CH 54

Chapter 54: A Lifeline or a Knife

Song Yu couldn’t hold back after all, and he pulled Yue Zhishi into his arms. He restrained himself and hugged him with a very, very light strength, so that the embrace looked more like he was comforting him — and not possessing him.

“I won’t.” Song Yu caressed Yue Zhishi’s nape, his voice a bit husky. “Something like that won’t happen again.” Song Yu was already smart enough, but he couldn’t understand how he could get Yue Zhishi to understand he actually really cared about him and actually didn’t want to leave him at all. His feelings were like the tip of iceberg: he could only show one ten-thousandth of his feelings. Only then could he continue acting normally as an older brother should.

But he found it harder and harder to regulate his emotions. He wanted Yue Zhishi to understand how important he was to him, and yet he wasn’t willing to expose his true desires to him. He borrowed Yue Zhishi’s trust and reliance towards him to satisfy his own narrow-minded possessiveness.

“I will do everything I promised you.”

Yue Zhishi quietly let Song Yu hug him. He didn’t cry, didn’t respond and was even more silent than the lake water. Song Yu felt a bit uneasy at this, as if Yue Zhishi thought the words he’d spoken were no longer useful — as if he would no longer ask him again and again like when he was a child, “Really? You promise.”

Now that Yue Zhishi was grown up, Song Yu was a bit scared he wouldn’t need his promises anymore.

But at the end, Yue Zhishi still lifted his hands and gently grabbed onto Song Yu’s clothes at the small of his back. Even though the wrinkles on his clothes could disappear at any time after this mutual embrace ended, not leaving behind a shred of evidence, Song Yu was still slightly consoled by this.

Noticing Yue Zhishi’s arms were a bit cold, Song Yu suggested taking him back. They walked on the plank road timidly, as if they were treading on thin ice, and yet they clutched each other’s hands tightly. Once they arrived back to the shore, they returned once again to a safe distance from each other.

Yue Zhishi had already recovered by the time they stood underneath his dorm building. It was like he’d already forgotten what they just spoke about, and he started smiling to Song Yu again. “If you’re going to basketball training, can you tell me ahead of time? I want to train with you.”

Song Yu nodded in agreement, and then he raised a hand to touch Yue Zhishi’s face, once again caressing Yue Zhishi’s nape for a little while.

These movements exceeded Yue Zhishi’s expectations. They made him feel like a little puppy who’d been given extra snacks; his heart very much liked them, but he didn’t dare move. He was even more shaken after he left Song Yu and went upstairs — to the point that he silently said to Song Yu in his heart in distress and out of spite, don’t touch me like that again.

But he wanted him to; he liked it.

When he reached the fourth floor, Yue Zhishi suddenly heard someone call his name. He saw Shen Mi once he lifted his head, and he was standing next to the windows in the corridor.

“Why are you here?” Yue Zhishi remembered he was drunk and asked again, “Are you feeling okay?”

Shen Mi chuckled and answered his second question first. “I didn’t drink that much. I’m just a bit red, I’m not actually drunk.” He then said quickly, “I sent you some messages after I got back. Since you weren’t replying, I came over by myself. I waited for you for a while, but since you weren’t back yet, I was getting ready to leave. I didn’t expect you to come back now.”

Yue Zhishi gave him a smile too. “I was walking around campus with my ge.”

“I know.” Shen Mi spoke a bit too quickly.

Yue Zhishi originally wanted to ask if he wanted anything else, but he felt asking something like that wasn’t too nice. So he extended out an invitation: “Do you still want to come and hang around?”

Unlike usual, Shen Mi refused. “No, it’s late. You should go rest. I just wanted to check on you, in case you weren’t happy about tonight.” He then said, consoling, “Don’t be angry because of someone like that. There’s no need.”

Yue Zhishi nodded. “I know, don’t worry.” He stood in the corridor, watching Shen Mi leave, and waited for him to reach outside. He could see his receding figure enter the building next door from the window.

Yue Zhishi was still caged by that feeling of insecurity. In the past, once he’d received Song Yu’s promise, his symptoms would ease; this time, they didn’t. Song Yu had clearly given him his word, but it didn’t help him at all.

Yue Zhishi felt very helpless.

Everything Song Yu promised, he truly did, including bringing Yue Zhishi to training. Even if he really was very busy, he’d still accompany Yue Zhishi at least twice a week. He once arrived still wearing his glasses. Song Yu would usually leave his glasses at his seat in the research lab in case he lost them, because he only wore them when he was either studying or working. But he didn’t even realise he was still wearing them this time, and he was even wearing a white button down shirt that was unsuited for basketball.

At that time, Yue Zhishi was about to shoot a three-pointer. The court he just happened to be in faced the entrance of the gymnasium, so when he saw Song Yu come in, the trajectory of the ball went crooked. He’d thought it would definitely go in, and yet his shot turned into a very absurd airball.

