out en
masse, as unstoppable as a virus.
Jiang Cheng jumped off his bunk, grabbed a piece of mint candy off of Lu Shi’s desk, and
stuffed it into his own mouth.
The mint flavor wasn’t bad. As soon as he had the candy in his mouth, a refreshing chill shot
through all of his facial orifices within two seconds, waking him right up.
Although, the intensity of the mint still couldn’t compete with the ones Gu Fei used to give
him.
Gu Fei.
Gu Fei Gu Fei Gu Fei.
Fuck.
Jiang Cheng unwrapped another mint candy and put it in his mouth. He didn’t even give it a
chance to dissolve before he crunched it to pieces between his teeth. A shot of icy cold
surged from his throat straight through to the top of his head, feeling as though it could
blast his scalp right off.
Jiang Cheng wiped away the tears induced by the chill coursing through his veins.
Nice.
“You guys are on winter break already? A whole week earlier than everyone else?” Li Yan
was squatting on the steps outside the convenience store, swiping away at his phone.
“Mmhm.” Gu Fei answered around the cigarette in his mouth. “If they packed the classes
into our schedule the way other schools do, I’d be done last month.”
“Relaxed schedules are good.” Li Yan held up his phone and took a picture of Gu Fei. “Less
pressure that way.”
“Don’t post my photo to your Moments,” said Gu Fei.
“Don’t worry,” said Li Yan. “Even if I do, I’d share it in filtered circles, I won’t let…see.”
“Mhm,” answered Gu Fei.
It had been his request, but for some reason, he felt a faint disappointment when Li Yan
actually abided. Those ties that drifted in and out of existence between him and Jiang Cheng
were slowly being broken.
“Did Xin-jie recommend you for that really cool fashion shoot?” Li Yan continued playing
the game on his phone. “She said you’ll have to think about it,
but what’s there to think about? With all that money, I wouldn’t think twice even if I have to
strip naked.”
Gu Fei gave him a side-ways glance.
“What? My figure is fine, I’m not afraid to show it,” said Li Yan.
Gu Fei breathed out a puff of smoke and continued side-eyeing him.
“I know that in your mind, Jiang Cheng is the only one…” Li Yan didn’t finish his sentence.
He held eye contact with Gu Fei for a few seconds, then started scooching away from his
spot. “It was only a slip of the tongue.”
Gu Fei looked at him in silence. After more staring, Gu Fei eventually turned back and
continued spacing out at the snow gathered on the road.
“Da-Fei, I’ve always thought those ‘looks can kill’ and what not in stories were just bullshit.”
“They are bullshit,” said Gu Fei.
“No. I saw it just now. It felt like you could crush me into the ground with your eyeballs
alone. It was…scary.”
“You wouldn’t have died from the weight of my eyeballs,” Gu Fei took a drag on the
cigarette, “you would’ve died from talking too much.”
“The fact is, what you’re trying to do can’t be done.” Li Yan was stuck on his current level,
so he turned and stared grumpily at Gu Fei. “Day after day, you look so out of it, like
someone had taken your soul away.”
“As long as you stop bringing him up day after day,” said Gu Fei. “If you can’t control your
tongue then stop coming around here. Didn’t you find a new date?
Well, go on out and enjoy your romance.”
“I’ve said it twice already last week, and again that day when we went out to eat bone
soup.” Li Yan continued glaring at him. “I’m single right now.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei answered.
“Fuck.” Li Yan glanced at the time. “I have to go—off to find my meal ticket.
You just keep dying right here.”
“Fuck off,” said Gu Fei.
After Li Yan left, Gu Fei blanked out for a while longer, then turned and walked into the
store.
Liu Li was in the back courtyard, he’d built a coal fire to roast some sweet
potatoes in. Gu Miao stood nearby, staring intently at the yam.
Gu Fei thought the man really was something special—he prohibited smoking inside the
store, yet he’d start a fire just to roast some yams.
Regardless, the store now belonged to Liu Li, so he could do whatever he wanted.
“Here.” Liu Li grabbed a small plate and handed a finished sweet potato to Gu Miao.
Gu Miao took the plate, bowed to him, then turned and bolted off, running right into Gu Fei.
“Whoa, slow down.” Gu Fei steadied her.
Gu Miao held the plate out for him.
“You go ahead,” said Gu Fei. “Gege isn’t hungry right now, I don’t want to eat.”
Gu Miao didn’t move. Stubbornly, she held up the plate until Gu Fei picked up the sweet
potato, then took the plate back to the fire to wait for the next one.
“See how thoughtful she is,” said Liu Li.
Gu Fei didn’t answer. Leaning against the front counter, he blew on the sweet potato in his
hands as he watched Gu Miao’s back.
It’d been a long time since he cut off contact with Jiang Cheng, but he was still unable to
return to his old life.
He was seeing everything around him through different eyes—Gu Miao, Liu Li, his mom,
and even the Steelworks.
Forget it, Cheng-ge.
Gu Fei didn’t remember how he felt when he said those words.
Nor did he know how Jiang Cheng reacted to them.
Perhaps he wanted to beat Gu Fei up.
He never physically fought Jiang Cheng before, not really. Technically speaking, Jiang Cheng
was no match for him, but under those circumstances, perhaps Contestant Jiang Cheng
would erupt with a burst of power.
Would he?
Maybe not.
The arrogant, stubborn, and proud Jiang Cheng would probably not care to lift a finger
against such a blunt and unreserved strike from Gu Fei.
He chuckled.
“Right?” said Liu Li. “Isn’t that funny?”
“Uh huh,” Gu Fei answered, though he had no idea what Liu Li said. “I’m going out for a
walk.”
“But it’s freezing out,” said Liu Li. “I noticed though, you must have an excellent
constitution, wandering around outside all the time.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He wrapped a scarf around his neck and headed out.
It was true that he wandered outside all day long.
He wandered aimlessly, with no destination in mind.
Gu Fei wouldn’t allow anyone to mention Jiang Cheng in front of him, but still Jiang Cheng
filled his mind relentlessly, every moment of every day.
He was like an anxious animal, unable to stay still in one place for any extended period of
time. He needed to keep moving, walking, because everywhere he looked, he saw Jiang
Cheng.
Jiang Cheng had only stayed here for two years, but managed to leave countless marks
behind. Everywhere Gu Fei turned, there he was. In the convenience store, at home, on the
streets; every corner of this place that had been Gu Fei’s home for almost twenty years was
charged with Jiang Cheng’s presence.
Those happy memories he’d once tried desperately to give to Jiang Cheng had all been left
behind, now turning into a pain that hurt him with every breath he took.
He couldn’t stay in the store, so he wandered outside, but every step was a memory.
Gu Fei suddenly felt scared. He dared not imagine how he was supposed to continue living
among these memories.
The apartment Jiang Cheng had rented was up ahead. Gu Fei slowed down and looked up at
the window.
Everything was as it was. The window was closed, and the curtains pulled shut.
The empty little flower pot on the window sill was where it’d been left. Gu Fei could still see
the way Jiang Cheng picked a pebble out of the pot and aimed it at him through his
slingshot.
He lingered outside for a while before entering the building, slowly but surely, walking up
the stairs one step at a time.
When Gu Fei arrived at the door, it almost felt like Jiang Cheng would suddenly rush up
behind him and grab his ass before dashing off.
He glanced back. There was no one in the cluttered hallway piled with miscellaneous junk.
He took out his keys and opened the door.
Normally, he’d come over every day to tidy up, wipe the surfaces, mop the floor, and spritz
some lemon water everywhere.
But he hadn’t been here since that last phone call with Jiang Cheng. Opening the door now,
he could already smell the faint scent of loneliness in the air.
He went into the kitchen, rinsed out a dish rag, then after standing in the middle of the
living room for a while, started to slowly wipe the table.
Dust had fallen on the sofa, so he spread the wet rag on the surface of the sofa and slowly
beat out the dust. Less than a minute later, he couldn’t take it anymore.
Hug.
Alright, coming—Cheng-ge hug.
Gu Fei quickly picked up the rag, turned around, and hastily wiped it a few times over the
side table. Just as he was about to enter the bedroom, he stopped again.
After standing in the doorway for what felt like forever, he finally pushed open the door
and walked inside.
Cheng-ge is everywhere.
Cheng-ge is everywhere.
Cheng-ge is everywhere.
Cheng-ge is never coming back.
Gu Fei opened the window to let in fresh air. Amidst the chilly wind pouring in through the
window, he started wiping Jiang Cheng’s desk.
I don’t have a home anymore, Gu Fei.
He frowned.
Jiang Cheng’s home shouldn’t be here. Nor should Jiang Cheng’s home be him.
Jiang Cheng would one day have a new home—a real home.
Gu Fei scrubbed hard at the desk, but he quickly started to feel tired; extremely tired.
He sat down and turned on the desk lamp.
The warm yellow glow abruptly splashed all over the desk top.
Why had he come here to tidy up? What was the point of cleaning this place that he couldn’t
even bear to enter? A place where Jiang Cheng was unlikely to come again…
Lunar New Year was coming up. Where would Jiang Cheng go?
The pain suddenly appeared out of nowhere, as though a thin needle had pierced into his
heart, causing a throbbing kind of ache.
He’d already considered this question before, but he didn’t dare think too hard about it.
Now that the winter break was almost here and everyone was figuring out their travel
plans to return home, Gu Fei’s heart was abruptly hit with a rush of pain that made it hard
to catch his breath.
Jiang Cheng could go to Pan Zhi’s home. Close as they were, Pan Zhi would surely drag him
along to spend the New Year together.
But Gu Fei knew that Jiang Cheng didn’t want to go back to that city again… So where would
he go?
Gu Fei’s stomach hurt.
Had he been infected by Contestant Jiang Cheng?
He clutched his stomach and doubled over, knocking his head on the edge of the desk in the
process. Clenching his teeth, he panted for a good while before he caught his breath.
He didn’t want to be so mopey about it. He’d already spoken the words out loud, so he
shouldn’t disturb Jiang Cheng again. Jiang Cheng probably had no need for his concern
anymore.
Even so, after coming out of the apartment building, Gu Fei still made a trip back home.
Fishing out an old cell phone from his drawer, he inserted his SIM
card and plugged it in to charge.
His hand was practically trembling as he tapped open WeChat. He didn’t dare look at the
red number in the bottom left corner that indicated the unread messages he had, let alone
open them. He was afraid to see Jiang Cheng’s name, but also afraid that he wouldn’t see it.
Going directly into the contact list, he found Pan Zhi’s name and opened the
chat.
But he had no idea what to say.
How is Jiang Cheng? How is he planning to spend the New Year? Will he go to your place over
the winter break? What are his plans for the break… Gu Fei’s mind was a chaotic mess. It was
impossible to find the appropriate words to say.
At last, he ended up only sending two words.
– you there?
Before he could figure out what his follow up message should be, a red exclamation sign
popped up in front of the message he’d just sent.
“Your dream man” has enabled friend request verification. You are not currently friends.
Please send a friend request and have the other party verify it before beginning your chat.
Gu Fei stared for a long time at these words before he recovered his senses.
Pan Zhi had deleted him.
He expected nothing less from Jiang Cheng’s best friend.
Gu Fei turned the phone off and tossed it back into the drawer. Leaning back in the chair, he
tilted his head back and let out a long sigh.
There was a tickle at the corner of his left eye. He quickly pressed his hand over it.
“I really didn’t buy a train ticket,” Pan Zhi said, sitting in Jiang Cheng’s chair.
“You’re sure there’s room in his car? No one else is going?”
“No one else,” said Jiang Cheng. “Just you, me, and Xu Xingzhi.”
“Didn’t you say…” Pan Zhi turned and glanced at Zhao Ke, “his sister is coming too?”
“My sister’s unconfirmed. It’s not like she’ll be of any help even if she goes, she’ll just be
there to watch, like a holiday,” said Zhao Ke. “Xu Xingzhi hasn’t decided yet if he wants to
bring her.”
“Oh.” Pan Zhi thought about it for a moment. “She should go. I’m also just there to watch,
like a holiday.”
Zhao Ke only smiled before climbing onto his own bunk to pack up his things.
Jiang Cheng poked Pan Zhi’s arm with a finger.
“Hmm?” Pan Zhi turned back to him.
“Can you have some shame?” Jiang Cheng asked in a low voice.
“What do you mean? I have so much shame, look at all these layers of shame I have, I
collected them over many years.” Pan Zhi also lowered his voice. “Also Cheng-er, I wanted
to ask, is that voice of yours going to get better?”
“What.”
“You sound a little too husky at the moment, I’m not used to it,” said Pan Zhi.
“After a while, maybe.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. “I don’t know why I’m still not better
either. Maybe I’m just tired from studying.”
“Oh yeah, and another thing,” said Pan Zhi. “I’m not going to stay in a hotel with that Xu
Xingzhi; I want to stay with you.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Or…” Pan Zhi hesitated before continuing quietly, “We can all stay at the hotel?”
“No need for that,” said Jiang Cheng. “I still have my lease, so I have to drop by anyways. All
my stuff is still there and I have to pick up some clothes.”
“I’m just a little worried.” Pan Zhi watched him.
“You gotta face what you gotta face,” Zhao Ke said from his bunk as he packed.
“There’s no use in running from your problems.”
“Spoken like someone who’s never dated before.” Pan Zhi sighed.
“Spoken like someone with lots of experience.” Zhao Ke poked his head out to look at Pan
Zhi. “From the sound of that, you must’ve been through at least twenty relationships, huh?”
“Fuck. Is someone going to get this guy under control?” asked Pan Zhi.
“Nope,” answered Jiang Cheng.
Everyone in the dorms had already purchased their tickets home. Jiang Cheng didn’t buy a
ticket. Xu Xingzhi always took his cat master with him on longer trips, so he was going to
drive them there.
All their travel plans had been finalized, but Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop feeling anxious.
He couldn’t bear staying inside, but walking aimlessly around campus didn’t manage to
anchor his mind either. Only once Pan Zhi showed up did he feel a

little more settled.

It was the first time ever that he so viscerally felt how disorienting it was to be without a
destination, or a place to belong.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6022
TL word count: 4295
TL time: ???
Edit time: 1:07:04
Curse words: 4x fucks, 2x asses
TL’s Notes:
⊙▽⊙
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT! (before
everything is taken down
AND the first volume of its physical copy is listed for sale!!! > Weibo info post
with listed stores!
First posted: November 6, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 125
“It’s just a sore throat. The weather’s too dry.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: AmidstwoodZ
It might still be a while before the Lunar New Year, but since most of the students had
already left the campus, Jiang Cheng could already sense the hollow panic that came with
every holiday time.
There was no one left in the dorm room. Their desks were tidied and cleaned, and the beds
neatly made. Zhang Qiqi even went so far as to drape an old sheet over each bunk to keep
them from getting dusty.
After all this, the room looked even more desolate.
As if to complement this atmosphere, snowflakes even began to fall outside the window.
Jiang Cheng stood at the window and looked out. There was no one else on the path outside
their dorm other than a pair of lovers. He could see no other students passing by. The
couple chatted as they walked along, the guy pulling the girl’s suitcase.
Jiang Cheng opened the window, stole a pack of cigarettes from Pan Zhi’s pocket, and lit one
up.
“Do you think I brought enough clothes?” The northerly wind slapped Pan Zhi in the face,
and he turned to let out a sneeze. “Last time when I went to visit you, I was wearing the
thickest down jacket I had.”
“You didn’t bring one this time?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“When I went back home on National Day, I didn’t think to bring it, who would’ve thought
I’ll be going there,” said Pan Zhi. “Forget it. I’ll just buy one if the cold gets too much.”
Yeah. Who would’ve thought.
“Is it really okay that you don’t go home for Lunar New Year?” he asked.
Though Jiang Cheng didn’t think it was necessary, Pan Zhi still insisted on not going home
during the winter break. Jiang Cheng was touched, but also uneasy that his own matter had
troubled his friend to keep him company over the holidays.
“It’s fine, I didn’t wanna spend it at home anyways. It’s annoying as hell.” Pan Zhi frowned.
“Did I tell you? When I went back for the National Day holiday,
my huge extended family wanted to gather nonstop. As soon as they heard about my
school, the whole bunch of them looked down at me so hard I practically went into the
ground. Each one of them, whether or not they’d gone to college, was giving this expression
like ‘oho all that money just to go to a school like that’. Makes me wanna line them up for a
beating.”
Jiang Cheng only smiled without a word.
“My older cousin, the one you met that one time,” Pan Zhi continued
indignantly, “fucking said that my school is not that different than their school.”
“The one who goes to the technical college?” said Jiang Cheng.
“Mhm.” Pan Zhi nodded.
“Beat him!” Jiang Cheng said fiercely.
“Absolutely!” Pan Zhi also clenched his teeth.
A car drove up outside the dorm. Jiang Cheng was about to see if the driver was Xu Xingzhi
when his phone rang.
“Come down,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Let’s go.” Jiang Cheng clapped Pan Zhi on the shoulder when he hung up, and the two of
them walked out of the dorms with their luggages.
Jiang Cheng had very few things in his luggage—only two sets of clothes for changing. His
plan before coming to school was to take some winter clothes there with him over the
break, switching it for some spring and summer clothes to bring back when the second
semester started.
But now, after all this, he couldn’t figure out what he should do, even as they were about to
leave.
Should he extend the lease on that tiny rental apartment in the Steelworks, and should he
bring all the stuff he had left behind here… If that was the case, there were a lot of things:
all sorts of books, clothes, his pillow, and bedding. He had no idea how he could bring all of
that, or where to put them if he did.
After all, he’d lived in that place for more than a year.
Though on the other hand, it shouldn’t be that big a deal. When he left the home he’d lived
in for almost twenty years, he had only a suitcase, as well as the handful of cardboard boxes
that got shipped to him after.
Tsk.
When he saw Zhao Jin sitting in the front passenger’s seat, Jiang Cheng knew
Pan Zhi wouldn’t regret making the trip.
Since he saw Zhao Jin’s selfie in Jiang Cheng’s Moments the other day, Pan Zhi had been
going on nonstop along the lines of “It is a true rarity to see a girl with such a perfect
combination of beauty, poise, and an air of nonchalance.”
“She’s not interested in dating,” Jiang Cheng reminded him.
“Don’t imagine me as such a thirsty person, I’m purely admiring,” said Pan Zhi.
To be fair, Jiang Cheng believed him. Pan Zhi had dated many girls in the past, and the ones
he’d expressed admiration for were likewise as bountiful as the sea, and as striking as the
stars.
“Jie,” suitcase in hand, Pan Zhi hurried up to greet her. Then he put the suitcase in the trunk
and got in the back seat. “I thought you weren’t coming.”
“There’s not much to do around the New Year,” said Zhao Jin. “Might as well go check it out.
Have you two had breakfast yet?”
“We did.” Jiang Cheng got in the car and closed the door.
“Then we’re off.” Zhao Jin picked up a soft-shelled cat carrier off her lap and passed to the
back. “Here, you two can be responsible for the master.”
“A cat?” Pan Zhi took the carrier.
“Mhm,” Xu Xingzhi turned the car around, “my cat.”
“Can we take it out?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Go ahead, it’s very friendly.” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“His name is Feiyang, right? Come on, Feiyang, come on.” Jiang Cheng opened the carrier,
reaching his hands in to scoop the cat out. But as soon as his hands touched the cat, he
paused. He’d been seeing this giant long-hair white cat almost every day in Xu Xingzhi’s
Moments, but it wasn’t until now that he realized why its name was “chubby sheep”. “Holy
crap, it’s so…”
He scooped Feiyang out of the carrier with both hands. Pan Zhi burst out laughing as soon
as he saw it. “My god it’s so fat.”
“Its nickname is Pig,” said Zhao Jin.
“That’s not its nickname,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“It is now.” Zhao Jin turned around and said, “Piiiig—”
When she turned, she happened to be facing Pan Zhi, who sat in the back seat on the
opposite side from her. After she finished, Pan Zhi sighed and said, “Should I
perhaps answer the call?”
They all laughed at this, and so did Jiang Cheng. He placed Feiyang on his lap and held the
cat as he leaned against the window and looked out.
Feiyang was very docile, giving no signs that he’d step on your face if he was in a bad mood.
At least, right now as he held the cat, he didn’t move even an inch.
Spending time with cats really was a stress reliever. He’d been mildly anxious ever since
yesterday, aimlessly circling around his dorm room, wondering what exactly he was trying
to do.
Now, holding Feiyang, his mind was slowly quieting down.
Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that the car was already on the road, heading
toward the expressway. His destination was set, and there would be no other changes. That
was why he felt anchored now.
After getting on the expressway, the car sped up considerably, the feeling of steady high
speed made him space out a little.
Outside the window was a view he hadn’t seen in his previous travels here and back, and
inside the car were the feelings he never had the last few times he made this journey. He
couldn’t tell whether it was impatience or anxiety; hope or denial.
There were many cars heading out of the city. Jiang Cheng watched the ones that passed
them—he could see the people in some of them, and others were not so clear. Some cars
contained only the driver, and others were full of passengers.
Where did these people come from, where are they going, and what are they thinking?
And what about us?
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes. He was getting sleepy. Sitting in this warm car, listening to
people chatting beside him, and with a fat ball of fur in his arms besides, these were the
prime conditions for a nap.
The journey there by car was similar in length to that of a train ride, but they needed to
make occasional rest stops to use the washroom or get a drink.
When they made a rest stop, Jiang Cheng glanced at the fuel gauge. “Do we need to get more
gas soon?”
“Mhm, just need to fill up before we get off the expressway.” Xu Xingzhi pulled on the hand
brake and turned off the engine. “There’s a harness and leash in the carrier, you can put it
on Feiyang and let him out for some air.”
“Walk the cat?” Pan Zhi was puzzled.
“Yeah.” Xu Xingzhi nodded. “He’s easier to walk than dogs.”
Jiang Cheng put the harness on Feiyang and carried the cat out of the car. As soon as he set
him on the ground, Feiyang started marching forward with chest puffed and tail perked.
Such a large, fat, white, and long haired cat quickly drew the attention of the other people at
the rest stop.
“Here, let me.” Pan Zhi offered to take the leash from him.
Jiang Cheng gave him a look, then after a moment, nodded. “True, what if you’re able to
attract a pretty girl.”
“Can you please have a more genuine judgment of me.” Pan Zhi sighed. “I just thought it
would be fun.”
Jiang Cheng laughed.
After Pan Zhi and Zhao Jin walked away, he went up to Xu Xingzhi, who was sitting on the
side taking a drink of water. “Senior.”
“Hm?” Xu Xingzhi looked at him.
“Why don’t you let me…fuel up later?”
“Fuel up?” Xu Xingzhi paused for a moment, then nodded. “Oh, sure. You can stand on the
side and shout.”
“Shout?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Add oil!” Xu Xingzhi waved his arms. “Go Senior, go!”
Jiang Cheng laughed for a while when he got the pun. “I’m serious though. The tolls and gas
along the way aren’t cheap, I can’t very well let you pay for all of it.”
“It’s not that much…” Xu Xingzhi glanced at him, paused, then smiled. “Alright then, you can
pay for the gas later before we get off the expressway.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
They rested for a little longer before continuing on their way. This time Zhao Jin drove, and
Xu Xingzhi sat in the passenger seat.
As they drove away from the rest stop, Pan Zhi said while wiping Feiyang’s paws with a wet
wipe, “Drive safely, jie.”
“Don’t worry.” Zhao Jin checked the rearview mirror and merged onto the expressway.
“When I first started driving, you were still wiping the cat’s paws.”
“That’s…” Pan Zhi thought about it, then looked down at Feiyang, “not wrong.”
Zhao Jin was a steady driver, and clearly very experienced. Holding Feiyang, Jiang Cheng
leaned against the window, closed his eyes, and continued resting.
The air at the rest stop already felt drier and more frigid than before. They were now past
the halfway point and closing in on the final destination of this journey.
Jiang Cheng buried his fingers into Feiyang’s fur. It made him feel a little calmer.
Despite the sleepiness, Jiang Cheng’s emotions would change with every meter of progress
they made. This high frequency of change made him unable to fall asleep, despite being so
tired he couldn’t keep his eyes open.
“Want some hot chocolate? I got some at the rest stop just now,” Zhao Jin asked from
behind the wheel. “The thermos is under the passenger’s seat. Just pour some out if anyone
wants some.”
Xu Xingzhi poured a cup for each person.
After drinking it, Jiang Cheng felt a warm and fuzzy feeling spread through his whole body.
When he closed his eyes again, he finally fell asleep.
He had no idea how long the nap lasted, but when Pan Zhi nudged him awake, they had
already left the expressway, and Xu Xingzhi was once again the driver.
“You‘ve fueled up already?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“Yeah,” Xu Xingzhi laughed, “Pan Zhi did it.”
“I took the money from your wallet,” said Pan Zhi. “We were just talking about dropping
our stuff and the cat at your place first, and getting something to eat before going to the
hotel.”
“Yeah, okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. Neither Xu Xingzhi nor Zhao Jin had much luggage with
them, they mainly brought their laptops and research material.
“So which way?” Pan Zhi asked.
Jiang Cheng looked out the window. He’d never been to this side of the city.
Like Gu Miao, his zone of activity extended to the train station at the furthest.
But right now, he could already feel the familiar bleakness unique to this little city seeping
in through the car window.
“I’m…not sure either,” said Jiang Cheng. “You’ll still have to rely on the sat nav.
Just set the destination to the Steelworks. I’ll know the way once we get there.”
“Great, that sure is a typical answer from someone with no sense of direction.”
Zhao Jin tapped away on her phone. “Looks like the Steelworks covers a pretty large area,
do you have a specific address?”
“There’s…a Rujia Hotel,” said Jiang Cheng. “You can set the destination to that.”
In the time he spent thinking of an address, countless Steelworks landmarks flashed
through his mind, and every one of them was associated with Gu Fei’s presence.
These memories sprang forth from his heart so abruptly that they momentarily disrupted
his breathing.
It took a few moments before he fully came back to reality.
He was already back, here, back to the space where every corner had to do with Gu Fei.
The car continued on, and when they reached the intersection by the Rujia Hotel, Jiang
Cheng finally snapped out of his trance long enough to say “not here, turn left at the next
intersection.”
Xu Xingzhi nodded and kept driving, then turned onto the street where Gu Fei’s
convenience store sat.
Pan Zhi glanced at Jiang Cheng, who glanced back with a slight tug at the corner of his
mouth to indicate that he was fine.
Xu Xingzhi wasn’t aware what this street meant to Jiang Cheng, and kept driving down the
road as he chatted with Zhao Jin. There were very few cars on this street on normal days, so
Xu Xingzhi drove through it fairly quickly.
Jiang Cheng spotted the convenience store before he could mentally prepare himself.
His heart rate accelerated dramatically and abruptly, and he could hardly catch his breath;
his throat felt stuffed up.
Good thing they quickly passed it. But while Jiang Cheng fixed his eyes on the back of the
passenger seat, he still managed to see from the corner of his eyes that there was no one at
the door. The heavy cloth curtain covered the doorway, preventing him from seeing inside
the store.
He let out a big breath and only then realized that sweat had covered his back.
Along with the relief, however, he also felt a little disappointment.
“Where do we go now?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“Straight.” When he spoke, the other three all looked his way. Jiang Cheng cleared his throat
and continued, “Then take another left, there’s an old residential area there.”
“Alright,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Did you catch a cold?” Zhao Jin asked. “You fell asleep earlier, right?”
“It’s nothing.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat again. Fortunately, the hoarseness that
suddenly appeared just now faded quickly. He was probably just a little overexcited. “I
haven’t talked the whole way, that’s all.”
Pan Zhi handed him a thermos. Jiang Cheng chugged down some warm water and let out a
long exhale.
The area around his apartment was the same as always, the only differences compared to
the last time he came back were the barren trees and the heaps of snow piled on the side of
the road.
“It’s freezing.” Zhao Jin started jumping up and down as soon as she got out of the car. “Did
you pay your heating bill? Please tell me there’s heat in your apartment.”
“I paid.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
They gathered their things and started walking up the stairs.
Jiang Cheng led the way at the front, holding the carrier with Feiyang in it. The sense of
familiarity grew more intense the higher he climbed, but he couldn’t put a finger on the
exact emotion he felt at the moment.
“We’re here.” He paused outside the door and pulled his keys out. “This one.”
“Not bad. The building’s a little old, but the inside is clean enough,” said Zhao Jin.
Jiang Cheng turned the key in the doorknob, and the door opened at once. He blinked. The
deadbolt wasn’t locked.
He and Gu Fei always had a habit of turning the deadbolt when they locked the door, since
these old residential buildings had no security, and this shoddy wooden door was the only
barrier between the apartment and the street.
Gu Fei didn’t turn the deadbolt! Now that they’d broken up, the dog-fucker wouldn’t even
lock the door properly when he dropped by!
Jiang Cheng pushed open the door and walked in. As he set the cat carrier on the coffee
table, he noticed someone lying on the sofa.
All at once, he froze in place.
“The fuck?” Behind him, Pan Zhi was also taken by surprise.
Jiang Cheng didn’t even need to look directly at the person on the sofa. The curtains were
drawn and the lights were off, it was dark inside. But the moment he perceived a presence
on the sofa and before his brain even established that it was human, he’d already sensed
who the person was.
Gu Fei.
It was Gu Fei.
This whole time, Jiang Cheng was too afraid to imagine in detail what it would be like for
them to see each other again. He was afraid of imagining and shooting down his
expectations at the same time. But in all the ideas that flashed briefly through his mind, this
scene before him was one he never expected to see.
At this moment, it was as if his brain had turned into a vacuum, leaving behind only an
empty nothingness.
But soon after, countless impalpable feelings rushed up all at once.
Longing; heartache for Gu Fei; heartache for himself; anger; fury… all this and more, but not
one of them was accurate.
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak, nor was he able to speak. In fact, he doubted whether he could
make a sound at this moment even if he were to open his mouth.
All he could do was stand here and stare at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei wore a pair of track pants, with one leg bent and the other hanging on the edge, and
on his upper body was a T-shirt Jiang Cheng was very familiar with.
He had an arm raised to cover his eyes, while the other was wrapped around a cushion.
It was a very relaxed pose, which showed just how deep in slumber he was.
Jiang Cheng made not an insignificant amount of noise coming through the door, but Gu Fei
didn’t move an inch.
He could even hear the sound of Gu Fei’s breathing, calm and even, with nothing to disturb
it.
However, when Xu Xingzhi and Zhao Jin walked inside and froze in unison in
the living room, the scene started to become a little awkward.
The four of them stood there side by side as they ogled the person sleeping on the sofa.
And still, Gu Fei didn’t wake up.
The passing of time became a little blurry in situations like this. It wasn’t until Pan Zhi
gently cleared his throat beside him did Jiang Cheng abruptly come back down to earth.
“Gu Fei,” he called out.
Gu Fei stirred a little on the sofa.
Jiang Cheng’s throat felt tight. He had to clear it before he called out again, “Gu Fei.”
Gu Fei’s leg twitched. Then, he lifted the arm that was resting over his eyes.
Perhaps he’d been sleeping too soundly. After he raised his arm, he stared at Jiang Cheng
for another ten seconds at least before he abruptly bounced up off the sofa as if he’d been
stabbed.
Completely skipping over the middle steps of sitting up and getting up, Gu Fei was soon
standing upright beside the coffee table.
“Um…” Jiang Cheng suddenly didn’t know how to continue.
“Cheng-ge?” Gu Fei stared at him. “You…”
Gu Fei didn’t manage to finish his sentence either. Just like that, the two of them stood
there, frozen in place and staring at each other.
“Sorry.” After another long stretch of silence, Gu Fei was the first to speak up.
“I…just came by to check on things, and then I fell asleep.”
“Oh. This is my…friend, Gu Fei.” It only then occurred to Jiang Cheng that he should
probably introduce the people who had been standing beside him in awkward silence this
whole time. “This is Xu Xingzhi, Senior Xu; and Zhao Jin-jie, Zhao Ke’s older sister, you’ve
met Zhao Ke before.”
“Hi everyone.” Gu Fei nodded at them before turning to grab his jacket and putting it on.
“I’ll be going then…”
As Gu Fei walked toward the door while putting on his jacket, Jiang Cheng caught a whiff of
Gu Fei’s familiar scent. As Gu Fei went through the door, Jiang Cheng was suddenly
overcome with a strong urge to cry.
He felt like a drama queen.
“Why don’t you go talk to him.” Pan Zhi finally spoke up. “We’ll rest here for now.”
“… Alright,” Jiang Cheng said, then followed Gu Fei out.
Gu Fei only descended one flight of stairs. Hearing the footsteps behind him, he stopped,
turned, and looked back.
“Let’s go for a walk.” Jiang Cheng tugged on his collar, and, squeezing by on the stairs,
headed down.
Gu Fei followed in silence.
Weather like this wasn’t at all suitable for activities such as “go for a walk”. As soon as they
emerged from the building, the northerly wind rushed at him with such force that Jiang
Cheng could hardly keep his eyes open.
“Fuck.” Jiang Cheng put his hood on, turned his back against the wind, and walked down the
street, not entirely sure where they could go.
“I thought…” Gu Fei quickened his steps to catch up, “you won’t be back for winter break.”
“Where could I go if not here,” said Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei didn’t answer.
The two of them continued walking in silence.
“You’ve…” Gu Fei spoke up again hesitantly, but didn’t finish.
Jiang Cheng turned and glanced at him.
Lost weight. He guessed that was probably what Gu Fei wanted to say.
The last time Gu Fei said he lost weight, Jiang Cheng didn’t really feel it, but this time even
he knew how much skinnier he was.
Just like Gu Fei, who had also lost weight. Though, technically, it wasn’t as obvious. More
than the trace of fatigue on his face was the air of despondency shadowing over him.
Yes, Gu Fei seemed very despondent. Perhaps other people wouldn’t have noticed, since Gu
Fei looked like this whenever he was expressionless or not smiling, but Jiang Cheng could
tell. The word for Gu Fei’s state of being right now was “despondent”.
He sighed.

