Han Shi Yu told Yang Mo he wanted to go back and put his books away first. Yang Mo said he didn’t mind so he followed him back to his dorm.
Han Shi Yu held the books in one hand while chatting with Yang Mo as he opened the door. The second the door was opened; Yang Mo’s eyes were drawn to what was inside. He raised an eyebrow.
Seeing Yang Mo’s expression, Han Shi Yu also turned around in confusion.
He saw his two roommates who had rolled up their sleeves, standing inside like Gods of the Door, hugging their arms as if they had been waiting for him for a long time now.
Another guy who was furthest in the room was sitting boldly on the two stools put together, with a long table laid out horizontally in front of him.
Three pair of eyes were staring sharply at Han Shi Yu.
He turned his head and ran.
Yang Mo moved to the side.
The two Gods of the Door caught him with ease. Han Shi Yu pleaded, “Ge…Ge— I was wrong.”
The guy who stood inside grabbed a bottle of shampoo and slammed it on the table, taking on the pose of a judge from the ancient times. He said, “Drag him here.”
Yang Mo watched on with interest.
Han Shi Yu was dragged and tugged back to the room, wailing along the way before he got pressed down on the table.
The guy taking charge among the three said, “Are you going to confess or should I do it for you?”
Han Shi Yu: “Brother Min, I’m innocent.”
Xie Chen Min swung the shampoo bottle in front of his eyes and interrogated, “Where exactly are you innocent in this?”
Xie Chen Min: “Changing my shampoo to water was you, is it not?”
Han Shi Yu remained silent.
“You even added a packet of seasoning for me! The chicken stew with mushrooms from Master Kong, huh?!” Xie Chen Min grabbed the back of Han Shi Yu’s neck and said in a friendly tone, “I really have to fucking thank you.”
Yang Mo: “……”
They initially wanted to step in and try to stop him.
But after hearing the second part, they held back, thinking this was too light.
Han Shi Yu whined like he was bringing up a complaint, “I’m innocent! Old Sui and Brother Qi have a part in this too. They are the ones who set the rules of the dare, I…Ah!”
Old Sui and his Brother Qi who were holding him down naturally could not let him finish his sentence. They immediately covered his mouth with their hands and said in a good-roommate kind of tone, “Brother Min, you can continue with the trial, we’ll stop him from spouting nonsense.”
Yang Mo couldn’t help but turn his face sideways and laugh a little.
The four of them had finally finished messing around. Han Shi Yu was one against three, so of course he was suppressed till the bitter end. His voice was hoarse from screaming out in pain and he was left gasping for breath on the bed, paralyzed.
After they finished punishing the culprit, Yang Mo walked in and met the gazes of Old Sui and Brother Qi. He pointed the mess that was on the bed and said indifferently, “His friend.”
The two of them: “Ohh, welcome, welcome.”
Xie Chen Min froze for a moment when he saw Yang Mo. His eyes were glued on him for a long time without looking away. Yang Mo felt his gaze and looked over as well, nodding politely as a greeting.
Xie Chen Min smiled sheepishly as he rubbed his nose and said, “Sorry, I just felt like you are really similar to a senior I know.” He pointed under his eye and laughed, “Both of you have a mole here.”
Yang Mo blinked.
Han Shi Yu breathlessly explained for him, “…Senior knows Brother Lin too.”
“Oh,” Xie Chen Min nodded and smiled at Yang Mo. He looked over at Han Shi Yu again and said, “How can you still be talking?”
Han Shi Yu immediately shut his mouth tight to prevent himself from falling into the death lock of strong men.
As someone really into computer works and frequently engaged it, Yang Mo had to deal with instant noodles and takeout often so he was really familiar to their flavors.
He thought to himself, no wonder when he once met Lin Chu at the university’s supermarket, he saw Lin Chu stock up on various flavors of Master Kong instant noodles at a discounted price, all except for the mushroom chicken stew flavor.
Yang Mo sighed at how all-encompassing nature is, and how all different forms of life can find a place they belonged at, even someone like Han Shi Yu could survive in it too. He looked at the stray puppy eating across the street and said, “This is truly an incredible thing.”
Han Shi Yu: “?”
From earlier on, Han Shi Yu’s gaze looked a little vengeful, so Yang Mo thought he was upset from being taught a lesson. Yang Mo was about to comfort him by saying he wasn’t beaten up unjustly and it was even a great pleasure to watch from the side. But Han Shi Yu spoke up first and called out, “Ge.”
Yang Mo: “Hm?”
Han Shi Yu took a bite of rice, bit down hard on his spoon before saying, “Why didn’t you…want me to go with you to tutor that girl’s younger sister.”
Yang Mo: “……”
He only felt that when Han Shi Yu clung to him, he felt really uncomfortable, so his mouth acted faster and blurted that out. He didn’t mean to refuse him and did not expect Han Shi Yu was dwelling on this all along.
Yang Mo said, “No, I think it’s actually a good idea.”
Han Shi Yu said, “You really won’t mind…?”
Yang Mo: “I will mind if you ask again.”
“Oh…” Han Shi Yu said, “Do you not like that I often annoy you?”
Yang Mo ate his food and did not answer.
Han Shi Yu lowered his head and continued eating. He mumbled, depressed, “Then I won’t annoy you in the future anymore…”
The chopsticks in Yang Mo’s hand paused. He looked over at Han Shi Yu and said, “Do as you wish.”
Yang Mo was lying on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
Lu You Qi, who was passing by, poked his head over and looked at the ceiling that Yang Mo was staring at and asked, “Is there a girlfriend up there?”