“That Xu Xingzhi,” Jiang Cheng said after they walked a little further down the road, “is an
upperclassman of Zhao Ke’s older sister. He’s a grad student in U of B’s psychology
department.”
Gu Fei’s footsteps paused briefly.
Jiang Cheng was suddenly a little nervous. He wasn’t sure if he should keep talking, or how
Gu Fei would react. So he stopped walking and peered at Gu Fei.
“What happened to your voice?” Gu Fei asked.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng blinked.
“Why is it so hoarse?” Gu Fei looked at him.
“It’s just a sore throat.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. “The weather’s too dry.”
“…Oh.” Gu Fei paused. “Cheng-ge…”
“Don’t you say ‘I’m sorry’,” Jiang Cheng cut him off. “I don’t want it. And I didn’t come back
here for you, I’m here for Gu Miao.”
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5846
TL word count: 4114
TL’s Notes:
Surprise! ⊙▽⊙
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT! They’re
currently being sickly sweet
First posted: December 4, 2022
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 126
“In memory of the day I dove headfirst into a pile of gay boys”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Neither of them spoke again as they walked around the old residential area, twice.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what Gu Fei was thinking or how he felt. He himself felt like he had
an endless number of things to say, but he couldn’t bring himself to open his mouth, unable
to form even a single complete sentence.
They had no idea what the other had gone through individually over the past month, and
could attempt to discern from their outward appearances. Jiang Cheng could tell—Gu Fei
wasn’t doing well.
“Let’s go sit in there for a while,” Gu Fei finally said during their third lap, pointing at a
small bakery on the side of the road. “It’s way too windy.”
Mm. Jiang Cheng answered.
But no sound came out.
Fuck! He quickly cleared his throat and “mm”ed again.
This time he managed to make a sound.
Was this still his shock response at work? Jiang Cheng was exasperated. Or could it be a
side effect from his initial shock response? Even he had to laugh at the sporadic
performance of his voice box.
The bakery was empty. Gu Fei bought two cups of warm milk tea and two slices of cake,
setting them all on a small table by the window.
Jiang Cheng sat down, and just as he pulled one of the cups closer, Gu Fei reached out and
took the milk tea away. “I forgot, you probably shouldn’t drink milk tea when you have a
sore throat. I’ll go get a…”
“No need.” Jiang Cheng tugged on the sleeve of Gu Fei’s coat. “It’s not that serious, don’t
worry about it.”
Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, then sat down.
The two of them sat across from each other with straws in their mouths, both of them
silent.
“Did you buy a new camera lens?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Mhm.” Gu Fei nodded.
“I…” Jiang Cheng bit on the straw, trying to speak slowly so his voice wouldn’t sound as
raspy. “I was going to give you a call first, to give you a heads up, but I wasn’t sure if the call
would go through, so…”
“I’m using my old cell phone,” Gu Fei said quietly. “I tried reaching out to Pan Zhi, to ask
him where you’d be over the break. He…”
“He deleted you, didn’t he?” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei took a sip of the milk tea, then pushed the cake toward Jiang Cheng. “This…
It’s pretty good. I had some before when I bought it for Gu Miao.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer. He took a bite of the cake.
He didn’t taste anything.
He couldn’t tell whether he was in a good or bad mood at the moment, but it certainly felt
stuffy. Extremely stuffy.
After forcing himself to munch through the whole slice of cake, Jiang Cheng wiped his
mouth and said, “We should…get to the point.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei said.
“I went ahead and did this thing on my own. And I never told you, because I was afraid that
you’d feel pressured.” Jiang Cheng took a sip of the milk tea. “But I just wanted to see if
there’s any possibility for treatment in Er-Miao’s case.”
Gu Fei didn’t answer. He kept his head down as he turned his cup round and round on the
table.
“I went to a few hospitals and asked the doctors, but as long as Er-Miao can’t go over there,
there’s nothing they can do.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. “So I thought I’d check out
some psychology books on my own first. And then, when I told Zhao Ke about it…”
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Fei, a little worried that he would be unhappy about other people
knowing about Gu Miao. But Gu Fei gave no reaction, keeping his head down the whole
time.
“Zhao Ke’s sister happens to be a grad student in U of B’s Clinical Psychiatry program, so
she…introduced me to Xu Xingzhi.” Jiang Cheng swallowed.
“Xu Xingzhi?” Gu Fei looked up.
“He’s…” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat again, “that upperclassman just now.”
“Mm.” Gu Fei nodded, then stood up.
Jiang Cheng blinked. He watched as Gu Fei walked over to pour a cup of warm water from
the dispenser on the side before sitting back down.
“Better just drink water.” Gu Fei set the cup down in front of Jiang Cheng.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng drank.
The water was pretty warm, the steam rushing onto his face made his eyes feel a little hot.
“When you called me that day…” Jiang Cheng stopped, he abruptly recalled what Gu Fei said
to him on the phone back then. Every word was like a needle jabbing into his heart until it
convulsed with pain. Despite knowing what Gu Fei was thinking at the time, he still had to
pause and give himself time to recover. “I was going to tell you about it, but I didn’t get the
chance.”
“I’m sorry,” said Gu Fei.
I’m sorry. It was the one thing that Jiang Cheng didn’t want to hear.
He didn’t know who was in the wrong, since it was a situation with no right or wrong, nor
should it be judged through those binary lenses.
“Right now, Xu Xingzhi is the only person who can come here to see and treat Er-Miao.”
Jiang Cheng took another drink of the warm water. “He might not have graduated yet, but
his advisor has high regard for him, so…”
Jiang Cheng bit his lips and glanced up at Gu Fei. “I wanted him to give it a try, to meet with
Er-Miao.”
“Mm.” Gu Fei looked back at him.
“This is something that requires your agreement, and your cooperation,” Jiang Cheng said
these words with difficulty. “But if you think it’s…not a good idea…”
“Okay,” said Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng looked at him. “So you agree? And you’re willing to cooperate?”
“Mmm.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng was quiet. He bowed his head and stared at the steam coming out of his cup as
he breathed a soft sigh of relief.
But immediately, his eyes felt hot again. It was as if along with the relief, he had
also breathed out some kind of defensive barrier. All of a sudden, tears started welling up
in his eyes.
Before he had time to react, two large drops fell into his cup.
Fuuuuck.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t believe it. He felt a strong urge to look up the viability of surgical tear
duct removal procedures.
He had no choice but to lower his head even more, furiously blinking his eyes at the cup.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei pulled out a tissue, hesitated for a moment, then shoved it into Jiang
Cheng’s hand. “Every single thing you’ve done, I remember it all, really, I…”
While stuffing the tissue into his hand, Gu Fei’s fingertip made contact with Jiang Cheng’s
hand.
It was the lightest, almost imperceptible touch.
It was also the only physical contact they had since October.
“Gu Fei.” Jiang Cheng wiped the tissue against his eyes haphazardly before looking up. “Did
you know, that I don’t want you to remember all that? It’s only because you remember it
too well that we’re here right now.”
Gu Fei looked back at him without a word.
“Before coming back here, I thought that I’d have a lot to say.” Jiang Cheng drew in a deep
breath and leaned back in his chair. He turned to look out the window at the empty street.
It had been a long time since he saw such a barren scene. The cold was visible through the
bleakness, and it slowly calmed him down. “But I’m a little worked up at the moment, so
nothing is coming out anyways.”
“I’m…” Gu Fei slowly rotated the cup of milk tea with his hands
subconsciously, “the same.”
“Let’s set the other stuff to the side for now,” said Jiang Cheng. “Xu Xingzhi is only here for a
few days. Let him meet Er-Miao first, get an idea of her current condition, and see if there’s
a possible treatment plan. And also, how she can continue her treatment in the future.”
“Yeah, okay.” Gu Fei nodded.
“I’m worried that Er-Miao may be resistant.” Jiang Cheng turned to look at Gu Fei. “Maybe
you can talk to her about it tonight? Tell her she’s meeting a new
gege tomorrow?”
“Alright, I’ll talk to her,” Gu Fei said.
Looking at him, Jiang Cheng wanted very much to ask what had happened that day with Gu
Fei, why he suddenly cut off contact and out of nowhere, told him to “forget it”.
He didn’t end up asking it out loud though. Gu Fei’s sore spot could only be his family, there
was no need to prod it with a stick to make it hurt again.
Coming out of the bakery, the two of them walked back in silence. It was only when they
reached Jiang Cheng’s building did Gu Fei finally speak up, “I’ll give you a call tomorrow?”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Then I…I’ll head back now,” said Gu Fei. “Tomorrow… Let’s go get
something to eat together.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “I’m heading up then.”
Gu Fei turned and walked away, but Jiang Cheng stood there unmoving,
watching Gu Fei’s retreating figure. It was the same familiar figure of his memory. He
remembered the way Gu Fei walked, his gait, all of it.
… Let’s not think about that for now.
There were too much to think about and too much to say, that it instead made the both of
them feel at a loss for how to behave.
Just as he turned to head into the building, Jiang Cheng spotted in the corner of his eye that
Gu Fei turned and looked back.
“That’s not very cool of you, Jiang Cheng,” Zhao Jin said as she chewed on a short rib, “to not
tell me about your relationship before we came here.”
“I…forgot,” Jiang Cheng said.
“This meal’s on me,” Zhao Jin said as she gulped down a mouthful of soup, “in memory of
the day I dove headfirst into a pile of gay boys.”
“Jie,” Pan Zhi said sincerely as he looked at her, “I am not, gay.”
“Oh.” Zhao Jin looked back at him. “A little disappointed about that, huh?”
“I…” Pan Zhi sighed. “Yeah, yeah I am.”
Zhao Jin laughed for a while. “You’ve been here before, right? How about you show me
around tomorrow? They have to go see the little girl, so we probably
shouldn’t get in the way.”
“No problem.” Pan Zhi immediately nodded.
Pan Zhi was the one who made a reservation for Zhao Jin and Xu Xingzhi’s hotel. After
dinner, Pan Zhi first took Zhao Jin back to the hotel while Xu Xingzhi and Jiang Cheng
stayed at the restaurant and continued talking.
“That’s about it then, I’ll probably have a chat with Gu Fei first tomorrow,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“And meet with Gu Miao after that. Is there somewhere nearby that’s suitable for sitting
and talking?”
Jiang Cheng thought about it, then said, “It’ll have to be the area close to our old school.
There’s a coffee shop that looks like it’s about to shut down. When school’s out, there’s
hardly anyone in there.”
“That’ll do.” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “You should go back and rest. You look kind of terrible.”
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered, touching his own face.
It was a nice day with no precipitation, one could see early in the morning that the sun
would come out later in the day. Gu Fei stood outside the convenience store with a
cigarette between his lips, watching Gu Miao zoom back and forth on her skateboard
amidst the northerly wind.
He glanced down at the time on his phone. It was a little too early to call Jiang Cheng right
now.
Gu Fei got up way too early. He hadn’t slept the whole night, though he wasn’t sure if it was
because of the jumble of thoughts in his mind, or because he’d slept the whole afternoon in
the apartment earlier that day.
If it wasn’t for Jiang Cheng’s sudden appearance, he might’ve slept all the way until
nightfall.
The feeling in that instant when he opened his eyes and saw Jiang Cheng—even now he still
felt as though he was in a dream.
Jiang Cheng had gotten a lot skinnier and no longer had the vivaciousness Gu Fei
remembered, back when “I’m the fucking best” was written all over his face.
His voice had also gone hoarse, and it definitely wasn’t from some sore throat.
Jiang Cheng could eat grilled meats for days on end without developing a sore throat from
the heat; he’d never seen Jiang Cheng get a sore throat the whole time they knew each
other.
Was it because he was too tired, or because of his mood?
Gu Fei leaned against the doorway and sighed. Obsessively, he went over and over every
little detail from the moment he opened his eyes and saw Jiang Cheng, all the way until
Jiang Cheng turned to walk back into the building.
He couldn’t help it.
Jiang Cheng had pretty good self-discipline—Gu Fei saw it at work during the crunch before
the Exams—but he wasn’t so good at controlling his emotions, and often didn’t know how
to conceal how he felt.
Yesterday, Gu Fei’s heart ached as he watched Jiang Cheng try hard to control his emotions.
He wanted to apologize, wanted to go over and hug Jiang Cheng, wanted a lot of things, but
in the end he could only sit there.
There was now a sense of distance between them, mixed with something elusive.
It was more than that phone call, and more than this empty span of time during which they
ceased contact with each other.
When his phone rang, Gu Fei was still staring at the snow on the ground, spacing out. It
wasn’t until Liu Li, who came out to throw away the garbage, asked “is that your phone
ringing?” did he come back to his senses.
The call was from Jiang Cheng, whose number wasn’t saved on this old cell phone, but Gu
Fei had already memorized it anyway.
“I thought you wouldn’t be up yet,” Gu Fei answered the phone. “I was going to wait to call
you.”
“Just woke up. But I figured you’d already be up.” Jiang Cheng’s voice was still a little husky.
“Xu Xingzhi and I will head over now. You’ve spoken with Er-Miao already, right?”
“Yeah,” said Gu Fei. “I told her that Cheng-ge is coming today, and that another big brother
is also coming to play with her.”
“Is she willing to see me?” Jiang Cheng’s voice sounded a little unsteady. Gu Fei thought he
must be going down the stairs.
“I can’t be sure.” Gu Fei looked at Gu Miao in the distance. “Either way, she can’t express
whatever it is she’s thinking. Though, I feel like she’s a little excited today. She’s been riding
her skateboard all morning, even on a windy day like this.”
“Then we’ll see how it goes. I can always step away,” Jiang Cheng said. “Is she afraid of
cats?”
“No. Why?” Gu Fei asked.
“We brought an extremely tame cat for her to play with,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Let’s see if she likes it.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei agreed.
“Then…see you,” said Jiang Cheng. “I’ll be there soon.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei glanced out toward the intersection as he hung up.
For some reason, Gu Fei felt a little nervous. It had been a long time since he felt like this.
He wanted to see Jiang Cheng, but at the same time was a little afraid to see Jiang Cheng.
Before Jiang Cheng’s figure appeared down the street, he felt anxious.
But as soon as he saw Jiang Cheng turn the corner at the intersection, he swiftly lifted the
curtains and went into the store.
Standing there facing the cash register, he took a few moments before turning around
again. Then he lifted the curtains and walked back out. His heart was thumping hard.
Jiang Cheng and Xu Xingzhi walked up, and Gu Fei greeted them, nodding.
“Good morning.”
“Morning.” Xu Xingzhi reached out a hand. “We didn’t get a chance to meet properly
yesterday.”
“Sorry about…yesterday.” Gu Fei shook his hand, then turned to glance back.
“I’ll call her over.”
“Alright. Is she that little girl over there?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei nodded, then let out a whistle.
In the distance, Gu Miao immediately returned a whistle before braking to an abrupt stop
on her skateboard. She then turned around and rolled her way over.
“Do you always call out to her this way?” Xu Xingzhi asked with a smile.
“Yeah, when she’s on her skateboard and far away, she can’t hear me when I shout for her,”
Gu Fei said.
“How interesting.” Xu Xingzhi smiled as he watched Gu Miao speed toward them. “What a
lovely little girl.”
“Thank you.” Gu Fei smiled too.
Despite his reluctance to give up in the face of adversity and always holding out hope for
how things would turn out, Jiang Cheng was a little nervous. He’d always told himself that
Gu Miao would surely improve.
However, when Gu Miao drew closer to them one meter at a time, he began to feel nervous
nonetheless.
Gu Miao was not the key to solving the problem between him and Gu Fei.
But she was the one tie he could never let go of.
Jiang Cheng was afraid of Gu Fei’s disappointment.
He was suddenly overwhelmed with fear. If Gu Miao really didn’t improve at the end of this,
what kind of despair would await Gu Fei then?
Gu Miao was getting closer. He could already see the slightly elated expression on her face.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei crouched down and gestured to her with his hand. “Slow down.”
Gu Miao slowed down. As the skateboard rolled up, she stepped on it and came to a stop.
Hopping off, she kicked the board up with the tip of her toe and clutched it under her arm.
“Cheng-ge’s back,” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao’s gaze skipped over Gu Fei and landed on Jiang Cheng.
“Er-Miao.” Jiang Cheng grinned and leaned down.
Gu Miao looked back at him, not giving any response.
Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers and gave her a thumbs up.
Still clutching her skateboard, a few long moments passed before Gu Miao lifted her hand
and snapped her fingers back at him, before returning a thumbs up.
“That’s amazing.” In that moment, tears practically burst forth from Jiang Cheng’s eyes.
“That’s awesome, Er-miao!”
Gu Fei turned back and glanced at him.
Jiang Cheng smiled. And the corners of Gu Fei’s mouth lifted as well. “She really has missed
you.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Er-Miao, this is Uncle Xu…gege.” Gu Fei pointed at Xu Xingzhi. “Say hi to
Xu-gege.”
Xu Xingzhi remained on the side the whole time, watching them. Jiang Cheng knew he was
observing the interaction between Gu Fei and Gu Miao, as well as Gu Miao’s responses.
With the skateboard in her arms, Gu Miao bowed to Xu Xingzhi, who smiled as he crouched
down and said, “Hello.”
Gu Miao seemed to draw a blank. She stared back at him expressionlessly.
“Is this your skateboard?” Xu Xingzhi pointed.
Gu Miao looked down at her skateboard. Xu Xingzhi continued, “How does it work?”
Gu Miao glanced at him, then turned and set the skateboard on the ground. She put one foot
on it, tipping the front of the board up, before turning back to look at Xu Xingzhi.
In her eyes, Jiang Cheng saw the little challenging look she had shown him back then, when
they took turns hopping on and off her board.
“And then what do you do?” asked Xu Xingzhi.
Gu Miao stepped onto the board with her other foot, leaned her weight forward, and rolled
out along the gentle slope of the road.
“Is she usually able to communicate with others like this?” Xu Xingzhi asked Gu Fei.
“Not always,” said Gu Fei. “About half the time. Sometimes if she’s upset or nervous, it
doesn’t work.”
“I see.” Xu Xingzhi nodded, then stood up and turned to Jiang Cheng. “So now we’ll go to
that…coffee shop you mentioned before?”
“Let’s go,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Gu Miao led the way in the front on her skateboard, with Xu Xingzhi watching her the
whole time.
Gu Fei walked beside Xu Xingzhi while Jiang Cheng brought up the rear, holding the cat
carrier.
Jiang Cheng was a little conflicted. Should he continue hanging back like this or catch up
and walk beside Gu Fei, or perhaps beside Xu Xingzhi?
This strange sense of awkwardness that appeared out of nowhere, of not
knowing what to do with himself, made him feel a little glum.
Gu Fei seemed to feel something similar. More than once Jiang Cheng saw him turn his
head, sneaking glances backward with the corner of his eye, and somewhat slowing his
steps, then speeding up again.
“Um,” Gu Fei finally turned around, “is the cat in the bag?”
“Yeah, his name is Feiyang.” Jiang Cheng lifted up the cat carrier. “It’s the Senior’s cat.”
“We’ll see in a while how Gu Miao reacts to little creatures. This cat of mine is very
affectionate toward people—like a dog—and very suitable for interacting with kids,” said
Xu Xingzhi.
“I had a neighbour keep rabbits when I was little,” said Gu Fei. “Er-Miao quite liked them.
Now bunnies are the only animals she draws.”
“Can you show me her drawings today?” asked Xu Xingzhi. “Anything she writes or draws.”
“Sure.” Gu Fei nodded. After a few more steps, he turned back again. “I can hold that.”
“… That’s ok,” said Jiang Cheng.
Whether it was intentional or not, Xu Xingzhi pulled out his phone and quickened his pace
to walk in front of them.
Gu Fei hung back a little, and Jiang Cheng walked up so they were walking side by side.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said quietly. “What are the…costs and stuff for the treatment?”
“It’s a favour,” said Jiang Cheng. “This visit is just a first contact to find out the specifics of
Gu Miao’s condition, so there’s no fee. If the treatment goes ahead after this, he won’t
charge anything. For the tests and scans, and things like rehab, those expenses will
probably be manageable.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say that he could help out with the expenses. He didn’t want Gu Fei to
feel that pressure again. Besides, it was still too early to discuss those details.
“Did you take on some jobs over the break?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah. Ding Zhuxin has work for me,” said Gu Fei. “But I can push them off for
the next few days.”
“That’s probably not necessary, it shouldn’t take an entire day.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “It
shouldn’t be affected.”
After that, the two of them continued walking wordlessly in the direction of the high school.
They had walked this road countless times in the past, whether it was on foot, on the
motorcycle, on the Little Bun, or on their bikes. But today’s journey would be Jiang Cheng’s
most memorable one.
Every step was a bold bouquet of mixed emotions.
There was indeed no one inside the coffee shop. Not only that, there was nothing available
to order on the menu aside from coffee. It was a very one-track coffee shop.
Therefore, they got coffee for themselves and a glass of milk for Gu Miao.
Xu Xingzhi wanted to chat with Gu Fei first, so Jiang Cheng sat at another table with Gu
Miao.
“His name is Feiyang.” Jiang Cheng opened the cat carrier and turned the opening toward
Gu Miao. “Look Er-Miao, doesn’t his fur look like a bunny’s?”
Gu Miao’s eyes shone bright when she peered into the bag and spotted Feiyang.
“You can pet it, Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao hesitated, then reached out a hand. But before her hand was even inside the bag,
Feiyang already reached out a paw and set it on her outstretched palm Gu Miao whipped
her head around and looked excitedly at Gu Fei.
“He really likes you,” said Xu Xingzhi. “Do you want to play with him?”
Gu Miao didn’t reply. Instead, she turned back around and flopped over the table, sticking
her face right up close to the cat carrier and stared at Feiyang.
Jiang Cheng breathed a sigh of relief. Like Gu Miao, he felt a pleasant surprise.
He could see that Gu Miao liked Feiyang a lot. She continued smoothing her hand over
Feiyang’s fur as the cat started rubbing up against her face.
Xu Xingzhi and Gu Fei sat down one table away from them.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, but he could pretty much guess
what Xu Xingzhi would want to know. Based on the psychology knowledge he had
forcefully crammed into his brain in high concentration over
this past semester but hadn’t yet digested, they would likely be touching on the past that Gu
Fei was unwilling to bring up.
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Chapter 127
“Can I call him a masochist?”
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
It was very warm in the coffee shop with its heating on full blast. Jiang Cheng could taste
the coffee in his mouth, see Gu Miao before him, stroking Feiyang and occasionally letting
out a smile, and hear the faint café music fading in and out. There was also the sound of the
conversation between Xu Xingzhi and Gu Fei, whose voices could be heard but not clearly.
Jiang Cheng slumped down on the table, turned his head to one side, and closed his eyes.
Despite the clear layer of jelly that still seemed to separate him and Gu Fei, nevertheless at
this moment, he felt a sense of relief. For the first time in a long time, his mind was not
crammed full of thoughts when he paused to stare off into space.
He felt his whole body relax and empty out.
He also couldn’t remember the last time he felt so sleepy.
It seemed to be ages ago, when he last slumped over a desk and slept like he’d never wake
up again. He could even hear his own snoring, low and quiet.
That was no good. It was bad for his image.
It was bad enough that a handsome guy such as him slept with his face smooshed against
the table like a dead pig, but he snored too!
Jiang Cheng kept trying to remind himself, but he didn’t manage to wake up, not even once.
Your face is going to be lopsided, Jiang Cheng.
He continued sleeping.
Will you drool, Jiang Cheng?
He continued sleeping.
You seem to be snoring, Jiang Cheng.
Still, he slept.
If it wasn’t for Feiyang placing a paw on his nose, Jiang Cheng figured he could continue
sleeping like this.
Though a cat’s paw is an amazing thing—soft and gentle. It had woke him up, but even so,
he didn’t leap up reflexively as usual. If a dog had put its paw on his nose like that, he’d
probably flip the table, and the dog with it.
Jiang Cheng opened his eyes and saw that beyond the white fur of Feiyang, Gu Miao’s
curious eyes were staring at him.
Gu Miao looked so much like Gu Fei, especially when it came to her eyes. Only, the look in
Gu Miao’s eyes was pure, while Gu Fei’s eyes contained a
slumbering story…
Gu Fei!
Jiang Cheng immediately lifted his head and glanced toward the table where Gu Fei and Xu
Xingzhi were sitting.
Xu Xingzhi was writing notes on his laptop. Meanwhile, Gu Fei was turned with his back
leaning against the wall and one leg propped on a chair, looking his way.
Gu Fei was caught off guard by Jiang Cheng suddenly sitting up. He wanted to turn his face
away and right his body at the same time, but ended up lifting his leg and bumping his knee
against the underside of the table, knocking down the chair he’d rested on in the process.
Xu Xingzhi was startled halfway through his typing. He first looked up at Gu Fei, then
turned and glanced in Jiang Cheng’s direction.
“I fell asleep.” Jiang Cheng wiped his mouth, a little embarrassed.
“We’re pretty much done talking too.” Xu Xingzhi smiled and closed his laptop.
“I noticed that Gu Miao is getting along quite well with Feiyang, so I’ll be bringing Feiyang
along with me for the next few days for her to play with.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded as he watched Gu Miao, who was once again
holding Feiyang in her arms. He checked the time on his phone and said, “So now…”
He…had fallen asleep at the table…for almost three hours!
“It’s time for lunch,” said Jiang Cheng.
“I made a reservation,” Gu Fei said. “Pan Zhi and Zhao Jin are already on their way there.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng blanked for a moment before standing up. “Let’s head over
then. Where’s the reservation?”
“A pork bone hotpot place—Li Yan took us there recently, it’s pretty good. They have…” and
here Gu Fei glanced at him, “large chunks of meat.”
“…Oh.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat, then picked up a cup of water at random from the
table and took several large gulps.
When he set the cup, he saw Gu Miao looking up at him.
He paused for a moment. “Was that yours?”
Gu Miao gave no discernable reaction.
“Do you want water?” Jiang Cheng asked hastily. He had never taken something from Gu
Miao before, this made him a little nervous all of a sudden. “I’ll get you another cup?”
There was no reaction from Gu Miao. Still holding Feiyang, she turned to look at Gu Fei.
“You can keep holding him,” said Gu Fei. “If you don’t want water, then we’ll go to have
lunch now, okay?”
Gu Miao turned and walked away.
“She’s not angry, is she?” asked Jiang Cheng.
“No. She’s in a very good mood today,” said Gu Fei. “She hasn’t even taken one sip of that
water.”
The hotpot restaurant wasn’t far from where they were, though it was still some distance
on foot, so they ended up taking a cab over.
Xu Xingzhi sat in the front passenger’s seat while Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei sat in the back,
and between them was Gu Miao with Feiyang on her lap.
It was the first time they sat in the backseat of a car without sitting side by side, their arms
touching.
After Gu Fei gave the address, they all fell quiet. Xu Xingzhi and Gu Fei might’ve been a little
tired from all the talking they did before, but Jiang Cheng simply didn’t know what to say.
He leaned against the door and watched Gu Miao.
He didn’t even dare lift his eyes, because if he did, he would be able to see Gu Fei’s side
profile.
Only Gu Miao was carefree with her head down playing with Feiyang.
The cat must’ve been a little tired, having kept Gu Miao company for so long.
Lying on his back on Gu Miao’s lap, Feiyang was still as Gu Miao rubbed the fur on his belly.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what a powerful effect a little animal would have on a child like Gu
Miao, but it certainly was unexpected that Gu Miao was able to stay quiet and calm for such
a long time as she focused all her attention on playing with Feiyang, petting his fur and
squeezing his paws. It was a pleasant surprise.
When Gu Miao moved her hand away, Feiyang would simply lie there quietly.
When Gu Miao reached over, Feiyang would also reach out two paws and put them around
her hand.
The interaction amused Gu Miao greatly. They played this game over and over until when
she reached out her hand again, Feiyang took her hand and gently nuzzled his head against
it.
“Ha!” Gu Miao shouted in glee.
Jiang Cheng was stunned. It was the first time he heard Gu Miao’s voice outside of screams,
though it was only a short sound, almost as if she had let it out by accident.
He stared at Gu Miao in shock, wondering if perhaps he wasn’t fully awake, or maybe if he
had too many things in his head these days and he was imagining voices.
Only, Gu Fei also whipped his head around just now.
He didn’t imagine it.
“Er-Miao?” Gu Fei called her.
Gu Miao didn’t respond, and instead buried her face into Feiyang’s fur.
“Senior,” Jiang Cheng could feel his voice shaking, threatening to split, “it’s the first time I’ve
heard her voice when it’s not screaming.”
“Really?” Xu Xingzhi turned and smiled at him. “It’s a fairly common
phenomenon. There are many pleasant surprises when kids interact with little animals.”
Xu Xingzhi wasn’t as excited as Gu Fei and him. Perhaps it was because he knew what kids
like her were like, and perhaps because he had seen a lot more, and besides, this didn’t
necessarily mean anything.
Jiang Cheng had known Gu Miao for a while now. He liked Gu Miao; he would feel happy
whenever he received any feedback from her, and likewise his mood
would drop when she screamed or reacted with apathy. Unlike Xu Xingzhi, this very short
vocalization from Gu Miao filled him with a thousand emotions.
And Gu Fei…
It would only have an even stronger effect on him.
Gu Fei squeezed Gu Miao’s shoulder gently before turning to look out the window.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t see his expression, but he knew that as someone who didn’t usually
wear his heart on his sleeve, Gu Fei wouldn’t have turned away if he was still in control of
his emotions.
When they arrived at their private room in the restaurant, Pan Zhi and Zhao Jin were
already seated at the table.
“How was your day?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Where’d you guys go?”
“Downtown, the area around the square,” said Zhao Jin. “We went to karaoke.”
“Karaoke?” Jiang Cheng turned to Pan Zhi. “The ones in malls?”
“Better than that.” Pan Zhi started laughing. “We saw it when we were wandering around.
It’s one of those one-person karaoke rooms, the kind that can record sound and video.”
“Did you record yourselves?” asked Jiang Cheng.
“I…” Pan Zhi stole a glance at Zhao Jin, who wore a fake smile as she stared at him viciously.
He paused before continuing, “Recorded my own.”
Zhao Jin laughed. “Hey, make sure mine doesn’t get out.”
“Why?” Jiang Cheng asked, also laughing.
“She sings off pitch,” said Xu Xingzhi. “It was already renowned throughout the school
several years ago during Orientation.”
“Wait a second,” Pan Zhi looked at Zhao Jin, “you were soloing for Orientation with your
pitch like that?”
“What’s your point,” said Zhao Jin. “You sang with me for two whole hours with my pitch
like that.”
“That’s because I have high endurance,” said Pan Zhi.
They all burst out laughing at that. Meanwhile, Jiang Cheng found a seat at the table with Gu
Miao. She preferred sitting in corners, so Jiang Cheng sat beside her toward the outside,
and Gu Fei, coming up behind them, sat beside him.
When Gu Fei took off his jacket, Jiang Cheng once again caught a whiff of the familiar scent.
He found it difficult at that moment to articulate how he felt with words.
All this time, he had gone through a variety of emotions when it came to Gu Fei
—understanding, confusion, clarity, anger, and resignation… However, what he felt right
now was new, something that never came up before.
Mixed in there was a longing for something only inches away, a feeling that he hadn’t felt in
a long time, but this time it made him sad.
The server brought them the menu. Gu Fei accepted it and started ordering. All the while,
Jiang Cheng stared blankly at his tea cup, not paying attention to any of the conversations
going on around him.
It wasn’t until Gu Fei turned in his direction to speak to Gu Miao that Jiang Cheng finally
snapped out of it. Just like when he was studying for his exams, the only thing he could be
sure to hear immediately without fail was Gu Fei’s voice.
“It’s time to eat, Er-Miao. Let Feiyang rest,” said Gu Fei. “And you’re going to go wash your
hands.”
Gu Miao hugged Feiyang and didn’t stir.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei said again. “Put Feiyang back in his carrier.”
Still, Gu Miao didn’t move.
Gu Fei stood up and walked behind Jiang Cheng to reach her. He gently picked Feiyang up
from her lap and placed the cat into the cat carrier.
Just as he zipped the carrier back up, Gu Miao leaned back in her seat, threw her head back,
and started screaming.
The scream was so sudden that it startled everyone in the room.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei tugged on her arm. “Er-Miao.”
“Gu Fei,” Xu Xingzhi called to him from the side. “Let her scream.”
After a few seconds of hesitation, Gu Fei let go of her.
“She has to learn to use the right method to express her needs,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Okay,” Gu Fei answered, glancing at the door to their room.
“I’ll go.” Jiang Cheng stood up. He understood Gu Fei’s worry. They were in a restaurant,
and though they had come early and there weren’t many customers
here, the servers would surely come by to ask about the screaming.
He stepped out of the room, and just as he was about to close the door, Pan Zhi followed
him out and shut the door behind him.
“The little girl’s got one hell of a voice, huh?” Pan Zhi remarked.
Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Did you make any progress this morning?” Pan Zhi asked.
“Xu Xingzhi and Gu Fei talked for a long time,” said Jiang Cheng. “I haven’t asked about the
details yet.”
“So do you have any ideas?” Pan Zhi continued.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng didn’t know what he meant.
“I wasn’t asking about Gu Miao,” said Pan Zhi. “I was asking about you two.”
“I…” The words got stuck in Jiang Cheng’s throat for a long time, before he managed to say,
“don’t know yet. I don’t have any ideas. I’ve just been thinking about Gu Miao.”
“Oh,” said Pan Zhi.
Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“For you,” Pan Zhi gave him a sideways look, “I gave up gathering with my family, with the
stress of ten broom beatings in a row from my mother hanging over my head…”
“I’m not keeping things from you.” Jiang Cheng smiled at him a little helplessly.
“I’m really… not sure. I just, my mind is a mess right now, I don’t even know what’s
happening.”
A server finished delivering dishes to the room next door and upon hearing Gu Miao’s
screaming, walked over to them.
“Sorry about that.” Pan Zhi immediately walked up. “We have a kid in there throwing a
tantrum, she’ll be fine soon.”
“Really?” The server didn’t seem convinced. “You’re not beating your kid, are you?”
“No way.” Pan Zhi laughed. “Kid’s got a bad temper, starts screaming when she gets mad.
She’ll stop when she’s tired.”
“Is that so.” The server sighed and said as he walked away, “How eccentric.”
“Cheng-er.” Pan Zhi went back to leaning against the wall as he looked at Jiang Cheng. “The
way I see it, you two didn’t have a clean break.”
Jiang Cheng looked back at him.
“But if you really are going to get back together, don’t be impulsive about it,”
said Pan Zhi. “If the problem between you isn’t resolved, even if you get back together,
you’ll just break up again.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t answer, only let out a soft sigh.
The problem between him and Gu Fei.
He used to think that the only problem between them was Gu Miao, and that if only Gu Miao
could get better, they would be fine. He’d never considered anything else.
But now he could sense that that wasn’t really the case.
Gu Miao’s screaming session today ended sooner than usual. At around the five minute
mark, she went quiet.
It could be due to her general good mood.
When she stopped screaming, Jiang Cheng let out a breath of relief.
When they went back into the room, Xu Xingzhi and Zhao Jin were calmly sipping tea while
Gu Fei crouched in front of Gu Miao, speaking to her gently,
“Gege knows you like Feiyang, but he’s tired and needs to sleep. If you like him, you should
let him sleep, or else he’s going to feel unwell… If you keep screaming, Gege can’t
understand…”
Jiang Cheng stood behind Gu Fei and gazed at his back quietly.
He had lost weight, it was obvious.
Jiang Cheng sighed.
Gu Miao seemed to be fairly cooperative today. After Gu Fei spoke to her for a while, she
picked up a wet wipe and started cleaning her own hands.
When the server they had run into in the hallway came in to bring their food, he specifically
gave Gu Miao several long looks, probably to confirm that she really wasn’t being beaten.
Gu Miao wrapped her hands around her tea cup and looked back
expressionlessly.
“Still mad, huh?” said the server.
“Mhm, she sure has a temper.” Pan Zhi nodded.
After lunch, Gu Fei took Gu Miao home for a nap, while Zhao Jin went back to the hotel to
rest. Jiang Cheng, Pan Zhi, and Xu Xingzhi went back to the apartment together.
Pan Zhi spread himself onto the sofa as soon as he entered. “I’m just going to snooze for a
while here, you two can chat in the room, right?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
He really didn’t wish to appear so anxious, but it was true that he was very anxious. He
figured there was no need to cover up his feelings in front of Xu Xingzhi and Pan Zhi though
—one was his BFF, and the other the listener to his rant style vents.
“So?” Once in the bedroom, Jiang Cheng shut the door halfway, pulled up a chair for Xu
Xingzhi, and stood leaning against the edge of the desk.
“Give me a moment to form my sentences properly.” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“Don’t use jargon, okay? My brain’s a little muddled right now, I probably won’t
understand,” said Jiang Cheng.
“I mostly got to learn about Gu Fei’s family situation this morning. I needed to know the
details of their living situation before Gu Miao started exhibiting these symptoms, as well as
the relationship dynamic between their family members,”
said Xu Xingzhi, his voice steady as always.
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He had to admit, whether it was the tone or cadence of his
speech, it always had a calming effect.
“Originally, Gu Miao’s condition wasn’t that serious, but she never received any good
intervention or treatment, so now, a lot more time and patience is required in order for her
to get better. I’ll talk to Gu Fei about the details of what to do, how to interact with Gu Miao,
as well as how to guide her,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“She’s not showing any signs of aggression; the biggest problem right now is concentration,
expressing herself, and keeping her emotions in control. It’s hard for her to maintain
concentration, which makes communication more difficult, which also makes learning
things difficult…”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Sometimes it feels like she doesn’t hear you when you talk to
her.”
“This is something that takes time, it’ll come slowly. I don’t think Gu Fei will have any
trouble cooperating in this aspect, he’s more patient than many parents of special needs
children I’ve met.” Xu Xingzhi paused before continuing, “And this is something I should
also speak to you about.”
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“We went pretty far in our conversation today. I think,” said Xu Xingzhi, “that Gu Fei himself
is also in great need of therapy.”
“What do you mean?” Jiang Cheng was immediately anxious.
“From what he’s told me about what happened in his family and about Gu Miao, I can see
that how he positions himself in his environment and his understanding of a lot of things is
rather problematic,” said Xu Xingzhi. “I’m sure you can feel it too. He positions himself as
the bearer of responsibility. His family, his mother, his little sister…”
“They’re all his responsibility, right?” Jiang Cheng frowned. “He took everything and put it
on his own shoulders, everyone is his responsibility.”
“Right,” said Xu Xingzhi. “He even thought that he failed to protect Gu Miao and that’s why
she got hurt and ended up like this…”
Jiang Cheng was surprised.
He understood the rest, and after what Xu Xingzhi said, he was also able to quickly match it
with a lot of Gu Fei’s behavior. However, he had never considered that Gu Fei would see
what happened to Gu Miao as his own fault.
“The environment he grew up in and his family structure made him internalize
‘giving’ as the default, and he’s also made it a habit of life. Conversely,
‘accepting’ is what scares him, because in his experience growing up, that’s an unusual
state. In his mind, he’s put himself below many things in terms of priority… Do you see
what I’m saying?”
“I…think so.” Jiang Cheng gave Xu Xingzhi a look. “Can I call him a
masochist?”
Xu Xingzhi laughed. “Not exactly. He doesn’t derive any pleasure from this process, he’s
always been very suppressed.”
“Yeah. I guess it’s just…a way of closing himself off.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“I want to test him for anxiety tomorrow,” said Xu Xingzhi. “I think he’s exhibiting serious
signs of anxiety. If he continues like this over the long term…”
“He probably won’t agree to it,” said Jiang Cheng.
“I’m going to be straightforward with him. His current mental state is not conducive to Gu
Miao’s treatment,” said Xu Xingzhi. “His emotions will have an effect on Gu Miao.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows.
At the end of their short chat, Xu Xingzhi got ready to return to the hotel to rest.
“Really…thank you so much.” Holding the cat carrier, Jiang Cheng walked him down the
stairs. “I didn’t think that Gu Miao would draw all of this out.”
“It’s not uncommon at all. Mental health issues are never due to one isolated cause. Aside
from yourself, your family and your surrounding environment are all influential factors.”
Xu Xingzhi smiled. “Honestly, I’m very interested in all this. I plan to go back and write my
thesis proposal on this and see if it’ll be approved.”
“I hope it will.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“You should get back, I’ll take a cab back to the hotel,” Xu Xingzhi said. “I’m going to
organize all my notes from today and decide on the next steps.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng handed over the cat carrier. “Feiyang needs to rest too.”
“Feiyang’s had a pretty good impact, I think,” said Xu Xingzhi. “If possible, you can try to let
Gu Miao interact more with little animals, though you’d have to make sure their
temperament is as mild as Feiyang.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
When he returned to his apartment, Pan Zhi was already awake. He was sitting on the sofa
with his arms folded, watching TV.
Jiang Cheng plopped himself down on the sofa and sighed loudly.
“What?” Pan Zhi asked him. “Is there good news about Gu Miao’s prognosis?”
“There’s hope,” said Jiang Cheng. His mood was elevated at the mention of Gu Miao, but he
sighed again when his thoughts turned to Gu Fei.
“If there’s hope then why are you sighing?” Pan Zhi turned to him.
“I just…suddenly realized,” Jiang Cheng also turned to look at Pan Zhi, “that I haven’t really
been striving in the right direction since the very beginning.”
“What?” Pan Zhi’s expression was one of utter confusion.
“I thought, as long as I keep holding onto him and not let go,” Jiang Cheng said,
“if I keep hanging onto him, that he would be able to move forward. But…”
“Huh?” Pan Zhi was still lost. “Who?”
“It’s no use holding onto him.” Jiang Cheng turned back to face the television.
“He has to want to move forward on his own.”

“You’re talking about Gu Fei?” Pan Zhi finally caught on.

“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“…Oh.” Pan Zhi continued looking at him. “I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to understand, it’s enough that I understand.” Jiang Cheng clapped him on
the shoulder. “Go back to your nap. I’m gonna go lie down for a bit.”
“You’ve worked hard, gramps,” said Pan Zhi.
Jiang Cheng lay down in his bed and felt his mind start to race in every direction again. He
thought about a lot and was anxious to make out a coherent thread through it all, but a long
time passed and still he couldn’t make out heads or tails of it.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5825
TL word count: 4003
TL’s Notes:
Happy New Year~
SAYE MANHUA is still updating every Friday
– CHECK IT! They’re
currently being sickly sweet
First posted: January 22, 2023
0002.jpeg
Translated by: amidstwoods
Chapter 128
An entirely different kind of significance
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
“I can talk to them for you and change all your times to the afternoon and evening,” said
Ding Zhuxin on the phone. “But first you have to come by this afternoon for a face-to-face.
There will be three photogs, in charge of three different sets.”
“Alright. Have I met the other two?” Gu Fei asked around the cigarette in his mouth. He was
leaning against the window, watching Gu Miao doodling on the coffee table.
Since coming home from lunch, she’d been drawing nonstop, filling the page with many
green bunnies.
He had already done as Xu Xingzhi suggested, found a cartoon line drawing of a cat as
reference, and drawn one for her as an example. It only took four lines in total. If she
wanted to draw Feiyang, it would be simple to learn. But up until this point, Gu Miao still
continued to draw her green bunnies.
“Probably not, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not like you’ll be working with them,”
said Ding Zhuxin. “If you do a good job on this project, it’ll be easy to refer you to bigger
gigs next time.”
“Thank you,” said Gu Fei.
“You don’t need to say that to me.” Ding Zhuxin chuckled. “Oh yeah, just let me know if you
need any equipment. I’ll find someone to lend it to you.”
“It’s not like I’m an equipment enthusiast or anything,” said Gu Fei. “What I have now is
perfectly fine. I didn’t even buy extra lenses.”
“That’s because you don’t have the money.” Ding Zhuxin was blunt.
“Even if I do, I wouldn’t spend it on this,” said Gu Fei. “There’s a ton of other things that
need the money.”
“Da-Fei…” Ding Zhuxin paused before continuing, “I’ve said it before, if you need help with
anything, just tell me. I can’t do much, but if ever you urgently need money for something,
that’s something I can help with.”
“Getting me jobs is already a great help,” said Gu Fei. “Really.”
“Is Jiang Cheng back for winter break?” asked Ding Zhuxin. “An old client he worked for
once wants to book him again. Does he have time?”
“Probably…not,” said Gu Fei. “His classmates and friends came back with him, and besides,
it’s a short break.”
“Alright then, we’ll have to see next time. Remember to go and meet everyone later.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei hung up and turned to face the window. He looked out, propping his elbow
on the windowsill.
He was tired. If it wasn’t for the high compensation of the gig and the potential connections
to bigger future projects it promised, he would rather not go outside again today.
The two hours he had spent talking with Xu Xingzhi that morning left him feeling
exhausted. Not because of the number of words exchanged, but because when he started
telling Xu Xingzhi about Gu Miao’s situation, he was forced to open up too many of the
memories he had sealed away for years.
They were all things he tried hard not to think about.
He had to admit, Xu Xingzhi was good: every one of his questions landed right on target on
his most sensitive point, forcing him to answer.
Besides, he had no choice but to answer, since it was related to Gu Miao.
A lot of these ideas, these thoughts, were things he had never mentioned to anyone before.
His friends didn’t know about them, and neither did Jiang Cheng.
And such an exhausting process as this… He opened his mouth and blew out a puff of
smoke, watching it fade into the wind before it even had time to expand into a vague shape.
Then turning, he snubbed out the cigarette in the ashtray on the desk and closed the
window.
He surprisingly wasn’t resistant to this process. Perhaps it was for Gu Miao’s sake, perhaps
it was for Jiang Cheng, or perhaps it was because Xu Xingzhi just seemed very reliable.
“There’s a problem with the way you interact with Gu Miao,” Xu Xingzhi had said. “With
your actions and reactions, you’re sending the subconscious message that you revolve
around her, that she’s your center. You’ve used all these years’
time to tell her that everything you do for her is natural, and will never go away.
Once she’s formed that preconception, then the slightest change will lead to her breaking
down.”
Gu Fei glanced at Gu Miao hovered over the coffee table and let out a gentle sigh.
He had felt a little lost at Xu Xingzhi’s words, but once he thought about it, he saw the truth
in them. From the moment Gu Miao refused to speak, his life seemed to have completely
changed.
He worked hard to process what Xu Xingzhi said, all of it things he had never thought about
before.
He only ever wanted to protect Gu Miao from any further harm. If she couldn’t express
herself, then he would strive to understand. If her big brother was the only presence she
recognized in her world, then he would be that one and only for her.
But Gu Miao was different from the other children born with autism, the source of her
problem was childhood trauma. She had the ability to perceive emotions in many
situations, but she couldn’t concentrate, and there was no one to guide her in
communicating and interacting with other people…
“And you, just so happen to satisfy her needs whenever she’s expressing herself
inappropriately. Therefore, any change and progress must start with you,” Xu Xingzhi had
said.
Gu Fei rubbed his face before glancing at the time. He had to go now, meet with his client,
find out their vision and ideas for the shoot.
“Er-Miao.” Gu Fei crouched down by Gu Miao’s side. “Gege has to go out now.”
Gu Miao threw him a glance and nodded.
“Nod only if you understand,” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao nodded again.
“Li Yan-gege will come and keep you company later,” said Gu Fei. “If you want to go out
skateboarding, he will go with you.”
Gu Miao nodded.
Gu Fei took the piece of paper on which he’d drawn a cat earlier, and drew a row of cats on
it before setting it down in front of Gu Miao. “This is gege’s drawing.”
“Sheep,” Gu Miao said softly.
Gu Fei was about to explain that they were cats, when he realized she was talking about
Feiyang’s name—Fat Sheep. He smiled and said, “Yes, Feiyang.”
Gu Miao stared at him.
“His name is Feiyang,” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao continued staring at him, and after a long moment, said again, “Sheep.”
Alright, “Sheep”. At least she remembered half of Feiyang’s name.
As he left home he pulled out his phone, figuring that he should give Jiang Cheng a call.
After all, Jiang Cheng had come back for Gu Miao’s sake, and Xu Xingzhi had spent the
morning talking to him. He should probably reach out now, in case they had further plans
for the afternoon and he wasn’t available.
But then again, he thought that if he made this call now, then these reasons he had would
all sound like mere excuses.
He hesitated for about five minutes, the span of his walk from home out to the intersection,
before finally calling Jiang Cheng’s number.
When he pressed the call button, he was surprised to sense a foreignness in this familiar
action, as though it had been years since he last called Jiang Cheng.
“Hello?” Jiang Cheng picked up.
“It’s me,” said Gu Fei.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng’s voice was hoarse again.
“What exactly is wrong with your voice?” Gu Fei couldn’t help himself.
“I’m going through puberty,” said Jiang Cheng.
“…Oh.” There was a pause before Gu Fei continued, “You’re a bit of a late bloomer, huh.”
“Uh huh” was Jiang Cheng’s answer.
After a gap of silence, Gu Fei heard Jiang Cheng’s laugh coming through the receiver. The
familiar and uncontrollable urge to give into nonsensical laughter once again swept over
him, and they giggled together for a good while.
“Okay but,” Gu Fei finally put a stop to his own giggles, “I wanted to give you a heads up.
You know how I have a shoot planned? I have to go there now to meet them in person. Do
you still need to talk to Er-Miao this afternoon?”
“Yeah. Xu Xingzhi actually wanted to meet with her directly,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Is that alright?”
“That’s fine,” said Gu Fei. “Li Yan is coming around in the afternoon, just get him to take her
wherever you need to go.”
“Alright.”
“Okay.”
Then they both fell quiet at the same time.
The levity from the silly giggles just now lasted only three lines before the heavy mood
returned.
After hanging up, Gu Fei stood for a long time on the side of the road.
Compared to the feeling before when he thought he would never see Jiang Cheng again,
what he found even harder to bear now was knowing that the guy was right here, right
where they used to live together, yet out of his reach. It was this knowledge that made it
hard for him to breathe
But if Jiang Cheng left now, he might just suffocate to death.
Xu Xingzhi wanted to spend some one-on-one time with Gu Miao, to see how she reacted to
other people when Gu Fei wasn’t around.
“She’s probably with Gu Fei’s friend right now,” said Jiang Cheng. “Should I give them a
call?”
“Sure.” Xu Xingzhi nodded. “Is there anywhere nearby where we can hang out and play?”
“I… I’m not sure. I usually see kids playing on the outdoor exercise equipment, fighting over
them with the old people.” Jiang Cheng considered for a second, then said, “I can ask Li Yan,
he’s familiar with the neighborhood.”
“Alright,” said Xu Xingzhi. “Even better if it’s somewhere with other kids around.”
Jiang Cheng called Li Yan and relayed the message.
“Sure there is, past your classmate’s flatbread–I mean, meat pie shop, there’s a small sports
field. Beside that there’s a playground with slides and stuff kids like to play with, I can take
her there now,” said Li Yan. “But it’s outdoors, it’s fine now while the sun’s out, but when it
gets cold later in the afternoon, all the kids will go back home.”
“Then let’s go check it out, if there aren’t any kids there, we’ll go somewhere else,” said
Jiang Cheng.
Xu Xingzhi pulled his scarf tight as they walked out the door. “Does Gu Fei not take her to
those indoor play spaces in the mall? Those ball pits and stuff?”
“She skateboards on any flat surface she sees, even restaurants,” said Jiang Cheng. “Gu Fei
rarely takes her to indoor places to play, because if she can’t use her skateboard, she’ll get
angry and start screaming.”
“Right.” Xu Xingzhi nodded.
“You two can take a walk around the area when we get there.” Jiang Cheng turned to Pan
Zhi and Zhao Jin. “There’s a restaurant street nearby.”
“Stop,” said Zhao Jin, “I’m on a diet.”
“It’s no fun by myself.” Pan Zhi shrugged. “We’ll just hang around as assistants.”
After they piled into Xu Xingzhi’s car, they received a GPS coordinate from the playground
where Li Yan had just arrived with Gu Miao. As someone with a hopeless sense of direction,
Jiang Cheng didn’t even bother looking at it before entering it into navigation. “It doesn’t
look very far away?”
“You’re right, it’s so close, just a finger width’s distance.” Pan Zhi glanced at the map.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand.
“I don’t even want to talk to you, directionally-challenged person.” Pan Zhi sighed. “This
place is further than the meat pie shop. Does that give you a better idea of the distance?”
“Oh,” said Jiang Cheng. “Please start driving, Senior.”
Along the way, every flash of scenery outside the window looked familiar to him, but at the
same time alien, due to his changed frame of mind.
Jiang Cheng withdrew his gaze from the window and fixed it on the air vent inside the car.
It wasn’t until the navigation indicated that they had arrived that he finally lifted his eyes
and glanced out.
“That’s Gu Miao there, right?” Xu Xingzhi pointed in front of them.
A fiery red shape jumped down from the top of the steps up ahead, landed, then quickly
zipped away.
“Yep. I don’t think there’s another little girl around here who’s so nimble on a skateboard,”
said Jiang Cheng.
“With skills like that… if she gets some proper training,” Zhao Jin said as she got out of the
car, “she could make something of it.”
Jiang Cheng hopped out of the car and whistled in Gu Miao’s direction.
She turned, looked over for a few seconds, then started zooming to him on her skateboard.
When she was only a few meters away, she lifted a hand and gave Jiang Cheng a snapping
thumbs up by way of greeting, then made a sharp brake and stopped in front of Xu Xingzhi.
“She must be looking for Feiyang,” Zhao Jin said quietly.
“Mhm.” Xu Xingzhi crouched down. “Hello, Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao stared at him.
“This is Xu-gege, remember?” Jiang Cheng prompted. “Say hi to Xu-gege, Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao stared, and after a moment, gave Xu Xingzhi a bow.
Jiang Cheng almost didn’t recognize Li Yan as he strolled over to them from a distance: he
was all bundled up in the shape of a cotton ball, and wore a mask over his face.
“This is Li Yan, Gu Fei’s friend.” Jiang Cheng introduced before turning to him and saying,
“This is my roommate’s sister, Zhao Jin. And this is Senior Xu Xingzhi.”
“Gu Fei mentioned.” Li Yan pulled his mask down. “Thank you for the hard work.”
“Not at all.” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “Gu Miao is adorable.”
“Has she gone over there to play?” Jiang Cheng saw a few kids on the
playground, playing with the slide.
“She did when there was no one else there,” said Li Yan. “But not now when there are other
kids around. Back then in school, she didn’t like to play with her classmates either.”
After this exchange, they all stood around in silence for a while.
Jiang Cheng found himself feeling a little awkward in front of Li Yan.
“Let’s head over to the playground.” Xu Xingzhi spoke up. “We can check it out first.”
“Sure.” Jiang Cheng exhaled in relief and quickly started walking.
Li Yan was right. At the playground, Gu Miao first played on the side for a while on her
skateboard, and only after a swing became free did she walk over to stand on it.
She seemed to be very athletic, and started swinging in no time, going higher
and higher with every swing.
However, when a little boy came over to watch, she quickly stopped what she was doing,
jumped off the swing, and walked away.
The boy was about five or six years old. He had seen her on the skateboard earlier, and now
after seeing her on the swing, he decided to keep following her.
Xu Xingzhi pulled out his phone and started recording a video of Gu Miao.
“Does she have any friends her own age?” he turned to Li Yan and asked.
“Not that I know of. She was a lone wolf from the first day I saw her,” said Li Yan. “She
doesn’t talk or respond to other people, so the other kids also shunned her at school.”
“Mhm.” Xu Xingzhi nodded.
Xu Xingzhi put his phone away after taking a series of videos. The whole time, Gu Miao
ignored the little boy trailing her, aimlessly rolling back and forth on her skateboard as if he
wasn’t there.
“Is she also like this when she goes out on her own to skateboard?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“Yep,” Li Yan said. “She has a regular route, just goes zoom and pays no attention to anyone
else. She’ll go racing for laps.”
Jiang Cheng sat on the side and watched Gu Miao in silence.
This little girl, flying in the chilly breeze.
Can she sense, he wondered, these subtle changes happening around her; the friends her
brother brought; Feiyang…
“Honestly, I think she has a mind of her own. I feel like—” Li Yan turned away and released
two sneezes in a row. “Fuck!”
Xu Xingzhi gave him a glance and grinned.
“Don’t laugh,” said Li Yan. “If it wasn’t because of you, I’d never bring her here. I would just
leave her to play by herself on the street outside, while I stay warm in the store.”
“Sorry about that, thank you for doing this,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“…You’re welcome.”
“Continue.”
“Continue what?” Li Yan asked. “You’re welcome, it’s okay, don’t worry abou…”
“You were halfway through a sentence before you sneezed. Continue that,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“Oh. My brain’s a little frozen over.” Li Yan tutted. “I meant to say, I’ve known Gu Miao for a
pretty long time, but she seems to like Jiang Cheng better for some reason.”
“Is that so?” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“The first time he found her, she followed after him,” Li Yan said. “If that was a human
trafficker she’d be sold in a jiffy.”
Jiang Cheng smiled without a word.
Xu Xingzhi and the others stayed for almost a week. It wasn’t much time, since he needed to
observe and interact with Gu Miao within the scope of what she would tolerate.
“Thank you,” Jiang Cheng repeated this over and over.
“I’ll leave some written instructions for specific behavioral corrections to Gu Fei before I
go,” said Xu Xingzhi. “I’ll start drafting a more targeted treatment plan when I get back.”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Senior, can you give me some reassurance?”
Xu Xingzhi glanced at him. “Gu Miao’s case isn’t as serious as you all think, as long as Gu Fei
can cooperate. She will have various reactions throughout this process, and if he can’t bear
to go through with it, it’ll affect the results. I also mentioned before that Gu Miao’s already
past the optimal age for developmental interventions, so it’s not going to get her to the
same level as the other kids.”
“Understood.” To Jiang Cheng, and to Gu Fei, an answer like this was more than enough.
Time flew by quickly. Before he knew it, the week had passed in a busy flurry while his
mind was preoccupied by everything to do with Gu Miao.
It was only when Xu Xingzhi and Zhao Jin got ready to leave that his senses slowly returned
to himself.
From the day he arrived back here, all the communication between him and Gu Fei were
because of Gu Miao. They spoke only of Gu Miao in their phone calls, their meetings, and
now that Xu Xingzhi was leaving, the connection forged between him and Gu Fei based on
Gu Miao’s case would be severed.
This made Jiang Cheng a little anxious.
In the past few days, he would often find himself sinking in his memories. Any passing
phrase, person, or scene, would swiftly draw him down into the well of remembrance.
All the little moments. He never knew he had such a good recollection. There were so many
details, details he didn’t even think he remembered, but there they were in his mind.
These details were what gradually led him to the conclusion that whether it was his
feelings for Gu Fei, or Gu Fei’s feelings for him, neither were as easy to give up as he initially
thought.
“Any questions at all, just call me,” Xu Xingzhi told Gu Fei. “I’ll also reach out if there’s any
progress on my end. Make sure you stick to the methods I wrote for you. Even if she makes
a fuss or gets angry, you have to be firm. If you give in once, it’ll be a waste of the previous
ten times when you didn’t.”
“Yes,” said Gu Fei. “Thank you.”
“Also…” Xu Xingzhi took a couple steps to the side, and Gu Fei followed.
Jiang Cheng knew they were probably talking about Gu Fei’s own issues. From the corners
of his eyes, he spied on Gu Fei’s back.
Gu Fei’s problems.
Which was also the real problem between the two of them.
After Xu Xingzhi and Zhao Jin left in the car, he and Gu Fei stood in their spots unmoving,
both of them spacing out in the direction where the car disappeared.
As if they couldn’t bear to see them depart, the scene was almost touching.
“Give me your key.” Pan Zhi reached out his hand. “I’m going upstairs.”
Jiang Cheng gave him the key.
Pan Zhi turned and left, while he and Gu Fei remained standing where they were.
“Umm,” Gu Fei finally spoke up, “I uh…want to get Gu Miao a cat.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“She really likes Feiyang,” said Gu Fei. “I think she’s much calmer and relaxed around small
animals, so I uh… want to get a cat for her.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Great.”
Gu Fei was quiet for a while. “So…do you have time? To come with me.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng finally understood. “Alright.”
“Then I’ll call you tomorrow?” asked Gu Fei.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“Also,” Gu Fei continued, biting his lips, “it’s going to be New Year’s… soon.”
“Four more days.” Jiang Cheng smiled. “Just today Pan Zhi was nagging me about it.”
“Maybe you two can…” Gu Fei seemed to be having great difficulty getting the words out,
“come to our place for New Year’s. It’ll be more festive.”
Jiang Cheng watched Gu Fei, and after a moment, finally replied, “Okay.”
“I’ll be going then,” Gu Fei said. “You should…get some rest, you’ve done a lot these past few
days.”
“It’s nothing.” Jiang Cheng gave a little smile.
Jiang Cheng didn’t move even after Gu Fei turned away. Standing in place, he watched Gu
Fei’s back as he left.
This time, Gu Fei didn’t look back. He sped briskly down the street as if running away.
Jiang Cheng had never seen Gu Fei so flustered.
He kept watch until Gu Fei turned a corner before heading back into the building. Lighting a
cigarette to hold between his lips, Jiang Cheng walked slowly up the stairs.
Whether it was the suggestion of going to get a cat together or the invitation for New
Year’s, it would’ve been difficult for Gu Fei to form those words, as the one who had told
him to “forget it”.
It was exactly these constipated invitations and the never before seen fluster as he turned
away that suddenly gave Jiang Cheng a glimmer of hope.
Real hope.
Let’s get back together.
Jiang Cheng knew that if those words came out of his mouth now, Gu Fei would certainly
agree.
But he would not utter them, no matter how much he wanted to. He couldn’t let
the two of them return to the cycle they were in before.
Those words—he must wait for Gu Fei to say them himself.
Let’s get back together.
These words from Gu Fei would bear an entirely different kind of significance.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 5847
TL word count: 3882
TL’s Notes:
SAYE MANHUA is updating every 8th, 18th, and 28th of each month
–
CHECK IT! They’re still being sickeningly sweet
Chapter 129
A female cat—named Cheng-ge.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
Jiang Cheng returned to his apartment to find Pan Zhi standing in front of the fridge.
“Looking for something to eat?” Jiang Cheng asked as he walked over.
“Nope.” Pan Zhi stared at the completely empty fridge that wasn’t even plugged into a
power outlet. “I’m just witnessing the live spectacle of me starving to death while standing
in front of a refrigerator.”
“Hang on for another half hour and we’ll go out to eat,” said Jiang Cheng.
“You’re not having dinner with Gu Fei tonight?” Pan Zhi shut the fridge door and turned to
him.
“Nah,” Jiang Cheng answered. “New Year is coming up and he has a lot to do in the house
before then, things to buy and cleaning to be done. And oh… He invited us to his place for
New Year’s Eve dinner.”
“Sure.” Pan Zhi went back to the living room and collapsed onto the sofa. “Did you say yes?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Then let’s go out and do some end of the year shopping tomorrow. You get a pass, but I
can’t very well show up empty handed, it’s New Year after all,” said Pan Zhi.
“Tomorrow…” Jiang Cheng hesitated. “I have to go with Gu Fei to get a cat for Gu Miao first.”
Pan Zhi was taken by surprise and stared fixedly at him for a moment. “Have you two…
made up?”
“No,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Oh,” was Pan Zhi’s reply.
Jiang Cheng turned the TV on, though there was nothing to watch around this time of day.
He usually tuned it to some local channel to have the news on in the background, most of it
boring, but occasionally there were some interesting
tidbits.
“Cheng’er,” Pan Zhi said his name after a few minutes of the news. “I think.”
“Uh huh,” Jiang Cheng answered, his eyes still glued to the screen.
“You two might as well make up.” Pan Zhi sighed. “I’ve been feeling awkward on your
behalf these last few days. No need to hold yourself back if you can’t.”
“No,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Dude,” Pan Zhi couldn’t help it, “looks like neither of you can let go, and you don’t seem
like the type to be stubborn about something like this for the sake of pride.”
“How do you know that?” Jiang Cheng retorted.
“Because of our intense cross-generational bond, duh,” said Pan Zhi. “Of course I know.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet for a while, staring at the TV, then finally said, “He needs to come to
me.”
“What’s the difference?” asked Pan Zhi. “Since he initiated the breakup, he has to initiate
the make up too?”
“I’m not sure how to explain this.” Jiang Cheng furrowed his brows.
“With your mouth, one word at a time,” said Pan Zhi. “Just like this.”
Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“Profound, right?” Pan Zhi clapped for himself.
Jiang Cheng slid a little down the sofa, extending his legs and propping his feet up on the
coffee table.
“Our problem isn’t about whether Gu Miao would get better, and it’s not about the long-
distance relationship or whatever,” he said. “It’s about Gu Fei himself.
Growing up, he… I don’t know how to say this, have you heard of that story?
When a baby elephant is chained up from birth, unable to break free, then even after
growing up and having the strength to break free, it still refuses to move.”
“Mhm,” Pan Zhi answered.
“It’s probably not a perfect analogy.” Jiang Cheng frowned. It was an oversimplification of
Gu Fei’s situation, but even in front of an old friend like Pan Zhi, his instinct was still to hide
Gu Fei’s wounds out of sight. “But you see what I mean?”
“Got it,” said Pan Zhi. “You’re saying he has his own… mental block or something. Either
way, there’s no use in you pulling him along when he doesn’t think he can break free, he
has to want it himself, right?”
Jiang Cheng gave Pan Zhi a thumbs up.
“Cheng-er.” Pan Zhi threw himself back against the armrest. “That’s pretty impressive.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng made an inquisitive sound.
“You’re gambling on how deep his feelings for you are?” asked Pan Zhi.
“That’s the only compelling force now, there’s nothing else at the moment that would tip
the scale,” said Jiang Cheng. “And besides, I think…it’s probably not a gamble.”
“Then,” Pan Zhi thought about it, “what if he can’t break free?”
Jiang Cheng looked back at him. He knew that it would be a very difficult move for Gu Fei to
make, but…
“I haven’t thought about it. I never think about things like that.” Jiang Cheng gave him a
little smile.
Since arriving here, they spent the whole week preoccupied with Gu Miao’s case. It wasn’t
until the sound of firecrackers rang out downstairs that Jiang Cheng was finally hit with the
festive spirit of the New Year.
When he tried to think back on last year’s winter break, there was not much he recalled
about the New Year itself. He remembered only the tall stacks of study materials piled up
all over his desk. And Gu Fei.
The memory was monotonous but it was one he couldn’t help looping over and over in his
mind.
Like a song he would hum along to no matter how many times he heard it before. I want
you on my left shoulder, a smile on my right…
And as Jiang Cheng turned the corner on the ground floor of his building, as he laid eyes on
Gu Fei standing in the entrance, his silhouette framed by the sunlight, it was as though his
heart was beating like the rhythm of Gu Fei’s fingers drumming against his guitar.
Badump.
“Have you had breakfast?” asked Gu Fei.
“No,” Jiang Cheng answered. “I just got up.”
“Then…” Gu Fei glanced down the street. “Let’s eat together?”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He saw Gu Miao shooting down the street on her skateboard
and smiled. “Good morning, Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao loudly snapped her fingers as she flew past them and bolted ahead.
“Did you tell her we’re going to get a cat?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I did,” said Gu Fei. “There’s a couple pet stores around the restaurant street area, we’ll see
if they have a suitable one.”
“But if not…won’t she be upset?” Jiang Cheng was a little worried.
“Xu Xingzhi said it’s important that she slowly learns to process emotions such as
disappointment.” Gu Fei tugged on his collar. “So we’ll give it a try.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
The two of them slowly strolled down to the breakfast stalls on the next street.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t eaten there since coming back, and just now, he found himself suddenly
missing the stall keeper who always called him “Number One Scholar” in a loud voice.
“Number One Scholar!” The stall keeper spotted them from a distance away and waved.
“You’re back!”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Even now you’ll still come here for breakfast, huh,” the man said. “You got into U of R
though! How’s their breakfast compared to mine?”
“Yours is better,” said Jiang Cheng.
The stall keeper laughed, his voice booming.
It was almost New Year, which meant not as many people were out at the breakfast stalls.
Jiang Cheng led Gu Miao to a small table and sat down while Gu Fei went for their food.
“The usual?” Gu Fei asked.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng answered.
He would always get the same things every time they came: steamed dumplings, mini soup
buns, tofu pudding… Gu Fei brought everything over and laid it out on the table, just like
before.
“Wang Xu said to drop by for meat pies if you have time.” Gu Fei sat down and took a bite of
a bun. “Do you want to go?”
“Sure,” said Jiang Cheng. “I even have a new flavour of filling to…tell him.”
Gu Fei paused noticeably, smiled, but didn’t say anything.
– the kind of filling Jiuri doesn’t have at his place! I’m going to sell this secret recipe to him
when I go back for CNY haha
– is something wrong with your phone? I can’t seem to get through, I’m pretty free tomorrow,
call me okay?
Gu Fei had lost all the chat history between Jiang Cheng and him. After switching to his
backup phone, those were the only two messages that remained in their chat box.
Those were the last messages Jiang Cheng sent him.
Gu Fei felt a rush of heartache for Jiang Cheng every time he saw them, but he could never
bring himself to delete it. He ended up carefully avoiding looking at Jiang Cheng’s name
every time he opened up his messages.
Gu Fei wondered how Jiang Cheng felt just now when bringing up the meat pies.
He personally would feel much better if Jiang Cheng would give him a beating, whether it
was verbal or physical.
The worst was when Jiang Cheng pretended that it didn’t bother him.
When he was so bad at it too.
The pet stores were within Gu Miao’s usual radius of activity. Gu Fei originally wanted to
take her to the local Bird and Flowers Market, but he figured that around this time of year,
they had probably already closed down to go home.
Besides, Xu Xingzhi did say that they should take it slowly, one step at a time, so Gu Miao
could have a chance to adjust.
If they couldn’t find a suitable cat today, then that would be the first step—Gu Miao would
learn how to deal with disappointment.
“I’m gonna go get…the car. Liu Li went out to restock first thing in the morning, so he
should be done by now,” Gu Fei said after breakfast. “You wait here with Er-Miao, okay?”
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei took off in the direction of the convenience store.
He only took a few steps before he felt a little uneasy. Out of nowhere, he felt an urge to
look back, but was afraid it’d be awkward if he did.
Gu Fei didn’t understand how he became this way.
All his life, he’d never faced such a quandry, so at loss as to what to say and how to move
his body.
Jiang Cheng ate his tofu pudding as he watched Gu Fei walk down the street with large
strides. He saw as Gu Fei stumbled when turning the corner, doing a little skip to regain his
balance.
Jiang Cheng smiled to himself.
Then he felt a twinge in his nose.
Gu Fei must be going through something entirely different from himself, Jiang Cheng
thought. He himself was in turmoil waiting for Gu Fei to wake up, for him to open his eyes
voluntarily.
Meanwhile, Gu Fei was struggling. He was struggling within that shell he’d built for himself
over the years. He might be afraid, panicked, lost.
Jiang Cheng slurped down the rest of his tofu pudding and wiped his mouth, staring at the
corner Gu Fei had just passed, lost in thought.
It didn’t take long for Gu Fei to come back with the Little Bun. Gu Miao happily got in,
skateboard in hand, and Jiang Cheng squeezed in after her.
“All settled in?” Gu Fei closed the door.
“Yep,” said Jiang Cheng.
The restaurant street was bustling with activity, people were out and about doing
preparatory shopping for the New Year. As Gu Fei drove them down the street in the tiny
car, Jiang Cheng looked around and noticed that the pet stores were all still open. Through
the glass store fronts, he could see the various cats and dogs inside their cages.
Gu Miao plastered her face excitedly against the car window, staring out. After Gu Fei found
a tiny spot on the side of the street to squeeze his car into, she immediately pushed open
the door and leapt out.
By the time Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei followed her out of the car, she was already standing in
front of a pet store’s window display, peering inside.
“Remember, you want an affectionate, mild-tempered one,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah.” Gu Fei nodded, then went to Gu Miao to speak to her face to face. “Er-Miao, no
touching the little animals without permission, okay?”
Gu Miao nodded, and Gu Fei led her inside the store.
It was probably the largest pet store around, with many cats and dogs inside. As soon as
they walked in, several dogs started barking at the same time.
Jiang Cheng glanced at Gu Miao, who didn’t seem to react. She only looked around
curiously.
“Do you have kittens?” Gu Fei asked.
“Sure, what kind would you like?” The shopkeeper took them to where some cat cages were
kept. “There’s a few here, if you want a different breed, I can show you the pictures.
Sometimes our customers ask us to consign for them.”
“One that’s docile, and affectionate,” said Gu Fei.
“You want a Ragdoll then,” the shopkeeper immediately said. “Ragdolls are the most
affectionate.”
“What are they like?” Gu Fei asked.
“Very pretty,” said the shopkeeper. “Do you want to see one? I also own the other store
down the street, there’s a Ragdoll there, only four months old.”
“How much is it?” Jiang Cheng knew a little about cats, so he jumped in before Gu Fei could
reply.
“The price is negotiable, you can go have a look first,” said the shopkeeper.
“How much?” Jiang Cheng insisted.
“Four thousand and five hundred yuan, and that’s on the cheaper end.” Seeing Jiang Cheng’s
reaction, the shopkeeper sat back down in his chair.
Gu Fei was clearly taken aback. He turned to Jiang Cheng and asked quietly,
“How much did he say?”
“Let’s look at domestic mix breeds,” Jiang Cheng said. “Purebreds are harder to take care of
anyway.”
“Well there aren’t gonna be any affectionate domestic mixes, they’re all fierce.”
The shopkeeper sounded displeased. “Some people want a good-tempered cat but aren’t
willing to shell out the price.”
“Let’s look around a little more then.” Gu Fei started to lead Gu Miao outside.
“Go to the market if you’re looking for a domestic mix, the hell are you doing here,” the
shopkeeper snapped behind them. “Here we sell pet cats.”
“The fuck?” Jiang Cheng had been a little repressed lately, trying forcibly to push his
emotions down and quietly process them on his own. But in this
moment, hearing that retort, an anger suddenly flared up in him, and his voice split a little.
“Well aren’t you refined. They say that dogs only have as much status as the masters who
keep them, but you sure are something special relying on cats to feed your ego. Are you
also worth forty-five hundred yuan, sir?”
“What the fuck is wrong with you! If you can’t afford it that’s not my problem!
Get the hell out!” The shopkeeper jumped up from his seat. “I’m not running a charity
here!”
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei tugged on Jiang Cheng’s arm, “let’s go.”
“It’s true I can’t afford a cat for forty-five hundred yuan,” said Jiang Cheng. “But I can
certainly buy a couple guys for forty-five hundred each to wipe my floors for me.”
The shopkeeper kicked over the chair and charged out at him with eyes bulging.
“I’ll fucking give you a hospital stay worth forty-five hundred yuan!”
Fight!
Beat him up!
All of a sudden, those were the only words left in Jiang Cheng’s mind.
As he turned around to meet the man halfway, Gu Fei was already rushing forward. He
blocked the shopkeeper’s punch with one hand, then proceeded to grab his collar and slam
him back against the wall, with one finger pointed at him. “I can call an ambulance for you
right now.”
The shopkeeper’s head knocked against the wall. It didn’t sound very loud, but Gu Fei kept
a tight grip on his collar, with knuckles pressed hard against the man’s throat. It took only a
few seconds for his face to go red as he struggled to pull Gu Fei’s hands away.
“It’s the New Year,” Gu Fei warned in a low voice, “but if you must make trouble, I’ll gladly
keep you company. I’m in a very troubled mood right now anyways.”
The series of quick and smooth maneuvers from Gu Fei seemed to steal Jiang Cheng’s
thunder, but it also allowed a second for his reason to return to his body.
“Forget it.” Jiang Cheng forced down his temper and glanced over at Gu Miao.
The little girl paid no attention to the quarrel going on around her, she was bent over with
hands on her knees staring at a puppy sleeping in its cage. He walked over to Gu Miao and
took her hand. “Let’s go.”
Gu Fei glared at the shopkeeper for few more seconds before letting go.
Gu Miao probably didn’t have her heart set on any of the cats in there, or more
likely, she didn’t have the time to look, so she obligingly followed them out of the pet store.
Jiang Cheng could hear the shopkeeper cursing after them in the doorway even after they
walked more than fifty steps out.
He forced himself to ignore the man’s voice, worried that he wouldn’t be able to keep
himself from charging back and getting into a brawl.
It was unnecessary, on New Year nonetheless.
Still, he felt all stuffed up, unable to extinguish the fury bubbling up within him.
His skin was crawling with the desire to fling his arms and stomp his feet, or even to roll
around on the ground and scream, whatever he could do to get rid of this irritation inside.
Gu Fei followed after him with Gu Miao in tow. Jiang Cheng’s pace was very fast, full of
wrath, it was a little hard for them to keep up. Gu Fei bent down and looked Gu Miao in the
eyes. “Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao looked back at him.
“We’re going to play over there for a while.” Gu Fei pointed at a clearing up ahead. There
was a dried up fountain with only a few people nearby. “Then after, we’ll go find a cat.”
Gu Miao nodded, put her skateboard on the ground, and rolled off.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei caught up to Jiang Cheng and called out.
“Mhm,” Jiang Cheng answered, his voice hoarse again.
It was definitely not a sore throat. Gu Fei couldn’t be sure whether Jiang Cheng’s
occasionally hoarse voice had something to do with his emotional state, but it was no sore
throat.
Only, if Jiang Cheng refused to tell him, he had no way of pressing the topic.
“Don’t be angry anymore,” he said.
“I’m not.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat.
Gu Fei stared at him and hesitated for a long while. As they reached the fountain, he finally
set his jaw and put his arm around Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
Jiang Cheng’s body visibly stiffened, his head turning in surprise.
Gu Fei tightened his grip, ushering Jiang Cheng to the side of the fountain where there were
less people, then turned around and hugged him.
Jiang Cheng was still stiff. Gu Fei didn’t let go, he rubbed his hands up and down Jiang
Cheng’s back and arms. “There’s another pet store down the street, tucked in the corner.
Let’s go check it out.”
“Mhm.” Jiang Cheng’s voice was low.
Someone walked by and glanced curiously in their direction, but Gu Fei didn’t care. Let
them look.
It didn’t matter anymore.
He hadn’t seen Jiang Cheng like this in a very long time. That Jiang Cheng in his earlier
memories, whose temper blew out of control at the slightest provocation, hadn’t appeared
in a long long time.
The way he was now, Gu Fei’s heart ached for him.
“Cheng-ge.” Gu Fei closed his eyes.
Let’s get back together.
The words were already stuck on the tip of his tongue, as though he needed only to open
his mouth to let them out.
Except.
Gu Fei clenched his teeth and didn’t make another sound.
He knew why he wanted to say it, but also why he shouldn’t.
It was too casual. Jiang Cheng wasn’t a tool made to accommodate the
fluctuations in his mood, nor someone he could send away and call back with a single line.
If he spoke now, it would make their relationship seem like a casual joke.
“I’m fine,” Jiang Cheng said quietly. “Let’s go look for a cat.”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei let go.
Jiang Cheng gave him a look, then turned and called out, “Er-Miao!”
Gu Miao stopped on her skateboard and glanced in their direction.
“Come on, let’s keep going,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Miao made a turn and rolled off ahead.
Jiang Cheng gave Gu Fei’s arm a little pat before walking after her.
Gu Fei had misremembered. This place at the end of the street was an animal hospital. They
had some pet supplies for sale, but weren’t selling any cats or dogs at the moment. Inside
were a few in-patient puppies receiving their shots.
“Should we try the store on the other side?” Jiang Cheng suggested.
“Okay.” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng was about to tell Gu Miao they were leaving when he noticed her watching a
little dog hooked to an IV drip.
“The puppy is sick.” Jiang Cheng crouched down beside her. “So it’s getting a needle… Come
on, we’re going to check out a different place.”
Gu Miao didn’t move. She turned her head from side to side, sweeping her eyes over the
room as if looking for cats.
“Can I help you with something?” a young woman came out and asked.
“We’re looking to buy a cat, but… This is an animal hospital, right?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“That’s right. If you want to buy a purebred cat, we don’t have those.” The girl smiled. “We
only have a few kittens boarded here, someone found them and brought them to us.”
“Can we…see?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Sure.” She led them to an interior room and pointed at a cage lined at the bottom with
thick padding. “In there. We checked them for diseases already, they’re all healthy and
ready to be adopted at no extra charge. But they’re not purebred cats, the person said they
might be a Persian and domestic mix.”
Gu Fei took Gu Miao up to the cat cage.
Gu Miao immediately leaned in and pressed her nose up against the outside.
There were four kittens inside, curled up asleep in a large clump.
Perhaps because Gu Miao touched the cage, one of the kittens lifted its head and made a
sound. Its mouth was opened wide, but the noise it made was incredibly tiny.
Gu Miao immediately turned to Gu Fei excitedly. “Ha!”
“Mhm.” Gu Fei smiled.
The one that lifted its head was probably the ugliest among the four kittens. It had a very
pointy face with a large black spot over its nose, it also had the
shortest fur. But when they took the kitten out and placed it by itself on a mat, Gu Miao
spent at least five whole minutes staring at it without moving.
With Gu Fei’s permission, she reached out a hand and very carefully petted the kitten’s
head.
The kitten closed its eyes and let out a very soft meow.
“That is the gentlest in their litter,” the staff said beside them. “It’s a little ugly, but it has the
best temperament, so the other three all like to gang up on it.”
They stayed there for almost an hour, letting Gu Miao spend time with the cat.
Finally, after confirming that Gu Miao liked it very much, and that the kitten really was
docile, or rather extremely lazy, Gu Fei decided to adopt the cat.
Gu Miao was in a great mood. She was careful when holding the kitten in her arms, perhaps
because the cat was much smaller compared to Feiyang—it was only one-fifth of Feiyang’s
size.
When they piled into the Little Bun, she set the cat on her lap and slowly stroked its fur.
The whole way back to Jiang Cheng’s apartment, she didn’t look up once.
Jiang Cheng got out of the car, then stuck his head back in. “Er-Miao.”
Gu Miao looked up at him.
“Remember to give it a name,” said Jiang Cheng.
Gu Miao looked at him blankly, like she didn’t understand.
“I’ll explain that to her later.” Gu Fei smiled. “She never named any of her toys or stuffed
animals before.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng lightly tapped on the car door a couple times. “Then…I’ll get going.”
“Alright.” Gu Fei nodded.
He watched Jiang Cheng walk into the building, then closed the car door. After sitting and
spacing out for a while, he turned to Gu Miao in the back seat. “Er-Miao, you should give it a
name.”
Gu Miao stared at him.
“Feiyang—that’s a name. Er-Miao is also a name, and so is Gu Fei,” he explained. “Cheng-ge
is a name too. What is this little kitty’s name?”
Gu Miao stayed silent.
“Once it has a name, then you can call it by that,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao thought for a long time, and at last snapped her fingers and stuck her thumb up.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei didn’t understand.
Gu Miao looked down and stroked the cat. “Cheng-ge,” she said.
“What?” Gu Fei asked.
Gu Miao didn’t reply again.
“Its name is Cheng-ge?” Gu Fei asked.
Gu Miao nodded as she continued petting the cat.
“…Alright then.” Gu Fei started the car and turned to head back home.
A female cat—named Cheng-ge.
He started laughing.

Chapter 130
It’s not Kitty.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
“I’ve always thought that after the age of ten, there’s not much point in celebrating the
traditional New Year—it’s not as fun anymore.” Pan Zhi strolled back and forth in front of
the seasonal display shelves at the supermarket, unsure about which gift set to get.
“Why not?” Jiang Cheng, manning the shopping cart, stood at the side and watched him go
back and forth.
In Jiang Cheng’s experience, the traditional New Year celebration was never that much fun
to begin with, before or after he turned ten.
Last year, because of the exams, and because of Gu Fei, the Lunar New Year was different
than all the ones before. But going back through his memories, last year was also the first
thing he thought of when trying to recall anything “New Year” related. It was the first one
after he turned eighteen.
And now, listening to the music drift from the supermarket speakers, looking at the endless
festive red displays around him and the people he risked crashing into every few steps, he
could still remember what it was like this time last year when he and Gu Fei were holiday
shopping together.
“Well at least for me, once I passed the age of ten, I couldn’t just have fun and play starting
the week before the New Year. I had to carry things when we went out shopping and help
with the tidying or else I’d be met with the cane…” Pan Zhi finally picked up two gift sets
and put them in the cart. “Does your place need tidying?”
“I don’t think so. It looks fine to me,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Looks fine to me too.” Pan Zhi gave him a glance. “Gu Fei must’ve come over often to clean.
When we arrived the other day, I didn’t see dust anywhere.”
“Probably.” Jiang Cheng handed the cart off to Pan Zhi and went to the shelves to get some
snacks. He got several packs of the jelly cups Gu Miao liked.
Gu Fei had always been the one to tidy his apartment and would often go there to stay.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know if he still did that after they broke up. Probably. He felt wistful at
the memory of the other day when he pushed open the door only to
find Gu Fei fast asleep on the couch.
Liu Li had installed new shelves in the store before the holidays, wanting to get it all ready
before the store opens again in the new year, so Gu Fei was busy helping with the cleanup.
They hadn’t been in contact in a while.
“Why not do it before year-end?” asked Pan Zhi. “There’s so much to do around the
holidays.”
“Liu Li built the shelves himself, it took some time,” said Jiang Cheng.
“He made them?” Pan Zhi was surprised.
“Uh huh. It probably saved a lot of money. After all, Gu Fei robbed him of thirty grand,” said
Jiang Cheng.
“That was pretty insane of him.” Pan Zhi couldn’t help laughing at the thought.
“When we met the other day, the ponytail guy didn’t look like such an easy mark.”
“If he and Gu Fei were both standing in front of you right now, and you had to pick one to
fight, who would you pick?” Jiang Cheng grinned.
“Guess I’ll have to pick the ponytail.” Pan Zhi tutted.
After the bulk of the shopping was done the two of them didn’t venture any further, but
remained nearby and bought some fireworks. There were no restrictions about fireworks
in the Steelworks area, which came as the most delightful surprise for Pan Zhi on this trip.
“To me, this is the only thing worth doing during New Year, nothing else,” Pan Zhi said as he
picked through a pile of fireworks. “Just tell Gu Miao to follow me, I’ll guarantee her a good
time.”
“Don’t you play mahjong over the holidays?” Jiang Cheng laughed, recalling the endless
rounds of mahjong games at Pan Zhi’s house every New Year.
“Screw that. Every one of them are like mahjong sprites or something. I’d rather take out
the little bit of pocket money I have and let them split it directly, which will at least save me
some time,” said Pan Zhi. “Hey, the fireworks they sell here are like rocket launchers, I feel
like I can carry them straight onto the battlefield.”
“It’s more satisfying that way,” said Jiang Cheng.
He wasn’t particularly interested in this stuff, but at the thought of setting them off with Gu
Fei… He suddenly started to miss him.
In the midst of this holiday atmosphere when everyone was at least a little bit
anxious, he more than ever missed the calm and tranquility he felt around Gu Fei.
Gu Fei called him on the morning of Lunar New Year Eve. “Cheng-ge, when are you guys
coming over? I’ll go pick you up.”
“Is that…necessary?” Jiang Cheng was taken by surprise. It would take less than half an
hour even if he were to crawl there.
“Is it…not?” asked Gu Fei.
“Sure it is,” Pan Zhi piped up nearby. “How are we supposed to carry all this there by
ourselves? Get him to come help carry stuff.”
“Ah.” That reminded Jiang Cheng. “You should probably pick us up then, Pan Zhi and I
bought a bunch of things, you can help carry them.”
“Alright,” said Gu Fei.
Ten minutes later, Gu Fei arrived driving his Little Bun.
Jiang Cheng and Pan Zhi carried the bags downstairs, stuffed them into the car, and that
was that for the available space in the back seat.
Jiang Cheng sighed. He had originally imagined the three of them would walk there
together, carrying the bags in their hands and chatting the whole way. Now, with the Little
Bun in the mix…
Gu Fei seemed to have a plan, however. “You know how to drive?” he asked, placing the key
for the Little Bun in Pan Zhi’s hand.
“Huh?” Pan Zhi blinked at him.
Jiang Cheng suddenly wanted to laugh.
“Why don’t you drive it over there,” said Gu Fei.
“I can’t even drive electric scooters…” Pan Zhi started, looking at the key in his hand.
“Stick the key in, turn the knob, and off you go. It’s easier than a scooter, with three wheels
you don’t even need to worry about balancing,” Gu Fei said.
Pan Zhi eyed the two of them, then gritted his teeth. “Fine.”
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei stood outside the building and watched Pan Zhi get into the Little
Bun.
“Key! Then the knob! Right?” he yelled from inside the car.
“Right!” Gu Fei yelled back.
“Key! Knob…” Pan Zhi didn’t get to finish repeating the instructions when the Little Bun
suddenly shot forward as though it was going to take flight.
“Turn it gently!” Gu Fei immediately ran after him, shouting as he went. “Let go! Squeeze on
the brakes! Pan Zhi! The brakes!”
“…Holy fuck!” Jiang Cheng’s knees grew weak as he watched the Little Bun charge straight
for a lamp post up ahead. He raced after them.
The Little Bun didn’t slow down, but made a sharp turn right before it hit the lamp post,
going around it, after which it veered off the sidewalk. Once on the road, it traveled on the
wrong side of the road for a while before going back onto the right side and speeding off.
“Shit.” Gu Fei finally stopped once he realized there was no chance of catching up. Turning
to Jiang Cheng who had run after him, he asked, “Has he even ridden a bicycle before?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng watched the Little Bun as it raced off down the road. “I think…he should
be fine? There are no cars on the road today.”
“I’m worried he won’t even know how to stop once he gets there,” Gu Fei said.
“He’s pretty astute, won’t take him long to figure it out,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Oh.”
They then stood there and watched the Little Bun disappear around the corner.
Jiang Cheng turned and gave Gu Fei a look.
Gu Fei looked back at him.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t help bursting out laughing. When he turned away to try to keep it in
he ended up choking, which led to a coughing fit.
Beside him, Gu Fei also laughed, then let out a sigh.
It wasn’t a long road. It seemed to Jiang Cheng that after their laughs together, they were
already halfway there. The remainder of the journey felt even shorter.
He hadn’t even thought of what to say when they already reached the street where the
convenience store sat.
“He parked the car,” Gu Fei said, peering forward.
Jiang Cheng followed his gaze. The Little Bun was parked at the side of the road with the
door open. Pan Zhi was probably still moving things out of it.
“How did he get here around the same time as us?” Jiang Cheng was stunned.
“Is he directionally challenged too?” Gu Fei asked.
“I don’t think so,” said Jiang Cheng. “He can read a map rotated or upside down, he’s pretty
good at directions.”
They saw Pan Zhi walking out as they reached the door, shouting as soon as he spotted
them. “What the fuck! I drove a car and only got here a minute before you did?”
“Where’d you go?” asked Jiang Cheng.
“It was way too hard to make left turns, felt like the car was gonna tip over. Not to mention
with how narrow this street is I couldn’t turn in, so I drove until I got to a wider road,
turned left and circled around before turning right from that street there.” Pan Zhi gestured
as he explained.
“…You sure seem familiar with the neighborhood,” Gu Fei remarked.
“That’s the pride of a non-directionally challenged person.” Pan Zhi turned and glanced
back. “Is that the cat you guys bought for Gu Miao?”
Jiang Cheng followed his gaze and saw the ugly cat with its paws hanging on the edge of a
cardboard box, looking over its edge at them. A pink ribbon was tied around its neck.
“Yep.” He nodded and looked toward Gu Fei. “Did Er-Miao give it a name yet?”
“Uh huh.” Gu Fei took two bags out of the car and started walking inside. “She sure did.”
“What is it?” Jiang Cheng asked as he picked up the last of the gift boxes and followed him.
“Is it Kitty? When I was little, I called all dogs Doggy, and all cats Kitty.”
“It’s not Kitty,” said Gu Fei.
His mom and Ponytail Boi were both in the store getting ready to make dumplings. Gu Miao
was zooming around on her skateboard between the newly installed shelves.
Seeing Jiang Cheng come in, she immediately rolled up to him and picked the little cat out of
the box by the door, handing it to Jiang Cheng.
“You want me to hold it?” Jiang Cheng accepted the cat into his arms. “Did you give it a
name?”
Gu Miao looked at him.
“Name.” Jiang Cheng stroked the cat. “Your big brother said you named it, so what’s it
called?”
Gu Miao reached out and petted the cat too, then turned and continued to zoom between
the shelves.
“What’s it called?” Jiang Cheng turned and asked Gu Fei, who was just about to start the
dough.
Gu Fei cleared his throat, then turned to face him. “Cheng-ge.”
“Yeah?” Jiang Cheng answered.
“No, I meant,” Gu Fei glanced at the cat in Jiang Cheng’s arms, “it.”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand.
“It,” Gu Fei pointed at the cat, “is called…’Cheng-ge’.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng nodded. He looked down at the cat, then suddenly whipped his head back
up. “What? It’s called Cheng-ge?”
“Yeah.” Gu Fei seemed to be suppressing his laughter, but it showed itself around the
corners of his lips anyway. “Er-Miao named it—Cheng-ge.”
“The heck?” Jiang Cheng held up the little cat and took a closer look at it before glancing
over at Gu Miao nearby. “Does she have a grudge against me or something? Didn’t the girl at
the animal hospital say it’s a female cat? And…it’s so ugly too?”
“I don’t know either.” Gu Fei grinned. “I asked her what the cat is called, and she said
‘Cheng-ge’.”
“…Are you sure?” Jiang Cheng looked at the cat in his hands. “But this little thing is so ugly.”
“Does that mean if it was good looking,” said Gu Fei, “you wouldn’t mind if it was male or
female, cat or pig?”
“That’s right. That’s the integrity of us visual animals.” Jiang Cheng stroked the cat again as
he spoke. “But I guess Gu Miao can call it that if she wants to. It’s just this cat is so skin and
bones, it’s gotta eat more.”
“We’ll go consult a pet store when they open up after the New Year.” Gu Fei nodded, then
said, “Cheng-ge.”
Jiang Cheng was about to answer but caught himself just in time to ask, “Which one?”
“You,” said Gu Fei.
“Oh. Yes?” Jiang Cheng replied.
“I feel like…Gu Miao made some progress over the last couple weeks. Xu Xingzhi said some
kids show very clear progress at the start but may sometimes revert or plateau as they
continue,” Gu Fei said. “But regardless, really…thank you.”
“No need for that. I said it before, I really like Gu Miao.” Jiang Cheng kept his head down to
look at the cat. He wasn’t quite sure how to respond to Gu Fei’s sudden expression of
thanks. It’d been a long time since such courtesy existed between them.
“Let’s start on the dumplings,” said Gu Fei.
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded and went outside to the courtyard to wash his hands.
It was fun, sitting around the little table with everyone to make dumplings together, even if
Gu Fei’s mom and Ponytail Boi were still in their eyesore honeymoon phase.
Gu Fei collected ten yuan worth of coins, washed them thoroughly, and wrapped them into
the dumplings.
Jiang Cheng watched him neatly arrange the wrapped dumplings one by one and couldn’t
help remembering his sleight of hand maneuver the year before, and chuckled.
By the time they finished and the dumplings were ready to go in the pot, the air outside was
already filled with a cacophony of firecrackers.
The new cat had never experienced a New Year before. It shrank in a ball of anxiety in Gu
Miao’s arms but Gu Miao didn’t notice its reaction, she was excited to bring it outside with
her to watch the mini explosions.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei held her back, “leave Cheng-ge in the den.”
Gu Miao held onto the cat, clearly not comprehending.
“She’s scared.” Gu Fei explained. “The firecrackers are too loud, it’ll scare her.”
Still Gu Miao held tightly to the cat and stood still.
“You get scared sometimes, and so does she,” said Gu Fei. “She’s very scared right now, Er-
Miao. You should take her to the den.”
Gu Miao shifted her gaze off of Gu Fei’s face and directed it aimlessly to the
side.
Jiang Cheng knew this was either a sign of her inattentiveness or resistance.
Just as Gu Fei was about to say something else, Gu Miao turned and walked toward the door
with the cat.
“Er-Miao,” Gu Fei stopped her, “no.”
Gu Miao pulled once against him, but Gu Fei didn’t let go. She started screaming.
The firecrackers outside were loud, which somewhat dampened the sound of Gu Miao’s
scream, but it could still be heard.
The others all stopped what they were doing and looked toward Gu Miao.
“As you were,” said Gu Fei.
“Oh.” Liu Li hesitated for a moment, then tugged Gu Fei’s mom. The two of them took the
dumplings into the kitchen in the courtyard.
Jiang Cheng and Pan Zhi went to the side to give Gu Miao room. Pan Zhi sifted through the
firecrackers and fireworks they would set off later while keeping an eye on Gu Miao. “We
can’t try to console her right now, right?”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng nodded. “She has to know that screaming doesn’t work.”
“But that must feel terrible for her,” said Pan Zhi. “Like she’s trying to say something but no
one is paying attention.”
“Yeah, they have to go through that to correct some bad habits.” Jiang Cheng sighed and sat
down in a chair.
He used to get a feeling of suffocating stuffiness in his chest whenever he heard Gu Miao
screaming, when he couldn’t begin to imagine the kind of pressure Gu Fei must’ve been
under.
Even now he didn’t understand how Gu Fei forced himself to take on all this load.
What a masochist.
But at this moment, listening to Gu Miao’s scream, he was much calmer than before. It was
more than just a process of gradual change for Gu Miao, but also the process of Gu Fei
taking steps forward.
It started with him no longer catering to Gu Miao’s every whims, not trying so hard to
indulge and bend for her, and not treating every one of her tantrums as
another ‘trauma’.
This time, Gu Miao screamed for a long time. She would stop and start again, over and over.
Perhaps…it was because she liked Cheng-ge too much. To leave Cheng-ge inside, so that she
couldn’t hold her if she wanted to go out and play, and couldn’t go out and play if she
wanted to hold her. It was a difficult choice for Gu Miao. Or rather, she didn’t understand
why she couldn’t have both.
The whole time Gu Fei crouched beside her, neither consoling her nor holding her either.
He only repeated the reason why she couldn’t take the cat outside and asked her to express
her dissatisfaction verbally.
Eventually, Gu Miao finally stopped screaming, and Jiang Cheng felt like he could finally
catch a breath again.
“Eighteen minutes,” said Pan Zhi.
“You timed it?” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Nothing to do anyway.” Pan Zhi waved his phone at him. “Just set a
stopwatch.”
“Let gege put Cheng-ge in the den for you, okay?” Gu Fei asked her.
“What?” Pan Zhi whipped his head around. “Put who in the den?”
“That cat, Gu Miao named it Cheng-ge,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Ah.” Pan Zhi stared at him in shock. After a moment, he started to laugh uncontrollably,
leaning against one of the shelves to prop himself up. “Cheng-ge!
Meow! Cheng-ge! Meow meow meow!”
Jiang Cheng stared back at him.
“Meow!” Pan Zhi kept laughing as he walked to Gu Miao’s side. “Miaomiao, let’s put Cheng-
ge inside, then Uncle Pan will take you outside to set off fireworks, sounds good?”
Gu Miao hesitated for a minute, then handed the cat to Gu Fei.
“You can play with her later when you come back, okay?” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao nodded.
“There we go. See, this is how you let gege know what you want.” Gu Fei wrapped a scarf
around her. “Go with your Unc—”
“Uncle,” said Pan Zhi.
“Yes? What is it?” Gu Fei glanced at him.
Pan Zhi opened his mouth but no sound came out. He jabbed a finger in Gu Fei’s direction,
tutted, then went to pick up the bag of firecrackers. “Come on Miaomiao, let’s go!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t know whether or not Gu Fei pulled the same trick with the coins this
year, but there were two coins in the dumplings Gu Fei gave him, worth one yuan each.
There were only two such coins in total and both had ended up in his plate. Everyone else
got only fifty-cent coins.
He must’ve cheated again, Jiang Cheng thought with a smile. Gu Fei had a childish
stubbornness when it came to certain things.
Going through the traditions of firecrackers, dumplings, fireworks, and watching Gu Miao
zip excitedly back and forth through the sparks and smoke, it made him feel like this New
Year was spent in a haze. Certain scenes overlapped on one another in his mind, but some
were new.
This was the second New Year he and Gu Fei spent together, yet the gap between the last
New Year and this one was packed so fully that it could hardly be contained in all this time.
He wondered what the next one would bring.
Pan Zhi lit the fuse of their largest firework and shouted at them, “Make a wish!”
Whenever you open your eyes, I’ll be right here.
“There’s still a few days to go before class starts again.” Pan Zhi was slumped on the couch.
“You can stay a couple more days, no need to go back with me.”
Many people looked forward to the New Year, but once it arrived bearing all of its
expectations, it was gone in a blink. The days then flashed by quickly, one after the other,
trotting toward the moment of parting.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the date on his phone. The winter break started early this year,
which meant classes also resumed early. He didn’t have much time left.
If it was before, he might have dragged it on until the very last day of winter break before
going back to school, but now he planned to leave with Pan Zhi.
“What I mean is,” Pan Zhi shifted closer to Jiang Cheng, “Valentine’s Day is coming up.”
“I know.” Jiang Cheng shot him a glance. “How do you propose that Gu Fei and I spend
Valentine’s Day together, with our current situation?”
“I thought you were gonna do a whole ‘hey come chase after me, come on chase
me’ thing with him?” said Pan Zhi. “Isn’t Valentine’s Day a good opportunity for that?”
“Dude.” Jiang Cheng sighed. “Panpan, did the firecrackers blast away some of your brain
cells?”
“While in a relationship, I only have enough brain cells to deal with two kinds of situations:
be together if we both want to be; and split if one party wants to split,” said Pan Zhi. “I don’t
have any brain cells for your kind of predicament.”
“If I stay here for Valentine’s day, it’ll put pressure on Gu Fei,” said Jiang Cheng. “Last year
we didn’t celebrate it properly because of the exams, and I said we’ll make up for it this
year.”
Pan Zhi s slumped over onto the armrest.
“So now with us here, do we celebrate Valentine’s or not, and moreover, what do we do? It
puts pressure on him, but it also puts pressure on me.”
“It’s the awkwardness,” said Pan Zhi.
“I don’t want to exert any external pressure on him.” Jiang Cheng lit a cigarette.
“I only want him to walk over to me on his own, one step at a time. No matter how long it
takes, he has to do that on his own.”
Pan Zhi peered at him. “Cheng-er.”
“No need to tell me how cool I am,” said Jiang Cheng.
“It’s not that,” said Pan Zhi. “I just think…you’ll definitely accomplish great things in the
future.”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“You’re too fucking composed with this waiting game.” Pan Zhi gave him a thumbs up.
Composed? He didn’t think so. Jiang Cheng knew himself, knew his own personality. He was
a straight shooter with a hot temper, who often had trouble hiding his emotions.
Besides, the so-called composure was only ever used on Gu Fei.
It was because this whole time they’d known each other, Gu Fei brought him so much
grounding and peace of mind, allowing him a chance to quiet down and face something like
this. It was only because it was Gu Fei.
Besides, when he truly came face to face with another parting, Jiang Cheng didn’t feel as
composed as Pan Zhi imagined him to be.
“I’ll go ahead first,” Pan Zhi said as he walked into the station with his luggage.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei stood dumbly at the entrance together, not knowing what to say.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei spoke first, his voice tight, “don’t pack your schedule like that next
semester. Make sure you leave some time for rest.”
“Okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“You don’t have to worry about the money,” Gu Fei said. “I’m starting to take on some
bigger contracts now, they pay pretty well… And if I’m ever short on money I’ll definitely
let you know. I won’t keep it from you.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng answered.
“If Er-Miao makes any progress I… I’ll tell you right away,” said Gu Fei.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei seemed to ponder on what else there was to say.
Jiang Cheng waited. His own mind was completely blank at the moment, he couldn’t think
of a single word.
“Take good care of yourself,” said Gu Fei. “Didn’t see you put on any weight even after the
holidays.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
The two of them continued standing there in silence.
After almost twenty minutes, Gu Fei spoke up again, “You…better go in.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng turned to look at the people around the departure gate—
there were only a few stragglers. “I’ll be going then.”
As he grabbed his suitcase and about to turn around, he paused for a moment, then took
one step forward, reached out with his arms, and pulled Gu Fei into a hug.
Gu Fei patted him gently on the back.
“Bye now.” Jiang Cheng turned and walked into the gate.
Some Stats
Raw character count: 6081
TL word count: 4257
TL’s Notes:
Hello! Forgot if I mentioned this before but here is a video tutorial I made to show how
you can tip authors (Wuzhe 巫哲) on JJWXC, since Sa Ye is still locked on there. If you’re not
familiar with the platform, I’ve also linked other helpful resources down thread that others
have made for navigating the platform.
Please support if you can! (Someone has asked about tipping the translator, though I’m not
sure about that with how sporadic my updates are haha.) Thanks for reading and loving
this though <3
In other news, Sanfu has five new chapters up now, chapters 6-10!
SAYE MANHUA is updating every 8th, 18th, and 28th of each month
–
CHECK IT! The most recent update brings us to the “Good Little Bunny”
bathroom scene :))))))
Chapter 131
May we both be as brave as each other.
Author: Wu Zhe; Translator: Amidstwoods
This was the third time he left on a train.
Every time, there were different people beside him, and every time, he was in a different
frame of mind. Also different was how he felt as he looked out the window at the view.
Jiang Cheng sipped on the drink he bought, figuring all this made him rich in experiences, at
least.
Since the day he was tossed back to this place, everything had changed drastically, whether
it was his day to day life, his relationships, or his mind. That was probably something no
one had anticipated.
Jiang Cheng didn’t regret any of the choices he made along the way. Regardless of what
would happen in the future, he did not regret a single choice or decision.
He was nothing if not sure of himself.
“Bottoms up.” He reached over and knocked his plastic bottle against the one in Pan Zhi’s
hand.
“Let’s do our best, yeah?” Pan Zhi threw him a glance. “It’s a pretty big bottle.”
Jiang Cheng laughed and took a drink.
“Good luck.” Pan Zhi also drank.
When their train arrived at the destination, Jiang Cheng sent Gu Fei a message.
– we’re here, the journey was fine, heading to school now
– good, I’m outside with 2miao setting off fireworks
– set a couple off for me too
– I will
Jiang Cheng quickly exited the chat after the conversation, not daring to let his eyes wander
upward, afraid that an accidental swipe of his finger would scroll the interface up.
Above were the two messages he sent that never got a reply from Gu Fei, the ones that
would upset him whenever he saw them.
They’d moved on from that now, and Jiang cheng had already determined what his next
steps were. But when he saw the two messages, the helplessness he felt during that period
would come rushing back.
He couldn’t bring himself to delete them either. He wanted to keep it, like a memento, a
scar.
Jiang Cheng returned to campus after having lunch with Pan Zhi. He wasn’t one of the
earliest ones to return. There were already a number of students on campus as well as
some milling about in the dorms. He wasn’t even the earliest in their dorm room.
His incredulity was off the charts when he pushed open the door and saw Zhao Ke there.
“When did you get back? Didn’t you say in your last message that you won’t be back until
after Valentine’s Day?”
“Change of plans,” said Zhao Ke. “Zhan Dantong suddenly decided to come back to school
today, so I changed my flight too.”
“And then what?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“What do you mean and then what.”
“She’s back on campus, so you immediately followed her back. And now you’re just lying
around in here?” Jiang Cheng didn’t understand.
“What else would I be doing?” Zhao Ke didn’t understand either.
“…I’ve no idea.” Jiang Cheng saluted him, one hand wrapped over the other first. “Just
wanted to say how innovative you are.”
“Speaking of which, I was going to ask you.” Zhao Ke got out of his bunk.
“Why didn’t you wait until after Valentine’s Day to come back?”
“I can’t celebrate that right now,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Oh,” Zhao Ke said, and didn’t pursue the subject.
“I brought back some food.” Jiang Cheng opened his suitcase, half of which carried his
clothes and the other half was filled with all kinds of snacks and local specialties Gu Fei had
purchased for him to bring back. They were even pre-packaged for different recipients—
there were ones for Xu Xingzhi, Zhao Jin, Zhao Ke, and the rest of his classmates.
“How was the little sister, now that Xu Xingzhi’s seen her?” Zhao Ke picked up a pack of
snacks and dug in. “Zhao Jin and I had a fight and didn’t speak to each
other all through the New Year.”
“Pretty good. She made progress immediately, though there may be plateaus and relapses
later on. We’ll take it slowly, one step at a time. Once we find the right approach, the rest is
easier,” said Jiang Cheng. “Some things really do have to be left to the professionals to do
targeted one-on-one sessions.”
“That’s good news,” said Zhao Ke.
“Has your sister come back yet?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Long ago. After our fight, she said she wanted to barf whenever she saw me, so she went
back to school early.”
“…What were you guys fighting about?”
“I’m not quite sure. We’ve been fighting since we were little, it’s gotten better the last two
years since she stopped hitting me,” said Zhao Ke. “We’d often wander off topic in the
middle of the fight or forget what we were fighting about right after, especially with all the
back and forth.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng was impressed. “Some of the snacks here are for her. Should I take them
to her myself or do you want to do it and use the chance to make up?”
“I’ll do it,” said Zhao Ke. “I’ll take out half to give to Zhang Dantong and leave the rest for
Zhao Jin.”
“Will there be anything left then?” Jiang Cheng started laughing.
“There’ll be some, at least,” said Zhao Ke.
There wasn’t much to do in the few days before the semester started. Jiang Cheng asked Xu
Xingzhi out to eat and gave him the snacks, taking the chance to express his gratitude once
again.
Xu Xingzhi’s family lived locally, but aside from the handful of days around New Year, he
always stayed at school.
“You’re too generous,” said Xu Xingzhi.
“You went all that way, it took a lot of energy,” Jiang Cheng said. “This isn’t generous at all.”
“Though I do really like this beef jerky.” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
“I’ll get Gu Fei to send some more when you’re done,” said Jiang Cheng.
“No need.” Xu Xingzhi opened a bag and put a small piece in his mouth. “I have
to go there again later this month. You can tell him to have some ready for me.”
“This month?” Jiang Cheng paused, suddenly a little worked up. “When?”
“Why?” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “You want to come along?”
“I…” Jiang Cheng suddenly realized his enthusiasm wasn’t only because Xu Xingzhi was
taking Gu Miao’s case so seriously, but more so because he said
“go there”.
Go there. This month. If he went, he would be able to see Gu Fei.
“I’m not going.” Jiang Cheng picked up the glass of fruit tea on the table and took a sip.
“Mm-hmm.” Xu Xingzhi nodded. “Give him some time, some things require sufficient time
and space.”
Jiang Cheng was quiet. He was going to ask Xu Xingzhi what he and Gu Fei talked about
before he left, but after some thought, he kept it to himself.
Xu Xingzhi had a point. He needed to give Gu Fei enough time, and enough space.
“So this time, are you going to take Gu Miao for a check-up?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Yeah, we’re going to do some tests and a thorough check-up. I’ll bring the results back for
analysis.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Xu Xingzhi eyed him. “How about you collect a hundred of your thanks
and tell them to me in one go, and I’ll get you an annual thank-you membership card so you
don’t have to say it next time.”
“It’s just…thinking back, if it wasn’t for you, the kid might spend the rest of her life like
that.” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“It’s because of you.” Xu Xingzhi smiled.
Really?
Perhaps.
Yeah.
Thank goodness for me.
The amazing Contestant Jiang Cheng!
Jiang Cheng giggled into his tea.
But if it wasn’t for Gu Fei—Jiang Cheng leaned back in his chair—what would his life be like
now?
Everything left impressions on everything else. Thank goodness he met Gu Fei.
Valentine’s Day fell on the second day of the new semester. For many young couples who
had been separated over the winter break, it was a blessing from heaven.
The night before, Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi’s phones were both still lit even long past eleven
o’clock, probably to make sure they got their holiday wishes in right at midnight.
Jiang Cheng held the sunny doll in his hands and gently squeezed it from time to time.
He still remembered what he was doing one year ago on this day, at this time.
He was studying, while Gu Fei watched him from outside the edge of the warm yellow lamp.
But Pan Zhi ended up stealing the first spot in line to wish him a happy Valentine’s Day.
Jiang Cheng felt like laughing at the thought of this. He rolled over in his bunk and laughed
silently to the wall.
His phone was quiet today though.
Even Pan Zhi was quiet, not sending him any cheesy consolation at this time. He was
thankful for that, and for being fortunate enough to have such a considerate best friend.
He closed his eyes and got ready to sleep.
As midnight rolled around, two message notification sounds went off in their dorm room.
No doubt it was from the two bunks across from him. But immediately after, Jiang Cheng’s
phone made a sound too—there was an incoming message.
He blanked.
The message couldn’t be from Gu Fei. Based on his understanding of Gu Fei, there was
absolutely no way he could do something like this right now.
Then it must’ve been Pan Zhi.
Right after Jiang Cheng mentally complimented him for being considerate too.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know what to feel.
When he turned on the screen and saw the message, however, he only paused for a
moment before bursting out laughing.
The message was from Zhao Ke.
– hurry up, send me something, anything
Jiang Cheng laughed to himself as he messaged back.
– what the heck is wrong with you
And so Zhao Ke’s phone also rang once. There were four phones in the room, and four
notification sounds in all. Perfect.
On Valentine’s Day proper, whether it was in class or in the cafeteria, everywhere you
looked there were roses and young women’s smiling faces.
They even heard that in the dorm room next to theirs, someone had succeeded in his
confession to a dorm mate.
“Can’t go on like this.” Zhao Ke was scrolling through his phone. The few school related
public accounts he followed were all posting Valentine’s Day adjacent content.
“Oh Ke, aren’t you going to confess your feelings today? It’s been a whole semester, that’s
half the year. We only have four years in total and half a year has gone by,” Jiang Cheng
said. “You are the most dawdling man I’ve ever met.”
“Hey, I’m planning to apply for graduate school.” Zhao Ke glanced up at him.
“What the hell does that have to do with anything,” said Jiang Cheng. “Is she going to stay
behind and wait for you? Will she not graduate? She may even get married…”
Zhao Ke leapt up from his seat.
“What are you doing?” Jiang Cheng was startled, immediately moving to protect the tray of
food in front of him.
“Hurry up and eat,” said Zhao Ke. “When you’re done, come with me to buy flowers.”
“…Oh.” Jiang Cheng watched him carefully.
Jiang Cheng’s words seemed to have gotten to Zhao Ke. Either that or he suddenly opened
his eyes and realized he’d already wasted half a year’s time.
The end result was the same, which was Jiang Cheng getting dragged out of
school immediately after lunch.
There were a plethora of flower shops around their campus, and at this time of year, all of
them were seas of roses. There were bouquets large and small, in various styles and colors.
It was the first time Jiang Cheng discovered Zhao Ke to be someone incapable of choosing
between different options.
Twenty minutes later and he still hadn’t decided on a single bouquet of roses.
Not only that, Zhao Ke might also be in the late stage of his fussy impairment as well. Either
this one was too big, or that one was too small, or this one had too few flowers, too many
buds, or the blooms were too large…
“Let’s just go with this one.” Jiang Cheng picked up a bouquet and inspected it.
“Grab a box of chocolates too…”
“Zhao Ke!” Someone called to Zhao Ke from outside the shop.
Zhao Ke’s hands froze in midair.
Jiang Cheng turned around and saw Zhang Dantong standing outside the shop.
She was holding a bouquet of flowers and grinning at them.
“What do I do!” Zhao Ke asked in a forced whisper but didn’t turn around.
“Go out there and give this to her.” Jiang Cheng smiled back at Zhang Dantong before
turning around and stuffing the bouquet into Zhao Ke’s arms. Then he took a box of
chocolates from a nearby shelf and shoved that to Zhao Ke as well.
“Just say you like her and want her to be your girlfriend. Then take away the flowers she’s
holding!”
“What?” Zhao Ke blinked, trying desperately to move his eyes so he could see without
turning. He was unsuccessful, however. “Somebody gave her flowers?”
“No shit. On a day like today, a 女神 would receive no less than ten. If you continue to keep
your mouth shut, it might really be too late.” Jiang Cheng grabbed his arm, turned him
around, and gave him a push. “Go!”
As soon as Zhao Ke turned around, Zhang Dantong started laughing until she was doubled
over.
“Your friend’s shy, huh.” The shopkeeper also couldn’t help but laugh as he watched Zhao
Ke walk out. “And what about you? Have you gotten flowers for your girlfriend yet?”
“I…” Jiang Cheng paused, suddenly unsure of how to answer this question.
I’m not getting flowers. That would sound a little odd.
I don’t have one. These were words he couldn’t bring himself to say, and an answer he
couldn’t bring himself to accept.
“Or a boyfriend?” The shopkeeper continued with a chuckle, “Boyfriends should get flowers
too. There were many guys here today, buying flowers for their boyfriends, some even pre-
ordered before the New Year.”
“Ah.” Jiang Cheng glanced at the shopkeeper, then laughed too. “It’s too far, he doesn’t live
here.”
“I see.” The shopkeeper didn’t pursue the subject, just watched the scene unfold outside the
store with him.
Zhao Ke performed better than Jiang Cheng expected. Perhaps he was prepared to die—he
even looked calm and collected while speaking to Zhang Dantong right in front of her.
Zhang Dantong was laughing the whole time. At the end, when Zhao Ke took away the
bouquet in her hands and handed her his own flowers and chocolate, Jiang Cheng saw her
blush.
“Not bad,” said the shopkeeper.
“Yup.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Zhao Ke didn’t relay in detail the process or result of his confession, but the gist of it was
she didn’t say yes right then and there, but she didn’t reject him either.
Jiang Cheng didn’t ask. He only knew that Zhang Dantong was grinning from ear to ear
when she waved goodbye at him before leaving.
“I’ll start today,” Zhao Ke said.
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng turned to him.
“Pursuing her,” Zhao Ke answered.
“Good luck.” Jiang Cheng patted his arm.
Good luck.
People were like this, obsessing and hesitating, thinking only about how unprepared they
were, and how little courage they’d gathered. In reality, once you took a step forward, you’d
realize that everything else had already fallen into place.
Jiang Cheng smiled to himself, then took out his phone and opened his WeChat Moments.
It was no different than what was around him, everything had to do with
Valentine’s Day.
He hadn’t posted today, and scrolling down, he saw that Gu Fei didn’t either.
However, on the way to the library that evening, he saw a Moments post from Gu Fei.
It was a little sun emoji.
Jiang Cheng smiled, then commented under the post with another sun emoji.
After finding a seat in the library, he opened up WeChat again to take a look, and found he
had a new notification. Gu Fei had also commented with a sun emoji.
He tutted, commenting right back with another one.
A few minutes later, Gu Fei also commented with another sun emoji.
Jiang Cheng laughed quietly for a while before opening his books to begin studying.
He hadn’t taken a single look at his textbooks over the entire winter break. Not only that,
not a single bit of academic information passed through his brain the whole time.
No wonder puppy love is so frowned upon, it takes up too much time and energy, and
messes with the mind.
Tsk.
Jiang Cheng sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. He closed his eyes and centered
himself, then focused his sight within the physical parameters of the textbook pages.
He needed to return to the life he had last semester, with classes, studying, library, and
tutoring. Aside from the psychology textbooks he no longer had to shove down his throat,
at least for now, he needed everything else to return to normal.
Then he would wait—for Gu Fei to open his eyes.
Only when he came out of the library, yawning, did he check his phone again. It had
vibrated once before, but he didn’t have time to look at it.
Or more accurately, he sensed the vibration while his mind was focused on studying, but it
didn’t occur to him what the vibration even was.
It was a message from Pan Zhi.
– do you two have any shame, fucking around in Moments like that! [1]
Jiang Cheng was briefly baffled by the message. Then he opened his WeChat Moments, saw
the back and forth string of sun emojis from Gu Fei and him, and burst out laughing.
However, he started feeling awkward immediately after.
– fuck off, and get your mind out of the gutter
– righhhht.jpg
Having spent the whole winter break away from coursework, diving head first into
studying for a whole evening actually made Jiang Cheng a little tired.
Coming back to the dorms, he went straight to his bunk to lie down without further
conversation with the others.
On the other hand, Zhao Ke had been out of it the whole afternoon after professing his
feelings to Zhang Dantong, that he probably wasn’t up for chatting anyway.
Jiang Cheng closed his eyes, rolled over a few times, then sat up again.
He went down and got a pen from his drawer along with a fresh notebook, before climbing
back onto his bunk.
Lying face down on his pillow, he opened the notebook, steeled himself for a moment with
the pen in his hand, then wrote down one line.
February 14th – sunny. Gu Fei posted a WeChat Moments. Jiang Chengcheng replied–
He stopped writing.
It had been a long time since he paid attention to his own handwriting. Only now, with all
his concentration focused here, did he realize his handwriting had somehow reverted back
to its old hideous self.
It was…truly hideous.
He hesitated for a beat, then ripped the page out.
After practicing a few more times on the page he ripped out, he gathered his focus again
and started to write.
February 18th.
What the hell! Jiang Cheng stared at the date he just wrote, unable to come to grips with
himself.
And so he ripped out this page as well.
Closing his eyes, he took a moment to calm down, then put pen to paper again.
February 18.
“Fuck me!” Jiang Cheng tossed his pen down and cursed under his breath.
“Please begin your performance,” Zhao Ke said from the next bunk, laughing.
“I thought you’re ripping paper for fun, what’s wrong?” Zhang Qiqi asked.
“Have you guys ever tried dialing a phone number in your dream, but you can’t just get the
number right, no matter how carefully you punch in each digit, it always comes out
wrong?” Jiang Cheng sat up and leaned against the wall.
“I have,” Lu Shi immediately piped up. “Never mind a phone number, I couldn’t even get
110 right when I tried to call the cops in my dream!”
“I’ve been there too,” said Zhang Qiqi. “Sometimes the frustration alone would wake me
up.”
“Then you should understand what I’m feeling.” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“Nope.” Zhao Ke’s voice joined in. “You’re awake right now, for one.”
The others all paused for a beat, then burst out laughing together.
“Shit!” Jiang Cheng kept it in for a few seconds before also giving in to laughter.
Ultimately, he was trying to write a journal entry that wasn’t quite a journal entry without
writing too many extra words, just a record of whether there’d been any contact between
him and Gu Fei that day, if Gu Fei did anything or posted any Moments, and whether he
himself had sent anything.
He planned to continue this until the day Gu Fei came to him and said “let’s get back
together, Cheng-ge”.
This thing shall be titled “The Awakening of Tyrant Gu”.
Reality, however, had proven how unfit he was for pen and paper. If one simple line led to
multiple ripped pages, the notebook would be an empty husk before the month was up.
At last, he tapped open the Notes app on his phone, writing down a line of text in a fresh
note dated today.
Sunny. Gu Fei made a Moments post: one sun. Jiang Cheng replied: one sun.
Repeat x4.
“So the cat is scared of the cold.” Gu Fei’s mom watched the plain-looking little ball of kitten
with its eyes closed in front of the space heater. “It’s already so warm in here and it still has
to seek out warmth.”
“Cats are like this.” Gu Fei was looking down at his phone. “Li Yan said he bought a cat
house for it, he’s going to bring it here later. The thing has a roof so it may be warmer.”
“What’s the cat’s name?” his mom asked. “I asked you the other day and you didn’t tell me.”
Gu Fei gave her a look. “Er-Miao calls it ‘Cheng-ge’. You can just call it Kitty.”
“Does she like Jiang Cheng that much?” She laughed. “I don’t want to call it Kitty, I want to
call it…Meowmeow! Meow— Meow—”
Gu Fei directed his attention back to his phone.
Not only was the cat good for Gu Miao, but it seemed it was good for his mom too. It
distracted her teenage energy from men and drew it to the cat instead.
The webpage Gu Fei had opened on his phone was a page from the U of R’s Confession
Board.
Not only the Confession Board, but he had followed several other public accounts from the
U of R. He would occasionally scroll through them when he had time, it helped him feel
closer to Jiang Cheng.
Valentine’s Day was more than two weeks ago, but it seemed the waves it made in people’s
hearts persisted. Recently, he could see confessions intended for Jiang Cheng almost every
day.
He didn’t think too much of it at first. Jiang Cheng had always been well liked by girls.
However, there was a message on the Confession Board today from a boy. He went so far as
to state the class he was in, but didn’t disclose his name. This upset Gu Fei, more than a
little.
He was very upset, to be honest.
But…what right did he have to be upset?
These were times that were particularly difficult to get through.
He set the phone down on the side, leaned back in the chair, and closed his eyes for a while.
Then he stood up and put on his jacket.
“Are you going out?” his mom asked.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei answered. “Just taking a walk around. Tell Li Yan to call me when he shows
up.”
“Okay,” she said.
The northerly wind came at him head on as soon as he walked out the door. He tugged on
his collar and went to retrieve the Little Bun, driving it toward Jiang Cheng’s apartment.
These days, Gu Fei would go there almost every day and hang out for a while.
When Jiang Cheng was by his side, there were many things he felt unable to make sense of,
but now that Jiang Cheng was gone, he still wanted to be somewhere that still held traces of
him.
Besides, Xu Xingzhi was coming tomorrow, he had to tidy up the apartment.
This way, if they needed a place to talk or interact with Gu Miao one-on-one, they had a
more convenient location than Gu Fei’s home.
The place was already clean. After wiping down the tables, chairs, and other surfaces, he
found nothing else to clean.
Gu Fei stretched, then walked into the bedroom, sitting down in front of the desk.
Jiang Cheng’s books were still here, piled high on the desk, along with question banks and
mock exams. Jiang Cheng didn’t let him throw them away, he wanted to keep it as a
memento, to commemorate those days where he grinded away like no tomorrow.
Gu Fei smiled to himself and patted a pile of books.
As he drew his hand back, he brushed against another pile nearby and the books toppled all
over the desk.
He sighed, then started to pick them up one by one and stack them together.
A piece of paper slid out from between an old soft-cover notebook. Gu Fei was about to put
it back when a line of text on the paper caught his eyes.
May we both be as brave as each other.
Footnote
[1]: The most common word for “sun” is 太阳, but more simplistically, it can be the character 日,
which colloquially, as a verb, also mean “fuck”. ⤴
Some Stats
TL’s Notes:
Hello! Forgot if I mentioned this before but here is a video tutorial I made to show how
you can tip authors (Wuzhe 巫哲) on JJWXC, since Sa Ye is still