Yang Mo: “Get lost.”
Lu You Qi got himself a glass of water and came back, saying, “What’s wrong with you? You’ve been staring at the ceiling every day for a week now. Does it look that pretty or something?”
Yang Mo did not answer and the air was filled with the sounds of water gurgling from the water dispenser.
Yang Mo picked up his phone and held it up to look at it.
His WeChat had been silent for a week now.
Ever since he told Han Shi Yu to ‘do as you wish’ last time, it seemed to have touched Han Shi Yu’s fragile heart of glass. He left pitifully and really never bothered Yang Mo again as he promised.
Yang Mo didn’t know why, but the entrance of his heart felt congested with all sorts of emotions. He felt off whether he was sitting or standing. And so, he always ended up going for a run to exercise, lying on the bed when he got back. But after the brain was emptied, that feeling became more intense.
Yang Mo faintly called out, “Broadband.”
Lu You Qi had given up on fighting that nickname and said, “What.”
Yang Mo turned his head to look at him, as if he was holding his breath before he squeezed out some words through his teeth with difficulty, “…If I scolded you with a sentence, and you didn’t contact me for a week, what would you be thinking during that week.”
“What’s wrong?” Lu You Qi hit the nail on the head immediately, “Your little junior is ignoring you?”
“No,” Yang Mo denied it immediately, “I just suddenly feel like scolding you.”
Lu You Qi had never seen anyone who would politely do a questionnaire before scolding him. He said in disbelief, “…Are you still a human.”
Yang Mo said, annoyed, “Answer it quickly.”
Lu You Qi thought it over for a while before replying, “I would be okay. Eating, drinking, living normally for a week. Since you don’t care about me anyways.” Lu You Qi again hit the nail on the head unintentionally, “Why? Can I even expect someone like you to look at your phone every day for a week, feeling guilty and torn over me?”
Yang Mo: “……”
Yang Mo: “What if that happens then.”
Lu You Qi: “That would mean you’ve fallen in love with me.”
After a week, Lu You Qi was once again pressed onto his bed for another education. This time, he didn’t even know what the reason was.
Yang Mo was a really prideful person, just like Old Yang.
He grew up taking on the ‘big brother figure’ trait and would subconsciously take care of every small animal or anyone smaller than him that he come across. When he was a child, the girls he played with were really fond of him and even boys his age liked following him around.
When others called him ‘brother’, although there were no ripples on his face, but his heart felt really great and happy.
This became his characteristic, following him like a shadow as he grew up, seeping into every little detail of his life. His personality seemed really cold on the outside so people who didn’t know him well would distance themselves far away. Only those who were really close to him could pick up on this characteristic of his.
From elementary school to high school, Yang Mo had set a record – all his desk mates, if they were girls, would stick close to him. And the confessions he received were not just a few too. The boys, whether older or younger than him would also respectfully call him ‘ge’.
However, he was a living contradiction, not liking to make friends and preferred to go about his school life on his own. He never took the initiative to establish any closer relationships with others.
When he hung out with Han Shi Yu, he would feel very comfortable and his mood sometimes change for the better because of him. Yang Mo never thought about what would happen if this person suddenly stopped bothering him. In the past, perhaps he would be happy that his surroundings were calmer and more peaceful. But now, his brain was the one that weren’t calm or peaceful.
Yang Mo finished a set of Olympiad questions to calm himself when he got annoyed. In the end, he answered two multiple-choice questions wrong, so Yang Mo instantly became even more annoyed and reached for his phone on the table to open WeChat.
He saw Hao Yan sending him a message, asking, “Can you make it to tutoring this weekend?”
Yang Mo: “Sure.”
He stopped his fingers on the keyboard for a moment and finally tapped on the stray puppy from the school of management.
Yang Mo: “Tutoring this weekend, 7am in the morning. We’ll meet at the east entrance.”
After 5 minutes had passed, Yang Mo finished marking a wrong question and glanced at his phone again.
Han Shi Yu: “Ohh.”
Yang Mo couldn’t explain why he felt relieved from that.
Sometimes fate worked in a really wonderful way.
Yang Mo was afraid of another sudden silence between them, so he spent the whole night making up a list of stiff conversation topics. Before he could pick one to talk about, he saw the little girl they were going to tutor.
Yang Mo: “……”
Han Shi Yu: “……”
The stall owner who sold those mochis stood there, “……”
She looked at Yang Mo, turned around and ran.
Han Shi Yu reached out, grabbed the back of her collar and said, “We came here to tutor you. Didn’t expect this, right?”
Her name seemed to be Mi Shu and Hao Yan was her cousin.
Mi Shu cried out, “I was wrong. I only earned an extra 10 yuan from Brother Yang Mo, was there a need to hunt me down all the way here for that?”
Han Shi Yu frowned, “What, you earned 10 yuan more from him?”
Mi Shu: “Ugh.”
Yang Mo rubbed the crease between his eyebrows and sighed, “What’s going on. Aren’t you a student at Shou Cheng University?”
Mi Shu confessed everything to them. That food festival allowed people outside of the university to participate as well as the university staffs collaborating with students – that was classified as a student ground. And so, she borrowed her sister’s name and entered the student ground, skipping all the tedious procedures that an off-campus group would have to go through.
Mi Shu folded her hands and said, “I was wrong. I’ll pay back the 10 yuan in installments. Please spare me.”
“……” Yang Mo said, “We’re really here to tutor you.”