locked on there. If you’re not familiar with the platform, I’ve also linked other helpful
resources down thread that others have made for navigating the platform.
Please support if you can! (Someone has asked about tipping the translator, though I’m not
sure about that with how sporadic my updates are haha.) Thanks for reading and loving
this though <3
SAYE MANHUA is updating every 8th, 18th, and 28th of each month
–
CHECK IT! The most recent update brings us to the “Good Little Bunny”
bathroom scene :))))))
Saye Ch. 132
When Gu Fei woke up in the morning, he was awakened by a group of elderly men
downstairs who were exercising early.
Every time he slept in the rental house, he would sleep soundly. If there was no noise in the
morning, he would wake up later than usual.
He took out his phone to check the time, got up, walked to the window and looked outside.
There were several elderly men gathered on the roadside downstairs. They were probably
competing for the nearby fitness equipment. There wasn’t much fitness equipment in this
area, and there were only a few downstairs. In theory, one for each person should be
enough, but now two old men were fighting for the same one…
Gu Fei watched with great interest at the window for a while. People here were like this,
each with a burning anger. Early morning exercise was originally for good health, but now
arguing over exercise equipment for half an hour could cost someone months of their life.
However, when he talked to Xu Xingzhi about the people here before, Xu
Xingzhi said that although not everyone was like this, for many people, it was also a way of
releasing pent-up frustration. For all the frustrations and disappointments in life, venting it
out with a good yell and then going back home to cook and live the same way was how they
lived.
Xu Xingzhi would probably arrive around noon today. Gu Fei finished washing up and
prepared to take Gu Miao to the store to wait for him.
As he was leaving, he stopped and hesitated for a moment, then returned to the bedroom
and pulled out yesterday’s soft leather notebook from the desk. He flipped through it and
took out the piece of paper inside.
“Hope we can be as brave as each other.”
This was obviously Jiang Cheng’s handwriting, and it was written before the college
entrance exam, or even earlier, because Jiang Cheng had already started practicing
calligraphy during the college entrance exam review, and his handwriting was better than
this now. Although it was clear that this handwriting was written very carefully, it was still
oddly ugly.
When was this written?
When did Jiang Cheng have this idea?
Gu Fei flipped through his notebook again. It was a political notebook. The content on it
was like a holy scripture. If Jiang Cheng didn’t have the habit of writing dates in his notes,
he wouldn’t have been able to understand it.
This was from the second semester of their sophomore year.
It was written so early.
Gu Fei stared at the words on the paper.
He couldn’t determine the exact time when Jiang Cheng wrote this sentence, nor could he
guess why Jiang Cheng wrote it or what idea he had at the time.
But regardless of why it was written initially, it now had new meaning.
Gu Fei folded the paper and put it into the wallet’s compartment, then turned and walked
out.
Xu Xingzhi came by car and drove directly to his store’s doorstep.
“I was thinking of waiting for your call to pick you up at the intersection,” Gu Fei said.
“I know the way,” Xu Xingzhi got out of the car. “I’m familiar with this area now.”
“Er Miao!” Gu Fei turned back and shouted into the store.
Gu Miao poked her head out, holding a cat. When she saw Xu Xingzhi standing outside the
door, she happily bowed to him.
“Is this your cat?” Xu Xingzhi squatted down and smiled.
Gu Miao nodded, then turned her head to look at his car.
“Fat Sheep is in the car,” Xu Xingzhi said. “Do you want to play with Fat Sheep?”
Gu Miao nodded again.
Xu Xingzhi opened the car door and let her in. He first tested the reaction of the two cats
after they met, and then took Fat Sheep out of the cat carrier.
The Fat Sheep is not as enthusiastic towards the cat as towards humans.
Although it does not scratch the kitten, it also ignores it, lying on the back seat like a queen.
In contrast, Cheng Ge is much more enthusiastic; he approaches and even hugs the tail.
Gu Miao watches on the side, completely absorbed.
“This time is quite tight,” Xu Xingzhi said, “we need to do a comprehensive physical
examination, as well as a psychological evaluation. I will tell you about the next stage’s
goals later.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded. He had taken Gu Miao for a physical examination before, but it was
all routine, and he wasn’t sure what kind of examination he should do. “Then… you go put
your things at Jiang Cheng’s place first. It’s convenient to live there.”
“I have booked a hotel,” Xu Xingzhi smiled, “you two can stay in your own love nest.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei also smiled, “I’ve tidied up there. It’s convenient for conversations and
everything.”
“Okay,” Xu Xingzhi nodded.
With the company of the cat, Gu Miao’s emotions were quite stable during this period, but
going to the hospital was still a huge hurdle.
The hospital she usually went to was nearby, within the scope of activities that Gu Miao
could accept, but this hospital did not have the equipment. Today, she had to do an MRI and
leave her comfort zone to go to a place farther than the
city center.
Sitting in Xu Xingzhi’s car, when they arrived at the plaza in the city center, Gu Miao’s mood
was still okay. But as they continued forward, she began to feel uneasy, tapping her hands
on the car window.
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei pulled her shoulder, “we are going to have a physical examination. When
your body gets better, you will be very happy.”
Gu Miao couldn’t quite absorb his words, her gaze remained somewhat distant, and her
body was tense, but what surprised Gu Fei was that she didn’t scream.
“Er Miao,” Xu Xingzhi parked the car on the side of the road and turned to look at her, “Do
you remember Cheng-ge?”
Gu Miao did not react.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei repeated, “Do you remember Cheng-ge?”
It took a long time for Gu Miao to nod, then she started patting the car seat with her hands,
constantly and repeatedly.
“We’re going to see Cheng-ge now,” Xu Xingzhi said.
Gu Fei turned his head to look at him and asked softly, “What?”
“Call Jie Cheng and let him video call with Gu Miao later,” Xu Xingzhi said,
“You haven’t done this before, have you?”
“No,” Gu Fei took out his phone.
“Try it now and let her know that overcoming a difficulty will bring a surprise,”
Xu Xingzhi said.
When the phone rang, Jiang Cheng was walking to the classroom with some dormitory
mates.
The ringtone made him stunned for a moment. It was the exclusive ringtone he set for Gu
Fei’s number, and he hadn’t heard it for a long time. For a moment, he couldn’t be sure if it
was his own phone ringing.
“Your phone,” Zhao Ke nudged him with his arm.
“Oh!” He came to his senses and pulled out his phone from his pocket. The screen showed
Gu Fei’s picture, and he stared at it for at least two seconds before answering the phone,
“Hello?”
So handsome…
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei’s voice came from the other end, “Are you not in class yet?
Do you have time now?”
“Yes, what’s up?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Senior and I took Er Miao to the hospital for a check-up, a place she’s never been to,” Gu
Fei said. “She’s feeling a bit nervous now, can you video call her later for a while?”
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng immediately looked around. “I’ll find a place with fewer people.”
After hanging up the phone, he patted Zhao Ke and said, “Hold a seat for me. I’ll be there in
a few minutes. I’ll video call my sister, and she’s a bit nervous now.”
“Okay,” Zhao Ke nodded.
Jiang Cheng found a chair with no one around and sat down. When Gu Fei’s video request
came in, he was actually a bit nervous when he clicked to accept.
“Er Miao,” seeing Jiang Cheng’s face on the screen, Gu Fei suppressed his excitement and
hugged Gu Miao over, “Look, Cheng ge.”
“Er Miao!” Jiang Cheng waved with a smile.
After hearing Jiang Cheng’s voice, Gu Miao’s gaze shifted from the window and turned to
the phone.
“Did Er Miao see me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Haha!” When Gu Miao saw Jiang Cheng on the screen, she turned her head towards Gu Fei
and shouted in surprise.
This was the most obvious progress. Since the day she met the big sheep, Gu Miao began to
use “haha” to express her surprise.
All along, she only talked to Gu Fei when there was no one else around, and the frequency
was very low, with a vocabulary of less than twenty words combined.
But when she said “haha,” she didn’t need to avoid people.
“Haha!” Jiang Cheng also shouted, then snapped his fingers towards the camera and gave a
thumbs up. “Er Miao!”
Gu Miao immediately snapped her fingers back and gave him a thumbs up.
The car arrived at the hospital in about ten minutes. Gu Miao’s attention was focused on
Jiang Cheng the entire time, listening to him speak and holding his little brother and the
stuffed sheep to show her, without the previous nervousness.
After hanging up the video call, Gu Fei got out of the car with her.
She looked around after getting out of the car, and immediately became nervous again,
turning around to climb back into the car.
“Cheng-ge is waiting for you,” Gu Fei grabbed her, “After the check-up, you can talk to
Cheng-ge again, okay?”
For Gu Miao, this should be a huge change, and no matter from which aspect, it is a
challenge.
Xu Xingzhi said that she cannot be forced at this time, as the feeling of fear will make her
refuse similar changes in the future. So Gu Fei can only keep talking patiently.
Squatting in front of the hospital steps, Gu Fei patiently repeated himself over and over
again, using simple language that Gu Miao could understand.
Xu Xingzhi sat on the side of the steps and occasionally prompted him on how to express
himself.
Forty minutes later, Gu Fei felt that if they didn’t go in soon, all three of them would catch a
cold. Finally, Gu Miao nodded.
Gu Fei breathed a long sigh of relief.
“This was just a short distance,” he felt his throat was a bit hoarse, “In her mind, this place
should be very close to the square, but even so…”
“It’s okay,” Xu Xingzhi said, “The first step is always the hardest.”
According to Xu Xingzhi’s plan, Gu Miao still has many first steps to take, leaving her
accustomed living environment is just one of them.
“We will gradually expand her range,” Xu Xingzhi sat on the sofa in the rental apartment,
watching Gu Miao walking back and forth in the living room with Cheng-ge in one hand and
the stuffed sheep in the other, “Next is to understand emotions and feelings, starting with
contact with small animals.”
“Well,” Gu Fei nodded and thought for a moment before asking, “You have more experience
in raising cats. Can the kitten be bathed now? I smell a little odor.”
“You can bathe them when they’re six months old,” Xu Xingzhi smiled, “but you have to
blow dry their fur immediately after washing, or they may get sick.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei said, “That should be about right. I’ll give it a bath in a few days. Er Miao is
holding it all day long, and sometimes I can smell the cat smell on her.”

“You can let her help you bathe the cat,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“Can she do it?” Gu Fei hesitated, “She…sometimes she’s afraid of water. She can wash her
hands and dishes, but for washing a cat…”
Xu Xingzhi smiled, “We actually talked about this issue before.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
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Saye Ch. 133
“Gu Miao…” Xu Xingzhi lowered his voice. “She wasn’t afraid of water
originally, and she didn’t see the scene where her father had an accident, right?”
“Right,” Gu Fei replied.
“She screams when she sees water,” Xu Xingzhi looked at him. “But it didn’t happen
immediately after her father’s death.”
“I see,” Gu Fei began to feel uneasy, sensing what Xu Xingzhi was about to say.
“She was influenced by you,” Xu Xingzhi said. “Because you are afraid of water.”
Gu Fei paused and didn’t say anything.
“You may express it differently. You can come into contact with water in your daily life,
stand by the river, and maybe even play with water for a while,” Xu Xingzhi said. “But deep
down inside, you have a fear of water.”
It took a long time for Gu Fei to respond. “Yeah.”
“Many times, the emotions we don’t feel can affect the people around us,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“What you’re afraid of, Gu Miao will be afraid of, what you avoid, Gu Miao will reject, and
she can only move forward when you do.”
There were many things that Gu Fei felt he didn’t lack awareness of, but he couldn’t put
them into words. Every time he talked with Xu Xingzhi, he would feel a sense of relief.
Although it was difficult to adapt to being exposed and vulnerable, once he really opened
up, he felt more relaxed.
It’s like he had been in a deep sleep for a long time. When Jiang Cheng woke him up, he
would feel uncomfortable and lost, but he knew that he would look forward to moments
like this from time to time.
Xu Xingzhi stayed for four days this time. After Gu Miao’s physical
examination and psychological test were completed, he was about to leave.
Before leaving, he gave Gu Fei a detailed treatment plan, including some interactive games
with Gu Miao.
“Thank you,” said Gu Fei, “I really don’t know what else to say.”
You and Jiang Cheng are quite amusing, both quite familiar with me,” Xu Xingzhi said. “He’s
also always thanking me all day long.
Gu Fei smiled.
Every time he heard the name Jiang Cheng from someone else’s mouth, his heart would
beat a little faster.
He didn’t know why.
“By the way, senior,” Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, “I have something I want to ask you.”
“What is it?” Xu Xingzhi asked.
“It’s… I want to ask if a person’s emotional changes can affect their voice,” Gu Fei thought
for a moment. “Just…”
Gu Fei didn’t know how to continue.
“Are you asking about Jiang Cheng’s voice?” Xu Xingzhi chuckled.
Gu Fei was a little embarrassed, but nodded: “Yes.”
“Did you ask him?” Xu Xingzhi said.
“I did. He said the voice-changing period of puberty has arrived,” Gu Fei sighed,
“Pan Zhi deleted me, but I added myself back, and when I asked him, he didn’t say
anything.”
“Well, then I can’t say either,” Xu Xingzhi smiled. “But I can tell you that when a person
experiences strong stimulation, both physiological and psychological reactions can occur.”
Strong stimulation.
This term made Gu Fei’s heart ache.
“I understand,” he furrowed his brow, “Jiang Cheng’s voice, it’s sometimes good, sometimes
bad. Does he need to go to the hospital?”
“No need, for most people, it gradually recovers over time,” Xu Xingzhi said.
“He has improved quite a bit now; during that period, he could barely speak.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei heard a slight click as his fingers were squeezed.
In the spring, it’s always easy to feel hungry, or more precisely, crave meat—
sizzling, oil-bubbling, large pieces of meat with a slightly charred edge.
Jiang Cheng was tormented by these thoughts throughout the afternoon. He couldn’t even
enjoy his lunch properly, and when he woke up in the afternoon, he made a great decision:
tonight, when he goes for his tutoring session, he’s going to have barbecue.
“Pack me some,” Zhao Ke couldn’t resist his persuasion from the dorm to the classroom,
“no, don’t pack, let’s go eat together. After we finish, you go to class, and I’ll go back to
school.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his stomach.
Perhaps his body needed fat, or maybe his mood was slowly warming up. From last year
until now, he finally had a strong desire to eat meat.
Sitting in the classroom, Jiang Cheng glanced at the notes on his phone.
It seemed like Gu Batian had awakened his awareness. The dates weren’t consecutive, and
most of the time now, Gu Batian didn’t maintain daily contact with him as before. Posts on
their social circle often had gaps of a day or two, with not much content recorded.
But Jiang Cheng goes through it all from start to finish every day, as if combing through all
the memories during this period, trying to sense Gu Fei from these fragments.
Gu Batian posted a photo, the sunset at the steel mill, with a caption, “Who says we can’t
produce blockbuster scenes here.” Jiang Cheng replied, “Exactly, look at this scene, it’s
huge!” Gu Batian responded with ellipses.
Jiang Cheng posted a selfie. Gu Batian replied, “The phone feels wronged.”
…
After finishing a class, Zhao Ke grabbed Jiang Cheng and headed to the supermarket.
“Come on, I haven’t been able to focus on this class because I’ve been thinking about
barbeque,” Zhao Ke said. “Let’s go to the supermarket first.”
“But there’s no barbeque at the supermarket,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Anything will do, chicken feet, chicken wings, beef jerky, spicy fish, let’s eat something
first,” Zhao Ke said. “I can’t wait anymore.”
“You gained five pounds over Chinese New Year,” Jiang Cheng said. “If you don’t control
yourself, how can you pursue your goddess?”
“I’m not the kind of person who pursues a goddess based on looks,” Zhao Ke looked at him.
“Speaking of looks…”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Have you been checking the confession wall recently?” Zhao Ke asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng shook his head. “I’ve only checked a few times. Why?”
“You’ve received quite a few confessions recently,” Zhao Ke said. “I saw one yesterday, and
another one today.”
“Really?” Jiang Cheng said. “Are you envious?”
“Yes,” Zhao Ke nodded. “I’m planning to write a few for myself.”
Jiang Cheng laughed, taking out his phone and said, “Don’t do that. Let me write
them for you. I promise they will be sincere and touching, full of emotions between the
lines…”
The phone lit up, and a notification sound chimed in.
It was from Little bunny.
“Cheng Ge, Are there classes this afternoon?”
Jiang Cheng was stunned.
Gu Fei rarely sent him messages, and when he did, it was usually about Guo Miao’s
situation.
Seeing this content, Jiang Cheng almost couldn’t react for a moment.
After a while, he replied.
-Class is over now, I’m going to the supermarket with Zhao Ke.
-Oh, is it the supermarket we’ve been to before?
-Yes.
After sending the message, Jiang Cheng was still a bit stunned and panicked. Gu Fei seemed
to be at a loss for words, which was a bit unusual.
“What’s wrong?” He sent another message.
It took a while for Gu Fei to reply.
“I’m at the entrance of that supermarket.”
Jiang Cheng suddenly stopped in his tracks.
“Hmm?” Zhao Ke also stopped and turned to look at him.
Jiang Cheng stared at the words on his phone, his hand trembling so hard that he could
barely read them.
“Holy shit,” he said.
“What’s wrong with you?” Zhao Ke was bewildered. “Why are you silent
again?”
Silent? Jiang Cheng looked at Zhao Ke.
“Don’t scare me. Why did you go silent again?” Zhao Ke, disregarding his principle of “not
my business, not my concern,” grabbed his phone and glanced at it. “I’m at the entrance of
that supermarket… Is this… Gu Fei?”
“Uh-huh.” Jiang Cheng responded, this time with a sound.
After hearing his own voice, he suddenly regained his senses and snatched the phone back.
He yelled at Zhao Ke, “Holy shit! He’s here!”
“Yes!” Zhao Ke was startled by his yelling. “Hurry up and go over there!”
Jiang Cheng’s hand was shaking so badly that he tried to call Gu Fei first, but he couldn’t get
to the right place after several attempts.
He didn’t bother with more exchanges; instead, he slapped Zhao Ke’s arm and dashed
towards the supermarket.
Gu Fei is here.
Gu Fei suddenly came to the school!
Gu Fei is at the supermarket entrance!
Gu Fei unexpectedly appeared out of nowhere!
What’s going on!
What happened!
Oh my god!
Is this real?
Am I seeing things?
Damn, could it be just wishful thinking!
Jiang Cheng’s ears were filled with the sound of the wind rushing by, and his own heavy
breathing due to running and excitement. While running, he grabbed his phone to check Gu
Fei’s message again.
But in order to see clearly, he had to stop. He couldn’t stop now no matter what.
Fuck it, I’m not looking anymore!
He stuffed his phone back into his pocket and quickened his pace.
Though the supermarket isn’t far from here, it usually takes less than two minutes to walk,
for some reason, running today makes the path seem unusually long.
Up ahead is the intersection. Once you pass the intersection, you’ll reach the supermarket.
Jiang Cheng stared at the people crossing the intersection, his eyes squinting against the
wind. However, with just one glance, he spotted the person standing on the roadside.
It was Gu Fei.
No need for a closer look; a single sweep, from any angle—up, down, left, or right—Jiang
Cheng could recognize him. It was Gu Fei.
Gu Fei!
He shouted.
Damn, he couldn’t make a sound.
Gu Fei!
The great Jiang Cheng activated telepathy at this moment.
Gu Fei turned his head.
The moment Gu Fei turned his head, Jiang Cheng felt like all his strength was drained in an
instant. He couldn’t take another step and stopped.
Gu Fei walked quickly towards him.
Jiang Cheng counted his steps, one, two, three, four, five…
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei called out to him.
He could already see Gu Fei’s face clearly, could see his expression, and even feel his breath
and heartbeat.
“Ah,” he responded.
Gu Fei walked up to him and hugged him tightly.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei held him tightly, his voice low and slightly trembling, “Are you there?”
“I’m here,” Jiang Cheng said.

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Saye Ch. 134
At this moment, there are many students on the main road leading to the supermarket.
Although the atmosphere at R University is very relaxed, no matter what type of couple it
is, everyone understands and won’t make a big deal out of it.
But embracing each other in the middle of the road, not to mention two boys, even a boy
and a girl, would still attract attention.
“Aren’t you… with Zhao Ke?” Gu Fei released his grip and took a step back.
“Yeah, he’s behind me.” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat. His voice was audible now, but not
very pleasant.
He looked around, and although the passing students seemed calm, their gazes still lingered
on them.
“I…” Gu Fei also looked around and felt a bit embarrassed. “There weren’t so many people
earlier.”
“Just got out of class,” Jiang Cheng said. “Why did you suddenly come here?”
His mind was in chaos. All the barrage messages he saw were “Gu Fei is here,”
but now that he had snapped out of it, he suddenly remembered this important question.
And as soon as he asked this question, the excitement he had barely suppressed resurfaced.
He’s here!
Gu Fei is here!
Gu Fei suddenly came here!
Right at the entrance of the supermarket!
Standing right in front of him!
He couldn’t help but reach out and gently tap Gu Fei’s arm to reinforce the feeling of reality.
“Xu Xingzhi was coming back today, and he was driving,” Gu Fei said. “So I thought I’d ride
with him in the car and skip the rush to buy a ticket.”
“I’m asking why you suddenly came here, not how you got here. Pay attention to the
question,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I just…” Gu Fei pulled on his collar. Perhaps because more and more students were coming
from behind, he felt uncomfortable. “I missed you.”
Jiang Cheng’s hand was in his pocket, nervously and awkwardly pinching his phone screen.
I missed you.
When Gu Fei said this, his hand trembled.
Click.
It felt like he had shattered the tempered glass screen.
“Do you still have class?” Gu Fei asked, looking to the side. He spoke softly,
“There are many of your classmates here, right? Is it not good if they see us?”
“It’s okay,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his nose. Although he said it was okay, he didn’t dare to look
to the side. He took a step forward and said, “Let’s go for a walk.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei followed him.
This feeling was still very strange.
One minute ago, he was sitting in the classroom with books in front of him.
Because suicides do not constitute a crime, it is difficult for instigators or helpers to
constitute a crime. However, if the instigator’s deception or coercion indirectly causes the
effect of the principal offender, the crime of intentional homicide is established…
When he turned his head, he saw Gu Fei.
He turned around, and there was Gu Fei.
Alive and tangible, Gu Fei.
In the flesh, Gu Fei.
Gu Fei you could reach out and touch, Gu Fei you could embrace.
Gu Fei, who spoke without the crackle of electricity.
Gu Fei, whose presence you could sense by scent.
Walking by his side, they strolled together outside the school. Even though dressed warmly,
the thickness of their down jackets couldn’t mask the subtle touch of their arms.
They were both wearing the same down jacket they had bought together that day.
“Will there be class later?” Gu Fei asked.”
“Skipping,” Jiang Cheng replied, checking the time on his phone.
The tempered glass screen was indeed shattered, resembling a blossoming flower.
The screen protector is completely shattered, like it burst into bloom.
“Tsk.” Zhao Ke gave it to him, saying it came with the phone case to avoid wasting it. Now,
it’s genuinely broken.
“Where’s your stuff?” Jiang Cheng remembered to ask after they left the school gate.
“I…” Gu Fei rubbed his nose, looking a bit embarrassed. “Didn’t bring anything.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng was puzzled.
“Just threw a pair of underwear in my bag,” Gu Fei swung the backpack on his back. “I just…
hurried over without planning, and I’ve got a photo shoot scheduled the day after
tomorrow, so I have to go back tomorrow.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “So, you’ll be heading back tomorrow?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei replied.
“You really came over just like that after getting out of Xu Xingzhi’s car?” Jiang Cheng still
couldn’t quite grasp it, turning to stare at Gu Fei.
“Yeah, he said he was coming back today,” Gu Fei smiled. “I just couldn’t hold back. He
dropped me off at the entrance of your school.”
“You’re crazy,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Once the madness kicks in, there’s no stopping it,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng initially intended for Gu Fei to stay at the hotel they used last time for the
interview, but he ended up getting lost on the way. In the end, it was Gu Fei who led the
way to the hotel.
“Do you really never get lost when you go for tutoring?” Gu Fei asked.
“I usually don’t get lost when coming here, but I guess I’m a bit absent-minded right now,”
Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei smiled but didn’t say anything.
After taking the room key, they entered the elevator in silence.
The room was on the same floor as last time, but it was a different one.
Now, standing behind Gu Fei and waiting for him to open the door, Jiang Cheng’s feelings
were different. Memories flooded back, but recalling them made it seem like a long time
had passed, long enough to evoke a sense of nostalgia.
Gu Fei entered the room, placed his bag on the table, and turned on the air conditioning
with the remote control.
Jiang Cheng followed, closing the door behind them.
The room instantly became quiet, with only the occasional beeping sound as Gu Fei
adjusted the temperature.
Thinking about various reunion scenes in movies and TV dramas, they probably should
have gazed affectionately at each other first, then hugged, followed by a passionate kiss and
falling onto the bed.
The next scene would show the two of them lying side by side under the covers, bare
shoulders of course.
However, their situation was somewhat different from a normal reunion. After all, they had
“broken up,” and even though Gu Fei had suddenly appeared this time, the purpose was not
explicitly stated, but they both knew.
But such a scene did not occur.
Jiang Cheng had been waiting for this day and had longed for Gu Fei. When he saw Gu Fei,
he was trembling with excitement, wanting to shout and rush over to embrace him no
matter what.
However, he now stood here, not knowing what to do, feeling a bit lost and bewildered.
When Gu Fei put down the remote control, turned around, and took off his coat, Jiang
Cheng felt that he was getting a bit hot, so he also took off his coat and threw it aside.
“I brought something small,” Gu Fei took his bag and walked over to him,
“It’s…for you.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked at his hand.
Gu Fei took out a glass bottle from his bag, and when he placed it in Jiang Cheng’s hand, it
felt heavy.
Jiang Cheng stared at the glass bottle, to be precise, it was a small round-bottom flask.
There was something inside the flask, and when Jiang Cheng saw it clearly, he was stunned.
The round belly of the flask was suspended with petals of roses and many tiny silver
particles. As the flask moved, the petals gently spun among the silver stars.
Gu Fei took a black leather notebook from the nearby table and placed it next to the bottle.
In an instant, what appeared before Jiang Cheng’s eyes was like the night sky.
In the silver starlight, roses were drifting.
“Is it beautiful?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, and the black notebook covered half of his face, leaving only his
eyes visible.
His eyes were full of anticipation.
“It’s beautiful,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, and Gu Fei’s gaze unexpectedly softened his
heart. He thought of an obedient Little Bunny for some reason, he said, “Beautiful.”
Gu Fei smiled.
“What’s inside…?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Glue,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng laughed, “That doesn’t sound too mysterious.”
“The silver parts are the mystery,” Gu Fei said.
“What are they?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“To maintain the mystery,” Gu Fei said, “I won’t say.”
Jiang Cheng smiled and shook the bottle in his hand. The bottle mouth was blocked by a
large steel ball, which could be turned upside down. The steel ball was fixed with glue, but
Gu Fei did it delicately, and the glue was barely visible.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei put down the notebook in his hand and also picked up the bottle and
placed it on the table.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I came here not to say anything,” Gu Fei opened his arms and hugged him,
“some things are too vague to say now.”
This gentle embrace brought Gu Fei’s breath over Jiang Cheng, enveloping him with a
feeling of faint warmth, calming his heart.
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng rested his chin on Gu Fei’s shoulder and closed his eyes.
“I miss you so much, and I’m also afraid of losing you,” Gu Fei whispered, “I’m anxious
because I’m afraid I can’t keep up with you.”
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng responded with his eyes closed.
“There are some words that you can’t take back even if you want to. The wounds are there
and can’t be erased.” Gu Fei gently touched his back, “I just want to tell you in person, face
to face. “
“Go ahead,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m sorry,” Gu Fei said, “I know you don’t need to hear this. I’m not talking about the break
up. I’m talking about myself… I’m not as brave as you are.”
Jiang Cheng’s hand trembled slightly.
“I will be as brave as you,” Gu Fei said, “I came here to tell you this. I want you to see it.”
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng lowered his head and rubbed against Gu Fei’s shoulder.
“Look at me,” Gu Fei said, “don’t look at anyone else.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like laughing.
“I’m serious,” Gu Fei said, “don’t laugh.”
“I didn’t mean to laugh,” Jiang Cheng bit his lip, but still couldn’t hold it back, he turned his
head and leaned against Gu Fei’s shoulder, laughing out loud.
“Laugh,” Gu Fei sighed, “if this conversation were recorded, I might even laugh listening to
it myself.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything and just kept laughing with his head tilted to the side.
Gu Fei didn’t speak again, he just hugged him and lightly patted his back.
Jiang Cheng didn’t even notice when tears started streaming down his face.
He felt like he had been laughing the whole time, and when he finally felt the tears, his face
was already covered in tear stains.
“I’m sorry,” Gu Fei hugged him tighter, “Cheng Ge, I’m sorry.”
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng held onto his waist, his voice trembling with a nasal tone, “Get the
hell out of here.”
“Mmm,” Gu Fei responded.
“I fucking swear, Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng finally couldn’t hold back his tears, “I swear, you said
you would always love me, until I no longer needed you to love me anymore! Why didn’t
you keep your promise?”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei rubbed his back.
“Why did you just give up?” Jiang Cheng yelled with a hoarse voice, “Why did you just give
up? Who gave you the right to decide for me?”
“I was wrong,” Gu Fei lowered his head and buried his face in Jiang Cheng’s shoulder,
“Cheng Ge, I was wrong.”
“I haven’t said it’s okay yet!” Jiang Cheng shouted, “Who the fuck do you think you are,
making decisions for me? It’s not just your love life! It’s not just your feelings!”
“Cheng Ge, I was wrong,” Gu Fei said softly.
“You motherfucker…” Jiang Cheng started yelling but his voice trailed off.
“Just kneel down and kowtow to me!”
For a long time, Jiang Cheng had been suppressing his urge to lose his temper.
He understood Gu Fei had his own reasons and his personality was influenced by his
psychological trauma. Jiang Cheng could remain calm and wait for him to come to his
senses, but now he felt like he had reached his limit.
However, this rationality completely collapsed at this moment.
I understand the reason, but I still feel wronged.
I understand the reason, but now I just want to curse, complain, and irrationally blame
someone.
He needed to yell out, curse out, and shout out. If he hadn’t been reluctant to let go, he
would have wanted to beat Gu Fei severely.
One punch after another hit him, hitting him in the face and body.
All the feelings he had felt in the past six months had turned into pain for Gu Fei to feel.
Although he knew that Gu Fei was also having a hard time, he just didn’t want to be rational
or reasonable anymore.
Who the hell is still a little princess!
How can a little princess endure such grievance!
Damn you, Gu Fei!
Jiang Cheng grabbed the back of Gu Fei’s clothes tightly and shouted again.
The words “go to hell” were completely silenced.
“Let’s not talk for now, Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei touched his hair with some heartache, “I checked
it. Your throat needs to recover slowly, and your emotions need to be… stable.”
Stable my ass!
“How stable is this!”
Jiang Cheng pushed him away and punched him in the stomach.
Based on Gu Fei’s reaction, he could completely block this punch, but he just stood there,
without even turning his body aside.
Just holding his breath.
Jiang Cheng could feel his abs when he hit his stomach.
The damn thing actually guarded itself secretly!
He swung his arm again and hit him in the chest.
“Strike back!” Jiang Cheng glared at Gu Fei and spoke up this time.
When Jiang Cheng was about to throw his third punch, Gu Fei grabbed his wrist and pulled
him, causing Jiang Cheng to stumble and fall onto the bed.
The moment he hit the bed, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt weak and didn’t want to move his
body anymore.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei knelt beside the bed with one arm propped up on the edge.
“Hmm,” Cheng Ge responded.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, he just leaned down and lightly touched Cheng Ge’s lips.
Cheng Ge closed his eyes and didn’t move.
Gu Fei didn’t make any further moves either, he just gently pressed his lips against Cheng
Ge’s.
Warm breath, gentle touch, familiar scent.
Tears once again flowed from the corners of Cheng Ge’s eyes.
Gu Fei used his fingertips to gently wipe away Cheng Ge’s tears, and then lowered his head
to rest it on Cheng Ge’s stomach.
Neither of them spoke nor moved.
It wasn’t until Cheng Ge’s phone rang twice in his coat pocket that Gu Fei lifted his head and
said, “Your phone’s ringing.”
“Uh, it’s my alarm,” Cheng Ge said.
“What kind of alarm?” Gu Fei asked.
“It reminds me to go for my tutoring session,” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes and sniffed.
“Then… I’ll go with you,” Gu Fei took out his phone and checked the time.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng sat up and wiped his eyes.
He had no more tears, but his eyes were a bit swollen, and he felt a little dazed.
“I’ll go wash my face,” Jiang Cheng stood up and walked into the bathroom.
After splashing his face with water a few times, he slowly regained his senses and looked at
himself in the mirror. His eyes were slightly red, and the tip of his nose was a little red too.
Everything else is fine.
He rubbed his face and pulled his clothes.
There was a wet mark on his clothes.
He touched it and found that this was the place where Gu Fei lay down just now.
As he walked out of the bathroom, he glanced at Gu Fei’s face but couldn’t see any traces.
It was one of Gu Fei’s magical skills. Whether he endures it or conceals it, he can do it
without leaving any trace.
“Let’s go,” Jiang Cheng put on his coat, picked up the flask on the table, “you carry this for
me.”
“Let’s leave it here, and you can take it when you come back tonight,” Gu Fei said.
“I want to take it with me,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him, “you carry it.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded, got up and put the flask in his bag, “Do you finish tutoring before
eating dinner?”
“Yeah, I was going to tell Zhao Ke to go eat barbecue first, then go to tutoring after eating,”
Jiang Cheng smiled, “but it’s too late now.”
“Then call him to eat barbecue together tonight?” Gu Fei asked.
“No, he must have already gone to eat,” Jiang Cheng said, “In the evening…I don’t want to
ask others to eat together.”
“Well,” Gu Fei put on his coat, and after putting on his bag, he hugged him and then went to
open the door and walked out, “I thought you would drop one of your tutoring jobs this
semester.”
“If the schedule can be managed, I won’t drop it,” Jiang Cheng said, “both parents are pretty
good, so I’ll just keep doing it for now. The money is quite good too.”
Gu Fei glanced at him.
“I still have tuition fees, living expenses, and material costs. The expenses are quite high,”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Got it,” Gu Fei put his arm around Cheng Ge’s shoulder.
After an hour of tutoring, Jiang Cheng was starting to worry about his voice, but it wasn’t
due to his emotions earlier. He had just yelled too hard, causing his voice to disappear
temporarily. Now, while lecturing, his voice was back to normal and even slightly magnetic.
“Do you have something to celebrate today?” The little girl held her arm and peeled a
lollipop stick while speaking.
Jiang Cheng looked at her but remained silent.
“Why, can’t I eat during break time?” The little girl clicked her tongue.
“Did I say it’s break time?” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Excuse me,” the little girl crushed the lollipop stick a few times and spat out the stick,
“Fine, continue.”
Jiang Cheng took her test paper and continued to teach the remaining half.
“Alright, let’s stop here today,” Jiang Cheng glanced at the clock on the table,
“Take some time to do the questions I circled for you today.”
“Okay,” the little girl replied, then pushed the desk and asked, “What about you?
Do you have something to celebrate?”
“What to celebrate?” Jiang Cheng looked at her.
“You seem to be in a good mood today,” the little girl pointed at his face, “I can’t describe it,
but I can feel it.”
“Is that so?” Jiang Cheng smiled, “The good news is your mother just gave me some money.”
“I wasn’t asking you in the first place. What are you pretending for? My mom gives you
money every month. When you took the money last month, you
looked completely disinterested,” the young girl said disdainfully, rolling her eyes.
“Congratulations on finding joy in life again.”
“Thank you,” said Jiang Cheng.
By the time he left the residential area, it was already dark outside. The wind was blowing
fiercely and he got hit by sand in the face.
As he rubbed his eyes and looked around, wondering where Gu Fei was waiting for him, he
noticed a dark figure by the wall.
“Gu Fei?” Jiang Cheng paused. “Why are you standing here? Aren’t you cold?”
“Is this considered cold?” Gu Fei walked over and took out something warm from his coat,
handing it to him. “It’s at least ten degrees warmer than back home.”
“If that’s the case, why don’t you take off your coat? You’re not cold anyway,”
Jiang Cheng suggested. He looked at what was in his hand and saw a giant roasted sweet
potato. He smiled. “Did you just buy this?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded and opened the bag. Blowing on it, he broke off half and handed it to
him. “I figured you’d be hungry when you came out, so have a bite first.”
“I am hungry,” Jiang Cheng said as he took a bite of the sweet potato. Just as he was about to
walk forward, the wind blew and he quickly lowered his head, using his hand to block it.
“Damn, this sand.”
Gu Fei turned around and stood in front of him, took a bite and said, “Eat quickly.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng faced him and together they shielded themselves from the wind, taking
a bite of the sweet potato.
He had never been particularly interested in this kind of food, thinking that it smelled good
but tasted just okay, nothing compared to a good cut of meat.
But for some reason, today this half sweet potato was exceptionally sweet and delicious.
He glanced at Gu Fei, who was seriously chewing on the sweet potato with his head down.
Perhaps it was because of Gu Fei, or maybe it was the feeling of eating a warm roasted
sweet potato face-to-face in the cold wind.
“I’m a little worried,” said Jiang Cheng as he ate, “This sweet potato must weigh about five
catties1. Will we still have room for barbecue after we finish it?”
“It’s not even a catty,” Gu Fei glanced at him, “Your visual estimation ability is really
shocking. You’re probably the least accurate person I’ve ever seen.”
Jiang Cheng chuckled, “Anyway, I think I’m going to be stuffed.”
“It’s fine, even if you eat five catties of sweet potatoes,” Gu Fei said, “We still have big pork
belly, you can eat another five kilograms.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
“Forget it,” Gu Fei thought about it and took the unfinished sweet potato from his hand,
“Leave some room in your stomach, or you might not enjoy it later.”
“Have you also not had barbecue in a long time?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Well,” Gu Fei smiled, “I… it’s not that fun to go eat with other people.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, put the sweet potato back in the bag, and then hugged him,
“Cheng Ge, look at how amazing I am.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng was taken aback.
“I will work hard,” Gu Fei said, “To eat big pork belly with you for the rest of our lives.”

Raw chapter 134: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24oq#:~:text=%E9%80%99%E6%A2%9D%E9%80%9A-
,%E5%BE%80,-%E8%B6%85%E5%B8%82%E7%9A%84
1. “Catties” refers to a unit of weight in some East Asian countries, including China. One
catty is approximately equal to 500 grams.
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September 10, 2023
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Saye Ch. 135
This barbeque restaurant, situated between the school and his tutoring sessions, always
catches Jiang Cheng’s eye when he passes by. After observing for a semester, he finds that
the variety of grilled meats here is comprehensive, and the meat is fresh. The only
drawback is the high prices.
However, despite the steep prices, coupled with his less-than-bright mood, he has never
mustered the determination to enjoy a hearty meal here.
Today’s prices are still intimidating, but he feels he can overlook that.
“I’ll check if there are any coupons,” Jiang Cheng took out his phone. “They had a group
purchase last month; I wonder if there’s still one now.”
“Let me do it,” Gu Fei intercepted him, taking out his phone. “I’ve struck it rich.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng smiled, “How much did you make?”
“Quite a lot,” Gu Fei said, “Didn’t I tell you before that I took a series of photos at the steel
factory?”
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“An editor really liked it and used several shots. Now they are planning a new theme where
several people capture the same subject from different
perspectives,” Gu Fei explained as he navigated on his phone. “I have one segment.”
“Isn’t that impressive?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Quite impressive,” Gu Fei said. “I’ve even raised my rates for commercial photography
jobs.”
Jiang Cheng smiled but didn’t say anything.
It had been a long time since Jiang Cheng had enjoyed barbecue so much.
They stuck to their old routine: Jiang Cheng handled bringing back the meat, while Gu Fei
took care of grilling it.
“This one is burnt,” Jiang Cheng picked out a piece of meat, “Your skills have declined.”
“Didn’t I often burn it before?”
Jiang Cheng lowered his head and took a bite of the meat.
Yes, he used to burn them frequently, because Gu Fei was not very focused when grilling,
his gaze was always following Jiang Cheng around.
“I’ve noticed,” Gu Fei slowly wrapped the meat in lettuce leaves, “the meat here is delicious.
You get what you pay for.”
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng was eating too quickly, nodding vaguely and saying,
“Yeah.”
“Eat a little more,” Gu Fei handed him the meat, “you’ve been thin since before the New
Year, and you still haven’t gained any weight.”
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng smiled.
Jiang Cheng’s current feelings were complicated.
He hadn’t felt this peaceful and warm feeling while slowly eating a large plate of meat that
Gu Fei had grilled for him in a long time.
It was the opposite of that feeling he had experienced in the past month, which would hurt
his heart with every thought.
Now, Gu Fei was right in front of him, and they had returned to their previous days, but he
still felt a bit… awkward, like the nervousness and constraint of the early stages of a
relationship.
Perhaps it had been too long, and during this extended period of time, he hadn’t talked to
Gu Fei properly, hadn’t relaxed and talked about things around him with him. Besides Gu
Miao, they hadn’t had any other topics for a long time.
Like a sponge that had been pressed down, it would leave marks after being released, and it
would take a long time to slowly return to its original state.
Easing the tension between them, Gu Fei spoke up. They wanted to fully return to the
atmosphere of the past but still needed time.
The barbecue was delicious, and Jiang Cheng felt like he couldn’t even take another step
when he walked out of the barbecue restaurant.
“I won’t take the car,” he held his stomach, “let’s walk back. I feel like if I take the car now,
I’ll throw up with just one bump.”
“Mmm,” Gu Fei smiled, “it seems like you got your money’s worth.”
“I always aim to break even every time,” Jiang Cheng said, “otherwise, it feels like a waste.”
“Take this membership card,” Gu Fei took out a card from his wallet, “come over whenever
you want to eat, and bring Zhao Ke and the others along.”
“Hmm? Why do you have a membership card?” Jiang Cheng was surprised.
“Just got it,” Gu Fei said, “you can deposit some money in it and get discounts.”
“How much did you deposit?” Jiang Cheng asked him.
“One thousand,” Gu Fei said.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng looked at the card in his hand, and turned to walk back,
“let’s go back and return it first.”
“Cheng Ge, Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei quickly pulled him, “I have to deposit at least five hundred. I
thought after today’s meal, I wouldn’t have much left, so I deposited one thousand.”
“That’s too expensive,” Jiang Cheng said.
“It won’t be like that all the time,” Gu Fei pulled him forward, “You don’t have any other
hobbies besides splurging on food…”
“Who said that?” Jiang Cheng looked at him and sighed after a while, “I can’t even refute
that.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, he reached out and hugged Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
Walking back from the barbecue restaurant, the distance was not short, but it didn’t feel
like they had walked for a long time, and they arrived at the hotel where Gu Fei was
staying.
Standing at the hotel entrance, the atmosphere reached its peak of awkwardness
– that peculiar tension after a breakup and makeup even though it wasn’t due to
relationship issues.
Going inside or returning to school, it was a difficult decision for Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, and pulled his arm, “Cheng Ge.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng responded.
“Is it okay if you don’t go back to the dorm tonight?” Gu Fei said, “I’m leaving early
tomorrow morning, so stay with me for a while.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at him and said, “Okay.”
Gu Fei’s request surprised him. Based on his understanding of Gu Fei, he wouldn’t usually
make such a request in this situation. If Jiang Cheng was willing to stay, he would stay, but
if Jiang Cheng wanted to go back to the dorm, Gu Fei wouldn’t say much.
But Gu Fei spoke up and asked him not to go back to the dorm.
From entering the elevator to opening the door to the house, Jiang Cheng followed Gu Fei
closely, observing him.
“The back of my head is on fire,” Gu Fei took off his coat and turned to look at him, “What’s
wrong?”
Jiang Cheng felt quite surprised. “You can feel it?”
“I didn’t feel it,” Gu Fei said, “I saw it when I turned around.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng was a little stunned but then laughed, “Did you turn around?”
“I did, and,” Gu Fei gestured with his hand next to his head, “I saw it from my peripheral
vision.”
Your peripheral vision angle seems to be quite wide,” Jiang Cheng suddenly remembered
their time in high school when he could see Gu Fei standing in the corridor even when he
was reading with his head on the desk, “You can compete with me.”
“Really?” Gu Fei laughed.
“In the past…” Jiang Cheng gestured, thinking it sounded a bit silly, “Didn’t I ever tell you?”
“About what?” Gu Fei walked up to him.
“When you’d be standing in the corridor, and I was sitting in the classroom.
Even without turning my head, I could see you clear as day,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything and stared at him for a while, then leaned over and kissed him
on the forehead.
When Gu Fei’s lips touched his, it was a familiar feeling – soft and slightly moist. The
delicate warmth that spread through his heart, like fine hair, made
him close his eyes.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei’s lips moved down to his nose and lightly tapped it.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng responded.
“Nothing,” Gu Fei said, “I just wanted to call you. It’s been a while.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng said, “then let’s review it so you don’t forget how to call me in the future.”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei called him again, and his lips continued to move down, landing on Jiang
Cheng’s lips.
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng responded.
Within his range of perception, Gu Fei’s breath was all around him. It was a unique scent
that he could recognize in an instant.
Jiang Cheng lightly rubbed his lips.
Gu Fei hugged him and buried his head in his shoulder, taking a deep breath.
“Did you change your body wash?” Gu Fei asked softly.
“Damn, you’re like a dog,” Jiang Cheng said, “Yes, I changed it. Zhao Ke grabbed two big
bottles on a buy-one-get-one deal and forced me to buy one. I told him I already had some,
but when he went to take a shower, he used up all of mine and then sold me his.”
Gu Fei laughed for a while with his head buried in Jiang Cheng’s shoulder, then raised his
arm and pointed to the side. “Get back at him.”
“Don’t copy me,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
“If I really wanted to copy you,” Gu Fei hugged him again, his fingers picking at his clothes
and slowly slipping inside, gently tracing along his back, “I’d definitely copy you especially
well.”
Jiang Cheng smiled and didn’t say anything, lowering his head and rubbing against Gu Fei’s
shoulder.
There wasn’t any strong desire to have a wild night, perhaps it was that subtle feeling that
hadn’t completely dissipated yet, or maybe it was because he knew that in Gu Fei’s bag,
there was only a pair of underwear, a wallet, and a flask, and the hotel didn’t provide any
items for a wild night…
No, actually, it’s because at this moment, Jiang Cheng just wants to be like this, to touch and
be close earnestly, to smell carefully, and to feel with his eyes
closed.
He hadn’t had such intimate contact for too long, as if he wanted to use this touch to pick
out every fragment of memory from his mind.
Gu Fei followed the curve of his neck, slowly from the neck to the earlobe, and finally
landing on his lips.
His wet tongue slid between his lips from left to right, and then slowly turned back, finally
lightly probing between his teeth.
Jiang Cheng didn’t meet him, but bit his tongue lightly, and Gu Fei didn’t dodge, just making
a soft “mm” sound.
This kind of breathy sound brushing past his ear, stirred up some emotions in him.
Jiang Cheng’s hand reached into Gu Fei’s clothes.
When his palm touched Gu Fei’s warm skin, he couldn’t help but move forward, circling his
tongue around Gu Fei’s tongue.
It felt like forever since he had last touched Gu Fei, as if a lifetime had passed without their
contact.
His palm still held the memory of Gu Fei’s body, every inch, every line, still so familiar.
The firm back, the waist without any excess fat, when he touched it, pressed it, pinched it,
all the sensations were like a conditioned reflex, causing a familiar excitement to surge up
in the moment of touch.
Gu Fei hugged him and turned around, pushing him back.
Behind him was the bed, and Jiang Cheng felt that the scene of the two of them falling onto
the bed probably wasn’t very beautiful because he hit the edge of the bed and fell back,
unwilling to let go of Gu Fei, so Gu Fei was slammed onto the bed with him.
He knocked his tooth against his chin twice.
“Hey,” Gu Fei propped up his arm and gently rubbed his chin, “Does it hurt?”
“Is your tooth okay?” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
Gu Fei quickly lowered his head and bit down on his chin.
“Ah…” Jiang Cheng tilted his head back.
Gu Fei’s breath suddenly stopped, then became somewhat heavy.
“How dare you fucking bite…” Jiang Cheng hadn’t finished speaking yet, and Gu Fei’s hand
reached down into his pants. He immediately tightened his breath and said with difficulty,
“Me?”
“How often do you bite me?” Gu Fei kissed him.
The gasping in the room slowly subsided, and Jiang Cheng could begin to hear the sound of
traffic outside the window.
This feeling was somewhat unfamiliar. In the past, in the rented room, after this kind of
thing, he should have heard only silence, occasionally a passing car, and occasionally a
child’s cry.
He quickly turned his head and looked at Gu Fei, who was lying next to him.
This handsome, familiar face made the uneasiness in his heart immediately fall back.
He turned over and lay on his side, watching Gu Fei.
The scenes from TV dramas and movies still hadn’t appeared. They hadn’t even taken off
their clothes, just unzipped their pants. It might have been disappointing for a broader
audience, but he felt quite content.
He used his finger to press on Gu Fei’s nose, and traced circles on the teeth marks on his
collarbone.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei opened his eyes.
“Did you only bring one underwear?” Cheng Ge asked.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei glanced down, “Did you… get any on your pants?”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng responded.
“You can wear mine later,” Gu Fei said.
“What about you?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’ll go commando,” Gu Fei said.
“Scratchy,” Cheng Ge said.
“…I’m wearing long johns,” Gu Fei said helplessly.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng laughed, “actually, I can just go back to the dormitory commando
tomorrow. It’s only a few minutes’ walk.”
“Wear mine,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng looked at him and smiled after a while: “Okay.”
Although they were so full after dinner that they could barely walk, they still masturbated
when they got back to the room, Jiang Cheng couldn’t resist the temptation and had a snack.
Surprisingly, after taking a shower, he felt hungry again.
“This doesn’t look good,” Jiang Cheng touched his stomach and stood in front of Gu Fei, “Am
I going to gain weight?”
“You should have gained weight,” Gu Fei pinched his waist and then his leg,
“You’ve really…lost so much weight.”
“It’s not too bad. I don’t feel it myself,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, hugged him, and pressed his face against his stomach.
“What’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“It’s a bit…heartbreaking,” Gu Fei said.
“A bit?” Cheng Ge said.
“Very heartbreaking,” Gu Fei said.
“Too late,” Cheng Ge said.
“Hey,” Gu Fei buried his head in his stomach and rubbed it hard twice, “I was afraid to
sound too cheesy by saying ‘very heartbreaking.’”
“I’m not afraid of cheesiness,” Jiang Cheng said, “I just need some Sichuan peppercorns
now.”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said in a muffled voice, “I really feel heartbroken. Every time I think of
you, I feel heartbroken, especially because all of this is because of me, it’s even harder to
bear.”
“It’s alright,” Jiang Cheng patted his head. “Don’t feel guilty. I’m the kind of person who
holds grudges. I’ll remember these things for a lifetime.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei smiled. “Remember them for a lifetime, please.”
That night, Jiang Cheng didn’t return to the dormitory, and his roommates didn’t message
to ask. It was probably Zhao Ke who helped cover for him. He planned to go back tomorrow
and treat Zhao Ke to some barbecue.
“Do you want to change the channel?” Gu Fei asked, holding the remote control.
“Whatever, I’m not really watching,” Jiang Cheng said.
The television was just background noise. It didn’t matter which channel it was on or what
was playing.
When they were living together in a rented room, they would always do this –
watch TV and chat.
Now… they weren’t chatting like they used to. Maybe it had been too long since they talked,
or maybe there were too many emotions in their hearts right now.
Anyway, they were just sitting in silence.
But it was okay.
Jiang Cheng didn’t have anything to say. He just wanted to stay like this – being able to
touch, see, and smell the person next to him with his eyes closed was enough.
Some small scars needed time to heal.
“How’s Er Miao doing lately?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Not bad. Last time we went to do the brain scan, he threw a tantrum and refused to go in
for the check-up. He was even criticized by other patients,” Gu Fei laughed. “But everything
else is fine.”
“Take it slow. We didn’t know what to do before, but now we have direction. As long as we
persevere, we’ll make progress,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Mmm,” Gu Fei turned over and hugged him, “Cheng Ge.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng turned his head slightly.
“I always thought you were very innocent, especially innocent, and I particularly liked
that,” Gu Fei gently traced his chin. “I feel like I’m too experienced, I’ve never been innocent
like you.”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng said, “I’m just a naive little cutie.”
Gu Fei laughed for a while, then cleared his throat before continuing, “Actually, your kind of
innocence isn’t childish.”
“Is that so?” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “I do think I’m quite mature.”
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t say anything else.
Jiang Cheng’s innocence was due to his inner strength, he wasn’t easily defeated, which
allowed him to remain innocent.
Gu Fei felt like he didn’t have that kind of innocence.
He had never assumed what it would be like if Jiang Cheng had the same
experiences as him; he only knew that in the end, it was Jiang Cheng’s unique, powerful,
and stubborn innocence that woke him up.
And ultimately, taking that step forward was much simpler and purer than he had
anticipated.
Because a Jiang Cheng like this one, once missed, would never come back.
He couldn’t remember if he had ever been afraid of losing something before, but he was
now, he was scared of losing Jiang Cheng, scared of losing the beautiful things he had only
just begun to see when he was with Jiang Cheng.
He tightened his arms around him.
Things between them could never go back to the way they were, but he still had time, he
could start a new life with Jiang Cheng in a different way.
Different from the beginning, but still the same life.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t fall asleep that night. He felt like he should have been able to sleep
soundly, but he had made a miscalculation.
When dawn broke, he had to take Gu Fei to the train station. He had always thought he had
adapted to this kind of separation, but only when Gu Fei was truly by his side did he realize
that he probably would never be able to fully adapt.
“What time is the train?” He asked as it was getting light outside.
“I refuse to answer,” Gu Fei was behind him, his nose pressing against his back as he spoke
in a muffled voice, “You’ve asked at least eight times already.”
“Have I asked that many times?” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “It seems like I need to
improve my conversation skills when I have nothing else to say.”
“Do you have nothing to say to me?” Gu Fei still sounded muffled.
“Not really,” Jiang Cheng said, “Every time I think about how you told me to forget about
you last year, I just want to make you kneel in the bathroom.”
“I was wrong,” Gu Fei pressed closer to him.
“I’ve told you eight hundred times,” Jiang Cheng said, “I’ll have to think of some kind of
punishment that actually works in the future.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
“By the way,” Jiang Cheng was silent for a while before turning over to face him, “After I
return to school tomorrow, I’ll send you a list of books.”
“What list of books?” Gu Fei asked.
“Qi Qi’s girlfriend is in the Chinese department at NTNU,” Jiang Cheng said, “I asked her for
the syllabus and the books recommended by the teachers. You said your school isn’t formal,
right? Take a look at her books.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
“If you have time,” Jiang Cheng added, “I’ll give you the English materials as well. You
should pass the Level 4 exam this semester, right?”
“When I have time,” Gu Fei smiled. “Really.”
“I just think since you’re already studying in this major, don’t waste your time, and learn
everything you need to learn,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Okay,” Gu Fei looked at him. “You’re particularly… cute at times like this.”
“I think so too,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Who is Qi Qi?” Gu Fei asked. “Is his last name Qi?”
“Zhang Qi Qi,” Jiang Cheng said. “He sleeps across from Zhao Ke.”
“Zhao Ke, Lu Shi,” Gu Fei said. “Why do you call him Qi Qi when you get to his name?”
Jiang Cheng looked at him but didn’t say anything. After a while, he laughed and turned
over, laughing at the ceiling.
“What are you laughing at?” Gu Fei said.
“It’s just that,” Jiang Cheng still laughed. “Don’t you have any experience being jealous?
You’re so serious, as if I owe you 800 dollars.”
“Really?” Gu Fei paused. “Is there any other mode of jealousy?”
“Maybe it’s just the Gu Fei mode,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “You’re so stiff.”
“I haven’t finished yet,” Gu Fei said.
“Then keep going, I’m listening,” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“That confession wall at your school,” Gu Fei said. “Do you usually check it out?”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t hold back and laughed again.
“Can you be serious?” Gu Fei sighed. “I’m jealous here.”
“I don’t check it out often, what’s wrong?” Jiang Cheng asked while still laughing.”
“Those people, do they just shout on the confession wall, or do they actually find you and
confess in person?” Gu Fei asked.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng rubbed his face, then put on a serious expression and turned to look at Gu
Fei. “You found them, huh? I’ve received handwritten love letters before, and I’ve had face-
to-face confessions…”
“From guys…?” Gu Fei asked.
Jiang Cheng stared at him for a moment. “You actually believe that?”
“I do,” Gu Fei looked at him, “You’re really great.”
“Just teasing you, no, I haven’t,” Jiang Cheng said, “My routine is basically just classroom,
cafeteria, dorm, library. With that schedule, everyone knows I don’t have time for
confessions. No one has ever approached me. You can relax.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei said, with a sense of relief in his voice.
Jiang Cheng smiled and closed his eyes.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said. “Do you still stand by what you said before?”
“Which one?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“The one where you said, ‘If you say forget it, don’t let me come and go as I please, stay a
little longer, this word…’” Gu Fei said, “Is it still valid?”
“It’s valid,” Jiang Cheng said.

Raw chapter 135: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24or
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September 11, 2023
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Saye Ch. 136
Jiang Cheng felt it was good to leave without bringing any luggage, as there was nothing to
pack and he wouldn’t feel the atmosphere of separation in the process.
Gu Fei went to the front desk and got a bag, put the flask in it and there wasn’t much else to
pack.
“Where’s my underwear?” Jiang Cheng went to the bathroom and looked
around. He couldn’t find the pair he washed and hung up yesterday.
“In my bag,” Gu Fei said, “It’s already dry.”
“Put it with the flask,” Jiang Cheng said, “Don’t forget to take it later.”
“Just a pair of old underwear,” Gu Fei looked at him.
Jiang Cheng also looked at Gu Fei, “It’s not old.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, just clicked his tongue.
“If you have something to say, say it,” Jiang Cheng also clicked his tongue.
“You’re wearing mine,” Gu Fei said.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng lowered his head and pulled his pants waist to take a look,
“You only have this pair of underwear, so I took them?”
“Hmm,” Gu Fei nodded.
“In the future, don’t just casually recharge someone’s card for extravagant spending with a
thousand bucks,” Jiang Cheng said with a sorrowful expression.
“At least buy some underwear first.”
“How do you still remember that thousand yuan?” Gu Fei laughed.
“A thousand bucks, like this thick,” Jiang Cheng showed the distance between his thumb
and index finger. “It should be this much.”
Gu Fei sighed and pinched their fingers together. “This thick, yours would be ten thousand.
I never realized your estimation skills were like this.”
“That just means I treat money like… well, you know,” Jiang Cheng said. “Let’s go, is there
anything left behind?”
Gu Fei looked at him, but didn’t say anything.
Jiang Cheng quickly pointed at him, “Don’t be cheesy.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
This was the second time he had escorted Gu Fei to the station.
Perhaps because this sudden departure caught Jiang Cheng off guard, he had not come to
his senses.
It was only when he was standing on the subway that he suddenly realized that Gu Fei was
about to leave.
He had only arrived yesterday afternoon and was leaving this morning.
The sudden surge of reluctance made him unable to bear it for a moment, staring blankly at
the reflection of himself and Gu Fei on the window.
“I’ll come see you on May Day,” Gu Fei said. “Maybe I can bring Er Miao out then.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him. This sentence still made him feel at ease. “But
can Er Miao make such great progress so quickly?”
“Maybe,” Gu Fei smiled. “Xu Xingzhi said I gave Er Miao a lot of negative hints. Maybe if I
stop…doing that, she’ll feel it too.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng nodded, feeling a hidden excitement, anticipation. Hope is the most
comforting thing, especially when two people can focus on it together.
When they got off the subway and walked towards the station, there were many people
coming and going with luggage around them. Jiang Cheng sighed softly.
Although there were still subtle feelings between him and Gu Fei, the urge to board the
train together at the moment of separation remained strong.
Just like before.
Gu Fei reached out and grabbed his hand, then put it in his pocket.
“Do you know how to get out of here when you leave later?” Gu Fei asked.
“I do,” Jiang Cheng said. “I won’t get lost.”
“Do you know where to pick up someone if you were coming to the station?” Gu Fei glanced
at him.
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “I can find a spot to wait, and you can come to find me.”
“That works,” Gu Fei nodded, squeezing Jiang Cheng’s palm.
Both of their hands were tucked in their pockets and they began to feel warm after a short
while. Their palms were also starting to sweat, but neither of them intended to take their
hands out.
As they approached the station, Jiang Cheng became increasingly flustered and restless. His
fingertips unconsciously dug into Gu Fei’s palm. He would stop when he noticed his own
action, but then start again after a few seconds.
Once they arrived at the station, they got off and Gu Fei took his hand out of his pocket to
look at his palm.
“Holy shit,” Jiang Cheng glanced at it and noticed two particularly red marks on his palm.
“Did I cause that?”
“Yeah, another two minutes and it would probably break the skin,” Gu Fei chuckled.
“I can’t control it, it’s like how some people shake their legs when they’re nervous,” Jiang
Cheng pulled his hand over and rubbed it in his palm before blowing on it.
Both of them fell silent, unlike before when they would make small talk to pass the time
while waiting at the station. Today, they were both quiet.
Even though they both felt like they had a lot to say, they didn’t want to say anything at all.
They just stood there, staring.
As usual, they waited until the announcement to remind passengers to board the train
before Gu Fei said, “I’m going in.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei took off his bag and pulled out a small flask. “Your roommates won’t say anything
about this, right?”
“They won’t say anything normally. Only Zhao Ke knows about my business,”
Jiang Cheng said. “But who knows if that’ll change once we get back today.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei was surprised.
“After all, yesterday I had a passionate embrace with an unknown handsome guy who was
not from my school in front of the supermarket,” Jiang Cheng said,
“They must have guessed it.”
“Then…” Gu Fei frowned.
“It’s okay,” Jiang Cheng took the bag with the flask, “No one will say anything.
I’m not smuggling fruit1. You go inside.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei hugged him and tightened his arms, “Then I’ll go in.”
Jiang Cheng nodded.
Gu Fei let go of his arms, turned around, and walked quickly towards the entrance of the
station.
Jiang Cheng suddenly remembered that he forgot to tell him not to look back, but then he
thought maybe he should have told him to look back.
While he was still pondering whether he wanted Gu Fei to look back or not, Gu Fei turned
his head and looked back at him.
He waved his arms at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei turned around and continued walking forward, but then he turned his head twice.
Jiang Cheng waved his arms again.
Gu Fei turned around and continued walking forward, but on the third time, he didn’t turn
his head.
“What the hell,” Jiang Cheng waved his arms again, “Is he messing with me?”
This time, Gu Fei didn’t turn around and continued walking backward until he reached the
corner, then he smiled and waved goodbye to Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng waved his arms and said, “Get out of here.”
After Gu Fei disappeared around the corner, Jiang Cheng turned around and left the station.
This time, he successfully walked out of the station without any trouble.
On his way back to school, he received a message from Gu Fei.
– Driving now.
– Okay, I’m almost at school.
– Then I’ll take a nap, you should catch up on some sleep when you get back to school too.
– Okay
Returning to school couldn’t make up for his lack of sleep. When Jiang Cheng entered the
dormitory carrying the flask, he was surprised to find all three roommates sitting in front
of their computers. As he pushed the door open, all three of them simultaneously turned
their heads.
“Money,” Zhao Ke pushed his chair back and reached out his hand to both Lu Shi and Zhang
Qiqi.
Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi each took out twenty yuan and put them into his hand.
“What’s going on?” Jiang Cheng asked as he looked at them.
“I said you would be back before noon,” Zhao Ke said, “but they said you wouldn’t be back
until tomorrow afternoon.”
“You guys are hilarious,” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“Here,” Zhao Ke took twenty yuan and put it on his desk, “half for each of us.”
“Thanks,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Ke, how did you know?” Lu Shi looked at Zhao Ke.
“Because he didn’t change his clothes,” Zhao Ke said, “he’s usually very particular, and he
wouldn’t be able to stand not changing his underwear for two nights.”
“You really…” Jiang Cheng looked at him. “Understand me.”
“Kinda,” Zhao Ke said.
“Then can’t I go buy a new one?” Jiang Cheng said.
“You just bought four last month,” Zhao Ke said, “based on how stingy you usually are, you
probably won’t spend another ten yuan on a new one, it’s more cost-effective to just come
back and get it.”
“Get lost,” Jiang Cheng laughed for a while, “do I really seem that stingy?”
“Yes,” Zhao Ke nodded.
“Come on, there are times when I’m not stingy,” Jiang Cheng took out his phone and glanced
at the time, “I’ll treat you guys to barbecue.”
Although he felt a little reluctant, he still intended to follow Gu Fei’s arrangement and invite
his classmates to eat barbecue. After all, they had been living together in the same
dormitory for such a long time, and there was no conflict between them. They also took
good care of each other, which was quite rare.
“Didn’t you come back to get your underwear?” Zhang Qiqi asked.
“Do you want to eat barbecue?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Yes,” Zhang Qiqi stood up immediately.
The two stations formed a distinct contrast every time.
From bustling to desolate, the temperature suddenly dropped. Gu Fei pulled his collar and
turned to look at the station when he walked out.
In fact, he didn’t come to the station that often. In the more than ten years before Jiang
Cheng appeared, he had no one to pick up and drop off, and no place to go.
He chose to take the bus for a few short trips. This was the first time he had looked at the
station so carefully.
According to the local news, the station had been renovated twice in the past few decades,
once to add a waiting area and once to expand the front square.
Other than that, the station had always been the same.
He stood in the middle of the square, staring at the train station that could be seen in its
entirety with just a glance.
There were some emotions stirring in his heart, emotions that he had never experienced
before.
“Need a ride, buddy?” A head poked out from the car parked beside him and asked.
Gu Fei shook his head.
“It’s not convenient to take the bus to where we’re going. Taking a taxi is much better,” the
head said. “I won’t take a detour, don’t worry.”
“The bus stops on my street,” Gu Fei said.
“You’re a local?” The head was taken aback by his words, then clicked his tongue. “Doesn’t
look like it… How many years has it been since you last came
back? Staring at this rundown station for so long.”
“Ah,” Gu Fei responded and didn’t say anything else before turning and leaving.
The bus could indeed reach the street next to his family’s store without needing to turn
around midway.
When Gu Fei jumped off the bus, he saw Gu Miao standing on the side of the road on a
skateboard. It was probably Li Yan who came over, and Gu Miao’s hair seemed to have been
cut short.
However, Gu Miao’s situation was different from usual today. She wasn’t alone; she was
standing with a little girl, who was saying something to her.
As Gu Fei approached, neither of the two girls noticed him.
“It’s so big,” the little girl said excitedly. “Have you seen it? The biggest hot air balloon can
carry up to a hundred people and stand in a big basket!”
Gu Miao’s expression remained blank, and her enthusiasm didn’t seem to affect her. She
didn’t even need to respond to the little girl and continued on her own, saying, “Then a little
fire… like lighting a firecracker, Bang! The hot air balloon is lit up and flies away, it’s so
fast!”
“That’s amazing,” Gu Fei said beside her.
“Yes!” The little girl turned her head to look at him. “You haven’t seen it, have you?”
“No,” Gu Fei said.
When Gu Miao turned her head and saw him, she immediately rushed over on her
skateboard and then pulled him back.
“Say goodbye to this little sister, we’re going home,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao seemed a little excited to see him and continued to pull him forward on the
skateboard without responding to his request.
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei pulled her over, grabbing her shoulder. “You have to say goodbye to this
little sister before we leave.”
Gu Miao looked at him, and after a while, turned her head to look at the little girl and waved
to her.
“Goodbye!” The little girl also waved and bounced away.
“Whose child is she?” Gu Fei followed Gu Miao back and asked.
Gu Miao pointed to the shop across the street.
“The one in the opposite shop?” Gu Fei looked back. The street was lined with small shops,
where cats, dogs, and children roamed freely.
“Candy,” Gu Miao said.
“Candy?” Gu Fei reached into his pocket, ” Cheng Ge didn’t bring any candy today. Let’s go
back to the shop and have some later.”
“Candy!” Gu Miao looked at him, seeming a little impatient.
“What candy?” Gu Fei immediately realized that Gu Miao was talking about the little girl,
probably surnamed Tang, but instead of answering immediately, he continued to ask. Gu
Miao needed to constantly reinforce his ability to express himself.
“Candy!” Gu Miao said loudly.
The volume surprised Gu Fei, but he still asked, “Which candy?”
Gu Miao’s face turned red with frustration, and finally pointed to where he had just talked
to the little girl, “Candy!”
“Her name?” Gu Fei responded to her.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Brother knows now,” Gu Fei also nodded, “Next time say it like this, so everyone can
understand.”
Gu Miao ignored him and rode her skateboard out.
Li Yan was in the shop. Although Liu Li was the current owner of the shop, Li Yan still sat
behind the cash register every time he came, just like before.
“Did you go see Jiang Cheng?” Li Yan immediately asked him as he walked in.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded and took a chair next to him.
“You went yesterday and came back today?” Li Yan asked again.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei responded, “I have work in the afternoon.”
“You can push the work back, it’s not easy to go all the way there and just stay for one
night,” Li Yan said in a low voice.
“I can’t push it back,” Gu Fei said.
“Why?” Li Yan was surprised, “Damn, did you guys have another fight?”
“No,” Gu Fei looked at him, “Do you have something else to say?”
“No,” Li Yan said, “I don’t have anything else to say, you guys deal with your own issues, I
was just asking.”
“Even if we fought, Xu Xingzhi will still continue to treat Er Miao,” Gu Fei said.
“…Damn,” Li Yan bounced in his chair. “I’ve realized you can be really annoying. Did I give
you that impression?”
“How would I know if you do or not,” Gu Fei said.
“I hadn’t really thought about it,” Li Yan clicked his tongue, thought for a moment, and
leaned in closer to him, whispering, “We’re not on the same page.
Intimacy is fine, but let’s not talk about anything else, too far-fetched.”
Gu Fei glanced at him.
“It’s the truth,” Li Yan said.
When Jiang Cheng’s message came through, Gu Fei and Li Yan were planning to take Gu
Miao to Wang Xu’s house to eat pastries.
“The book list has been sent to your email, check if you can borrow them. I’ve already
copied the English materials and will send them to you today. The ones I don’t have, I’ve
listed in the book list, go check and borrow them if you can.”
“Okay.”
Jiang Cheng was always so proactive, once he said something, he would act immediately,
not even a second was wasted.
“Do you know where the city library is?” Gu Fei turned to ask Li Yan.
“What library?” Li Yan looked at him.
“The city library,” Gu Fei repeated.
“Library?” Li Yan repeated, “Damn, the library? You’re asking me? I almost didn’t realize
what a library is.”
“Can you be a little more serious? You’ve at least been to school,” Gu Fei said,
“And you even did better than me.”
“Let me think,” Li Yan sighed, “Now that you mention it, I do have some recollection. It was
probably in the municipal government, in the Xincheng District.”
“That’s so far,” Gu Fei said.
“Why?” Li Yan asked.
“I… want to borrow some books, I don’t know if I can find them,” Gu Fei said,
“I’ll just take a look first, and if I can’t borrow them, I’ll buy them.”
“What books? Photography books?” Li Yan asked, still looking a bit surprised.
“No, it’s not that,” Gu Fei suddenly felt a bit embarrassed. After hesitating for a while, he
continued, “It’s a reading list that Jiang Cheng gave me. It’s for a friend from the Chinese
department at Teacher’s University who’s coming over.
It includes books related to their field and… his English materials. He wants me to pass the
English Proficiency Test Level 4 this semester.”
Li Yan half-opened his mouth and looked at him, but didn’t say anything.
“You’re making me feel a bit awkward like this,” Gu Fei reached out and lifted his chin,
closing his mouth for him.
“Fuck,” Li Yan finally spoke after a long time, then stared ahead without saying anything.
It wasn’t until they were almost at Wang Er’s Baozi that Li Yan turned his head to look at Gu
Fei and said, “Big Fly.”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei glanced at him.
Li Yan had a strange expression on his face, one that Gu Fei had never seen before, and he
couldn’t quite tell what emotion it was portraying.
“I’m a little excited,” Li Yan said. “I can’t explain it…”
“Ah.” Gu Fei responded, Li Yan rarely spoke like this, and he didn’t know how to proceed.
“It’s… good,” Li Yan nodded. “Really good.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, he just patted his shoulder.
“Do you know this feeling?” Li Yan sighed, looking down. “I always felt like we, this group of
people, just grew up here, no matter what our childhood dreams were… when I was in
elementary school, my dream was to become a pilot, but in the end, none of us have any
dreams anymore. We just live our lives, working wherever, opening a store… and those
who soar high are always so far away from us.”
Gu Fei looked at him.
“Do you understand what I mean?” Li Yan looked at him.
“I haven’t soared yet,” Gu Fei said.
“Just that meaning, don’t you have to take off and flap your wings a bit before you can fly?”
Li Yan said. “We’ve known each other for so long, for years, and I’ve never seen you like
this. It just suddenly made me a little excited.”
“Hmm.” Gu Fei responded.
“At least your name isn’t in vain,” Li Yan said.
Li Yan had known him for a long time, and even though they hardly ever talked about their
feelings, Li Yan knew about his life and family situation.
Gu Fei didn’t feel much at first, he just wanted to catch up with Jiang Cheng and learn
something useful from studying. It didn’t necessarily have to result in any specific change,
but when people move forward, they don’t always count one, two, three, but every step
counts towards progress.
But now, after Li Yan’s words, he suddenly felt a little emotional.
After returning home at night, Gu Fei sorted out the book list and the courses taught in the
Chinese department that Jiang Cheng had given him, and wrote them down on his phone.
He planned to go to the library tomorrow to see if he could borrow the books.
He put down his phone and picked up his camera, preparing to process the photos he had
taken in the afternoon.
Sitting in front of the computer, he looked at a small frame beside him. Inside was a piece of
torn paper with the incredibly ugly handwriting of classmate Jiang Cheng.
Underneath the torn paper was a neat little note with Gu Fei’s handwriting, which looked
like that of a calligraphy master compared to Jiang Cheng’s.
The handwriting translated the ugly words above so that they could be easily read every
time he needed inspiration.
“Brother is going to the library,” Gu Fei said,.
“The library is far away, a place you haven’t been to.”
Gu Miao held the cat, looked up at him, and listened to him seriously.
“If you want to go, I’ll take you there,” Gu Fei said. “But it’s much farther than the hospital,
you know?”
Gu Miao stared at him for a while before nodding.
“Do you want to go?” Gu Fei asked, then thought for a moment before adding,
“There’s a fountain there, the kind you’ve seen on TV, and statues. Do you know
what statues are?”
Gu Fei picked up a photography magazine from the side and flipped through it, pointing at
a bronze sculpture. “This is it.”
Gu Miao lowered her head to look at the photo.
“Do you want to go see it?” Gu Fei asked again.
There were too many things that Gu Miao had never seen before, and Xu Xingzhi had told
him that this was a good way to use Gu Miao’s curiosity.
Gu Miao took a while before nodding.
“Okay,” Gu Fei said, “If you’re not happy after we go, you can’t scream. You have to tell me.”
Gu Miao nodded.
“Go change into your pajamas,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao ran into the bedroom with the cat in her arms.
“Is it possible?” Mom came out of her own room, looking a bit worried. “The city hall is
really far away, I’ve never been there.”
“Let’s try,” Gu Fei said, “We’re not forcing her now, we just want her to tell me if she’s not
happy.”
Because the journey was a bit far, Gu Fei was afraid that Gu Miao would still scream
uncontrollably on the way, so he didn’t take a taxi or public
transportation, but instead drove a small car.
Xu Xingzhi had said that during this process, he should talk to Gu Miao more to distract her
attention and make her less nervous. Talking more was also a way for Gu Miao to
communicate better with others.
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei didn’t talk to Gu Miao much before, and it seemed that Gu Miao was not
interested in other people’s words. So most of their previous exchanges were basic. Now he
had to find something to talk to Gu Miao about, which was a bit difficult for him. “Do you
miss Cheng Ge?”
After saying this, Gu Fei was stunned, and he thought it was a bit funny.
He didn’t expect himself to say Jiang Cheng’s name as soon as he opened his mouth.
“Let’s cheer with Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said, “We can always be with him in the future, for a
long time, especially long.”
“Haha!” Gu Miao shouted from the back.

1. In the context, (“I’m not smuggling fruit”) is a humorous way for Jiang Cheng to
reassure Gu Fei that there won’t be any
problems or suspicions if he enters a certain place with the bag
containing the flask. ↩
Raw chapter 136: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-
d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24os
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September 20, 2023
Uncategorized
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Saye Ch. 137
The Awakening of Gu Fei.
Gu Fei posted a row of small red hearts on his WeChat Moments without dividing them into
groups. Within three minutes, he received over a hundred replies. Jiang Cheng joined in,
saying, “Give me one, I’ll take it.”
“Are we going to the supermarket?” Zhao Ke tapped on Jiang Cheng’s bed.
“Which supermarket?” Jiang Cheng closed his phone’s notebook and asked.
“The luxury supermarket,” Zhao Ke said. “I want to buy a thermos.”
“Well,” Jiang Cheng nodded and got off the bed. “Don’t you already have a good thermos?
Why buy another one?”
“I’m buying it for Zhang Dantong,” Zhao Ke said.
“It’s already April, why buy a thermos?” Jiang Cheng felt a little confused.
“You’re in love after all,” Zhang Qiqi sighed. “Don’t you know that cups can last a lifetime?”
“Then why don’t you just buy a bed and a quilt?” Jiang Cheng said. “The outcome is the
same.”
“Don’t force me to criticize you,” Zhao Ke looked at him.
“Let’s go,” Jiang Cheng grabbed his coat. “I’m just going to buy two towels.”
On weekends when they had nothing to do, if they went to the supermarket, they usually
went to the luxury supermarket outside the school to enjoy the slow-paced life of standing
in line for ten minutes and checking out for an hour.
While accompanying Zhao Ke to pick out a thermos for Zhang Dantong, Jiang Cheng also
casually picked up a few to look at.
“Do you want to buy one?” Zhao Ke asked.
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “I don’t even know what he uses to drink
water…”
“Most people drink from cups.” Zhao Ke reminded him.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
“Giving a gift is about the thought,” Zhao Ke said. “He might usually use a glass, but if you
give him one, he’ll use the one you gave him. What’s there to consider?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “That makes sense.”
Sending a thermos to Gu Fei for drinking water, he probably would agree.
In the end, Jiang Cheng picked two sports water bottles, one red and one blue, as red and
blue are a classic CP pairing1.
If Gu Fei comes over on May Day, they can use them when they go out to play.
Gu Fei has been very busy lately, going to class, studying, reviewing English, taking photos,
and the rest of the time he’s been cooperating with Xu Xingzhi to treat Gu Miao. Their
contact is almost the same as before, calling each other before going to sleep at night, and
sending messages when they have time.
Jiang Cheng thinks that this rhythm is good, like a stable and soothing piano piece, and they
seem to have been together for many years… Of course, this state can only be maintained
by trying not to think about “holiday.”
At the thought of the May Day holiday, Jiang Cheng turned into a lively violin.
While waiting in line at the supermarket checkout, he saw the promotion for the May Day
event and suddenly became excited. He slapped Zhao Ke’s arm and said, “Ke, there’s only
half a month left!”
“Yeah,” Zhao Ke rubbed his arm and said, “I asked you, have you thought about the group
we talked about with Qiqi the day before yesterday?”
“I’m fine with it,” Jiang Cheng said, “I still want to invite Pan Zhi. He hasn’t decided whether
to bring a girl or not. He’ll reply to me tonight.”
“Okay,” Zhao Ke said, “Does Pan Zhi have many girls to choose from?”
“Not really, he usually focuses on one at a time. The length of time is uncertain,”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Should I learn some tips from him?” Zhao Ke said. “How to pursue and please girls?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng immediately said, “You’re fine just the way you are. Don’t learn from him.
He’s just playing around. Wait until one day someone sorts him out, and you’ll see, it won’t
be like this. Don’t learn that playboy way from him.”
Zhao Ke smiled.
Zhang Qiqi had been looking forward to this group trip for half a semester, and had been
lobbying in the dormitory. Finally, a few people decided not to go home during the May Day
holiday and planned to play on the nearby grassland with their boyfriends and girlfriends
for two days. Although the time was a bit tight, everyone was very enthusiastic about the
trip.
Jiang Cheng told Gu Fei about it, and Gu Fei also wanted to go. So he started communicating
with Gu Miao half a month in advance, showing her pictures of horses, grasslands, and
some videos of others skiing. Gu Miao’s reaction was good, she was excited and curious.
Although bringing Gu Miao along might not be as enjoyable for Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei,
Jiang Cheng doesn’t mind. If Gu Miao can come out and play this time, it will be a great help
for her illness.
“I don’t think there’s a big problem,” Gu Fei called when he came out of the supermarket.
“But…”
“But what?” Jiang Cheng asked quickly.
“She’ll probably want to bring her pillow and small blanket,” Gu Fei said.
“Without these two things, she’ll definitely make a fuss. She hasn’t let them be replaced for
many years. It doesn’t matter what she uses outside, but the one that touches her body has
to be that blanket.”
“Then let her bring them,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “It’s only two days, we can
just bring our underwear. It’s not a big deal to stuff her pillow and blanket in the suitcase.”
” Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said, “what if she causes trouble…”
“It’s okay,” Jiang Cheng said, “Just look at how much she has improved compared to this
time last year. Even if she really causes trouble, it won’t be as exaggerated as before.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei responded.
“You want to go yourself, and she’s just a kid; she definitely wants to go too,”
Jiang Cheng said, “It’ll be so much fun.”
“I really want to go,” Gu Fei smiled, “I…have never been that far before.”
Jiang Cheng suddenly felt like hugging Gu Fei and giving him a good rub: “Will you bring a
camera? Take some photos, there’s a big group of people here waiting for a photographer
to take their pictures.”
“Sure, no problem,” Gu Fei said with a smile.
In the end, Pan Zhi decided not to bring anyone and attended the event alone.
“I can’t afford to keep playing flirtatious games anymore. I’m not incapable of pursuing
other girls,” Pan Zhi said, “Maybe this time I might meet someone.”
“Then you and Zhao Ke can share a room?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Sure,” Pan Zhi paused, “Are you sharing a room with Gu Fei and Gu Miao?”
“That’s the only way. We’re going so far, Gu Miao will definitely have to follow Gu Fei. It’s
not like being at home,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then you two must be very…” Pan Zhi whispered, “It’s been almost half a year since you
last did it, right? Are you going to become vegetarians and chant Buddhist scriptures next?”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng laughed, glancing at Zhao Ke, who was admiring the newly purchased
thermos, “Can you be serious?”
“Okay, how about this,” Pan Zhi thought for a moment, “I’ll take her out to play and give you
two some time to get things done.”
“Can you shut up?” Jiang Cheng said helplessly.
Pan Zhi’s words weren’t entirely wrong. He and Gu Fei hadn’t even had any physical
contact since the New Year’s Eve, let alone anything else. The last time was when Gu Fei
came to visit him for one night, which was something.
It’s been over a month now, and if he didn’t sometimes react when he heard Gu Fei’s voice,
he would think he had lost his function.
“We’re going to the grasslands, we’ll have to take a long ride, and sleep in different beds.
You can bring your pillow and a small blanket, do you understand?” Gu Fei sat face to face
with Gu Miao, speaking slowly.
Gu Miao met his gaze for only a few seconds before turning away and looking at the cat
passing by. She understood and agreed that she couldn’t bring the cat.
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei turned her face towards him, “did you hear what I said?”
Gu Miao nodded.
“What did I say?” Gu Fei asked.
Gu Miao looked at him.
Gu Fei repeated his previous words and asked again, “Did you hear me clearly?”
This time, Gu Miao didn’t look away and nodded, indicating that she heard what Gu Fei said.
“What did I say?” Gu Fei continued to ask.
“Play, car,” Gu Miao whispered, then got up and ran into her room, holding a pillow and
looking at Gu Fei.
“Well, bring your pillow and blanket,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao seemed to be in good condition and has no objections about going out.
However, just to be safe, Gu Fei had reserved a soft sleeper in advance, which had fewer
people in the compartment and would not make Gu Miao nervous.
Before leaving, Gu Fei called Xu Xingzhi several times and asked in detail about various
contingency plans if Gu Miao had any issues. Xu Xingzhi laughed at his repeated questions.
“Don’t be so nervous. Remember my words. Your nervousness will affect her.
Relax and make her feel that these are not a big deal, then she will relax too,” Xu Xingzhi
said. “When I visited her at the beginning of the month, her condition was quite good. Her
progress was relatively fast, and her emotions were stable.
If she can maintain this state, it’s already very good.”
“Well,” Gu Fei looked at the calendar, “when I get there, let’s go out for a meal.”
“I have no problem with time, it’s up to your schedule. Let’s have fun first and then decide,”
said Xu Xingzhi. “You guys haven’t had a proper gathering in six months.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei smiled.
He had not paid much attention to time before. Looking back now, six months had gone by
so quickly. Previously, he used to think that the days were long and monotonous, and he
had gotten used to not paying attention to the specific time.
But now, looking back, it all seemed like a blink of an eye.
Time, whether long or short, just follows the heart.
This trip was Gu Miao’s first time leaving the city, and her first real journey in life. Although
she was still a bit confused and didn’t really understand the meaning of traveling, she was
excited for the three days before departure. Gu Fei knew the reason for her excitement –
Cheng Ge, horses, and skiing.
Gu Fei had no experience traveling with a child for two or three days, and he felt
overwhelmed when packing.
“She needs her toiletries, her cup for drinking water, and cold and anti-inflammatory
medicine,” at this moment, Gu Fei felt for the first time the role of a mother as his own
mother was reminding him. “She needs to bring a hat and a thick coat, as it is very windy
there.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei packed as she instructed.
“Also, bring the new clothes that Liu Li bought for her, they will look nice in photos,” said
his mother.
“Okay,” Gu Fei replied.
“Do you think this clip is cute?” His mother took out a small box and opened it, revealing a
beautiful silver butterfly bow.
“It’s pretty,” Gu Fei glanced at his mother. “Is it for Er Miao?”
“Yeah,” his mother said. “Actually, I bought it for myself, but it seems too childish for me, so
I want to give it to Er Miao.”
“Tell her that she should like it,” Gu Fei said.
“I’m afraid she won’t like it,” the mother said in a low voice. “She’s been hanging out with
you since she was young, acting like a boy. Will she like hair clips?”
“Try it.” said Gu Fei.
Mom took the clip to show Gu Miao. Gu Miao was quite interested. These days, she showed
interest in everything, probably because she was always in a state of excitement.
She liked her mother’s clip. When her mother clipped it on her hair, she was not unhappy.
But after a few minutes, when she looked at it again, she had already moved the clip to the
front of her hair.
“What kind of taste do you have…who do you follow?” Gu Fei looked at her.
Jiang Cheng and Pan Zhi stood together at the exit waiting to pick them up. Gu Fei’s train
had already arrived at the station, and there were many people around now. Jiang Cheng
felt like he should hold up a sign.
“Should we get a hotel room?” Pan Zhi asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng said, “He took a soft sleeper over and already spent all the money on
getting a room. Besides, he’s with Gu Miao. Do you think there is anything else he can do?”
“If you really want to do something,” Pan Zhi thought for a moment, “I can take Gu Miao out
to play skateboarding, and you two can stay at my place…my bed is big…”
“Pan Pan,” Jiang Cheng draped his arm over his shoulder and poked his face with his thumb,
“I’m not that thirsty.”
“You’re not that thirsty,” Pan Zhi nodded, and when Jiang Cheng let go of him, he added,
“But what if Gu Fei is that thirsty?”
“Do you want to fight?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Pan Zhi didn’t say anything, he took out a tissue from his pocket and waved it over his head.
Gu Fei appeared in the crowd and walked up to them, “Pretty smart, you even know how to
wave a flag.”
“… I am waving a white flag,” Pan Zhi said.
“Oh,” Gu Fei glanced at him, then turned to Jiang Cheng and remained silent for a while
before calling out, ” Cheng Ge.”
Jiang Cheng really wanted to hug Gu Fei first, but Gu Miao, who was nervously looking
around, was still standing next to Gu Fei. He had to greet Gu Miao first.
After gently patting Gu Fei’s arm, he bent down and said, “Er Miao.”
Gu Miao turned her head.
He snapped his fingers and gave a thumbs up.
Gu Miao looked around before snapping her fingers and giving a thumbs up too.
However, perhaps due to nervousness, there was no smile on her face.
“Let’s go out first,” Gu Fei said. “There are too many people here.”
“Shall I carry her out? Can we walk faster?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Can I carry her?”
“You can carry her…but she’s quite heavy now,” Gu Fei said. “She has gained a lot of weight
since spring.”
Jiang Cheng did not speak, but bent down and carried Gu Miao on his back.
“Oh,” he muttered as he stood up. “She’s so heavy now?”
“Let’s go,” Pan Zhi took a bag from Gu Fei’s shoulder and said, “Hurry up.”
“Er Miao, Er Miao,” Jiang Cheng leaned over and called out to her ear, “You have gained so
much weight now. Cheng Ge almost couldn’t carry you, fat girl.”
Gu Miao hugged his neck.
“Fatty,” Jiang Cheng said, “you can’t be like this. You’re just gaining weight, not growing
taller…”
“Ha!” Gu Miao shouted, her voice not loud but clear enough.
“Ha!” Jiang Cheng followed her and shouted too.
Carrying their luggage and with Gu Miao on his back, they rushed out in a hectic manner,
trying to avoid the crowd. They walked a bit further before finally catching a cab.
Pan Zhi sat in the passenger seat, Gu Miao remained in the back, and Jiang Cheng sat
between Gu Fei and Gu Miao. Gu Miao fell asleep against Gu Fei
within a few minutes.
It was only at this moment that Jiang Cheng finally quieted down. His feelings of longing
and excitement for Gu Fei started to slowly awaken in his heart.
He turned his head and asked Gu Fei softly, “Did she not sleep much on the way?”
“She did sleep,” Gu Fei smiled, and his hand quietly reached over and touched Jiang Cheng’s
lower back. “She was just a little too excited.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
Gu Fei’s hand went directly into his shirt, and his palm rested on his back, making it warm
and slightly hot.
This warmth quickly spread around, and Jiang Cheng leaned back, tilting his head to look at
Gu Fei.
There were several people in the car. If they wanted to say something at this moment, no
matter how quietly they said it, they would be heard. However, at this moment, Jiang Cheng
had nothing else to say except for things that were not suitable for others to hear.
Missed me?
I missed you.
He turned his hand over and grabbed Gu Fei’s hand.
Gu Fei quickly grasped his hand tightly.
There was nothing more to say, so they just held hands like this.
Hands held tightly together, gently squeezing each other, in moments like these, it feels as
though only this kind of genuine, strong touch can calm a person down.
Because they were leaving early tomorrow morning, tonight Gu Fei and Gu Miao were both
staying in the one-bedroom apartment Pan Zhi rented.
The taxi stopped downstairs, and as soon as Pan Zhi got out of the car, he pointed to a small
path next to them and said, “Er Miao, see that? This path is smooth, there are a few slopes
ahead. Do you want to go skateboarding?”
Gu Fei glanced at Pan Zhi.
Gu Miao stood on the side of the road, holding a skateboard and looking at Pan Zhi, with no
reaction.
“Skateboarding,” Pan Zhi continued, “shall we go skateboarding?”
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei carried their luggage and paid the taxi fare. After the taxi drove
away, Pan Zhi was still persuading Gu Miao, “Want to go
skateboarding?”
“Er Miao, should we go or not?” Gu Fei said, “Tell Brother Pan Zhi.”
Gu Miao looked at Pan Zhi holding her skateboard for a long time before finally shaking her
head.
“I… ” Pan Zhi turned his head, “Damn it, am I that unattractive?”
“She’s probably a bit tired,” Jiang Cheng smiled, “Let her rest first.”
Pan Zhi is a dutiful grandson, thinking of his grandpa’s thoughts and sharing his concerns.
Even if grandpa doesn’t express them, he worries about them single-mindedly.
After letting Gu Miao lie down and fall asleep in the room, he took his wallet and went out,
“I’ll buy some vegetables at the supermarket next door. Let’s have hotpot here tonight.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng watched him leave.
“You two…rest for a while,” Pan Zhi said.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng responded. Originally, he didn’t think that “doing something”
was such an urgent matter, but Pan Zhi’s actions suddenly made his brain sprout like a seed
with 1G of information.
After Pan Zhi left, he turned around and looked at Gu Fei, suddenly not knowing whether to
express his feelings first or to do something first.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei spoke first, opening his arms, “Hug.”
It had been a long time since he had heard Gu Fei speak in such a tone. At that moment, the
feeling that surged in Jiang Cheng’s heart could fill a table of delicacies.
He walked up to Gu Fei, opened his arms, and hugged him tightly.
As he closed his eyes, he was enveloped by the familiar scent of Gu Fei. He tightened his
arms, then tightened them again, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t feel it clearly
through their clothes.
He let go of Gu Fei, took off his own jacket, and then took off Gu Fei’s jacket.
It’s just a coat, something entirely normal to take off at any time or place, but in
the current atmosphere, it has suddenly become filled with ambiguity.
“You…” Jiang Cheng wanted to say something, but felt he should start with something else.
This meeting, compared to the last time when Gu Fei came over, was only a little over a
month apart, but it carried an entirely different feeling. Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell if it was
because they had been holding back for too long, but that subtle gap from the last time
seemed to have disappeared. Now, the reason he couldn’t find anything to say was because
his mind was full of nothing but Gu Fei’s body.
Being brave enough to face his inner feelings was one of Jiang Cheng’s advantages. After
realizing that the only thing on his mind at this moment was
“go for it,” he raised his arms and took off his shirt.
Gu Fei was probably hesitating between having sex first or just chatting. When he saw Jiang
Cheng’s action, he was stunned for a moment, then turned his head to look towards the
bedroom.
“Go take a shower,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Um…” Gu Fei paused, reached into his bag and rummaged around, then turned back to
Jiang Cheng. “Do you… want to…?”
“Yes.” Jiang Cheng heard his voice sound a bit hoarse. There was no other reason this time,
it was purely due to excitement.
Gu Fei took something out of his bag, and at a glance, Jiang Cheng could see that it was a
lubricant.
“You… have no shame,” he sighed.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, he took off his own shirt and hugged Jiang Cheng, then kissed
him on the lips before Jiang Cheng could say anything.
Jiang Cheng could still clearly remember the gentle and lingering feeling of their last kiss,
but this time the kiss was completely devoid of that beauty.
Both of their lips, teeth, and tongues were filled with desire. All the emotions that had been
suppressed for half a year were forcefully released in this moment, like a torrential
downpour.
Jiang Cheng held onto the nape of Gu Fei’s neck, passionately exploring and sucking
between his teeth. As he dragged him towards the bathroom, his hand had already slipped
into Gu Fei’s pants.
The bathroom was not large. After Gu Fei closed the door behind them, the small space was
filled with their gasps, and even the slight friction sound when
their hands rubbed against each other’s skin became particularly clear due to the small
space.
Every action, every touch, feels like striking the keys on sensitive nerves.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng lowered his head and fiercely bit him on the shoulder.
“Huh?” Gu Fei responded, taking a breath because of his bite.
Jiang Cheng pushed him hard against the wall, grabbed his shoulder, and whispered in his
ear, “I want to fuck you.”

1. ¹ “CP” is an abbreviation commonly used in Chinese internet

slang, and it stands for “Couple” or “Character Pairing.” It’s often
used to refer to a popular or favored romantic pairing in fictional
works. ↩
Raw chapter 137: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-
d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24ot
voromih258
September 23, 2023
Uncategorized
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Saye Ch. 138

Gu Fei reached out and turned on the nozzle switch, and the water sprayed onto Jiang
Cheng’s face.
At first, it was cool, and he was startled. Before he could dodge, he was hit in the face by the
steamy water. This slightly warm temperature slid over his body, making him feel relaxed.
Jiang Cheng let the water run over him for a while before slowly coming back to his senses
from the excitement.
Gu Fei had one hand still leaning against the wall, with smooth and flowing lines from his
arm to his shoulder, back, and waist.
The panting and low moans from before echoed in Jiang Cheng’s ears again as he looked at
Gu Fei. He couldn’t help but slide his hand that was supporting Gu Fei’s waist all the way
up, following his body, until it reached his arm, and finally pressed up against him.
“Do you want to cool the water down a bit?” Gu Fei asked.
“No need,” Jiang Cheng hugged him and touched his lower abdomen. “The heat feels good.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei responded and was about to turn around when Jiang Cheng suddenly
pressed down on his shoulder. He was taken aback and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Don’t move,” Jiang Cheng touched his back. “I want to look.”
“What’s there to look at?” Gu Fei laughed and leaned against the wall.
“I haven’t seen you for a long time,” Jiang Cheng lowered his head and kissed his shoulder
blade.
“Then take a good look now,” Gu Fei glanced at him, “You won’t have many chances like this
in the future…”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue, “Didn’t manage to overwhelm me, huh?”
“You’re just that strong,” Gu Fei laughed.
Jiang Cheng leaned over and kissed him on the corner of his mouth.
After taking a shower, they realized that they hadn’t brought any towels or a change of
clothes. They were still wearing their wet outer pants, which were soaked from their play
in the water.
“I’ll go get them,” Gu Fei twisted the doorknob.
“I don’t have any luggage,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Wear mine,” Gu Fei said, opening the door a crack and poking his head out. “I brought two
pairs of sweatpants.”
“Shall I go instead?” Jiang Cheng whispered. “What if Er Miao gets up…
Wouldn’t it be bad to see her brother like this?”
Gu Fei turned back and looked at him, saying, “If my sister saw you… it’s better she sees me.
At least I’m her real brother.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng thought about it and then smiled. He also leaned out and looked outside.
“Then hurry up and use your agile skills as the boss of the steel mill.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei opened the door and ran out, quickly rushing into the living room.
In just two or three seconds, he ran back holding his bag.
“Er Miao is still sleeping, right?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I didn’t hear any movement. She probably won’t wake up even after a while,”
Gu Fei rummaged through his bag and took out a pair of pants. “You wear these.”
“I want one with padding,” Jiang Cheng said.
“At this moment, you’re still being picky?” Gu Fei looked at him.
Jiang Cheng nodded. “With padding, it makes my legs look longer.”
“Okay, okay,” Gu Fei took out another pair and gave it to him. “From now on, I will buy all
my sweatpants with padding, not the ones without padding.”
Jiang Cheng laughed and put on the pants.
Gu Fei tidied up the bathroom and checked it again before coming out.
“Call Pan Zhi,” Gu Fei said. He walked to the bedroom door, pushed it open and looked
inside, then closed it and sat down next to Jiang Cheng. “He’s not going to come back right
away after buying things.”
“In a little while,” Jiang Cheng took out his phone and looked at the time.
Gu Fei watched him without saying anything. After a while, he leaned back on the sofa and
laughed.
“What are you laughing at?” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue. “He doesn’t know who did
whom. If he thinks it’s you, this can be regarded as giving you some face too.”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei laughed as he leaned on him, “This time is pretty normal.
Don’t always compare yourself to the length of the male lead’s scenes in adult films. That’s
edited.”
“Get lost,” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
Gu Fei quickly kissed him on the face.
“Missed me?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Of course I did, very much,” Gu Fei said. “I’ve been reading at the rental house every night.”
“Reading there is pretty good, that desk and chair set has the bonus of being a top
students.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh yeah, speaking of which,” Gu Fei took out a notebook from his bag, “This English
essay… can you help me take a look, top student?”
Jiang Cheng looked at him and didn’t say anything for a while.
“I don’t know who else to ask,” Gu Fei said, “I feel like asking Lao Lu would be worse than
asking you.”
Jiang Cheng took the notebook, hooked his arm around his neck, and gave him two loud
kisses on the mouth.
“I don’t know if I can pass level 4 in June,” Gu Fei sighed, “I’ll give it a try…
you won’t make me take level 6 with you again, will you?”
“I’m not going to force you to do that,” Jiang Cheng smiled and opened the notebook. “I plan
to take level 6 next semester.”
Indeed, Gu Fei’s handwriting was better than his. Even without looking at the content of the
essay, just looking at the slanting angle and neatly arranged letters, it was very satisfying.
“Tsk tsk,” Jiang Cheng felt the strong contrast when the English exam grader looked at his
paper.
Gu Fei must have done a lot of papers, he had written many essays.
Jiang Cheng couldn’t actually focus on how well it was written at this moment, but he still
flipped through the pages slowly, savoring the process. It was an enjoyable process, looking
at the neat rows of English that were the footprints of Gu Fei’s hard work.
After reading through all the essays, Jiang Cheng took out his phone and called Pan Zhi,
“Where are you? Have you finished buying the groceries? Do you need me to pick you up?”
“No need to pick me up. I’m sitting at the gateball court in the community,” Pan Zhi replied.
“…Do you have a lot of things?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“How much could four people have for hot pot?” Pan Zhi said, “Should I head back now?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Where is he?” Gu Fei asked.
“He’s sitting at the gateball court we saw when we just drove in,” Jiang Cheng thought for a
moment and laughed, “Really… let me go pick him up and help him with the things.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei stood up, “Then I’ll cook the rice first.”
“Alright,” Jiang Cheng also stood up, put on his coat, pinched his butt, and went out the
door.
He hadn’t walked far out the door when he saw Pan Zhi carrying two big bags of vegetables,
swaying over towards him. He quickly went to meet him, “Why did you buy so much?”
“To kill time,” Pan Zhi sighed, “If you stay too long in the supermarket, you will always
exceed your budget.”
Jiang Cheng took a look at the bag of vegetables, “Little Sheep hotpot?”
“Yeah,” Pan Zhi nodded, “There’s also pork belly, all meat. I didn’t buy a lot of vegetables,
since you love meat.”
“Thanks,” Jiang Cheng patted his shoulder.
When the rice was cooked, Gu Miao got up, and Pan Zhi found a cartoon for her to watch.
“Boil the water,” Gu Fei picked up the sesame sauce that Pan Zhi had just bought on the
table, “This…”
“You two come here,” Pan Zhi immediately pointed to them, “The most
annoying thing in my life is leaking sesame sauce. I’d rather not eat it.”
“I’ll do it,” Gu Fei said with a smile, “I’ll do it with Er Miao.”
“Can she do it?” Pan Zhi asked with great interest.
“Sure,” Gu Fei said, “and she… really loves making Xie Ma Jiang ( spicy sesame sauce).”
Gu Miao stood beside the table, waiting for Gu Fei to scoop the sauce into a big bowl. As
soon as he added water, she eagerly took the bowl and started stirring with a spoon, her
face focused and serious.
“Er Miao,” Jiang Cheng watched her with a smile, “slow down a bit, be gentle.
You’ll get tired if you keep going like that.”
Gu Miao glanced at him sideways while stirring the sauce, then lowered her head and
stirred vigorously again for a while before glancing at him
provocatively.
“Hey,” Jiang Cheng laughed, “do whatever you want, keep it up.”
Surprisingly, Gu Miao was quite good at it. She kept stirring the sauce with all her energy
until they finished setting up the table, placing the dishes and chopsticks, and boiling water.
She didn’t stop.
“I find her like a perpetual motion machine,” Pan Zhi sighed. “Isn’t it the same when she’s
skateboarding? Once she starts, she can’t stop. She may not be tall, but she has really good
physical fitness.”
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei called her, “that’s enough.”
Gu Miao looked at him, but didn’t stop stirring. Gu Fei picked up a chopstick, dipped it in
the sauce, and tasted it. “It’s enough, very good.”
Gu Miao stopped stirring, looking a bit proud as she turned to Jiang Cheng.
“Awesome,” Jiang Cheng gave her a thumbs up. “You’re better than me.”
Pan Zhi bought two large bags of mostly meat. He didn’t know if it was because he was in a
good mood today or he was really hungry, or because it was particularly fun to eat like this
with everyone in the small house… Anyway,
Jiang Cheng ate more than ever before today.
Except for Gu Fei, all four of them were eating like crazy, with Jiang Cheng in the lead.
“Damn,” Pan Zhi held his stomach, “I was thinking maybe we bought too much and couldn’t
finish it. I was going to save it and eat it later… This is barely enough!”
“I’m stuffed,” Jiang Cheng leaned back in his chair. “If Gu Fei eats freely, it definitely won’t
be enough.”
“I’m shy and can’t really eat freely,” Gu Fei said.
“I’m quite surprised that Gu Miao can eat so much despite being so small,” Pan Zhi looked at
Gu Miao. “But why hasn’t she grown taller? Wasn’t your mom tall?”
“It’s partly due to childhood injuries, and also…” Gu Fei sighed, “Xu Xingzhi said that
emotions can affect growth.”
“Ah,” Pan Zhi also sighed and poured a drink for Gu Miao, “Come on Miao Miao, after
finishing this cup, you won’t eat anymore. You’ll feel stuffed for a while.”
Gu Miao took the cup and drank it all, then wiped her mouth.
After dinner, they rested in the house and talked about what to do tomorrow.
They took Gu Miao out for a while to skateboard, which was her way of release and her
only hobby. Xu Xingzhi’s advice was to let her enjoy it as long as it didn’t affect her normal
life.
After they had enough of skateboarding, they returned to the house together.
Next was the part that Jiang Cheng didn’t like. He had to go back to school.
Pan Zhi had two rooms here: Gu Miao slept in the bedroom, Gu Fei slept on the small sofa in
the bedroom, and Pan Zhi slept on the sofa in the living room. He had nowhere to sleep.
Sleeping on the floor was not impossible, but firstly, it was too troublesome, and Pan Zhi
lived alone and didn’t have enough bedding. Secondly, he didn’t want to appear too clingy.
“Tomorrow morning we’ll take a taxi over to the gathering,” Pan Zhi said.
“Should we split up and eat breakfast separately or eat together?”
“Let’s split up. With so many people, it would take too much time to eat together,” Jiang
Cheng said.
“Okay,” Pan Zhi nodded.
“Then I’ll go back to school first,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ll accompany you to take the car,” Gu Fei stood up and prepared to get his jacket.
“No need, it’s just three steps away, we don’t even need five minutes to walk there,” Jiang
Cheng said.
“Oh,” Gu Fei replied.
“Oh man, I can’t take it,” Pan Zhi said, laughing while lighting a cigarette. “Gu Fei, let’s chat
for a while.”
People are strange sometimes. They don’t feel too upset when they are apart, and talking
on the phone for a while each night is enough. But now that the two of them are in the same
place, they are thinking about each other a lot.
After returning to the dorm and lying down, Gu Fei called him. They talked for about an
hour before hanging up. They had been too busy before and hadn’t had the chance to
express their longing for each other.
After catching up, Jiang Cheng finally felt at ease. He closed his eyes and fell asleep until
morning without even dreaming.
“Wake up, wake up, wake up!” Zhang Qiqi and Lu Shi were with their
girlfriends in a hotel next to the school yesterday, but they returned to the dorm early in
the morning. They knocked on the edge of Jiang Cheng and Zhao Ke’s beds back and forth,
“The car will arrive in an hour, get up and get ready for breakfast! We brought breakfast for
you two.”
“Are you guys up?” Jiang Cheng called Gu Fei while getting ready.
“I woke up early. Gu Miao was making a fuss this morning,” Gu Fei said.
“What happened? Is it serious?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“She just woke up and realized she wasn’t at home,” Gu Fei said. “It’s not too bad. She was
upset for half an hour, but she’s not making a fuss anymore.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng breathed a sigh of relief. “She’ll feel better when she sees the grassland
later.”
“Well, if it were me, I’ll feel better when I see Cheng ge later,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue. “Don’t be so cheesy all the time.”
After finishing the breakfast brought by Zhang Qiqi and the others in the
dormitory, they carried their things downstairs. Two girlfriends were waiting for them
downstairs.
Jiang Cheng only realized why Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi talked about their girlfriends all the
time after seeing these two girls in person. Surprisingly, they both had a slight
resemblance.
“Just like sisters,” Zhao Ke remarked.
“Indeed, quite similar,” Jiang Cheng chuckled.
“You’re Jiang Cheng, right?” Lu Shi’s girlfriend asked with a smile.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Has your… friend and sister arrived yet?” she asked. Jiang Cheng had previously informed
Lu Shi and Zhang Qiqi about Gu Miao’s situation, and everyone was fine with it. Both girls
were quite welcoming. “We bought some snacks for your sister, not sure if she’ll like them.”
“She will like them,” Jiang Cheng said. “Thank you.”
The two girls bought a lot of snacks for Gu Miao, a bag of chocolates, jelly, potato chips, and
so on. Snacks were undoubtedly the best way to please children.
When Gu Miao came over, she was obviously not in a good mood with a gloomy expression
on her face. She only relaxed after seeing the snacks.
“Thank you,” Gu Fei said.
“Don’t mention it,” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend took selfies with Gu Miao twice with her phone.
“What a beautiful little sister.”
By the time the car arrived, Gu Miao was already feeling much better, riding her skateboard
back and forth in the open space.
When everyone was looking at Gu Miao, Gu Fei leaned over to Jiang Cheng’s side and
quietly pinched Jiang Cheng’s hand: “Good morning, Cheng ge.”
“Good morning, little bunny,” Jiang Cheng also pinched his hand.
The car arrived quite punctually, and Zhang Qiqi had booked a 12-seater car, so everyone
could sit more comfortably after all the belongings were loaded onto the car.
“Miao Miao, do you want to choose a seat?” Zhao Ke asked Gu Miao, “You can choose a seat
you like.”
Gu Miao looked at him, seemingly not understanding.
“Where do you want to sit?” Zhao Ke, being someone who had taken
psychology classes, quickly changed his wording.
Gu Miao pointed to the co-driver’s seat.
“Indeed it’s cool,” Zhao Ke said, “but children can’t sit in that seat, only adults can, so pick
another one.”
Gu Miao held her skateboard and thought for a long time, then pointed to the single seat in
the first row.
“This one is fine,” Zhao Ke nodded.
She quickly went over and sat down, then looked at them seriously.
Everyone got on the car and sat down in pairs. Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei sat in the first row,
closer to Gu Miao to take care of her. Pan Zhi and Zhao Ke sat behind them.
“Gu Fei,” Lu Shi shouted from the back, “take a departure photo. It’s so cute to see everyone
in pairs…”
“Objection,” Zhao Ke raised his hand, “not everyone is in pairs, rephrase that.”
“I second that,” Pan Zhi also raised his hand.
Gu Fei smiled and took out his camera, taking a photo for everyone. When he turned back
to his seat, he saw Gu Miao turning her head to look at him, so he lifted his camera towards
Gu Miao.
“Er Miao, give me a smile,” Jiang Cheng smiled and tilted his head towards Gu Miao.
Gu Miao looked at him for a few seconds, then also tilted her head and smiled.
This smile was short-lived, but it was the first time Gu Fei had seen Gu Miao smile like that.
He quickly pressed the shutter button and captured the moment.
When he looked up again, Gu Miao had already turned back around and sat down with a
serious expression.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng huddled together, looking at Gu Miao’s smile for a while.
Gu Fei raised the camera and aimed it at the back, “Smile for a photo.”
Jiang Cheng leaned his head next to his and smiled at the camera.
“Everyone in the back, smile!” Gu Fei shouted.
Suddenly, there was a burst of laughter and shouting from the back.
The photo turned out great, with Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng’s heads together in the front, and a
group of people waving their arms and laughing in the back. There was also a little girl
eating jelly seriously by the window.
Jiang Cheng held the camera and looked at the photo for a long time.
This photo reminded him of the “break-up dinner” they had in high school. The photo they
took when they kicked open the door that day is still on his phone, and it’s also the profile
picture for their class group chat.
Now, in this photo, he sees a smile and memories that are different from those of his 20-
year-old self.
After the car started moving, the group started discussing and eating, talking about the
various entertainment activities they had planned. Although they had discussed these plans
in the group chat countless times half a month ago, they were still excitedly talking about it
now, as it’s part of the fun of a group trip.
As the car drove to the suburbs and the high-rise buildings disappeared outside the
window, replaced by greenery, the discussion ended and they started a round of singing.
Jiang Cheng listened to everyone singing loudly and happily, unable to stop laughing.
Jiang Cheng listened to the group of people singing loudly, unable to stop laughing.
“Qi Qi’s singing is even more impactful than Zhao Jin’s,” he said with a laugh.
When he saw Gu Miao turn her head, he immediately snapped his fingers in her direction.
Gu Miao also snapped her fingers back at him, then turned and leaned against the car
window, looking out at the scenery.
“Are you happy?” Gu Fei asked in a low voice in his ear.
“Happy,” Jiang Cheng said, “You just asked a superfluous question. Are you happy?”
“I’m not just happy,” Gu Fei said, “I’m extremely excited.”
“Really?” Jiang Cheng leaned back and looked up and down at him. “I can’t tell.
You seem pretty calm.”
“My heart is raging,” Gu Fei took his hand and pressed it against his own chest.
Jiang Cheng applied some pressure, keeping the palm of his hand firmly against Gu Fei’s
chest.
“Do you feel it?” Gu Fei asked.
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng smiled, his hand still pressed against his chest. Whether it was a
psychological effect or not, in this unquiet environment, he could still feel Gu Fei’s
heartbeat, which was beating quite fast.
“This is the first time I’ve gone out like this,” Gu Fei looked at him, “with so many people
and with Gu Miao. I never thought there would be such a day.”
Jiang Cheng smiled without saying anything.
“I don’t know what to say,” Gu Fei also smiled, “I’m just so excited.”
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng responded with a smile.
“Cheng ge,” Gu Fei leaned in towards him and whispered, “I used to think about going on a
trip with someone I liked, driving forward without thinking about where to go, as long as
the two of us were together.”
“Have you ever thought of such a romantic thing?” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue, “Did you
have someone in mind at the time?”
“No,” Gu Fei laughed, “Really not, I just thought there could be someone like that.”
“You didn’t tell me,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I just thought about it casually,” Gu Fei said. “And then I didn’t think about it again.”
“But now it’s come true,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded. “So… Cheng ge.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Thank you for not giving up on me,” Gu Fei said softly.
“Suddenly so emotional,” Jiang Cheng said. “Do you have any ulterior motives?
With so many people here, I won’t be moved to tears.”
Gu Fei laughed and leaned back in his seat. “You’re especially cute like this.”
“Actually,” Jiang Cheng cleared his throat and glanced back to make sure everyone was still
immersed in the various magical songs before whispering,
“Would you like to… open your eyes? I’m really… although it’s because I’m so charming…” ¹
Gu Fei had been looking at him seriously, but when he heard this, he couldn’t help but laugh
out loud.
“Did I say something wrong?” Jiang Cheng glared at him.
“No,” Gu Fei chuckled, biting his lip to stifle his laughter.
“No, seriously,” Jiang Cheng continued to stare at him, “Is it necessary for you to be so
disrespectful? If you keep laughing, I swear I’ll smack you.”
“Go ahead,” Gu Fei turned his head to face him, still laughing. “I just can’t help it. Please,
beat me to death.”
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t hold it in for even a second, and he burst out laughing with
Gu Fei.
The two of them leaned against their seats, laughing hysterically.
¹ In this context, Jiang Cheng is speaking quietly to Gu Fei, and he begins by saying that he
wants Gu Fei to open his eyes. However, he hesitates a bit and playfully attributes Gu Fei’s
willingness to open his eyes to Jiang Cheng’s own charm. Essentially, he’s jokingly
suggesting that Gu Fei might want to open his eyes just because Jiang Cheng is so
captivating or charming. It’s a light-hearted and teasing remark meant to make Gu Fei smile
or laugh.

Raw chapter: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24ou
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October 2, 2023
Uncategorized
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Saye Ch. 139

Jiang Cheng was quite impressed with this group of people. They had been driving for over
two hours, and during that extended period, they hadn’t stopped talking. While continuous
singing wasn’t possible, they even got the driver involved, and after a few tunes, everyone
started eating and chatting.
The room they had booked this time was arranged by Zhang Qiqi and happened to be at the
driver’s place. As a result, this driver was very hospitable and gave them a tour along the
way.
Gu Miao wasn’t afraid of riding in the car, but she soon got sleepy. Gu Fei helped her lie
down in the last row.
When Jiang Cheng came back and leaned against him, his head tilted: “I’m also sleepy.”
“Didn’t sleep well last night?” Gu Fei asked.
“I don’t know, I felt like I slept pretty well,” Jiang Cheng said, “But every time I sit on a long-
distance bus, I get sleepy. When there were school activities that required us to ride in a
car, I would definitely sleep the whole way.”
“Well, you can sleep for a while and start playing as soon as we get there, without having to
sleep again.” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng closed his eyes, “Do you want to sleep for a while too?”
“Sure.” Gu Fei grabbed his hand and to avoid the driver seeing anything that might not be
acceptable, they both put their clasped hands in Gu Fei’s coat pocket.
They couldn’t really sleep, Jiang Cheng just dozed off while leaning against Gu Fei. It was an
enjoyable state of sleep, listening to the people in the back occasionally saying a few words,
sometimes laughing a few times. He could smell the breath of Gu Fei and hold his hand
tightly. If the car shook, he could knock his head on Gu Fei’s shoulder a few times.
It was wonderful.
Peace of mind, they felt every second of it.
Although Gu Fei said he would also sleep for a while, Jiang Cheng could feel that he hadn’t
slept at all and was always leaning his head towards the window, looking outside.
Gu Fei has never been far away from home. The farthest he has been is when he came to
report, and now he’s embarking on a new journey.
The scenery outside the window is becoming beautiful, and Jiang Cheng can tell even with
his eyes closed because the people behind him occasionally let out various exclamations.
The driver stopped at a gas station midway for them to take a break and use the restroom.
Gu Fei pushed Jiang Cheng and said, “Cheng Ge.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes and stretched lazily.
“Let’s go to the restroom,” Gu Fei stood up and shouted to the back of the car,
“Er Miao, do you want to go to the restroom?”
Gu Miao’s head popped out from the back seat, nodding.
“We’ll take her in,” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend said, “Miao Miao, come with us.”
Gu Miao carried her skateboard off the car and followed the two girls to the restroom.
The restroom at this gas station is not big, and when the group of people crowded in, there
was barely enough space.
“This is truly a collective activity, even going to the restroom together,” Pan Zhi said, “How
about we all stand in line and pee together?”
“Childish,” Zhao Ke sighed, “Why don’t you suggest we all do bayonet fighting together?”
“That’s not good since it’s a public place,” Pan Zhi said.
Everyone laughed for a while.
After leaving the restroom, Jiang Cheng saw Gu Miao playing with her
skateboard on an empty lot nearby. There was a car repair shop nearby with two cement
tables for repairing the chassis, one on each side. Gu Miao came down from one side, slid
onto the opposite table, leaped high in the air, and landed again.
Several car repair workers were watching her, and every time she jumped, they would
applaud and cheer for her.
Gu Miao was having a great time playing and would whistle loudly every time she flew into
the air.
Jiang Cheng noticed the vast expanse of grass behind the low wall of the gas station only
when Gu Miao leapt up for the third time. “Holy shit!” He slapped Gu Fei’s arm and pointed
over there.
He finally realized why Gu Miao was excitedly jumping up and down and even whistling.
She was too short to see the large expanse of grass until she leaped up.
Everyone at this point also saw the scenery over there. Lu Shi shouted, “Let’s go take some
pictures!”
“Let’s go!” everyone responded immediately.
The driver smiled and looked at them with a “you guys haven’t seen the world”
expression as they ran towards the wall.
Gu Fei went back to the car to get the camera, so he and Jiang Cheng walked at the back
with Gu Miao, appearing to be the calmest three people.
But that was only how it appeared.
Gu Fei kept murmuring softly, “The scenery on the road is so beautiful. The lighting is
perfect right now. Cheng Ge, do you see how pure blue the sky is…”
Jiang Cheng watched him without speaking. Even though Gu Fei had changed a lot now, his
personality meant that he rarely acted like this, so it was rare to see him babbling like an
idiot.
“You’re so cute, little bunny,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng Ge, go to the front,” Gu Fei raised the camera, “and tell everyone to run together.”
“Okay,” The tacit understanding between the two of them that they had practiced together
for so long allowed Jiang Cheng to quickly understand what Gu Fei wanted to capture. Jiang
Cheng rushed out quickly, shouting ahead, “Ah–“
“Ahh–” Everyone, who was in an excited state, didn’t ask what was going on and
immediately roared together, then ran and jumped forward.
Gu Fei looked at the series of frozen frames in the camera: someone jumping up, someone
taking a step forward, someone opening their arms, and a small girl calmly watching these
people with a skateboard in her hand. Behind them was a continuous slope of grass, with
no flowers in this season and the grass not yet lush, but the green grass with some soil
color, together with the blue sky, white clouds, and sunshine, had a particularly spring-like
atmosphere.
After taking the photos, Gu Fei flipped through them and found that in the last shot, Jiang
Cheng turned around when he jumped, and his arms raised high.
Gu Fei smiled.
After jumping around for a while, they were urged by the driver to get back into the car.
Holding the camera, they passed it around.
“Jiang Cheng is really good at stealing the spotlight!” Lu Shi said. “He even turned around!
We all had the back of our heads!”
“I can steal the spotlight with the back of my head, too. You don’t have to use your face to
steal it,” Jiang Cheng said with a smile.
“I heard that,” Zhao Ke’s voice came from between the seats.
Jiang Cheng burst into laughter, unable to stop.
After the car started moving, everyone gradually calmed down and began to feel the cold.
Gu Fei stood up and gave a thicker coat to Gu Miao, who continued sleeping in the back. He
also took Jiang Cheng’s thick coat out of his luggage, so he’d be ready to wear it later when
they got out of the car.
“You’re so thoughtful,” Jiang Cheng covered the coat on his legs.
“In a while, when we get off the car and it’s chaotic outside, it’s rare to have something
warm to cover up with,” Gu Fei pulled the coat that was covering Jiang Cheng’s legs onto his
own, each covering half. Then he reached his hand underneath the clothes. “I find… this…
quite nice.”
Jiang Cheng turned his head to look at him.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng without speaking.
He really liked looking at Jiang Cheng up close like this. Jiang Cheng usually looked quite
arrogant from a distance, but up close, he thought he looked rather cute. The slightly
drooping arrogance at the corners of his eyes even turned into cute puppy eyes… He
realized he was indeed quite a sucker for Jiang Cheng.
He touched Jiang Cheng’s thigh, but it left no trace because it was covered by clothes.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, “pay attention to your manners.”
“I have no manners,” Gu Fei smiled and touched his thigh again.
This time, after he touched him, he didn’t move his hand and kept it pressed
against Jiang Cheng’s thigh.
This situation was a bit awkward. Gu Fei was surprised by his own shameless thoughts in
the presence of so many people chatting in the back of the car.
In fact, logically speaking, he shouldn’t react to Jiang Cheng just by looking at him a few
times like he did initially, but he didn’t know what was wrong with him today.
His hand uncontrollably moved towards Jiang Cheng’s upper thigh.
“What the fuck?” Jiang Cheng was startled and grabbed his wrist, looking at him in shock.
“Gu Fei, did some pervert possess you?”
“Ah,” Gu Fei responded, gritting his teeth to keep from kissing Jiang Cheng’s face. However,
his hand was not easy to control since it was already independent and knew that clothes
were covering it.
Jiang Cheng was probably afraid of making too much noise and not being able to cover up
their actions, so he didn’t use too much force to resist Gu Fei. As a result, Gu Fei’s hand
successfully touched the spot.
“I’ll shout!” Jiang Cheng grabbed his hand.
“You can shout,” Gu Fei looked at him. “You can shout until your throat is hoarse, but it
won’t do any good.”
“Until my throat is hoarse…” Jiang Cheng’s voice didn’t raise at all. He tried to yell, but then
burst out laughing. “I can’t fucking believe you.”
Gu Fei was also amused by his laughter, and they laughed together as if it was a reflex that
they couldn’t control.
After the two of them finished laughing, it seemed like the pervert who had possessed him
had been squeezed out.
“Hey,” he sighed and grabbed Jiang Cheng’s hand.
During the latter half of the journey, everyone became tired from chatting excessively and
basically entered a semi-sleep state.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei were squeezed together and didn’t doze off again. After feeling that
Gu Fei had fallen asleep, Jiang Cheng also fell asleep.
It wasn’t until they heard voices and honking outside the car window that the group woke
up again.
“We’re here?” Jiang Cheng looked bewilderedly at the suddenly appearing shops and
people coming and going on both sides of the road.
“We’ve arrived at the county seat,” the driver brother said up front, “we’ll be there in forty
minutes!”
This statement excited the group of people who had been sleeping all the way, and they
resumed eating and chatting mode.
Because they knew they were getting close, time suddenly seemed to pass quickly. They
chatted while looking outside, and before they knew it, they were greeted by vast
grasslands.
“Ha!” Jiang Cheng heard Gu Miao’s excited voice from behind.
“Go bring Er Miao up front,” Jiang Cheng said, “talk to her for a while.”
“Okay.” Gu Fei went to the back and brought Gu Miao to their seats, squeezed and sat by the
window.
“Er Miao, this is the grassland,” Jiang Cheng pointed outside, “look, aren’t there lots of little
plants?”
Gu Miao excitedly stared outside and didn’t hear what he said.
“That’s so disrespectful,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
Gu Fei laughed and said nothing.
Jiang Cheng also stopped talking and looked outside with Gu Miao. The scenery here was no
longer comparable to the grassy slopes they saw at the gas station earlier, with big clouds
in the sky and an endless grassland stretching into the distance.
The furthest point of the gaze, the sky seems to press down on the grassland, with a
dazzling beauty in full view.
Gu Fei leaned towards him, also looking out: “It’s really beautiful.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. Gu Fei squinted his eyes against the sunshine, looking
very handsome. At this moment, he suddenly wanted to sing, a melody had been jumping in
his head for a long time.
“I think, lifting my head, warm sunshine and spring grass…” Gu Fei softly sang a line in his
ear.
“You give me a simple embrace,” Jiang Cheng responded without thinking, “I want to crush
the confusion and walk through time, and when you open your eyes, you’ll hear…”
Gu Fei didn’t continue singing the lyrics and looked at him before switching to humming.
The first line surprised Jiang Cheng. He didn’t know if Gu Fei came
up with it on the spot or had written it before, but the hum was melodious and harmonious.
“I think, with you on my left shoulder and a smile on my right,” Jiang Cheng held Gu Fei’s
hand, “I want to run freely in your eyes…”
“I think, with just one look,” Gu Fei joined in, “we’ll grow old together…”
Jiang Cheng gazed at Gu Fei in the bright sunlight for a long time without speaking.
“That’s really nice,” Zhao Ke suddenly appeared in the gap between the chairs,
“what song is it?”
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng was startled by him and almost threw Gu Miao beside him.
“Zhao Ke, you are truly the most emotionally unintelligent person I have ever met in this
regard,” Pan Zhi, who was sitting next to him, sighed while eating potato chips.
Gu Fei smiled.
“Do you have any more chips?” Jiang Cheng asked from the gap in the chair, still smiling.
“Here you go.” Pan Zhi handed him a can of potato chips.
“Er Miao,” Jiang Cheng handed the potato chips to Gu Miao, “do you want some? Potato
chips.”
Gu Miao quickly grabbed a handful of potato chips and leaned back to the window.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei reached over and took some potato chips, “You… startled me just now.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
“You sing so beautifully,” Gu Fei said.
“You startled me,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I thought something was wrong with me if I could
still startle you.”
They soon arrived at their destination, the car slowed down as they passed by various rural
houses and yurts, and finally pulled into a farmhouse courtyard.
“We’re here,” the driver yelled as he parked the car. “We’ll arrange the yurts for you in a bit.
You can tidy up and have a simple meal in half an hour. We’ll be riding to several scenic
spots in the afternoon, and we’ll have roasted whole
lamb for dinner!”
Everyone cheered and got off the car with their belongings.
Zhang Qiqi had ordered small yurts, all in one place, and everyone quickly distributed them
and went in with their belongings.
“It’s not bad,” Jiang Cheng entered their yurt. It was small, but very clean and had a TV. But
when he saw the bed, he paused and then laughed, “Holy crap, it’s a big bed!”
A semicircular table took up half of the space in the yurt, but it looked very comfortable.
“It’s pretty good,” Gu Fei looked around. “Er Miao can sleep on that side, and we can sleep
on this side. It’s better than the three-person room… We’d have to squeeze together in the
middle of the night in a three-person room.”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, “Did you get lubricant in your brain or something?”
Gu Fei sat on the bed and laughed for a while, “I don’t know, maybe I’ve been holding back
for too long. I’m already looking forward to the summer vacation.
I’ve been waiting so long that my neck has stretched.”
“Cheng’er!” Pan Zhi’s voice came from outside.
“Come in, we’re tidying up,” said Jiang Cheng.
“Er Miao,” Pan Zhi poked his head in, “Want to go see the horses?”
“Ha!” Gu Miao was studying a chair nearby when she heard this and
immediately turned around.
“Where are the horses?” Jiang Cheng asked. When they had entered, they had seen quite a
few horses, but he didn’t spot any horses in this particular farmhouse courtyard.
“Just look around and you’ll find them,” Pan Zhi said. “Come on, Er Miao.”
After Gu Miao followed Pan Zhi outside, Jiang Cheng went to check the door of the yurt,
locked it from the inside, and then turned around with a sinister smile.
Just as he was about to pounce on Gu Fei, Gu Fei had already rushed behind him and
grabbed his arm to throw him onto the bed.
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng grabbed his shoulder when he pounced on him. “Gu Fei, Gu Fei!”
“Hmm?” Gu Fei was kissing him fiercely on his neck.
“We have to gather for dinner soon,” Jiang Cheng was a little breathless from his actions,
“we can only…”
“I know.” Gu Fei kissed him and put his hand into his pants.
When they came out of the yurt, they coincidentally ran into Lu Shi and his girlfriend
hugging as they came out. Zhang Qiqi and her partner also followed them out.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know if it was because he had just done something with Gu Fei, but
everyone looked like they had just done something similar.
Several people walked to the back of the yurt together and saw the family’s horses, there
were quite a few of them, all leisurely swishing their tails on the grass.
Zhao Ke stood in front, Pan Zhi squatted beside him with a cigarette in his mouth, and their
idle state looked very innocent, unlike the rest of them.
Especially the four behind them, who were embracing each other like they had grown up
together.
“Pan Zhi!” Gu Fei shouted, “Where is Gu Miao?”
Pan Zhi turned his head and pointed ahead with his hand.
When Jiang Cheng looked in the direction he pointed, he was stunned: “Wow, she’s not
afraid of horses at all, even though they’re such big animals.”
There was a pretty large horse in front of them, and Gu Miao stood in front of it, feeling as if
it was only as tall as her legs. A man dressed in Mongolian clothing was pulling the reins,
and the horse lowered its head. Gu Miao was patting its head.
“Wanna ride?” Pan Zhi said. “They say they’ll find her a small horse later.”
“This little girl is stronger than me,” Jiang Cheng said, looking over. Gu Miao had already
hugged the horse’s head and was rubbing her face against its forehead. “I’m even a bit
scared to go and touch it now.”
“She does the same thing with cats at home,” Gu Fei chuckled.
After seeing the horse, Gu Miao lost interest in eating and refused to go inside to have her
meal. Instead, she insisted on standing with her skateboard among the horses.
“Let her be,” Gu Fei said, and went inside to get a big bowl of rice and some vegetables,
which he brought over to her.
Inside the house, Jiang Cheng ate while occasionally looking outside. Gu Miao sat cross-
legged on her skateboard, eating her rice while glancing at the horses, looking very happy.
“It’s really something to interact with animals,” he said with some emotion.
“Children should naturally be with animals.”
“Yeah, that’s why she’s so happy with Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei said with a smile.
“Cheng…” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “Oh right, Cheng-ge, Cheng-ge, Cat Cheng.”
“Cat Chengcheng,” Gu Fei said.
“Don’t be cheesy in public,” Jiang Cheng snorted. “Bunny Feifei.”
They had a simple lunch and soon finished. They planned to rest for a while before going
horseback riding.
Gu Fei disappeared in a flash. Jiang Cheng searched for him for a long time before seeing
him walking over from the small building of the farmhouse, holding a large paper bag in his
hand.
“What?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Beef jerky, let’s eat it while we play later,” Gu Fei said. “Try it and see how it compares to
what we have back home?”
Jiang Cheng took a piece and put it in his mouth. “Hmm, not bad.”
Gu Fei took out a few small bags and distributed the beef jerky to everyone.
“It’s quite expensive, isn’t it?” Jiang Cheng asked in a low voice.
“This bag costs several hundred,” Gu Fei also whispered. “It’s alright, we’re just here to
have fun.”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
Earlier, the uncle who brought Gu Miao to see the horses came over to greet everyone and
pick horses.
“Girls should choose smaller horses, while boys can choose bigger ones,” the uncle said.
“These horses are all good-tempered.”
Gu Miao refused to ride with Gu Fei and wanted to ride on her own.
Because they were going to a scenic spot, they couldn’t choose horses that were too small.
Finally, the eldest brother brought her a slightly smaller horse. “This little red horse is my
most precious horse. Look, how beautiful!”
After choosing the horses, the most confusing moment arrived, learning how to mount and
dismount and control the horses.
The boys were fine. When Zhang Qiqi mounted, he looked a bit like Spider-Man, and the
others had no problem. After trying to mount and dismount a few times, Jiang Cheng stared
at Gu Fei.
When it comes to mounting and dismounting, it’s a world dominated by long legs.
No matter how Gu Fei mounted and dismounted, with a raise of his long legs, it always
made him feel his nose getting hot, as if he’d get a nosebleed any second now.
The two girlfriends had to be much slower when mounting their horses, and they were
both a little scared.
What surprised everyone was Gu Miao.
Even Gu Fei was shocked by her. Gu Miao, who always found it extremely difficult to learn
things and even needed many days to learn how to write a word, actually managed to
mount the horse after the uncle demonstrated it twice, with just one push of the stirrup,
and even jumped off without stepping on the stirrup.
“My goodness!” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend exclaimed in surprise. “This is so awesome!”
“It’s a bit like the kids who grew up around here,” the old man said with a smile.
However, Gu Miao’s passion for skateboarding remained unchanged, and she refused to put
it down even when riding a horse. In the end, Gu Fei had to find a rope to tie the skateboard
to Gu Miao’s back.
“Okay,” the old man mounted his horse. “Let’s go slowly and follow me. Don’t rush and
shout if you need anything.”
Jiang Cheng slowly rode forward on his horse.
Gu Fei raised his camera and looked at Jiang Cheng riding in the golden sunlight. After Jiang
Cheng took two steps forward, he disappeared from the lens.
“Cheng Ge,” he called out to Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng turned his head, and the sunlight spilled from the side of his face, creating a
long column of light.
Gu Fei pressed the shutter button.

“Be careful not to fall,” Jiang Cheng said with a smile.

Gu Fei pressed the shutter button again, capturing Jiang Cheng’s smile in a brilliant
moment.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng through the lens.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng responded.
Gu Fei put down his camera and looked at him. “I love you.”
“What…” Jiang Cheng was stunned.
“I said,” Gu Fei raised his voice, “Jiang Cheng, I love you.”
“What?” Jiang Cheng’s eyes suddenly widened, and his hand holding the reins shook
violently.
The horse received the signal and walked a few steps forward quickly. Jiang Cheng was
caught off guard, his body leaned back, and then slid to the side.
He fell off the horse abruptly and hit the ground.

Raw chapter 139: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

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Saye Ch. 140
I love you.
These three words flashed through Jiang Cheng’s mind countless times, with longing and
timidity, appearing and then running away.
From childhood to adulthood, he had probably said “I love you” so many times that even an
approximate number couldn’t be calculated. He even said a stronger version to Pan Zhi, “I
really fucking love you.”
But these three words, which had always been reserved for jokes and teasing in his mind,
had taken on a completely different meaning since the day he started missing Gu Fei. He
had transformed himself and become more serious when he turned around.
And it was heavy.
I love you.
He didn’t know when and in what situation these three words could be
cautiously spoken.
He had also thought that maybe these three words weren’t necessary at all. The emotions
he had for Gu Fei, and the depth of feelings Gu Fei had for him, they could both keep those
feelings in their hearts.
But.
I love you.
Under the brilliant sunshine, on the vast grassland, and between the bright sky and earth.
The handsome guy he had put a lot of effort into liking, riding on a black horse with a
golden outfit, looked at him and said these three words.
There was no better time, no better place.
Nothing could make him more dizzy than this moment.
During the entire process of Jiang Cheng stumbling backward, slipping, failing to grip the
horse’s belly with his feet, and finally flipping over from the horse’s back onto his back, his
gaze never left Gu Fei’s face.
He had been staring at Gu Fei all along.
This was the person he wanted to be with forever, who had just spoken a second ago.
I love you.
I love you very much too.
Jiang Cheng watched anxiously as Gu Fei tossed the camera, dismounted the horse, and felt
a wave of worry. That camera is worth tens of thousands, and so is the lens! For two broke
students, breaking it again would be a disaster!
Fortunately, the next second he realized that the camera was hanging around Gu Fei’s neck.
He let out a sigh of relief and lay flat on the grass, looking at the golden light all around and
the handsome guy with long legs running towards him in a golden field.
Those legs should be put in a pair of tight-fitting sports pants.
Tsk.
When Gu Fei jumped off the horse, he felt his legs go weak.
What made him breathe a little easier was that Jiang Cheng’s horse stopped moving after he
fell off, standing still on the side.
Jiang Cheng had good athletic ability, and even when he fell to the ground, he managed to
twist his body to the side and not hit his head directly on the ground.
But…
“Jiang Cheng!” he shouted and ran forward a few steps, kneeling beside Jiang Cheng a few
steps away, his heart pounding as he looked at Jiang Cheng nervously. “Cheng Ge, how are
you?”
He couldn’t accept something like confessing his love and scaring his boyfriend into
amnesia, paralysis, or a vegetative state.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng responded, his eyes fixed on him, clear and bright.
“Where did you hit? Does it hurt anywhere? Is there any numbness? Can you feel anything
on your body?” Gu Fei asked in rapid succession. “Can you move your fingers?”
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng looked at him and said, “can you say that again?”
“What…?” Gu Fei was confused, but quickly began to repeat, “Where were you hit? Does it
hurt anywhere? Is there any numbness? Can you feel anything on your body?”
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng said, “the one before that.”
“The one before?” Gu Fei felt like his brain was a mess.
“I love you,” Jiang Cheng tilted his mouth and squinted his eyes towards the sunlight,
looking quite like a cat. “Gu Fei, I love you too.”
Gu Fei suddenly snapped back to reality. Jiang Cheng’s “I love you” came too suddenly.
Although Gu Fei had spoken first and Jiang Cheng was responding, in that moment, Gu Fei
felt like his blood wasn’t flowing properly.
“I love you, I love you, I love you…” It took him a while to say it all in a row.
“Jiang Cheng, do you feel any pain?”
“How did you fall?” The uncle in the front rode back on his horse and jumped off, yelling,
“Don’t move yet!”
“Jiang Cheng! Jiang Cheng!” Everyone else started shouting too. They didn’t have the skill to
turn their horses around flexibly, so they could only dismount with various strange
movements while shouting.
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng answered and tried to sit up. “I’m fine!”
“Don’t move!” Gu Fei quickly held him down. “Don’t move yet!”
“I’m really fine!” Jiang Cheng raised his head and looked forward, then shouted again, “Er
Miao, slow down!”
When Gu Fei looked up, he noticed that Gu Miao had actually turned her horse around and
rode over. She didn’t use the stirrups in the middle and jumped straight down. Zhao Ke
even reached out to catch her but ended up with nothing.
“Slow down!” Gu Fei pointed at Gu Miao, who was running over with a
skateboard on his back. “Er Miao, slow down!”
Gu Miao slowed down and slowly followed everyone to Jiang Cheng’s side. She lowered her
head and frowned anxiously, looking at him
“I’m fine,” Jiang Cheng lay on the grass, sincerely explaining to the circle of people
surrounding him, “Step on the ground and you’ll see it’s very soft. I’m really fine.”
“Move your fingers and feet,” the uncle squatted next to him and directed him
professionally.
Jiang Cheng immediately drew a few circles in the air with one hand rounded and the other
squared, saying, “See that? Can any of you do it? I can even switch hands, squares, and
triangles, whatever you like.”
“Wow, you have this skill?” Zhao Ke was quite surprised.
“Hasn’t he shown off to you before? He even does the left-hand eight and right-hand four,
constantly showing off to people,” Pan Zhi crouched by his side,
lightly pressing his hand on Jiang Cheng’s leg, “Do you feel anything?”
“Get lost. When did I show off all day?” Jiang Cheng shook his foot and looked around, “I’m
begging you, let me get up. The ground is wet, and my back is soaked!”
“Get up,” the middle-aged man said, “but take it slow.”
Gu Fei helped him up, and Jiang Cheng felt like an old man in his declining years, slowly
sitting up with a pace that could put everyone at ease, then slowly standing up while
hanging on to Gu Fei’s arm.
“This ground is soft,” he jumped up and down in place, “when I fell, my foot didn’t hit any
rocks, I’m okay.”
“Hey!” Lu Shi breathed a long sigh of relief, “You scared me!”
“Sorry,” Jiang Cheng smiled and bent over to look at Gu Miao, “Er Miao, I’m okay, just fell
down, like you usually do when you fall off a skateboard.”
“She hasn’t fallen off in a long time,” Gu Fei said from behind.
“Can I chat with her?” Jiang Cheng turned his head to look at him.
Gu Fei smiled and didn’t say anything else.
“Just like you fell off a skateboard before, no big deal,” Jiang Cheng snapped his fingers,
“Don’t worry.”
Gu Miao turned around and looked at him, circled him, and made sure he was okay, then
snapped her fingers too, ran to her little horse, and got on it skillfully.
“Okay, let’s keep going,” the middle-aged man said, “Remember, don’t pull the reins too
hard, and move slowly! If something falls to the ground, call me, don’t jump down by
yourself. You can’t dismount until the horse stops!”
Everyone nodded, preparing to mount their horses individually. Pan Zhi took a couple of
steps and then turned back, saying, “It’s one thing if others fall, but how did you manage to
fall?”
“I…” Jiang Chengqing cleared his throat, “I’ll tell you later.”
“Oh, okay,” Pan Zhi looked over at Gu Fei and chuckled, “Grandpa, when you’re riding a
horse, focus on it. Don’t think about fake horse riding.”
“Get lost,” Jiang Chengqing said in a low voice.
After mounting their horses, Jiang Cheng looked back at Gu Fei, and when Gu Fei caught up,
they followed everyone else.
“You,” Jiang Cheng looked ahead for a long time before saying, “That was so sudden.”
“It just happened,” Gu Fei smiled, “I suddenly felt like saying it. I’ve never felt this way
before. It just happened, and I meant it seriously.”
“I know,” Jiang Cheng tilted his head, “I’m serious too.”
Gu Fei smiled.
“Stop taking pictures,” Jiang Cheng glanced at his camera, “Or you’ll fall again, and that
would really be something.”
“I won’t,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
The first scenic spot the uncle took them to was a birch forest.
“It’s very dense and beautiful. There’s a different kind of beauty in every season!” The uncle
introduced them, “Many people come here to take pictures and paint. In our farmhouse, we
often have photographers and painters staying for half a year.”
“We’re here to take pictures,” Zhao Ke said, pointing to Gu Fei, “He’s the photographer.”
“I can tell,” the uncle nodded, “From his camera and his bag, he’s a
photographer. And you guys?”
Apart from Gu Fei’s camera gear, the only photography equipment these people had was
their phones. Jiang Cheng stifled a laugh as he watched Zhao Ke try to continue with this
pretense.
“We’re models,” Zhao Ke said.
“Oh?” The uncle looked puzzled, glanced at them all, and then circled around to get a better
look. “Models?”
“Yes,” Zhao Ke nodded solemnly.
Everyone else nodded in agreement.
“Now that you mention it, it does seem quite fitting,” the uncle continued, “You all are
better looking than the average tourist, and the photographer looks like a model too.”
“He’s a photographer who grew up to be a model,” Zhao Ke continued with a straight face.
“This guy can really talk,” Pan Zhi whispered, “He looks so serious, but he can spin a story
like flying a kite.”
The white birch forest was indeed beautiful. From afar, you could see the vast expanse of
dense green on the grassy slope. The bottom half of the slope was white, which made it
even more striking.
“Wow, it’s so pretty!” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend exclaimed, “Are there eyes on the white birch
trees?”
“Yes,” the uncle said, “Actually, it’s just a scar left by a branch that fell off, but other trees
don’t look like eyes. Only white birch trees do.”
“Uncle,” Pan Zhi said, “Your explanation is too unromantic. You should come up with a
legend or something.”
The uncle laughed, “Nowadays, we emphasize scientific knowledge, but it does look like
eyes. You guys can look for them later.”
“We’ll take Er Miao to find some eyes later… will she be scared?” Jiang Cheng said.
“No,” Gu Fei said, “She’s quite brave. Maybe there are some things she can’t understand,
though.”
As the group dismounted their horses by the edge of the forest, the uncle was still
explaining, but they had already rushed into the woods.
“Found it! Here, here! There’s also some here!” Two girlfriends excitedly ran back and forth
in the woods, “Gu Miao, come and see, there are flowers here!”
Gu Miao rarely played with girls, especially adult women, but at this moment she was
particularly excited to run along with them.
“Say,” Gu Fei held his camera, looking through the viewfinder as he spoke, “if I were a big
sister, would Gu Miao be better off than she is now? I feel like girls are better at taking care
of little girls than boys.”
“Maybe,” Jiang Cheng replied, watching the scene, and then chuckled, “But no, you’re still
the big brother. If you were a big sister, what would I do?”
“I’m so charming, you’d probably still like me the same,” Gu Fei pressed the shutter, “you’ve
had a girlfriend before anyway.”
“Can we just drop this already?” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue, “you’ve been nagging about
this for so long.”
“If I were a girl, I’d definitely be very pretty,” Gu Fei said.
“….yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
“Maybe Pan Zhi would chase after me,” Gu Fei aimed the camera at Pan Zhi in front of him,
“I find that Pan Zhi is quite photogenic too.”
“If you were a girl,” Jiang Cheng said, “you wouldn’t even have a chance to see Pan Zhi, we
wouldn’t have anything in common.”
“Well,” Gu Fei pressed the shutter and turned his head to stare at Jiang Cheng,
“thank goodness I’m a guy.”
“What do you mean, thank goodness?” Jiang Cheng was puzzled.
“I’m just glad I’m a guy,” Gu Fei said.
“Damn,” Jiang Cheng laughed, “you’re crazy.”
There weren’t too many tourists in the woods at the moment. As they walked through the
forest, they occasionally encountered a few. Pan Zhi was somewhat disappointed, saying,
“Why are they all aunts and older sisters? Don’t young girls come here to play?”
“Zhao Ke is also a person,” Jiang Cheng said as he ate beef jerky. “Why are you so thirsty?”
“He has a girlfriend, okay? It’s just that she’s not here with him,” Pan Zhi pointed to himself.
“I’m a single dog, can’t I leave my mark?”
“I swear, your description,” Jiang Cheng laughed and reached into the side pocket of his bag
to take out his own cup, taking a few sips of water. “It’s just spot on.”
“Your cups,” Pan Zhi looked at the cups on the side of Gu Fei’s bag, “are too conspicuous.”
“Does it excite you?” Jiang Cheng handed the cup to Pan Zhi. “Want some? It’s ginseng tea,
refreshing.”
“Sure,” Pan Zhi took a few sips. “Gu Fei, take some wide shots for me.”
“For picking up girls?” Gu Fei looked around. “Go over there. The woods are too dense here,
it’s hard to get good lighting.”
“It’s for self-promotion,” Pan Zhi corrected him. “Don’t make me look tasteless like you and
your other half.”
“Oh,” Gu Fei nodded.
Jiang Cheng felt like Gu Fei had no time to look at the scenery. He kept holding
up his camera and taking pictures of all the models, each one posing in various seductive
ways.
“Let me take some pictures of them,” Jiang Cheng said. “You haven’t really seen the scenery,
have you?”
“I have,” Gu Fei smiled. “It’s quieter and more beautiful in the viewfinder.”
“Isn’t it pitiful? You came all the way here and you have to look at it through the
viewfinder,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You don’t understand,” Gu Fei said. “Scenery isn’t just something you see with your eyes.
When you’re in the scenery, you’re a part of it. You feel more than what you see.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“You’re better suited for studying science,” Gu Fei raised his camera and looked at him. “But
seriously, we should take a group photo.”
“Um,” Jiang Cheng suddenly became enthusiastic, “and Er Miao, I haven’t taken a photo with
her yet.”
At the moment, Gu Miao wasn’t in the woods. She was determined to skateboard on the
grassy slope. Even after being told they could go skiing tomorrow, she didn’t quite
understand. In the end, the uncle found her a patch of grass with fewer bumps and let her
play on it.
“Let’s take pictures first,” Gu Fei opened his tripod, looked around, found a suitable angle,
and fixed the camera on it. “Cheng Ge, go over there and stand, let me see.”
Jiang Cheng walked to the designated spot and stood there. It was a suddenly familiar
feeling; he had stood like this countless times before, watching Gu Fei, who was a few steps
away, behind the camera.
He suddenly felt sentimental.
While staring at the lens, Gu Fei pressed the shutter.
He clicked his tongue. “Taking photos without permission.”
“Come here,” Gu Fei ran over with the remote control, stood behind him, and hugged him.
“Just like this will do.”
For them, taking photos was probably the most harmonious thing they could do besides
being in bed. Any movement, the other person could immediately understand how to
cooperate.
Standing, sitting, hugging, passing by casually, no matter what the scene was, they were in
perfect harmony.
After taking the photo, Jiang Cheng pulled Gu Miao over. This little girl was always cool and
expressionless in photos, without a smile. Finally, they took a set of photos of one person
looking cool and two people pretending to be cool.
When the uncle came to call them to move to another location, the group of people
requested a group photo. After struggling for a while and taking at least twenty to thirty
pictures, they finally satisfied everyone.
After taking the photos, the uncle took them to see the flowers.
“Calendulas,” the uncle said, “there are flowers now, a large patch of them, yellow, very
beautiful. The sun is good today, you will definitely like them!”
“Calendulas?” Pan Zhi looked at the uncle.
“That’s just a daylily,” Gu Fei said. “It’s an essential ingredient for making braised noodles.”
Pan Zhi looked at him and sighed after a while, “I shouldn’t have asked.”
Everyone laughed uncontrollably.
“Don’t underestimate the daylily,” the uncle immediately added, “it’s a very good thing.
Eating it can also improve your beauty.”
Not sure if it was because of his mood, the environment, or the first time he saw a large
patch of daylilies, but Jiang Cheng suddenly realized how beautiful daylilies are.
“Oh my god,” Zhang Qiqi said, “fresh daylilies are amazing!”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said while taking photos, “I realized that I am really quite simple.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“I have never seen any of these before,” Gu Fei said, “I feel like today, I really…
truly stepped out of the steel mill and saw the world for the first time.”
“I’ve never seen them either,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Really?” Gu Fei glanced at him, “That’s probably because everything is different when I’m
with you.”
Jiang Cheng looked at the people around them. It seemed that no one noticed them. He
quickly leaned over and rubbed his face against Gu Fei’s, then kissed
the tip of his ear.
A very fake cough came from behind them.
Gu Fei chuckled and tsked.
Jiang Cheng turned around and saw Pan Zhi taking photos of a cluster of daylilies with his
phone.
“It’s hard to control oneself,” Pan Zhi said, “today I finally understand the meaning of that
phrase.”
After playing in two places, the sky began to darken. The uncle waved his hand,
“Let’s go, it’s time to go back now. You can go play archery and wait for dinner.”
“Archery?” Lu Shi became interested immediately.
“Archery is good, it’s interesting,” Pan Zhi said.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng and asked quietly, “Can’t you show off a bit with archery?
After all, you’re the slingshot prodigy Jiang Cheng.”
“I don’t know,” Jiang Cheng laughed, “I haven’t played in a long time.”
“Contestant Jiang Cheng has chosen a new challenge, and everyone is looking forward to it,”
Gu Fei mimicked his tone, “Coach, can you tell us why he chose this challenge?”
Jiang Cheng looked at him without saying a word, and kept laughing.
“Jiang Cheng has always been someone who dares to challenge himself. He has superlative
professional qualities,” Gu Fei continued quietly, “This time, his boyfriend will also come to
watch and participate in the challenge with him. I believe he will achieve good results.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
“Coach, do you think he will be disappointed if he fails this challenge?” Gu Fei also looked at
him, “No, Jiang Cheng’s greatest strength is his toughness. He won’t bow his head in the face
of any setbacks or failures. He is a powerful athlete who always surprises people.”
“You’re really flattering me,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’m happy to do it,” Gu Fei said.
After returning to the farmhouse, Gu Miao didn’t want to go anywhere else and wanted to
stay with the horses.
Gu Fei tried to persuade her to go to archery, but she refused. In the end, Gu Fei had to
agree to let her sit next to the horse herd.
“I hope she won’t refuse to leave with us later,” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Miao, who was
focused on watching the horses, “Why does she like these horses so much?”
“It’s okay, it’s the first time she’s seen them,” Gu Fei looked at the horses, “It’s my first time
seeing real horses too. If I were her age, I would probably want to stay with the horses all
the time.”
“Fortunately, you’re all grown up now,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Yeah, now I just want to hang out with Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei replied.
“Wanna go do archery?” Zhao Ke walked over. “They’re having a competition over there,
three arrows per round, and the first-place winner gets a prize.”
“What prize?” Jiang Cheng asked immediately.
“It seems to be some kind of strong liquor, the uncle said it’s special,” Zhao Ke said.
“Let’s go take a look,” Gu Fei said.
“I want to compete,” Jiang Cheng said, jumping up and down. “I want to win that bottle of
wine.”
“Why?” Gu Fei laughed. “If you want to drink, we can just buy it. I see plenty of alcohol in
their little shop.”
“No, it’s not the same,” Jiang Cheng still jumped up and down. “I want to win a bottle of
wine to marry you with.”

Raw chapter 140: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24ow
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October 4, 2023
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Saye Ch. 141

Gu Fei watched as Jiang Cheng strode forward, rolling up his sleeves along the way, and
couldn’t resist catching up to him and pinching his butt.
“Ah! What the hell!” Jiang Cheng jumped in surprise, taking a step forward and turning
around to glare at him.
This action was a bit too bold. Although there were no other tourists around, there were
still people from their group. Behind him, Gu Miao was
contemplating while looking at the horses, and next to him was Zhao Ke.
Gu Miao didn’t react, but Zhao Ke glanced over at them and cleared his throat.
“What should I do?”
“Just keep walking,” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Let’s go practice first. They’re all playing at the practice range,” Zhao Ke said.
“The boss said there’s a competition in half an hour. The person who ranked first in the
previous competition hit three bullseyes in the previous round, I wonder how skilled the
next round of participants will be.”
“I’ll be in the next round,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m pretty good.”
Gu Fei had no doubt about Jiang Cheng’s accuracy with a slingshot. Not only did he not
doubt it, he could practically bow down to him for it. But archery…he didn’t even know
how to hold a bow, let alone shoot an arrow. Judging from Jiang Cheng’s demeanor, he
probably hadn’t played it before either.
The practice area was bustling with many people. One of the target positions was occupied
by their group, and several of them took turns aimlessly shooting at the target. The person
guiding them, an older brother, was on the side, smoking a cigarette, with a “as long as
you’re having fun” smile on his face.
When they arrived, Pan Zhi had just shot an arrow that landed on the stick under the target.
He immediately waved his hand and exclaimed very coolly, “I hit the target, damn it!”
“The target will make you cry with anger.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Cheng’er, come here,” Pan Zhi handed over the bow, “Try it, I think you should be able to
do it.”
“I’ve never done it before,” Jiang Cheng took the bow. “It’s quite heavy.”
“Your slingshot with wrist support there is not light either, and it’s still with one hand,” said
Pan Zhi, “Give it a try.”
“Call over Coach Cha to give us some pointers,” said Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng immediately perked up, looked at him and said, “Are you asking for a beating?”
However, Jiang Cheng did have talent in this area. After Coach Cha came over and taught
him for a few minutes on how to stand, hold the bow, and aim, he felt it immediately when
he stood in front of the target and pulled the bowstring to aim.
Gu Fei raised his camera and took several shots.
Jiang Cheng shot arrows like he played slingshots. He didn’t take long to aim.
Basically, he raised the bow, aimed, and before the people around him could react, he had
already let go of the arrow.
This time was the same. While several people were still teaching him their three-minute
experience of shooting arrows, he already let go of his arrow with a snap.
“Great!” Coach Cha next to him exclaimed.
The arrow hit the front target, between the eight or nine rings.
“How about that,” Pan Zhi leaned happily against the wooden pole next to him, looking at
Coach Cha, as if he had shot the arrow himself. “You can tell he’s not an ordinary person,
right?”
“You’ve played before, young man?” Coach Cha asked.
“No,” Jiang Cheng smiled. “But I’ve played with slingshots before.”
“You still play with slingshots?” Zhao Ke was a little surprised. “I couldn’t tell.”
“There are a lot of things you can’t tell,” Jiang Cheng said, and then he took another arrow,
pulled the bowstring, aimed and said, “I’m just that good at keeping a low profile.”
Before Zhao Ke could respond, he shot his second arrow, which landed above the previous
one, close to the bullseye.
“Amazing!” Several people were surprised.
Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng and couldn’t help but want to smile, he didn’t know why.
“Keeping a low profile, Jiang Cheng indeed has many things that he keeps hidden. His
excellence doesn’t need to be shown off; it’s the kind of understated surprise that fits his
character.
Gu Fei looked at the targets next to him, and many people were playing with great interest.
After looking for two or three minutes, he found that a girl in the adjacent spot was actually
shooting quite well, and both of her arrows were hitting the bullseye.
This will definitely become a competition…
He moved two steps over and stared at her for a while, making sure that the two arrows
just now weren’t a fluke.
When he was about to leave, the girl turned her head back, and he didn’t have time to look
away, so he had to meet her gaze.
The girl looked at him, then looked at the camera in his hand and smiled.
He could only awkwardly nod.
The girl tilted her head, smiled and made a V sign, then looked at him.
“Okay,” Gu Fei raised the camera and took a picture of the girl, then quickly turned and
walked away.
He didn’t go back to watch Jiang Cheng shoot arrows, instead he quickly went to the small
shop in the farmhouse yard and asked the owner.
“What kind of wine is the prize for the competition later?” He looked at the various unique
wine bottles hanging on the wall.
“It’s this one,” the owner took down a wine bag. “It’s very strong and people who don’t
drink often will fall down with just one sip, but it’s also very fragrant.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei looked at it and said, “Give me a bottle.”
After buying the wine, he first put it in the Mongolian yurt and then returned to the
shooting range.
“Where did you go?” Jiang Cheng had stopped shooting arrows and was leaning against the
side, watching Zhang Qiqi hugging his girlfriend and pointing.
Then he shot a misfire.
“The bathroom,” Gu Fei said.
“Want to play?” Jiang Cheng asked him.
“I…” Gu Fei hesitated for a moment, then said, “Sure.”
“Give me the camera,” said Jiang Cheng, “I’ll take a few shots for fun, can you help me set it
to automatic?”
“No need for automatic,” Gu Fei opened the camera and looked at it, “just use the settings I
had before. This is how I took your photos.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng nodded and held the camera up to his eye.
Before, he always looked at the LCD screen when using a camera, but Gu Fei had always
looked directly through the viewfinder, so he followed suit.
Aside from the times when the light was too strong and he couldn’t see through the
viewfinder clearly, Jiang Cheng felt that the world through the viewfinder was completely
different from that on the screen.
Especially quiet.
This was what Gu Fei had said.
Jiang Cheng had never really understood this statement clearly, but today he finally
understood what “especially quiet” meant.
Only what you want to see is in front of your eyes.
No distractions, no peripheral vision.
Only the vastness within this small frame.
He quietly watched Gu Fei in front of him.
The calm profile, the slender figure, holding the bow, fitting the arrow, pulling the
bowstring.
Jiang Cheng pressed the shutter button.
Click.
Click click click.
Gu Fei’s movements were captured one by one in front of him, and there was only this one
figure left in the world.
So handsome.
He heard a group of people’s compliments in his ear, then put down the camera, looked
over at the target, and saw it hit the bullseye.
Not bad. For someone who had never played with something that required aiming before,
this was really impressive.
“Luck,” Gu Fei said.
“Try another arrow, see if it’s still luck,” Pan Zhi said.
“Let me gear up first,” Gu Fei said, putting his hand into his coat pocket.
Everyone watched him together, and Jiang Cheng didn’t react to what he was doing until he
took out his glasses from his coat, which made Jiang Cheng burst out laughing.
Everyone was quite surprised.
“Damn, are you near-sighted?” Pan Zhi was stunned.
“Well, my prescription isn’t very strong,” Gu Fei put on his glasses and picked up his bow
again.
“Don’t tell me you were shooting blind just now,” Pan Zhi said.
“It’s not that extreme,” Gu Fei said, “I can see the target without glasses; it’s just not very
clear.”
Jiang Cheng quite liked seeing Gu Fei wearing glasses, although it was rare to see it.
He raised his camera and continued to aim at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei is such a magical person that just putting on glasses changes his whole demeanor.
Now Gu Fei, with glasses, immediately transformed from a calm steel mill boss into a gentle
delinquent.
Jiang Cheng thought about it and laughed, but he didn’t want Gu Fei to hear this evaluation.
This one arrow, with glasses on, proved Gu Fei’s words that he could see the target clearly
with or without glasses, and the arrow hit the bullseye.
“Your equipment didn’t break, did it?” Pan Zhi said.
“Cheng Ge, give me a BUFF1, ” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng and said.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng was stunned.
Add a BUFF, what kind of BUFF and how to add it?
He was stunned by Gu Fei’s sudden request, but finally gritted his teeth and threw a kiss at
Gu Fei.
“Damn,” Pan Zhi was very shocked, “he’s gone crazy.”
Several people immediately shouted and burst into laughter.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything, just smiled and picked up his bow, strung an arrow, and aimed
again.
Nine rings.
“It really works,” Zhao Ke laughed.
After everyone practiced for a while, the competition was about to begin on the other side,
and Lu Shi was ready to go over and register for everyone.
“Pan Zhi, Jiang Cheng, Gu Fei, and me, who else?” he asked.
“It’s just the few of you,” his girlfriend said. “The rest of us who can’t even hit the target will
just cheer you on from the sidelines.”
“I’m not going to participate,” Gu Fei said.
“Huh?” Lu Shi was surprised. “You’re so good, why not join?”
Several people looked at him in surprise.
“I’m just playing around, not really interested in the competition,” Gu Fei said.
“I’ll get too nervous and end up hitting someone.”
“It’s not that serious,” Zhang Qiqi laughed.
“Then don’t participate,” Pan Zhi said. “Jiang Cheng is representing his family, and you can
send one from yours.”
“Are you with Zhao Ke’s family?” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend asked with a smile.
“Someone like him, a fake single dog,” Pan Zhi said, “I’ve drawn a clear line between him
and me. There is a gap.”
“I’m video chatting,” Zhao Ke shook the phone in his hand. “With Zhao Jin.”
“Sis!” Pan Zhi immediately turned his head and shouted.
“I didn’t expect you to be like this,” Zhao Ke sighed, “just kidding.”
“…Zhao Ke, you just look like a serious person,” Pan Zhi pointed at him.
After registering, they stood by the fence, watching the people in front compete while
chatting.
“You’re not going to compete?” Jiang Cheng whispered to Gu Fei.
“No, not used to it,” Gu Fei smiled.
“Then can you take pictures for me?” Jiang Cheng said as he looked at the photos on his
camera.
“Sure,” Gu Fei nodded.
It wasn’t strange for Gu Fei to not want to participate in the competition. There were
certain things in his personality that wouldn’t change, like how he couldn’t adapt to being
in the spotlight in front of so many people.
But there was no need to change. These unchangeable habits were a part of his
temperament that was quite attractive, from the beginning until now.
As long as he moves forward, it doesn’t matter what posture he uses.
For Jiang Cheng… His finger paused while flipping through the photos.
What the fuck?
A beautiful girl.
A beautiful girl holding a bow and smiling even brighter than the V sign in front of the
camera.
“Gu Fei?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at Gu Fei and called out to him through gritted teeth.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei looked at him.
Jiang Cheng pointed at the camera, “You dog…”
“Hey!” A girl’s voice sounded behind them.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei both turned around and saw a girl standing behind them.
Oh?
Oh!
Although Jiang Cheng was almost useless when it came to remembering people, he could
still remember her after looking at the photo and then at the person in just a second.
This was the beautiful girl in the photo.
“Are you also participating in the competition?” the girl asked Gu Fei with a smile.
“No,” Gu Fei said.
“Ah, I am participating. It’s my turn soon,” the girl said. “I thought you were participating
too, so we could compete against each other.”
What a joke.
Jiang Cheng looked at her.
Gu Fei had been with him all day, how did he suddenly meet this girl and even have her
photo in the camera?
“Hello,” the girl looked at Jiang Cheng again, “You also came with friends, right? I see there
are quite a lot of you.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng responded.
“Are you participating too?” the girl asked with a smile.
“Yeah, I am participating,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Let’s compete later,” the girl said as she waved towards the competition area,
“My friend is calling me, it’s my turn. I’ll go first.”
“Good luck,” Gu Fei said.
“Take a few more pictures for me,” the girl turned her head while walking towards the area
and said, “I’ll ask you for the pictures later.”
“Sure,” Gu Fei responded.
Jiang Cheng watched as the girl walked away, then turned to Gu Fei and said,
“Go and follow her.”
“Cheng Ge, listen to me explain,” Gu Fei said.
“I’m not listening, I’m not listening, I’m not listening,” Jiang Cheng glared at him. “I’m not
listening.”
Gu Fei looked at him, his mouth twitching with suppressed laughter.
“What, if I’m not listening you’re not going to explain?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Well, you see, just a moment ago…” Gu Fei began.
“I’m not listening, I’m not listening, I don’t want to hear it,” Jiang Cheng interrupted.
“I’ll hit you,” Gu Fei said.
“We’ll talk later,” Jiang Cheng sighed and glanced over to the other side. “Just wait and see
me steal your romantic encounter.”
Zhao Ke waved at them.
“Let’s go, over there,” Jiang Cheng said. “Give me a close-up shot.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
Apart from Jiang Cheng, who was still competing, everyone in their group had already
finished. Their results were astonishing, but they had to combine their scores to match the
scores of others.
“We should sign up as a group,” Pan Zhi said.
“And then compete as a group against individuals?” Gu Fei said.
Pan Zhi looked at him and sighed after a moment, then patted Jiang Cheng’s shoulder.
“Cheng’er, it’s up to you.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, he looked at the scoreboard of the competition field.
Although they were all tourists, the results were surprisingly good, and everyone had a
serious look of competition.
After scanning the field with his eyes, Jiang Cheng saw the girl he had been following earlier
was competing.
An arrow had already been shot and landed perfectly on the bullseye.
“Wow,” Gu Fei said, taking a few pictures of the girl. “She’s pretty good, Cheng Ge, you need
to focus.”
“Are you trying to provoke me?” Jiang Cheng whispered. “I’m calm right now, whether I’m
provoked or not, it doesn’t matter. And I don’t have time to be jealous right now.”
Gu Fei smiled and quickly touched his waist, “You weren’t really jealous just now.”
After the girl finished shooting, Jiang Cheng looked at the score: two perfect 10s and a 9.7.
Jiang Cheng was impressed that an archery competition in a grassland farm could be so
precise, even to one decimal place.
“Cheng’er, it’s your turn!” Pan Zhi called him.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei, “watch as your Cheng Ge shows off.”
Gu Fei looked at him seriously, “Okay.”
Jiang Cheng picked a bow he liked from a few and stood in position.
Actually, whether it was an exam or a competition, he rarely had a specific target to beat
someone or achieve a better score than someone else. His goal was always for himself. “I
want to get first place. I want to achieve a certain score.”
As for who he needed to surpass to achieve this goal, he never cared, it was all the same to
him.
As for that beautiful girl, her score was pretty good and was currently the highest.
Even though they jokingly categorized her as Gu Fei’s romantic encounter, his mindset
remains the same as before.
He wanted that bottle of wine.
He wanted to take Gu Fei Fei home.
He raised the bow, aimed, and shot.
Jiang Cheng realized that although the targets for these so-called archery competitions
were quite large and close, probably to let tourists feel like sharpshooters, the targets for
this competition were actually farther away than those in the practice area.
Tsk, tsk.
But for Jiang Cheng, who had excellent vision, aiming wasalmost a conditioned reflex of the
body. Visual acuity and distance are not the primary factors.
He pulled the bowstring taut and shot the first arrow.
Just like when he played with a slingshot, he could almost judge the target when the arrow
flew out.
9.9 points.
Jiang Cheng felt that the way of scoring by artificial judgment was too arbitrary.
He didn’t know how the scorer judged the 9.9 points.
There was a cheer and applause behind him. His cheerleading team was strong, after all,
there were many people.
He turned his head to look for Gu Fei, but suddenly found that Gu Miao was
standing beside Gu Fei’s leg, staring at him with round eyes.
Gu Fei raised his camera and smiled at him, and he smirked.
Gu Miao quickly snapped her fingers at him and gave him a thumbs up. Jiang Cheng
returned the gesture.
Gu Miao probably didn’t understand the meaning of the competition. She was probably just
here to see Cheng Ge show off.
So, he’ll show off again.
He pulled the bowstring again.
The second section, chest expansion exercise.
Hey ha!
The sound of the arrow flying out was particularly pleasant. Jiang Cheng gave himself a
round of applause in his heart.
The onlookers applauded too.
However, Jiang Cheng felt that the arrow that hit the bullseye was still judged as 9.9 points
by the scorer.
It was so arbitrary.
If the scorer was an old lady, he might have scored a perfect 10.
For that bottle of wine, no, to marry Gu Fei, he decided to go all out.
When Jiang Cheng shot his last arrow, Gu Fei put down his camera and took out his phone,
filming a video of Jiang Cheng’s last arrow, which he shot in order to…marry him. Whether
or not he could marry Gu Fei depended on this last arrow.
When the scorer shouted “10 points”, Jiang Cheng turned his head.
Gu Fei smiled at him and made a V sign.
Until Jiang Cheng approached him, he was still holding his phone and taking pictures.
“I’ll go get the wine,” Jiang Cheng said to the camera.
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
He then bent down and gave Gu Miao a high-five, “Er Miao, this is called a high-five. We do
it when we celebrate victory. Remember?”
“You have to teach her at least another ten or eight times,” Gu Fei said.
“Just remember what I said,” Jiang Cheng stood up straight and looked at him,
“this bottle of wine…”
Halfway through his sentence, he looked around. The tourists had started to disperse, but
their group had gathered around him. Jiang Cheng had to look at him, “You know.”
“I know,” Gu Fei said with a smile.
“Enough talking, let’s go get the wine,” Jiang Cheng said.
After getting the wine, the pretty girl approached them, “You’re really amazing, handsome
guy.”
“Just lucky,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Are you playing tomorrow?” she asked.
“We have other plans tomorrow,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Oh, I see,” she looked at Gu Fei, “Can we add each other as friends? Can you send me the
pictures?”
NO!
In your dreams!
“Okay,” Gu Fei said, taking out his phone.
After adding her as a friend, the girl laughed for a while, “Your name is so funny… see you
at the bonfire party tonight.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything.
After the girl left, Jiang Cheng pointed at Gu Fei, “Let’s go back to the room.”
“Gu Miao is still here,” Gu Fei said.
“Rest for a bit and change clothes,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, “What are you thinking
about?”
“Thinking about you,” Gu Fei said.
“It’s useless,” Jiang Cheng grinned, “Sweet talk won’t work at a time like this.”
Gu Miao followed them back to the yurt. She was probably tired, as she went straight to the
bed and hugged her little blanket, closing her eyes as if she wanted to sleep.
Gu Fei was about to go over and talk to her, but was pulled back by Jiang Cheng.
“Gu Xiaofei2,” Jiang Cheng grabbed his clothes and pushed him towards the wall, shaking
the bottle of alcohol in his other hand. “You really don’t make it easy for me. You need to
hurry up and marry her so I can be at ease.”
“When you were confessing on the confession wall every day, I didn’t say anything.” Gu Fei
hugged his waist and whispered.
“Can that be the same?” Jiang Cheng glared at him fiercely.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything and leaned in to lightly kiss him on the corner of his mouth.
“You…” Jiang Cheng reflexively closed his eyes, then quickly opened them wide. “Don’t do
that…”
“Jiang Cheng!” Zhao Ke shouted from outside. “Get ready and go to the courtyard over there
for the bonfire party.”
“Okay!” Jiang Cheng responded, then turned his head to continue glaring at Gu Fei. “You…”
“Bring that bottle of wine with you. Let everyone have a taste!” Zhao Ke said again.
“Okay…” Jiang Cheng responded again, then hesitated. “Shit, they want to drink it?”
“Yeah… surprised?” Gu Fei laughed.
“That won’t do,” Jiang Cheng let go of him and picked up the bottle of alcohol.
“I’ll go buy another bottle.”
“No need, I have one,” Gu Fei grabbed him and bit his earlobe, then took out another bottle
of alcohol from the nearby cabinet and handed it to him. “We’ll drink this tonight.”
“Where did this come from?” Jiang Cheng was confused.
“I just bought it.” Gu Fei said.
“Why did you buy this?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I saw that girl practicing earlier and thought she was pretty good… I think she thought I
was secretly taking pictures of her, so I took another picture of her.”
Gu Fei explained.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng chuckled. In fact, he didn’t really intend to ask Gu Fei what
was going on. “And then?”
“Then I thought, what if… you happen to run into her during the competition, and what if
you don’t win…” Gu Fei said.
“Are you afraid I’ll be disappointed?” Jiang Cheng hugged him. “How is that possible? It’s
just a game.”
“No,” Gu Fei squeezed his waist. “I was thinking, what if you didn’t win the bottle of wine
and you didn’t want to marry me anymore, so I bought a bottle just in case.”
Jiang Cheng held back his laughter for a long time. “Damn.”
“I am considering everything thoroughly,” Gu Fei kissed him.
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng hugged him tightly and kissed him back.

Raw chapter 141: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24ox#:~:text=%E8%86%80%E5%AD%90%E5%BE%80-
,%E5%89%8D,-%E9%82%81%E8%91%97%E5%A4%A7
1. “Give me a BUFF,” or “add a BUFF,” typically means to enhance
or improve someone’s abilities or attributes, as if in a video game.
In this context, Gu Fei is likely asking for some kind of support or
encouragement from Jiang Cheng ↩
2. A nickname or a playful way to address Gu Fei ↩
voromih258
October 19, 2023
Uncategorized
bl, danmei, gufei, gumiao, jiangcheng, lgbt, love, romance, webnovel, wuzhe
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Saye Ch. 142

Gu Miao doesn’t adapt well to crowded places. For example, when people gather around
the bonfire in the evening at a farmhouse, she tends to get a little nervous and is unwilling
to go over.
However, she really wanted to eat meat.
In the end, she picked a spot and sat on the grass farthest away, while Gu Fei kept bringing
her meat.
The bonfire and the excitement over here didn’t appeal to her, as long as she had meat and
could see horses.
Although the horses were all resting.
“It’s quite unusual,” Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend held up her chin and looked at Gu Miao, who
was sitting cross-legged on the grass more than ten meters away, gnawing on meat and
facing the night in the distance. “I think she must have a lot of her own ideas, but adults just
can’t understand her.”
“You just have to take it slow, she’s making quite a bit of progress now. Last year, I never
thought I could take her out to play,” Jiang Cheng tore into his meat as he spoke, “Maybe in
a few more months, she’ll be able to say that Cheng Ge is handsome.”
Gu Fei glanced at him and smiled.
“Handsome, aren’t I?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“Your lips have oil all over them,” Gu Fei said.
“You have to have oily lips when you eat meat,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue,
“Don’t be shy, eat as much as you want, it’s a rare treat…”
“I can’t even kiss you with oily lips,” Gu Fei’s voice was very low.
Jiang Cheng was startled and almost choked, quickly turning his head.
Pan Zhi next to him looked at him warily, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng said.
“If you dare to smear oil on me, I will definitely throw away the principle of respecting the
elderly and caring for the young and fight you to the death,” Pan Zhi said.
“You…” Jiang Cheng didn’t finish his sentence before he felt someone walking towards
them.
Before he turned his head, he heard a girl’s voice saying, “Good evening.”
Jiang Cheng felt that his facial expression must have changed quite noticeably, and Pan Zhi,
as a perfect ironclad, instantly understood and exchanged a quick glance with him.
A potential love rival?
Yes.
The gist of the telepathic communication was as follows.
“Good evening,” Gu Fei greeted her.
“This is the nougat I made,” the girl took out a small iron box and put it on their table. “I
brought some out this time. You guys should try it.”
“Thank you,” Jiang Cheng smiled, despite having no expression on his face before. It wasn’t
very graceful for an older gentleman to have a girl specially come over and offer small
snacks with a straight face.
“Don’t mention it,” the girl smiled, waved her hand, and walked towards her own table
while saying, “You guys eat first. I’ll come over and have a drink with you later!”
Jiang Cheng felt his eyes widen for a moment. She was coming over to have a drink with
them?
He turned to look at Gu Fei.
“Hmm?” Gu Fei also looked at him.
“She’s inviting us for drinks?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“That’s what she said to you guys,” Gu Fei said.
“Does that include me?” Pan Zhi asked.
“It should include all of us at this table,” Gu Fei said.
“Alright,” Pan Zhi nodded, patted Jiang Cheng on the shoulder, and picked up
his own glass. “Grandpa, leave this to me.”
“What are you going to do?” Jiang Cheng was puzzled.
“Find someone to have a drink with,” Pan Zhi said leisurely, swaying his glass as he made
his way over to the girl’s table.
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei turned to look at him together.
Pan Zhi was gifted in this area. After he greeted the girl and exchanged a few words, a few
other girls crowded around them and made space for him to sit comfortably.
“Cheng-ge,” Gu Fei looked at Jiang Cheng with a serious expression, “you must not learn
from him.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng laughed, “I can’t learn from him. I’ve known him for so many years, if I
could learn it, I would have learned it by now.”
“I can’t be with anyone but you,” Gu Fei said, “Your jealousy is fine for fun, but please don’t
take it seriously.”
“What if I do take it seriously,” Jiang Cheng took a sip of the wine, which indeed was as
fragrant as the boss had advertised. However, a single sip seemed to set his throat on fire,
burning from the throat to the stomach and then returning to the top of his head. He
exclaimed, “This wine is too strong.”
“I’m okay with strong drinks, but the boss said that someone who doesn’t drink often will
collapse after just one sip,” Gu Fei narrowed his eyes and said, “I’m waiting to see if you will
collapse or not.”
“Why, are you hoping for me to collapse?” Jiang Cheng laughed, “If I collapse, it’s fine.
Anyway, with Er Miao here, we can’t seal the deal.”
“Not necessarily,” Gu Fei looked at him with a sly smile.
“Gu Fei,” Jiang Cheng pointed at him, “what are you expressing with that sneaky smile?”
“I’m expressing excitement,” Gu Fei whispered in his ear.
“Excitement my ass!” Jiang Cheng said, maybe because he had drank almost two liang of the
supposedly one-cup-down drink, his voice was a little out of control and he shouted quite
loudly.
“Excitement! Why not be excited!” Lu Shi slammed the table, “Look! Is there anyone here
who isn’t excited!”
Everyone at the table nodded in agreement and clinked their glasses.
Even if they hadn’t drunk enough to collapse, they had still consumed a lot of specialty
liquors, like sheep’s milk wine, mare’s milk wine, and fruit wine. At this point, they were all
in a state of partial sobriety, but definitely starting to get a little tipsy.
Jiang Cheng watched them with amusement.
When everyone was almost finished eating, a few employees from the nearby farmhouses
walked over and music started playing. They began dancing around the bonfire in the
middle.
A circle of tourists eating and drinking became excited and began shouting and clapping to
the rhythm. Then, the dancers ran to nearby tables and started pulling people to dance.
Jiang Cheng and his group were sitting a little farther away, but before anyone came to pull
them, everyone at their table stood up and said,
“Let’s dance!”
“I’m not going,” Zhao Ke said. “I’ll eat a little longer.”
“Ke Er!” Pan Zhi appeared out of nowhere, patted him on the shoulder, and said,
“Let’s go dance!”
“I don’t know how…” Zhao Ke hadn’t finished speaking when Pan Zhi pulled him up and
dragged him towards the bonfire.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei put his arm around Jiang Cheng’s shoulder and pointed to Pan Zhi.
“Look.”
Jiang Cheng took a sip of tea and was surprised to see that Pan Zhi was actually holding
hands with the girl he was with earlier.
In less than an hour, Jiang Cheng was quite impressed with Pan Zhi’s efficiency.
“My romantic encounter,” Gu Fei joked, “was stolen just like that.”
“Why, are you disappointed?” Jiang Cheng laughed happily. Everyone around them was also
laughing and having fun, and he laughed along with them.
“Let’s go,” Gu Fei stood up and pulled his arm.
“I’m not going,” Jiang Cheng smiled and shrunk back. “I really don’t know how to dance, and
I don’t want to go over there.”
“I’m not asking you to dance,” Gu Fei said. “Just come with me.”
“Where are we going?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“You’ll see when we get there,” Gu Fei smiled.
Gu Fei went to call Gu Miao, who was already asleep at this time. When he went to wake her
up, she was sitting cross-legged and napping, like a little old lady, which made Jiang Cheng
want to laugh.
“Go back to sleep, Er Miao,” Gu Fei pulled her up, “Do you want anything else to eat?”
Gu Miao squinted and shook her head.
“Then let’s go. Big brother will take you back to sleep,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng had been leaning on the nearby railing, listening to Gu Fei speak.
The alcohol was indeed quite strong; while drinking, he hadn’t felt it that strongly. But now,
when he stood up and moved, he realized that his footing was unsteady. He felt like he was
swaying, and he couldn’t control even a simple head turn; a 45-degree angle could easily
turn into a right angle.
When they were walking towards the Mongolian tent, Gu Miao turned around several times
to look at him. Gu Fei said, “Cheng Ge is drunk.”
Gu Miao glanced at him again.
“Are you looking down on me?” Jiang Cheng laughed, “Not everyone can drink like your
brother.”
Gu Miao probably didn’t understand, so she turned her head and continued walking
forward.
After they returned to the room and Gu Miao finished washing up, Gu Fei spread out her
little blanket, put the pillow in place, and put her clothes next to the pillow.
Gu Miao climbed onto the bed, and after personally checking it, she layed down.
Gu Fei put her special phone next to her, “Your phone is here. If you can’t find big brother at
night, send a message, okay?”
Gu Miao nodded, and she was probably tired, as she pushed Gu Fei away, pulled over the
little blanket, covered herself and closed her eyes.
“Can’t find big brother at night?” Jiang Cheng finally asked.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei nodded, picked up a big bag from the ground and put it on his back. He also
picked up his camera bag and hung it around Jiang Cheng’s neck.
“Where is her big brother going at night?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Her big brother is going out to play with Cheng Ge tonight,” Gu Fei hugged him and kissed
him on the nose.
Jiang Cheng’s head was buzzing a bit. He always felt this way when he drank too much. He
couldn’t hear things clearly, and everything he looked at seemed to be spinning. His legs
felt alternately long and short, as if he were walking with a limp, and walking was quite
unsteady.
When walking out of the Mongolian yurt with Gu Fei, they could still see the lively crowd
around the bonfire in the courtyard, with everyone wearing a smile, dancing, jumping, or
sitting to drink and chat.
Gu Fei put his arm around his shoulder and led him away from the scene.
This feeling was wonderful.
In the dark night, the bright fire and the noisy crowd gradually faded away behind them.
They walked forward in the chilly night breeze, and as the laughter disappeared, they could
hear the rustling of the grass when the wind blew, the strange and intertwining chirping of
insects, and even their footsteps.
“Will we get lost?” Jiang Cheng asked. He felt his voice was low, but it was clear on the quiet
grassland. He could even hear the drunkenness in his own voice.
“No, we won’t,” Gu Fei said. “We’re not going too far. I saw it on horseback today. Just
beyond that grassy slope in front of us, there’s a patch of grass that grows particularly thick
and well.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng replied.
“It must be especially comfortable to lie on,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng paused for a moment and then burst into laughter. While laughing, he
staggered and patted Gu Fei on the butt, saying, “You bunny! Are you thinking about some
outdoor action?”
“Yes,” Gu Fei said.
“How can you answer so calmly?” Jiang Cheng still laughed.
“I have no shame,” Gu Fei replied.
“But let me tell you,” Jiang Cheng leaned against him. “You have to wait for me to sober up.
I’m a little dizzy right now.”
“Why do you need to sober up?” Gu Fei asked.
“Because of you!” Jiang Cheng shouted loudly.
Gu Fei covered his mouth and looked behind him, saying, “Cheng Ge, there are at least four
couples in our courtyard, plus others from neighboring farms who come to hang out. There
could be dozens of people around us.”
“Mm,” Jiang Cheng muttered through the gap between Gu Fei’s fingers.
“When we do it later, don’t scream too loud,” Gu Fei whispered in his ear.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng replied, then widened his eyes and muttered indistinctly in Gu Fei’s
palm, “Who’s doing who?”
“I’m,” Gu Fei whispered in his ear again. “doing you.”
“In your dreams!” Jiang Cheng said.
“In reality too,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng was about to speak, but Gu Fei nudged his leg. He suddenly felt the ground
vanish from beneath him, and he toppled backward.
However, Gu Fei caught him with his arm, so when he fell, apart from feeling dizzy, he
found the ground surprisingly soft.
But immediately after, Gu Fei crouched down and gave him another push.
It was then that he realized he was lying on a grassy slope. With Gu Fei’s push, he slid down
as if he were on a slide.
“I—” Jiang Cheng tried to control his body, but failed. “Fuck.”
He tumbled headfirst down and gazed at Gu Fei, who stood at the top of the slope. Dazed
for a moment, he didn’t know what to say, but he thought Gu Fei, bathed in the moonlight,
looked very handsome.
“Are you awake?” Gu Fei threw his bag up the slope, but it slid back down.
“Your… camera bag,” Jiang Cheng pointed to the camera bag in the middle of the slope,
which must have fallen there earlier.
“It’s fine, the bag has shock absorption,” Gu Fei said as he jumped and slid down the slope.
“Cheng Ge…”
“You fucking…” Jiang Cheng was startled when he saw Gu Fei sliding towards him. He
quickly propped his arm up and tried to move backwards, fearing that Gu Fei might
accidentally kick him in the crotch when he loses control.
But Gu Fei stopped sliding halfway, probably because the dirt under him had already been
rubbed away, causing too much friction.
Jiang Cheng had just breathed a sigh of relief and was about to speak when Gu
Fei suddenly stood up and rushed down.
“Holy shit!” Jiang Cheng felt like a coward in a horror movie who couldn’t stand up against
an approaching monster. He could only awkwardly shuffle backwards on the ground.
He watched Gu Fei pounce on him like an eclipse, prop himself up with his arms, and then
kiss him on the lips.
Before he could even respond, Gu Fei had already let go of him, stood up, and grabbed a
large bag before walking off to the side.
“You…” Jiang Cheng sighed and lay still on the ground, feeling dizzy.
Gu Fei opened the bag and pulled out something, laying it on the ground and straightening
it out before shaking it a few times. Suddenly, the thing popped open.
“What the fuck?” Jiang Cheng was surprised. “A tent?”
“Yeah, not bad,” Gu Fei said. “It’s even automatic.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng was still stunned.
“We’ll sleep here tonight,” Gu Fei laid down a moisture-proof pad and threw a sleeping bag
inside the tent. “Right here.”
“In the tent?” Jiang Cheng tried to sit up on the ground.
“Let’s get down to business first,” Gu Fei walked over and pulled him up, hugging him and
kissing his neck and shoulders. He then reached into Jiang Cheng’s clothes and pushed him
towards the tent. “And then I want to take pictures of the stars tonight, and I still have to
take pictures of the sunrise after only two hours of sleep. You can’t sleep. You have to keep
me company.”
“Uh,” Jiang Cheng felt his breathing becoming uncontrollably heavy, struggling between
alcohol and desire, his rational mind persisted and asked, “What if someone comes?”
“If you don’t make a sound,” Gu Fei pressed his shoulder and shoved him into the tent, then
followed him inside, “even if someone comes, they won’t know what’s going on here.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng lay down, “this tent is so small, is it for two people?”
“It’s for two people,” Gu Fei closed the tent door, quickly took off his coat, and pounced on
him, “for outdoor action only.”
“Bullshit,” Jiang Cheng laughed.
Gu Fei didn’t say anything else. He didn’t even take off his coat. He just unzipped it, pushed
up the clothes inside on Jiang Cheng’s chest and stomach, and rubbed against him while
kissing him.
Jiang Cheng didn’t make a sound either. He reached up and grabbed Gu Fei’s shoulder.
Gu Fei pulled down his pants without even taking them off, and pressed his legs up.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng felt the blood rushing to his head from the leg press, “do you have to be
so urgent?”
“Yes,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng was still quite dizzy. He had initially thought he would be the one taking care of
his “little bunny” tonight, but now, between the dizziness and excitement, he found himself
unable to exert much effort.
When Gu Fei entered, the sudden intense stimulation made him unable to suppress his
voice: “Ah…”
“Shhh.” Gu Fei said softly, reaching out to cover his mouth.
…
When Gu Fei loosened his hand from covering his mouth, Jiang Cheng bit down on his
finger.
“Let go,” Gu Fei pinched his chin.
But Jiang Cheng still kept his mouth shut and continued biting.
“Fine, you can keep biting,” Gu Fei rested on his pillow and looked at him, “I’ll try again
later.”
“Damn it,” Jiang Cheng finally let go and glanced at him, “Does this
environment really turn you on?”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei lowered his head and kissed him, “Doesn’t it turn you on too?”
“…Ah,” Jiang Cheng responded.
The tent was a bit small, and they struggled for a while before finally cleaning up the
battlefield and putting on their clothes.
“Do you still want to take pictures of the stars?” Jiang Cheng asked as he lay down, half-
closed his eyes.
“Yeah,” Gu Fei sat beside him, attaching his lens to the camera, “Didn’t you see?
The starry sky on this side is especially beautiful with the Milky Way.”
“I didn’t notice,” Jiang Cheng said, “I got a little dizzy from drinking and didn’t dare to look
up. If I did, I’d definitely fall.”
Gu Fei opened the tent door and pulled Jiang Cheng outside, then turned him around with
his arm.
“Hey…” Jiang Cheng felt dizzy and closed his eyes.
Gu Fei placed an inflatable pillow under his head and said, “Look, Cheng-ge.”
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng opened his eyes.
He was speechless at the sight before him.
To be honest, Jiang Cheng had always felt that he lacked any romantic sensibilities,
especially when compared to Gu Fei. He wasn’t particularly romantic or artistic, and many
things, beauty or lack thereof, didn’t deeply touch him.
But when he opened his eyes and saw the spectacular stars stretching across the night sky
for the first time, he was overwhelmed.
The dark, bright sky, the large areas of silver and dark red light intertwined, and his breath
stopped.
Gu Fei lay down next to him and asked softly, “Is it beautiful?”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng replied softly.
“When I was a kid,” Gu Fei said, “when I didn’t dare go home, I would go up the mountain
and stay there from afternoon until the next day.”
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng held his hand.
“If we have time, I’ll take you to climb that mountain. It’s a bit far from the steel plant, in the
suburbs,” Gu Fei said, “That’s where I first saw stars like this.”
“I’ve never seen them before,” Jiang Cheng said.
“As I grew up, I stopped going there,” Gu Fei said, “I was worried about Er Miao when my
dad was at home.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything, but he held Gu Fei’s hand tightly.
“I’ve always thought the sky is beautiful,” Gu Fei smiled. “During the day, at night, clear
skies or cloudy ones, it’s all beautiful.”
“Have you ever,” Jiang Cheng looked at the vast expanse of stars, “taken pictures of the
night sky before?”
“No,” Gu Fei smiled. “There wasn’t a suitable time, and maybe I just stopped looking at the
sky later and didn’t think about taking pictures. I’ve taken many pictures of the sun
though.”
“Do you want to take pictures now?” Jiang Cheng turned his head.
“You should rest for a while,” Gu Fei said. “I want you to accompany me for photography,
and then you can sleep later.”
“I’m not sleepy,” Jiang Cheng said. “You’ve kept me awake.”
Gu Fei laughed at the sky for a while and said, “Do I have that much power?”
“Well,” Jiang Cheng slowly sat up, zipped up his jacket, and then sighed, “This was really a
quickie. My clothes aren’t even off, and my pants are only halfway down.”
“If you’re not satisfied, you can take it all off and we can do it again,” Gu Fei joked.
“You shameless brat,” Jiang Cheng crawled out of the tent, stood up and stretched lazily,
“Where are we going to take pictures?”
“Up the slope,” Gu Fei grabbed his tripod and camera, pointed to the place they slid down
from earlier, “I checked it out earlier, and it looks good.”
Jiang Cheng followed Gu Fei up to the top of the slope and sat on the grass, watching him
take pictures.
Gu Fei set up the camera and spent some time adjusting it before taking a shot.
“Cheng Ge, take a look,” he said.
“Look,” Jiang Cheng immediately approached, peering into the viewfinder. “It’s so beautiful.
I don’t know why, but what you capture through the camera feels different from what you
see with your own eyes.”
“Quieter,” Gu Fei said.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him.
Gu Fei took a few more pictures, but when some clouds appeared, he stopped and moved
the tripod behind Jiang Cheng.
When Cheng Jiang turned around, he saw that the camera was pointed at him.
“Why did you start taking pictures of me halfway through?” he asked with a smile.
“You look sexy with that just-been-fucked expression,” said Gu Fei as he adjusted the
camera.
“Fuck off. Does my face have ‘just been f*cked’ written all over it? Did you forget to add ‘by
Gu Fei’ in parentheses?” Jiang Cheng retorted.
“Are you happy?” Gu Fei asked from behind the camera.
“Your Cheng Ge’s last name is Jiang1, ” Jiang Cheng said. Gu Fei smiled, and Jiang Cheng
looked at him. After a moment, he spoke again, “Yes, I’m happy.”

Raw chapter 142: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

d8acc4ee336c/chapters/24oy#:~:text=%E5%A4%9A%E7%9A%84%E5%9C%B0-
,%E6%96%B9,-%EF%BC%8C%E5%83%8F%E6%99%9A%E4%B8%8A
1. I’m not entirely sure why he brought up his last name in response to the question. It
might be that Jiang Cheng is jokingly implying
that his last name (Jiang) is related to happiness or that he finds
happiness in his last name in a playful way. ↩
voromih258
October 29, 2023
Uncategorized
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Saye Ch. 143
This was probably the first time Jiang Cheng had ever stayed up all night without closing
his eyes even for a second.
He accompanied Gu Fei to take photos of the stars, capturing various silhouettes
illuminated in the darkness. Later, they lay down on top of the grassy slope together to gaze
at the stars. But it was too cold in the middle of the night, so they returned to the tent and
crawled into their sleeping bags, poking their heads out from the tent.
They watched the stars and the moon.
Until the horizon began to lighten.
Gu Fei climbed up the slope with his camera equipment on his back.
“Can you get some photos?” Jiang Cheng followed behind him.
“Yes,” Gu Fei bent down to look through the viewfinder. “I’ll take some good ones for you.”
“Take a few photos of me later,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Sure,” Gu Fei said. “Later, you can go to the slope on the other side and jump.
It will make for a great silhouette with the sun behind you.”
“How should I jump?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Jump with both feet off the ground, the higher the better,” Gu Fei smiled.
“Alright.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his hands together and fastened the hat on his jacket.
Although it was already May, it was still freezing before sunrise. Fortunately, they brought
thick jackets.
Sunrise was one of the most exciting and awe-inspiring sights.
Jiang Cheng stared at the brightening horizon, and when a not-so-dazzling golden color
emerged, he couldn’t help but shout, “It’s coming out! The sun is coming out!”
“Jiang Cheng is about to bloom,” Gu Fei chuckled.
“It really looks like an egg yolk,” Jiang Cheng gazed at the sun rising bit by bit from the
horizon. “I can still stare at it now, but I’ll be blinded soon.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei said as he pressed the shutter. “When I tell you to go, run over quickly. You
only have two minutes, so hurry up. Once you miss it, you won’t be able to take any more
shots.”
“Got it,” Jiang Cheng began jumping in place, swinging his arms and kicking his legs to
warm up his body that was already a little stiff from the cold.
As the sun was about to leap out of the horizon, Gu Fei shouted, “Let’s go!”
Jiang Cheng rushed down the grass slope and ran up the opposite slope, then began
jumping without any hesitation, waving his arms, doing splits, and kicking.
After a while, his back was covered in sweat.
When the sun started to turn white, Gu Fei stood up straight and waved his arms at him.
He ran down the grass slope, jumping and running back to Gu Fei, hugging him and giving
him a kiss, saying “Good morning, Gu Fei.”
“Good morning, Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei smiled.
As they packed up and headed back, they ran into quite a few people who had also come to
watch the sunrise. At a glance, there were more than a few dozen people, and at this
density, there must have been over a hundred.
“I can’t believe how many people there are,” Jiang Cheng sighed.
“That’s why I told you not to shout so loudly,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him but didn’t say anything.
“You tell me if what I said makes sense,” Gu Fei said.
“Ah, yes, yes, yes, yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
When they returned to the yurt, Gu Miao was standing at the door, brushing her teeth with
Zhang Qiqi’s girlfriend.
“Did you go watch the sunrise?” she asked.
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “Did you guys not go?”
“We set an alarm, but didn’t wake up,” she sighed with her toothbrush in her mouth.
“Everyone else went, but the two of us didn’t wake up. Zhao Ke even called us, but we didn’t
hear it.”
“We’re leaving tomorrow afternoon, so there’s still a chance in the morning,” Gu Fei said.
“I feel like I still won’t be able to wake up, I’ve given up at this point,” she said sadly.
After Gu Miao finished washing up, they went to have breakfast together and saw Pan Zhi
and a few others walking in with sleepy expressions, accompanied by a pretty girl.
“How come we didn’t see you?” Jiang Cheng asked Pan Zhi.
“Grandpa,” Pan Zhi sat down next to him and whispered, “Don’t bother with such insincere
words. Who knows which grass nest you two were hiding in all night? It would strange if
we did see you.”
“Fuck off,” Jiang Cheng laughed.
The fun activities program arranged by Zhang Qiqi was quite abundant. Today was a busy
day, and after visiting several attractions, the highlight of the day was sledding.
Although no one slept much the night before, everyone seemed to have energy and
enthusiasm to play. Even during sledding, everyone was still in high spirits.
Gu Miao didn’t care what they were doing, as long as there were horses, but her eyes lit up
when they arrived at the sledding area.
There were many people actually grass sledding, but most of the visitors just sat on a board
and slid down. There were different levels of difficulty on the sled tracks, but they all
dressed like they were skiing.
Gu Miao wasn’t interested in sitting on a board, and after two trips, she refused to go up
again, persistently pointing to the track where people wore shoes and held sticks.
“Er Miao, big brother can’t play on that with you; big brother doesn’t know how,” Gu Fei
said.
Gu Miao turned to look at Jiang Cheng.
“I…” Jiang Cheng hesitated. He could play on a skateboard, but sledding was not his forte.
Gu Miao stubbornly pointed to the track and they had to bring her over to inquire about it.
Surprisingly, there was a children’s sled track.
“Let her slide then,” Gu Fei breathed a sigh of relief. “It’s not easy for her to come out and
play, let her enjoy it to the fullest.”
The coach took Gu Miao to the shortest and lowest sled track and taught her the basic
posture, but Gu Miao just stood there with her arms folded, expressionless.
“Kid, do you understand?” the coach asked, “Now watch me and learn…”
Gu Miao stood at the top of the slide with a prepared stance, feeling a little impatient.
“Hey, that’s great, very standard,” the coach said, “Now, uh…”
Before he could finish, Gu Miao leaned forward and slid down.
The coach didn’t even have time to shout before she had already stopped at the bottom and
turned back to look at them with pride.
“I’m sorry,” Gu Fei quickly apologized to the coach, “My sister is a bit impatient.”
“Can she sled?” The coach looked at Gu Miao.”She hasn’t tried sledding, but she’s into
skateboarding,” Gu Fei said, “balancing and all that is no issue for her.”
“I thought the skateboard on her back was just for decoration,” the coach laughed, “So she’s
a skateboarding expert?”
“She’s not bad,” Gu Fei smiled.
After sledding a few rounds, Gu Miao moved on to a slightly larger one nearby.
When everyone was tired and resting in the lounge, Gu Miao was still playing tirelessly. The
coach in charge of the slide couldn’t take it anymore: “Kid, it’s time to take a break!”
“I’ll go get her,” Gu Fei sighed.
By the time they returned from the field, it was getting dark. After playing for several
hours, the group finally looked exhausted when they arrived back at the farmhouse.
They didn’t even attend the campfire party at night, and after eating, they each went back
to their rooms to rest.
As usual, Gu Miao went to bed and fell asleep immediately, while Jiang Cheng lay on the
other side with his eyes closed. “Ah, my legs are really sore. How does Gu Miao manage to
play for such a long time?”
“You don’t see how long she spends outside every day, and that makes sense, especially
considering last night…” Gu Fei said.
“Shut up,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei smiled, “I’m going to the convenience store.”
“Hmm? What are you going to look for?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I’m going to buy some souvenirs or local specialties to bring back and give to people,” Gu
Fei said.
“But things sold here are so expensive,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I won’t buy too much, it’s mainly because… it’s my first time going on a trip like this,” Gu
Fei smiled. “I want to commemorate it, so I don’t care about the price.”
“I’ll go too,” Jiang Cheng said as he stood up. “I’ll buy you a little trinket as a token of love.”
The purchasing channels for tourist souvenirs are probably similar throughout China, and
Jiang Cheng and Gu Fei spent half a day in the small supermarket before finding some
unique items.
Jiang Cheng bought a pair of small rings that were claimed to be made of bone, although
they may or may not be real. The rings were simple with two circles, probably not meant to
be worn on a daily basis, just fitting for this occasion.
After returning to their room, Jiang Cheng put the ring on Gu Fei’s ring finger.
“It looks good on you.”
“Hmm,” Gu Fei put the other ring on his own ring finger. “When we have more money, we’ll
buy fancier ones.”
“It’s just a formality,” Jiang Cheng said. “We don’t really need this kind of formality
anymore.”
“We’ve been bound together for quite some time, haven’t we?” Gu Fei said.
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng nodded. “One person wanted to run away, but he
couldn’t.”
“I’m sorry, Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said with a smile. “I won’t run away anymore.”
The May Day holiday felt like it passed in the blink of an eye, after all, it was only a little
longer than a weekend. The exhausted group of people on the way back barely had any
energy to talk, and they were all sleeping.
Jiang Cheng didn’t sleep though. He leaned against Gu Fei and looked out the window at the
scenery flying past quickly.
Tonight, they have plans to meet with Xu Xingzhi, and tomorrow morning, Xu Xingzhi has
arranged for them to meet with the mentor to assess Gu Miao’s progress in treatment
during this period. They will then schedule the next visit for Gu Miao.
He is leaving tomorrow afternoon.
Time seems to have passed too quickly, but the feeling of these three days is different from
the past visits.
Maybe because it’s the first time we’ve traveled together.
Maybe because I love you.
This time, when Jiang Cheng thought about Gu Fei leaving soon, there was no longer that
previous anxiety and reluctance.
Summer vacation is not far away and will be here soon. This sense of stability makes it hard
to feel sad about separation because there is really no separation at all.
However, after meeting with Xu Xingzhi in the evening, they would sit at Pan Zhi’s table,
seizing every moment to discuss topics. That was something Jiang Cheng hadn’t
anticipated.
“Are you both crazy?” Pan Zhi sat on the sofa, looking speechless.
“Exams are coming next month,” Jiang Cheng said as he looked at Gu Fei’s English
composition, “It’s better to pass this time; otherwise, dragging along with this CET-4 thing
is annoying.”
“I’m not afraid of annoyance,” Pan Zhi scrolled through his phone, then raised it, showing
them the screen. “What do you think of this photo?”
“Very handsome,” Gu Fei said.
“Then let’s use this one. To be honest, Gu Fei, you’re really good at taking pictures,” Pan Zhi
said, “With the ones you took of me, I feel like I’ve reached new heights of handsomeness.”
“Are you sending the photo to that girl?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Uh-huh,” Pan Zhi nodded, “Then I’ll invite her to dinner next week.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
It’s fate, after all. The beautiful girl’s school is just one station away from Pan Zhi’s school.
The next day, Jiang Cheng didn’t go with Gu Fei to meet Xu Xingzhi’s mentor.
He cleaned up his things at school and then layed in bed waiting for Gu Fei to notify him
when he was going to the station.
In the past, he would have followed them every step of the way. Even if they were upstairs,
he would sit downstairs and wait.
He never thought he could lie calmly in his dorm bed and wait for the phone call.
Am I getting old?
Tsk.
He turned over and picked up the small rose-scented flask made by Gu Fei, turning it over
and over for a while.
If they were becoming an old couple so quickly, he couldn’t accept it. With their ages
combined, they were still in their prime, not in the “old couple” stage!
They could still be passionate!
He turned over and lay flat, placing the flask in front of his eyes and watching the rose
petals slowly swirling inside.
He was very passionate during their time alone in the field!
If it weren’t so cold, they could have gone at it ten or more times without hesitation!
They were not in the “old couple” stage yet.
Thinking about such scenarios, got him a little excited. He lost his grip on the flask, and it
hit his nose with a thud.
He covered his nose, gritted his teeth, and muttered softly after a minute,
“Fuck.”
When he answered Gu Fei’s call and ran to the school gate, Xu Xingzhi’s car was already
waiting there.
“You’re still sending us off?” Jiang Cheng got in the car and said, “We’re really sorry.”
“The luggage is quite heavy, and you’d have to drag it if you take the subway,”
Xu Xingzhi smiled, “I’ll leave after I drop you off. I still have to rush back to school later.”
“Did we agree on when you’ll come visit next time?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Summer vacation,” Gu Fei said, “probably for a longer period, so that Er Miao can undergo
more systematic training.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but smile.
“Find a short-term rental in advance then,” Xu Xingzhi said, “If you can’t find one, I can help
you ask around.”
“Should be able to find it,” Jiang Cheng couldn’t control the smile on his face,
“Pan Zhi’s neighborhood seems to have it, I’ll let him ask first.”
Gu Fei nodded without saying anything, looking at him.
Jiang Cheng glanced at him, “What?”
“Nothing.” Gu Fei smirked.
Xu Xingzhi left them at the station and they proceeded with their previous plan –
Gu Fei carried the luggage while Jiang Cheng carried Gu Miao on his back.
Although Gu Miao didn’t scream, the crowded station during these peak travel days made
her extremely nervous.
When Jiang Cheng lifted her up, she clutched his neck with one arm, causing him to almost
lose his breath.
“A little girl like her,” he walked quickly with Gu Fei towards the entrance of the station,
completely abandoning the leisurely pace he had when sending Gu Fei off before, “has so
much strength. When she grows up, she’ll beat anyone up.”
“But don’t let her fight. She’s terrible at it,” Gu Fei sighed, “Fortunately, she hasn’t shown
any violent tendencies so far.”
Jiang Cheng remembered how Gu Miao swung a skateboard towards someone’s head
before and couldn’t help feeling scared.
When they arrived at the entrance, they didn’t stay long.
“Go in,” Jiang Cheng said, “Send me a message once you’re seated.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei replied, “Remember to grab something to eat later.”
“I won’t forget.” Jiang Cheng rubbed his stomach.
“We’re going in, Er Miao,” Gu Fei bent down and said to Gu Miao, “Say goodbye to Cheng
Ge.”
Gu Miao was still nervous and held tightly onto Gu Fei’s hand without responding.
“Go in, don’t say goodbye anymore,” Jiang Cheng pushed him worriedly.
Gu Fei quickly walked with Gu Miao into the entrance channel.
Jiang Cheng stood to the side and watched their backs. Gu Miao was very nervous and
walked forward while sticking close to Gu Fei’s leg and lowering her head.
It was both heart-wrenching and a bit funny to watch.
Jiang Cheng sighed.
As Gu Fei turned his head while walking, Jiang Cheng quickly waved his hand and said, “Go
ahead!”
Gu Fei smiled and blew a kiss to him across the distance.
Jiang Cheng quickly returned the gesture with an air kiss.
Only then did Gu Fei turn his head back and lead Gu Miao into the building.
Jiang Cheng checked the time and messaged Zhao Ke to save a seat for him. He had classes
in the afternoon and needed to hurry back after grabbing a bite to eat.
When he got off the subway, he hadn’t received any messages from Gu Fei. He took out his
phone, ready to call and ask, but the train should have already left by now.
Just as he was about to dial, his phone rang, and it was a video call request from Gu Fei.
He hesitated for a moment before accepting.
The screen froze for two seconds before showing up, but before he could see the person’s
face, he heard Gu Miao screaming.
“What’s wrong, Er Miao!” he quickly turned the camera to his face. “Er Miao!”
The screen showed Gu Miao frowning and screaming while beside her was Gu Fei, and the
background didn’t look like the subway car. He saw a train attendant behind them.
“Where are you?” Jiang Cheng asked. “What’s wrong?”
“The duty room,” Gu Fei said. “As soon as we started driving, something suddenly… Er
Miao, do you see Cheng Ge? Have you seen Cheng Ge?”
Gu Miao’s wandering eyes focused on the phone screen when she heard Gu Fei’s words, but
she continued screaming.
“Er Miao,” Jiang Cheng quickly put on a smiling face. “It’s Cheng Ge. Can you see me? Can
you hear me?”
After screaming at the screen for a while longer, Gu Miao’s voice slowly subsided.
“Er Miao?” Jiang Cheng waved his hand.
Gu Miao stared at him, and just as Jiang Cheng was about to say something else, she let out
a very soft “Cheng Ge.”
Gu Miao’s “Cheng Ge” was very soft, like a mosquito, and particularly gentle, but Jiang
Cheng still heard it clearly.
He was stunned.
This was not like a “ha.” Jiang Cheng had never heard Gu Miao call anyone’s name, and he
hadn’t even heard her voice in months. Now, hearing this, he was completely stunned.
Also stunned was Gu Fei, who looked at Gu Miao with half an open mouth, not moving.
In the end, Jiang Cheng was the first to recover, almost shouting, “Hey! Hey hey hey! Cheng
Ge is here! Er Miao! Cheng Ge is here!”
Gu Miao did not speak again, looking at him steadily.
“Er Miao,” Gu Fei finally spoke up, “look, Cheng Ge is here, when you want to talk to him,
you can use your phone to find him, right?”
Gu Miao frowned, as if she was thinking about the process of using her phone to see Cheng
Ge. She thought about it for two minutes before nodding.
“Next time you want to talk to Cheng Ge, you have to tell brother, you can’t shout like that.
Brother told you before, remember?” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao nodded.
“Apologize to this auntie, you scared her just now,” Gu Fei pointed to the train attendant
behind him.
Gu Miao looked at the screen again, turned around and bowed to the train attendant.
“Oh, it’s okay,” the train attendant said. “You’re really good; Auntie is fine.”
After video chatting with Gu Miao for a while, she didn’t speak again, but her emotions
gradually stabilized.
“I’ll take her back to the car first,” Gu Fei said. “I’ll call you later.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
After the video call ended, he stood on the roadside for a while before continuing to walk
towards the school.
As soon as he walked through the school gate, Gu Fei called.
“Hello!” Jiang Cheng quickly answered.
“Cheng Ge!” Gu Fei’s voice was filled with excitement.
“How is it? Is she okay?” Jiang Cheng couldn’t help but get excited too.
“She fell asleep. She was already tired these past few days, and after screaming, she got
even more tired,” Gu Fei said with a laugh. “She’s sleeping now.”
“She called me! Did you hear that?” Jiang Cheng jumped up and down. “She called me Cheng
Ge!”
“I heard it, I heard it, I heard it!” Gu Fei whispered. “I heard it very clearly.”
“She was calling me, right?” Jiang Cheng remembered and quickly asked, “She wasn’t calling
the cat, was she?”
“No, no, no,” Gu Fei said repeatedly. “She was calling you, you, you, you!”
“Sing to me,” Jiang Cheng laughed.
“I really want to sing,” Gu Fei said, “She never speaks with a third person present. In all
these years, for the first time, there was a train attendant behind her, and she called you!
You you you you you!”
Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop laughing. “Me, me, me, me, me!”
“She only realized after getting on the train that you weren’t with her,” Gu Fei
said. “As soon as the train started moving, she panicked and looked for you everywhere.”
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a bit heartbroken, but then he thought about it and laughed.
“Ah! Her voice is quite nice to listen to, even better than when she says ‘ha’!”
“Really?” Gu Fei laughed. “Ha!”
“Ha!” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Ha!” Gu Fei whispered again.
“Ha!” Jiang Cheng continued to respond.
“Ha ha!” Gu Fei followed suit.
“Ha ha!” Jiang Cheng sat down on the stone bench by the road. “Have you gone insane?”
“I have to talk to Xu Xingzhi,” Gu Fei said. “Oh, it seems like he’s busy now. I’ll report to him
later.”
“Is this a big step forward?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I don’t know,” Gu Fei said. “But for me, it’s a huge step forward.”
“After you go back, remember to talk to her more when there’s nothing to do.
Xu Xingzhi said that stimulating her language skills can make her think more often,” Jiang
Cheng said.
“Well,” Gu Fei thought for a moment. “Cheng Ge, can you give me a list of the psychology
books you read before?”
“You want to read them?” Jiang Cheng said. “You don’t have time. You have to review for
class, take pictures, and accompany Gu Miao. When do you have time to read?”
“When did you have time to read them?” Gu Fei smiled.
“I don’t have to take care of Gu Miao,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Gu Miao sleeps at eight o’clock,” Gu Fei said.
“Gu Fei, don’t work too hard,” Jiang Cheng frowned. “It’s so exhausting…”
“It’s pretty tiring, isn’t it?” Gu Fei continued his words. “You know best.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.

“Do you feel sorry for me?” Gu Fei asked.

“Nonsense, of course I feel sorry for you!” Jiang Cheng said.
“Then feel sorry for me,” Gu Fei laughed. “Let me show you how much I felt sorry for you
when I saw you working so hard.”

Raw chapter 143: https://m.moshuiping.com/novels/21853c16-ceb7-416b-8024-

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November 19, 2023
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Saye Ch. 144
As soon as Gu Fei left, Jiang Cheng felt like a water-filled balloon that was suddenly
emptied. After the non-stop excitement of the three-day trip, he collapsed there and
couldn’t recover his senses.
Several people in the dormitory seemed to feel the same way. For the first two or three
days of classes, they were constantly organizing various photos. Gu Fei would send over a
portion of the edited photos every day. They spent three consecutive days without going to
the library, staying in the dormitory to look at the pictures.
“So many photos,” Jiang Cheng whispered while lying on his bed talking on the phone,
“didn’t it take up a lot of your time?”
“It’s fine. The weather was good, and the sunlight was good, so there wasn’t much that
needed to be edited,” Gu Fei said. “Sometimes I just have the habit of editing people a bit.”
“How do you edit them?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Just some slimming and touch-ups, you know,” Gu Fei replied. “Like Lu Shi and Zhang
Qiqi’s girlfriends, the young ladies definitely needs a bit of retouching.” Gu Fei said.
“You’re responsible for this too?” Jiang Cheng laughed, “It’s not like you’re being paid to
take photos of models. Yet, your service is that meticulous? But I don’t think it looks like it
has been retouched.”
「Of course, can you tell?” Gu Fei smiled, “I retouched yours too.”You were grinning like a
Cheshire cat, so I made you look thinner.”
“…Shit,” Jiang Cheng was stunned for a moment, quickly grabbed his laptop and opened it,
clicking through the photos one by one. “Seriously? Which one?”
“When you were eating meat,” Gu Fei said. “You can’t tell. I just made you look like your
original self.”
“Does it look deformed?” Jiang Cheng looked at several photos taken while eating meat, but
couldn’t see anything wrong. He still looked handsome and elegant.
” It looks deformed,” Gu Fei said. “but I revealed your handsome original form.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “I thought I had to rely on my face in all my selfies, but I can’t
even hold up my face in your DSLR 1 photos.”
“There’s an old saying, have you heard it?” Gu Fei asked.
“What old saying?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“Happy to the point of deformation”,” Gu Fei explained.
Jiang Cheng paused for a moment, instinctively searching his brain for any related
information about this “saying”. After a few seconds, he finally caught on and replied, “Get
lost!”
After chatting with Gu Fei for a while, Zhao Ke suggested going to the library.
“You guys go ahead,” Gu Fei said. “I finished my photos today, I’ll read some books tonight.”
“When you’re studying English, it’s effective to speak out loud to strengthen your memory,”
Jiang Cheng said.
“Okay,” Gu Fei smiled. “I speak out loud when I’m doing my exercises now.”
“Don’t stay up too late,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’ll message you when I’m leaving the library
later.”
“Okay,” Gu Fei responded.
Jiang Cheng hung up the phone and went to the library with Zhao Ke.
In fact, it had only been a few days since he had last been to the library, but he had the
feeling that it had been a long time. Sitting quietly in a chair and reading felt strangely
unfamiliar.
So, it’s true that people can’t be too relaxed. Once you’ve relaxed, it takes more time to
tighten up again.
Looking at the people around him, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a sense of urgency.
After closing his eyes and focusing for a while, he opened his book.
Thinking of Gu Fei, who was currently buried in studying, he felt much more comfortable.
Although they weren’t together, it was nice to know that someone you cared about was
doing the same thing as you at the same time.
Gu Fei felt that he had made great progress. He was able to persist for half an hour before
getting up to smoke while facing a series of English words, which was a miracle.
The only reason he could sit quietly in front of a pile of books before was that the person
reading was Jiang Cheng.
Now, he was sitting at Jiang Cheng’s desk, surrounded by various materials that Jiang Cheng
had used before, looking at Jiang Cheng’s best subject.
It was a strange sense of happiness.
But he couldn’t be like Jiang Cheng, sitting still like he was in a trance for one or two hours.
After ten minutes, he wanted to get up, finding all sorts of excuses, like his butt would get
sore from sitting too long and he needed to move around, or his legs weren’t getting
enough blood flow and he needed to move around…
Did someone knock on the door?
Was he getting thirsty?
Did he need to use the restroom after drinking water just now?
He held a cigarette, leaning against the window sill, looking at the dim street outside. He
picked up a piece of paper nearby, on which his nightly plans, drawings, reviews, study
hours, and goals were listed.
Whenever he couldn’t sit still and felt like wandering around, he would take a look at it.
Somehow, it added a bit of pressure.
Following Jiang Cheng closely was not an easy task. Jiang Cheng had always been a person
who ran forward. He always has to grit his teeth.
Jiang Cheng said he was taking the CET-4 exam2 without preparation, but in reality, he still
found time to read and reviewed for half a month in advance like he used to cram for
exams.
Compared to his own CET-4 exam, what he couldn’t let go of was Gu Fei’s CET-4 exam.
He hoped Gu Fei could pass it in one go, not because it would save him trouble later on as
he told Pan Zhi, but because if Gu Fei passes directly this time, it would be a significant
encouragement for him. The significance is definitely greater than the four words “passed
the CET-4 exam”.
“Don’t study tonight,” Jiang Cheng said, “go to bed early, and just review the main points
with your eyes closed.”
“Uh-huh,” Gu Fei smiled, “Are you a little worried about me?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng said, “I just want to be cautious.”
“After the exam tomorrow, I’ll call you,” Gu Fei said.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng replied.
The next day, Jiang Cheng got up and picked up his phone to call Gu Fei.
Before he could dial,
the phone rang, and it was Gu Fei calling.
“I was just about to call you,” Jiang Cheng answered the phone.
“I know,” Gu Fei laughed,” I timed it. Just woke up, right?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng yawned, “You timed it pretty accurately.”
“Of course,” Gu Fei said, “I know when you go to sleep and when you wake up.
After all, I’ve been waking you up for so long.”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng smiled, recalling countless times when he opened his eyes and saw Gu
Fei’s face. These memories were truly nostalgic.
“I’m about to go out for breakfast,” Gu Fei said, “Hurry up and get ready.”
“Isn’t it a little early to go out? There’s still time.” Jiang Cheng looked at the large round
clock on the wall opposite his bed.
“I’m meeting a classmate and we’re going to walk over slowly,” Gu Fei said. “I want to clear
my head and review what we’ve learned recently.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment, “Which classmate?”
“A classmate who’s taking the CET-4 exam,” Gu Fei said.
Jiang Cheng didn’t say anything.
“Our class leader, who’s always worrying about us,” Gu Fei added.
Jiang Cheng laughed, “I figured as much.”
“You and your jealousy,” Gu Fei said, “it’s so fake every time. I can’t be bothered to play
along.”
“Come on, Just play along a bit,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s mainly because I don’t want to seem
like I don’t care about you by not getting jealous. In reality, it’s just that you make me feel
so at ease, and I really can’t pull off the jealousy act.”
“Actually, the order should be like this, I know you care about me,” Gu Fei said.
“That’s why you can feel so at ease.”
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue. “You’re getting better and better at talking. Alright,
you go take a walk with your class leader, I’ll go wash up.”
Since the college entrance exam, Jiang Cheng hadn’t really felt the “exam”
feeling anymore. Although there was still a lot of pressure from various exams in school, he
didn’t feel it too much. He just kept pushing himself.
But this time, he was taking the exam with Gu Fei, and it was like he was pulled back to
those days in high school.
He walked into the exam room and sat down, taking a deep breath to calm himself down
and clear his mind of distractions, including thoughts of Gu Fei.
Then he put on his earphones, adjusted the frequency, and everything seemed fine.
From this moment on, he entered exam mode.
Composition.
The time for the composition posed no problem for him, but for a brief moment, a thought
crossed his mind: Gu Fei probably has no issues either.
He had seen the compositions Gu Fei wrote before, some were a bit stiff, and there were a
few minor errors, but there were no major issues. If he had reviewed well during this
period, today should be no problem for him.
After finishing the composition in a short while, the invigilator reminded them of the time
and it was time for the listening section.
The listening section, Gu Fei should also be able to do it. He would often listen to music
with his earphones in his free time.
Jiang Cheng smiled as he filled in the answer sheet. Although he was already in exam mode,
he still thought of Gu Fei at every stage, like the opening credits of a film.
After finishing the listening section, he felt much more relaxed. Reading comprehension
and translation were not too different from previous exams for him.
The first thing he did when leaving the exam room was to take out his phone.
Before even meeting his dorm mates, he called Gu Fei.
Gu Fei was probably also holding his phone, as he answered after just one ring.
“How was it?” Jiang Cheng asked straight away.
“It was okay, I might lose more points in the listening section,” Gu Fei said. “As for the rest…
it should be fine. I forgot what I wrote as soon as I walked out of the exam room.”
“What’s your overall feeling?” Jiang Cheng asked.
“I didn’t rely on guessing for any of the questions,” Gu Fei answered.
“That’s a unique way to summarize it,” Jiang Cheng breathed a sigh of relief. Gu Fei’s habit
was to guess, but since he didn’t this time, it meant that he had thought about and knew
how to do each question.
After analyzing it with his xueba 3 logic, Jiang Cheng felt that Gu Fei shouldn’t have any
problems this time.
After all, Gu Fei has a good memory and he’s very intelligent.
He’s also very handsome.
“How about you?” Gu Fei asked him.
“Of course I’m fine,” Jiang Cheng had a rough idea of his score while he was answering the
questions, “I said I passed the exam without any preparation before. This time, I even
reviewed right before the exam.”
“That’s the spirit.” Gu Fei laughed, “Going to take the Level 6 exam next semester without
any preparation too?”
“I still need to review for that,” Jiang Cheng stretched his waist lazily, “but I have a good
understanding of the level I’m at.”
While he was on the phone with Gu Fei, he received a call from Pan Zhi, who had been
waiting. He checked his phone and said, “Pan Zhi is calling me, he probably has news about
the rental house.”
“Then talk to him first,” Gu Fei hung up the phone.
“Grandpa,” Pan Zhi’s call was answered, “how did the exam go?”
“Do you even need to ask?” Jiang Cheng said.
“Just asking as a formality,” Pan Zhi said, “Have you decided on the time for Gu Fei to come?
How long is he staying? The landlord I asked said the minimum rental period is one month,
even if you only stay for one day. Is that okay?”
“That’s fine,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s hard to find a short-term rental house with better
conditions now, so let’s go with that.”
“This is not bad. I know the landlord, and it just so happens that my parents are coming to
visit, so we can rent the whole place from him and maybe get a discount,” Pan Zhi said.
“Your parents?” Jiang Cheng hesitated. “Why don’t they just stay with you, and you can
sleep in the living room?”
“Cheng’er,” Pan Zhi sighed, “Do you really think I could share a room with them? My mom
will criticize me from head to toe, and I’ll have to listen to it all day long. I finally have some
peace and quiet.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue. “You don’t know how lucky you are.”
“It’s not just having parents that makes you lucky,” Pan Zhi said. “I think you’re lucky to
have someone who makes you feel secure, right?”
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng smiled.
“I used to think that you two wouldn’t last,” Pan Zhi said, “Actually, even setting aside
emotions and just looking at you two, I still feel like it won’t last… but…”
“You can’t set aside emotions when it comes to matters of the heart,” Jiang
Cheng said, “Right?”
“Yes,” Pan Zhi said, “So…”
“Huh?” Jiang Cheng responded.
“I might be alone for the rest of my life.” Pan Zhi said.
“You still have a long way to go before that happens,” Jiang Cheng said. “What happened?
Did the grassland beauty reject you again?”
“I didn’t expect anything from her,” Pan Zhi said. “Maybe my attitude towards relationships
is wrong, and I can’t make it work with anyone… Anyway, forget about me. I’ll call you next
week, and you can come see the place.”
“Okay,” said Jiang Cheng.
He didn’t feel this way before when he wasn’t in a relationship, but now he slowly sensed
that Pan Zhi’s thoughts on relationships were indeed different from his own.
Pan Zhi is very rational and always sees things clearly. It seemed like he never had the
intention of being with anyone for the long haul, which was completely different from Jiang
Cheng.
However, Jiang Cheng didn’t think that Pan Zhi would be alone forever, he just hasn’t met
the right person who can handle him yet. When that day comes, he will definitely buy the
biggest firecracker and set it off in front of Pan Zhi’s house.
He doesn’t know when that day will be, but maybe by then, Gu Miao would have already
become a normal girl who just doesn’t talk much. Maybe he’d have graduated, maybe Gu
Fei would be by his side, maybe…
There are a lot of maybes, but he doesn’t dwell on them too much, he just feels that it will
definitely be like this.
The apartment Pan Zhi helped find is very suitable – a one-bedroom with beds in both the
bedroom and living room, equipped with a small kitchen and all necessary living facilities.
Outside the bedroom, there is a small, open balcony with a good view. From the middle of
the building, you can see distant lights.
He went over two days in advance to tidy up, changed the sheets and cleaned inside and
out, then bought some lemons and sprayed the juice all over the apartment.
He even went to the supermarket and bought a lot of groceries, including milk, yogurt, and
snacks, filling up the refrigerator.
For some reason, even though it’s just a small rented apartment, it gives him a stronger
sense of “us” than the rental house in the steel mill.
Perhaps it’s because their relationship and mindsets have changed from a year ago.
Gu Fei hasn’t moved out of the steel factory’s house, and Jiang Cheng doesn’t want to either.
The rent is quite cheap, and they have no pressure in continuing to rent it. If he were to go
back, that place would be his and Gu Fei’s cozy nest, which is quite nice.
A sense of security is something he will always need, and there are many ways to achieve it,
whether it’s a certain person, a certain event, a memory, or a certain place. He wants to
hold onto them all.
Surprisingly, Gu Fei’s school extended the holiday by three days. Jiang Cheng stayed in the
cabin for three days. On the first day, he went to the station to pick up the cat that Gu Fei
had sent over. After waiting for two more days, he finally went out to the station to pick up
the person.
It had only been two months since Gu Miao had last come over, but she still felt nervous in
the station environment. Xu Xingzhi said that it’s challenging to change such a state and not
the top priority. It’s possible to address other issues with targeted solutions as long as it
doesn’t affect normal life.
This time, Jiang Cheng didn’t carry Gu Miao on his back when they went out.
Instead, he held her hand and ran with her until they reached a less crowded spot in the
square.
“Er Miao,” Jiang Cheng finally bent over and said, “you haven’t said hello to me yet.”
Gu Miao was still accustomed to their old way of greeting, snapping her fingers and tapping
her thumb together.
“Do you like chocolate?” Jiang Cheng took out a piece of chocolate and said, “I particularly
like this one, I don’t know if you like it or not.”
Gu Miao looked at him and nodded after a while.
Jiang Cheng peeled the chocolate and handed it to her. Gu Miao stuffed the whole piece into
her mouth and chewed on it.
“Why are you so wild,” Jiang Cheng laughed as he watched her.
“Can you look at me now?” Gu Fei asked next to them.
“Oh,” Jiang Cheng stood up straight and stared at Gu Fei for a while, “Have you lost weight?”
“No,” Gu Fei said.
“Really?” Jiang Cheng stepped back two steps and looked him up and down,
“Why do I feel like you’ve lost weight?”
“Are you just trying to find something to talk about?” Gu Fei said seriously.
“You saw right through me,” Jiang Cheng laughed and hugged him, “Did you really not lose
any weight?”
“No, I haven’t,” Gu Fei patted his back lightly, “I just weighed myself yesterday and didn’t
lose a pound.”
“That’s not logical,” Jiang Cheng said, “I lost so much weight before, did you not study or
read properly?”
“I can only say that I have better stress resistance than you,” Gu Fei looked around and
leaned forward, giving Jiang Cheng a kiss on the nose.
This time, Gu Fei brought a ton of luggage because of the extended stay.
Although Gu Miao could reluctantly accept leaving a familiar larger
environment, her dependence on a smaller environment was still strong. For such a long
time, she brought not only her pillow and a small blanket but also every item she could see
and touch in her daily life.
Jiang Cheng even saw one of Gu Miao’s torn sandals while packing.
“What the hell is this?” he asked.
“She wore these out and then Cheng Ge chewed them up…” Gu Fei explained to him.
“I chewed…” Jiang Cheng said in shock, only realizing halfway through, “Oh, it was the cat.”
“Yes,” Gu Fei nodded and pointed to the cat sitting on the sofa, “It was the cat.
This sandal has always been in Gu Miao’s room. When I asked her what she wanted to
bring, she said she wanted this, so I brought it.”
“Okay, let her do what she wants,” Jiang Cheng nodded, “By the way, let’s order takeout
tonight. It’s too late to cook now, and you’re tired too.”
Gu Fei slumped onto the sofa and laughed for a while, “Why is it that when I’m tired, we’re
not cooking anymore? Are you just going to eat?”
“Stop trying to embarrass me. Even if you eat what I cook, Gu Miao won’t give me face,”
Jiang Cheng picked up his phone and scrolled through it, “How about we get some pork
stomach and chicken?”
“Okay,” Gu Fei nodded.
After finishing their meal, Gu Miao obediently went to take a shower, but afterwards, she
became disobedient and wouldn’t let Gu Fei blow dry her hair.
Instead, she went to the balcony with wet hair, holding the cat to admire the view.
“Let her be, it’s so hot out, she won’t catch a cold,” Gu Fei said, watching her back.
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng walked up behind him and hugged his waist, lightly tracing his hand on
his stomach. “Do you want to talk?”
“We talk every day,” Gu Fei said. “I really don’t know what to talk about at the moment.”
“Let’s force ourselves to chat for a bit,” Jiang Cheng said. “After all, we can’t do anything else
in front of a child except speak our minds.”
“What do you want to do?” Gu Fei chuckled.
“Have shower sex, fool around,” Jiang Cheng rested his chin on his shoulder.
“Do it all kinds of ways.”
“Let’s do it at night when the child is asleep,” Gu Fei said.
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “The expenses for this trip are quite high, aren’t
they? It’s those system training sessions related to cognition and behavioral correction that
Xu Xingzhi mentioned.”
“It’s not too bad,” Gu Fei said. “He helped save a lot of money before, so the cost now isn’t a
big deal.”
“Did you bring him beef jerky? He doesn’t want money and doesn’t want to be treated to
meals, but he loves beef jerky,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I brought a big bag,” Gu Fei said. “Li Yan bought it for everyone, saying that this kind is
better than the one we used to buy… Oh, by the way, I haven’t told you yet.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Miao on the balcony, who seemed like a frozen statue. If
it wasn’t for the cat walking back and forth by her feet, she could have been mistaken for a
little sculpture.
“Li Yan and Liu Fan might come over in a few days,” said Gu Fei. “So, help me book a room
for them when the time comes, they’ll probably stay for three to five days.”
“Sure,” Jiang Cheng walked over to the coffee table and picked up his phone. “Is
it just the two of them?”
“Yeah, nobody else is available,” Gu Fei nodded. “They haven’t been here before, and they
wanted to come over during the May Day holiday.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng sat down on the sofa, propped his legs against the wall, and looked at
Gu Fei. “Hey, Gu Fei.”
“…Yeah,” Gu Fei looked at him.
“Just wondering,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “Have you thought about where you
want to go after graduation?”
“Of course,” Gu Fei replied.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng looked at him, suddenly feeling nervous.
It was the same kind of nervousness he felt a long time ago when he asked Gu Fei if he had
thought about the future.
“I’ll go wherever you are.” Gu Fei’s response came almost without hesitation.
1. A digital single-lens reflex camera (digital SLR or DSLR) ↩
2. The CET-4 is mandatory for university students in China who
are not English majors. It is also a prerequisite for a bachelor’s degree. Many employers in
China prefer applicants with CET-4 or
even CET-6 certification. Passing the CET is important for
Chinese college students.
↩
Saye Ch. 145

Gu Miao’s training therapy is about to begin in a few days. Once it starts, Gu Fei will have to
accompany her every day. So, for Gu Fei, these few days mark the start of his vacation.
“I think we should celebrate our birthdays before Gu Miao starts her therapy.”
Jiang Cheng looked at the calendar. “Once Er Miao starts her treatment and all, there won’t
be time, right?”
“How do you want to celebrate?” Gu Fei asked.
“I don’t know. Let’s just have a small celebration for the two of us today. When Li Yan and
the others come over, we can invite Pan Zhi and go out for a meal together,” Jiang Cheng
suggested. “I don’t have much experience celebrating birthdays, though.”
“Me neither,” Gu Fei smiled. “Let’s go with your idea. When they come, we can all go out for
a meal together. Should we book a private room in advance? It’s quite busy around here,
unlike the steel mill. I’ve heard the business is booming.”
“Well, let me look for a group discount that allows for a private room,” Jiang Cheng
searched on his phone for a while, then looked up at Gu Fei. “Have you thought of a gift for
me?”
“No,” Gu Fei said. “I’ve been busy all this time and haven’t thought about it.”
“Really?” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“…Really,” Gu Fei sat down next to him. “You’re not upset, are you?”
“No, why would I be upset? There’s nothing to be upset about,” Jiang Cheng sighed
dramatically. “At this age, we don’t need to spoil each other. We’re not
kids anymore…”
“What the hell,” Gu Fei laughed and leaned on the armrest of the sofa for a while.
“We’re not kids anymore,” Jiang Cheng insisted, “we’re not worthy of birthday gifts.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” Gu Fei chuckled and playfully kicked his leg.
“I’m not kidding. What’s there to worry about?” Jiang Cheng slapped his leg,
“Anyway, I didn’t prepare a gift for you either.”
“Damn,” Gu Fei said, “I thought you had prepared some big gift for me with that pitiful look
on your face.”
“I had completely forgotten about birthdays,” Jiang Cheng said, laughing. “What can I do?
It’s only the third birthday, and it’s already so uneventful. What about the next hundred or
so?”
“Let me tell you, Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei said, “those couples who celebrate and commemorate
any day that’s different from a certain month, day, and week are the ones who think they’ll
break up tomorrow. They have to commemorate it quickly before they run out of
chances…”
“Don’t generalize,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him. “There are so many people who still
commemorate their anniversary even when they’re old.”
“But it’s different for us,” Gu Fei closed his eyes. “Listen to my cheesy words.
We don’t need to commemorate anything. Every day we spend together is etched in our
memories, no need for commemoration, we will never forget.”
“Stop it,” Jiang Cheng said, laughing. “We both forgot about our birthdays.”
“Can’t you cooperate a little?” Gu Fei opened his eyes. “You’ve mastered the skill of being a
buzzkill, haven’t you?”
“I’ll pay attention in the future,” Jiang Cheng said, laughing as he reached out to pick up the
cat that ran over from the back of the couch and started rubbing it on his lap. He then
looked over at Gu Miao, who was drawing on the table. “Er Miao!”
Gu Miao turned around to look at him, and Jiang Cheng pointed outside. “Shall we go out
and play?”
Gu Miao looked out the window and then back at him before nodding after a while.
“Where should we go?” Gu Fei asked.
“I don’t know. The amusement parks and places like that are always crowded, and there are
even more people during the summer holidays. We can only find a place with fewer people.
Let me think,” Jiang Cheng said.
“I doubt there’s any place with fewer people on a day like this,” Gu Fei said.
“What about the small garden in our community?”
“She wants to go skateboarding. The small garden is filled with elderly men and women
and unsteady children. If she rushes through, we will be scolded to death,” Jiang Cheng said
while browsing on his phone. “Let me check… at least it’s her birthday.”
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei thought for a moment, then stood up. “How about… you accompany me
to take some photos? Old streets, alleys, not many people around. We can take our time
strolling?”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng stood up.
In fact, Jiang Cheng has been attending school for a year, but to be honest, besides the
school surroundings, he has only been to three places: B University, the residential area of
the two children he tutors, and the train station.
The farthest was the train station, and every time he went there, he had mixed feelings.
Gu Fei wanted to take photos, and Jiang Cheng was willing to accompany him, but he didn’t
know where to go, how to get there, and how to plan the route.
“Let me check again,” Jiang Cheng took out his notebook and sat down again.
“Cheng Ge,” Gu Fei lightly grabbed his hair and rubbed it, “you really make people feel sorry
for you.”
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng responded while typing on the keyboard, “why do you feel sorry for
me again?”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything but just pinched a handful of his hair and rubbed it.
“To be honest, I’m not someone who loves to go out a lot,” Jiang Cheng said.
“During holidays or rest days, I didn’t have anywhere to go. Usually, I would just hang out
with Pan Zhi and chat somewhere.”
“In this past year, you didn’t even have time to hang out and chat,” Gu Fei said.
“After all, being with a group of xué bà’s1, ” Jiang Cheng smiled. “When I saw them spending
all day in the library, I got a little nervous. When I got into this school, my grades were so
high that I couldn’t just slack off during classes.
That’s not my style.”
“Yeah,” Gu Fei lowered his head and gave a kiss to the hair on top of Jiang Cheng’s head.
“This entire head of yours… just this one whorl, and it’s still a normal whorl. How can it be
so sturdy?”
“My entire head,” Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue, “can’t you use a term that doesn’t sound
like a horror movie?”
“The entire head,” Gu Fei smiled.
After checking the route, the two of them, along with Gu Miao and her skateboard, went
out.
Before leaving, Gu Fei spent twenty minutes laying down some rules with Gu Miao. No
shouting, no skating too fast, no weaving through people, stay close to the side while
skating…
Gu Miao kept nodding her head throughout.
Jiang Cheng felt that their efforts over the past half year had been quite effective; Gu Miao
now had little trouble with complex communication that wasn’t a single topic.
Today’s weather was quite nice, although the sun was intense, the wind was also strong, so
it didn’t feel hot.
Following Jiang Cheng’s plan, they took a taxi directly. They could have taken the subway,
which was much cheaper, but there were too many people on the platform and inside the
carriages, which might make Gu Miao nervous.
Gu Miao was in a good mood today and bounced down the stairs with her skateboard on
her back.
Since Gu Fei had helped her tie the skateboard to her back while playing on the grasslands,
she had requested to carry it with her every time she went out.
Eventually, Gu Fei made a small strap for her that could be hooked onto both ends of the
skateboard wheels, making it easy to put on and take off, convenient to carry, and leaving
her hands free.
Although Gu Miao’s hands were free, there wasn’t much she could do with them. Even
when eating something, the time she spent with the food in her hands wouldn’t exceed ten
seconds. Basically, she would take it and stuff it in her mouth a few times before finishing it.
“Where do we eat for lunch?” Gu Fei asked from the back seat of the taxi.
Before Jiang Cheng sitting in the passenger seat could answer, the driver took over the
conversation, “For lunch, if you’re in that area…”
The elder driver was very enthusiastic. For just one lunch, he recommended 20
different restaurants in order of price range, and also gave them some tips on how to enjoy
themselves. He kept talking until they got out of the car.
“Thank you, sir,” said Jiang Cheng as he got out of the car.
“This is my business card,” the driver handed him a card. “If you need any help or
recommendations on where to go, just give me a call.”
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng accepted the card. He might actually need it. If Li Yan or Liu Fan came
over, he wouldn’t know where to take them.
As they walked along an old street with Gu Miao, Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Fei and said,
“Hey, Gu Fei.”
“Yeah?” Gu Fei responded.
“Don’t you think you should get a business card?” Jiang Cheng suggested,
“Look at the taxi driver, his business card is so convenient.”
“Who would I give my business card to?” Gu Fei laughed. “Everyone I know already has my
number. They just need to give me a call.”
“That’s true,” Jiang Cheng thought for a moment. “I guess I just thought it would be fun for
you to have one.”
“In that case, I’ll get one printed when I get back,” Gu Fei said, gesturing with his hands.
“It’ll say ‘Gu Fei’ with my English name ‘GoodFly’ underneath…”
“Wow,” Jiang Cheng laughed. “You’re a person who just finished the fourth level of English
proficiency, can’t you put a little more effort into it?”
“Listen to me,” Gu Fei laughed, “then below that, you need to write a position or profession.
So, I’ll write, ‘Cat Cheng’s…”
“Wife,” Jiang Cheng quickly interjected.
“Cat Cheng’s Bunny Fei,” Gu Fei glanced at him. “Doesn’t that sound catchy?
Bunny Fei of Cat Cheng?”
“Yeah, okay.” Jiang Cheng nodded.
After discussing the design of their business cards, they walked into a small alley with few
people. The alley was half dark and half lit by the sun, making it look very quiet and lazy.
Gu Miao took down her skateboard and stepped on it, gliding slowly ahead of them,
because Gu Fei didn’t want her to skate too fast, she obediently maneuvered forward in a
slow and meandering manner.
A few old men sitting on the side of the road chatting even greeted her.
Gu Fei took out his camera and slowly walked, taking a few shots.
Amidst graffiti-covered old walls, lamp posts adorned with small
advertisements, and Gu Miao meandering along the stone-paved road, there was only one
small grocery store with an open window selling goods on the side of the road. People
chatting under the shade of trees, worn-out wicker chairs placed against the wall, and a cat
basking in the sun…
There were quite a few cats in the alley, and Gu Miao now called all of them
“Cheng Ge”.
“Cheng Ge.” She looked up at the white cat lying on the wall like a small cushion.
Her voice was so low that Jiang Cheng wouldn’t have heard her speak if he hadn’t seen her
lips moving.
But even so, it was exciting to walk down an alley and meet four cats, and she said “Cheng
Ge” twice.
“Am I treated better than you?” Jiang Cheng asked. “She never calls you that openly, does
she?”
“Well,” Gu Fei raised his camera and pointed it at the grass growing in the crack of an old
wall, “she doesn’t even call me ‘brother’ much.”
“She’s my sister now.” Jiang Cheng said.
“Hmm,” Gu Fei smiled, “okay.”
After walking through two alleys, at the end of a cobblestone path, they saw a small river.
Several old men were fishing on the riverbank. Gu Miao stopped on her skateboard, stood
behind them, and watched them intently.
Jiang Cheng sat down on the stone bench next to him. Gu Fei held his camera and slowly
took pictures while leaning on the railing. Although the river was very small and the water
was not particularly clean, the occasional floating leaves in the water and the reflections of
the trees on the water’s surface, the ripples on the water’s surface when the wind blew, and
the circles of ripples gently made by the fish or shrimp underwater were all very calming in
this quiet environment.
Gu Fei stepped back a few steps with his camera, and Jiang Cheng knew he was going to
take a picture of him. After hearing a few shutter clicks, he turned his head and gave Gu Fei
a side view.
After Gu Fei took the picture, he whispered, “Stand up.”
Jiang Cheng stood up, facing the sun, then turned sideways, turned around against the light,
and finally turned his head to look at Gu Miao on the side.
This set of coordination is exceptionally perfect. Their tacit understanding in photography
is as flawless as their understanding in bed…
Thinking of bed.
Yesterday, when Gu Miao fell asleep in the inner room, they didn’t dare to roll around on
the bed in the outer room, and finally chose the bathroom.
“Are we going to do it in the shower for this whole month?” Gu Fei asked.
“We can also lock the kitchen door and do it on the dining table,” Jiang Cheng replied.
This shameless reminiscence could easily turn into wild thoughts, and once it did, it was
bound to run rampant.
The image that flashed through Jiang Cheng’s mind in that instant made him sit back down
on the stone bench.
After all, it was summer, and he was wearing a pair of casual shorts. Any slight movement
or breeze could reveal his arousal.
“What’s up?” Gu Fei sat down next to him, lowered his head to look at the camera, and
smiled as he asked, “Are you getting hard just from taking a picture?”
“Of course YOU have the most say on this matter,” Jiang Cheng said, “You even had to take a
break midway through taking my photo’s to go to the bathroom.”
Gu Fei made a sound of disapproval, “Cheng Ge, you are so vindictive now.”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng glanced at him sideways, “because there is someone who takes
advantage of the opportunity to tease others.”
Gu Fei lowered his head and laughed for a while, then turned to him and said with a pure
and upright smile, “With you like this now, I really want to press you down and do it ten or
more times on the spot.”
“…Fuck,” Jiang Cheng was very shocked, “Did you pick up a lot of faces along the way? You
could probably plaster ten layers!” 2
“Uncle,” Gu Fei smiled and greeted a middle-aged man who stood up, “Did you catch any
fish?”
“Not yet,” the middle-aged man moved his arm, “It’s too windy today.”
“Usually, you can catch quite a few, right?” Gu Fei asked.
“Not really, they are all small fish, so we catch and release them,” the middle-aged man
smiled.
After chatting with the middle-aged man seriously for a while, Gu Fei stood up and said,
“Shall we go somewhere else? Can you stand up now?”
Jiang Cheng made a sighed and stood up.
They walked along the riverbank for a while and then turned back into the alley.
There were a few more people, and occasionally, there were one or two small shops with
unique characteristics selling strange things. They went into a small shop selling handmade
cups and tea trays and looked around.
Gu Miao was interested in a small black clay flower. Jiang Cheng bought it for her, and the
shopkeeper gave her a thin leather rope to match it, but she refused to wear it around her
neck and insisted on tying it around her ankle.
“The little girl has such personality,” the shopkeeper smiled and changed the rope to a
shorter one for her, tying it to her ankle, “You are so cool.”
Gu Miao bowed, turned around solemnly, and walked out.
When she stepped on the skateboard, Gu Fei followed her and took a few photos.
“Er Miao is a completely naturally cool girl,” said Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei smiled and said, “I hope she can be a little less cool in the future.”
The two followed behind Gu Miao and continued to saunter. Gu Miao rode her skateboard
and turned the corner ahead of them, and they followed suit.
This was a narrow alley that was too small for cars to pass through, but there was a very
small storefront in the middle of it.
Gu Miao stood at the door on her skateboard, looking inside.
“Probably thirsty,” said Gu Fei. “Let’s see if they have any water or something.”
It wasn’t until they walked outside the door that they realized it was probably a coffee
shop. The smell of coffee was in the air, and the small handwritten sign on the
inconspicuous storefront was unexpected.
“Want to go in and sit down?” Gu Fei asked quietly.
“Okay,” Jiang Cheng nodded.
The name of the shop suddenly made people feel a little sentimental.
The shop wasn’t very big, with no deliberate decoration, just simple white walls and
cement bricks. The tables and chairs were also the simplest, black lines forming a square
frame, with a cement table top.
There was only one table of customers in the shop, two girls sitting by the window,
speaking softly.
There didn’t seem to be any staff, just a young girl who was probably the owner walking
over and placing her hand on the table. “What would you like to drink?”
she asked.
Gu Fei and Jiang Cheng ordered coffee, and Gu Miao ordered a glass of orange juice and a
glass of water.
Gu Miao had been staring absentmindedly at a small ironwork polyhedral ball on a nearby
flower stand. Jiang Cheng looked over and thought of the maze that Gu Fei had given him
for his 18th birthday. “This thing has a strong steel mill vibe,”
he said.
“Hmm,” Gu Fei smiled.
When the owner brought the coffee over, he asked, “Did you make that?”
pointing to the small ironwork ball.
“Yeah,” she nodded, lightly kicking the black iron leg with her toe. “I made all these myself.”
“Amazing,” said Jiang Cheng.
The boss smiled and looked at Gu Miao before walking over to her and placing the small
iron ball on the table in front of her. “It’s yours,” she said.
Gu Miao looked up at her and bowed her head. “Thank you, sister,” said Gu Fei quickly.
Gu Miao stood up and bowed to her. The boss hesitated for a moment and then said,
“You’re welcome, it’s fate.”
“Fate,” Gu Fei leaned back in his chair and looked at Jiang Cheng. “Cheng Ge, we must be
extremely fateful, right?”
“Hmm,” Jiang Cheng took a sip of coffee. “I traveled thousands of miles to the steel mill just
to meet you. That must be very fateful.”
“Lucky too,” Gu Fei leaned on the table.
“How so?” Jiang Cheng also leaned onto the table, face-to-face with Gu Fei.
“Alittle earlier or later by a second,” Gu Fei said, “and you wouldn’t have bumped into Gu
Miao. If you hadn’t picked up Gu Miao, I probably wouldn’t have paid much attention to
you.”
“You were relatively polite to me at the beginning because of Gu Miao, right?”
Jiang Cheng smiled.
“Well, she liked you,” Gu Fei smirked. “But also, you’re good-looking.”
Jiang Cheng clicked his tongue.
“You’re really handsome, Cheng Ge,” said Gu Fei.
“We’re close enough now, you don’t have to flatter me,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Am I handsome?” Gu Fei asked.
“Devastatingly handsome,” Jiang Cheng said.
Gu Fei laughed and leaned back in his chair. “It’s really nice like this,” he sighed softly.
“Yeah,” Jiang Cheng nodded and leaned on the table.
After chatting for a while, Gu Fei’s gaze fell on something behind Jiang Cheng.
“Cheng Ge, look,” he said.
“Hmm?” Jiang Cheng turned around.
In the corner next to the bar behind them was an electric piano, and there was a guitar
leaning against a chair next to it.
“What?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him.
“Do you have any ideas?” Gu Fei asked quietly.
Jiang Cheng looked at him for a moment and then laughed. “Do you have an idea?”
“A little bit,” Gu Fei said.
“I also have a little bit,” Jiang Cheng said.
“But I don’t know if they’ll let us use it,” Gu Fei said.
“Why don’t you ask?” Jiang Cheng said.
“I’ll go ask,” Gu Fei looked towards the bar and stood up.
The last time Jiang Cheng played the piano was at the performance in high
school. When he thought about it, he felt an indescribable emotion in his heart.
The panic and helplessness at the time, the heartache after the anger, and finally clearly
feeling Gu Fei’s despair.
Thinking back now, his heart still trembled slightly.
At that time, he had hoped to play together with Gu Fei, but it was never realized.
When Gu Fei showed him just now and he turned to see the piano and the guitar, he
suddenly felt a shiver down his spine.
“It’s okay,” Gu Fei came back and said softly, “the owner said we can use it.”
Jiang Cheng turned his head, the owner leaning on the bar made a gesture of invitation
towards him.
He smiled, stood up, and walked over with Gu Fei.
He had played an electric piano before at Pan Zhi’s house. His mom joined some middle-
aged and elderly art group and bought a piano but never touched it. Jiang Cheng was
probably the only one who had ever made it produce sound.
The electric piano in front of him was more advanced than the one at Pan Zhi’s house. After
sitting down, Jiang Cheng moved his fingers a bit and then climbed a scale, feeling that it
was still okay.
The two girls sitting over there chatting heard the music and looked over together.
“What do you think?” Gu Fei stood next to him with a guitar, sliding his fingers over the
strings. “This guitar seems to be played frequently, and the tuning is still accurate.”
“Pretty good,” Jiang Cheng played a few notes on the keys with both hands, looking at Gu
Fei. “So… shall we start?”
“Mm-hmm.” Gu Fei nodded.
They didn’t discuss what song to play, but they both knew what to play.
As Gu Fei lightly tapped out the rhythm on the guitar case, Jiang Cheng smiled and listened
to the prelude that gently flowed from Gu Fei’s fingertips for a few bars before his fingers
fell onto the keys.
That song was already ingrained in both of them. Starting from any measure, they could
smoothly continue.
At the beginning, Jiang Cheng’s hands were slightly tense, after all, it had been a
long time since he last played, and it wasn’t a familiar piano.
But by the time they finished the first run, he had gradually relaxed.
During the interlude, he looked at Gu Fei. In the sunlight, Gu Fei’s slightly lowered
eyelashes cast long shadows, gently trembling.
When it was time for the piano to come in, he looked up at Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng smiled, his hands descended, and the notes leaped from his fingertips.
“ I think, with just one glance, we’ll grow old together… ” Gu Fei sang softly.
Jiang Cheng followed along with a gentle hum.
“I think, under the warm sunshine and spring grass, you give me a simple embrace
I think, trampling through the maze of time, when you open your eyes, you’ll hear
I think, with you on my left shoulder, a smile on my right
I think, running freely in your eyes
I think, with just one glance, we’ll grow old
In the quiet sunshine, the music and singing were both soft and gentle.
Jiang Cheng’s gaze remained on Gu Fei’s face, intertwining with his eye line.
Sometimes, he would feel that “forever” was a quite unreal term, something uncertain and
elusive, but it could unexpectedly appear in a moment when you least expected it.
Right now, in front of them.
Within the notes at their fingertips, within the gaze they shared, and in the small square of
sunlight coming through the window beside them.
Gu Fei took two steps back within the piano sound, received a rose handed out by the
owner from behind the bar, and walked back to Jiang Cheng’s side.
“Cheng Ge, happy birthday.”
“Happy birthday.” Jiang Cheng finished playing the last note and took the rose.
“We don’t need any anniversaries,” Gu Fei said, “what we need to commemorate isn’t
measured in days.”
“Uh-huh.” Jiang Cheng looked at him.
“We have to measure it in a lifetime,” Gu Fei said.
“Ah,” Jiang Cheng smiled and nodded, “a lifetime.”
《 撒野》 正文完: The story of Saye (Run Freely) ends.

1. (slang) top student · bookworm ↩

2. Jiang Cheng is figuratively suggesting that Gu Fei has gathered so many flattering
expressions (referred to as “faces”) along the way
that he could stack or plaster ten layers of them. The use of “pick
up faces” is a playful way of saying that Gu Fei has gained a lot of
attention or admiration. ↩
Document Outline
 Chapter 1
 Chapter 2
 Chapter 3
 Chapter 4
 Chapter 5
 Chapter 6
 Chapter 7
 Chapter 8
 Chapter 30
 Chapter 31
 Chapter 32
 Chapter 33
 Chapter 34
 Chapter 35
 Chapter 36
 Chapter 37
 Chapter 38
 Chapter 39
 Chapter 40
 Chapter 41
 Chapter 42
 Chapter 43
 Chapter 44
 Chapter 45
 Chapter 46
 Chapter 47
 Chapter 48
 Chapter 49
 Chapter 50
 Chapter 51
 Chapter 52
 Chapter 53
 Chapter 54
 Chapter 55
 Chapter 56
 Chapter 57
 Chapter 58
 Chapter 59
 Chapter 60
 Chapter 61
 Chapter 62
 Chapter 63
 Chapter 64
 Chapter 65
 Chapter 66
 Chapter 67
 Chapter 68
 Chapter 69
 Chapter 70
 Chapter 71
 Chapter 72
 Chapter 73
 Chapter 74
 Chapter 75
 Chapter 76
 Chapter 77
 Chapter 78
 Chapter 79
 Chapter 80
 Chapter 81
 Chapter 82
 Chapter 83
 Chapter 84
 Chapter 85
 Chapter 86
 Chapter 87
 Chapter 88
 Chapter 89
 Chapter 90
 Chapter 91
 Chapter 92
 Chapter 93
 Chapter 94
 Chapter 95
 Chapter 96
 Chapter 97
 Chapter 98
 Chapter 99
 Chapter 100
 Chapter 101
 Chapter 102
 Chapter 103
 Chapter 104
 Chapter 105
 Chapter 106
 Chapter 107
 Chapter 108
 Chapter 109
 Chapter 110
 Chapter 111
 Chapter 112
 Chapter 113
 Chapter 114
 Chapter 115
 Chapter 116
 Chapter 117
 Chapter 118
 Chapter 119
 Chapter 120
 Chapter 121
 Chapter 122
 Chapter 123
 Chapter 124
 Chapter 125
 Chapter 126
 Chapter 127
 Chapter 128
 Chapter 129
 Chapter 130
 Chapter 131
 Saye Ch. 132
 Saye Ch. 133
 Saye Ch. 134
 Saye Ch. 135
 Saye Ch. 136
 Saye Ch. 137
 Saye Ch. 138
 Saye Ch. 139
 Saye Ch. 140
 Saye Ch. 141
 Saye Ch. 142
 Saye Ch. 143
 Saye Ch. 144
 Saye Ch. 145