Yue Zhishi thought it was a bit embarrassing, but Song Yu looked so nice wearing his white button down shirt and his glasses. The two feelings collided, and he forgot what he was doing, only foolishly saying to Song Yu, “Wouldn’t your glasses fall off if you wear them playing ball.” He rapidly realised his question was very silly, so he added, “They shouldn’t, your nose bridge is really high.”

Song Yu reached up a hand to touch his glasses, and he only then realised what had felt different. He didn’t say he had just come from an unexpected meeting; he merely said he could see clearer with his glasses and didn’t take them off.

He was always like this — using lies neither too big or too small to cover up the thoughts he’d thought wouldn’t hurt or itch at his heart. Yue Zhishi wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, anyway.

Bumping into Shen Mi during training was unavoidable. Song Yu had held a large prejudice against Shen Mi in the beginning. He’d very keenly sensed the good feelings Shen Mi held towards Yue Zhishi, as well as his extremely strong desire to show off to him. Song Yu had always felt that the majority of the people who liked Yue Zhishi usually only liked his outer appearance, or maybe they thought he was a kind and innocent person who was very easy to approach. But after interacting with him, Song Yu realised Shen Mi truly did treat Yue Zhishi very well — he was just too childish and wasn’t able to hide his feelings at all.

There were a few times when Song Yu had hugged Yue Zhishi from behind, teaching him how to shoot. When Shen Mi saw them, his hand movements would freeze, and then he’d continue acting as if nothing had happened, continuing to train with other people.

Other than him, everyone else was even less likely to find Song Yu and Yue Zhishi’s overly close actions strange. Everyone silently saw them as brothers who’d grown up together.

The people in the basketball team wouldn’t joke about Yue Zhishi and Song Yu, but they had still yet to cure their old habit of discussing Song Yu and Nan Jia, despite Nan Jia sternly refuting them every time and Song Yu directly walking away. Sometimes, Yue Zhishi would also be very curious — just exactly where did they think them so well-matched?

Whenever he thought about this, he would look towards Nan Jia. She was very beautiful, and despite her exquisite face, she didn’t have any airs at all. Her warmth and gentleness basked others like a soft spring breeze, and yet her strength was convincing and believable, not discordant at all. She and Song Yu would sometimes accidentally stand together, and they truly did look beautiful together.

After observing and pondering over it for a while, it felt like Yue Zhishi also started to gradually believe this as fact.

They truly complemented each other very well.

His moods lately were like the unstable temperatures in September — it would be hot enough to wear short sleeves one day, and yet the temperature would suddenly drop the next day, catching people by surprise.

Yue Zhishi wore the wrong clothes twice, running back to his dorm after a class to grab a jacket. After doing so a number of times, he fell slightly sick, and it felt like he had fallen into a vicious cycle, his cold aggravating the heavy weight on his emotions.

Two weeks had clearly already passed since they’d had their late night chat at Lingbo Gate, and yet he still hadn’t made much progress.

His afternoon course started pretty late, and Yue Zhishi was pulled by the seniors in the main basketball team to eat lunch together in the cafeteria. Song Yu, Qin Yan and Nan Jia were all not present, so he sat next to Shen Mi, his left side filled by another cheerful senior. They chatted about NBA competitions and gossip from other faculties. Yue Zhishi was somewhat distracted. His course that afternoon was very difficult; he hadn’t been able to fully follow along in the last few classes, and most importantly, the professor didn’t provide course notes. He wanted to buy a cup of coffee after lunch so he could be a bit more awake during class.

“Hey, Le Le, I have a question for you.”

The senior sitting next to him interrupted Yue Zhishi’s worries. He lifted his head, earnestly looking at the senior’s face. “Sure, what is it?”

“Has your brother really not dated before?” He looked extremely curious. “A guy like him should have heaps of people chasing after him.”

“He hasn’t,” Yue Zhishi replied. “He doesn’t seem to be very interested in dating.”

The senior sitting across from him laughed. “The key thing is that most high schoolers dating early also wouldn’t tell their younger brothers.”

“True.”

Yue Zhishi shook his head. “He really hasn’t. There’s never been a girl who’s gotten close to him.”

“Really? We really can’t understand the world of a university tyrant. I hear his entrance exams score was fucking high, so him running over to study a painful major like geomatics is amazing.”

“He really likes this field.” Yue Zhishi stressed, “It’s very good as long as he likes it.”

“You’re so good to your brother. It would be nice if I had a little brother like you, I’d steal some fame just by showing you off.” The senior chuckled and gave Yue Zhishi some of his own stir-fried noodles with squid. “Have some.”

Yue Zhishi didn’t want to say he couldn’t eat it, but Shen Mi moved swiftly and quickly took the noodles from his bowl once the senior wasn’t paying attention.

“Hey, then let me ask you something else.” The senior looked at Yue Zhishi again. “Have you thought about what kind of sister-in-law you’ll have in the future?”

The other guys all unintentionally cracked up at the same time, their laughter coming across a bit strangely.

Yue Zhishi shook his head. “No.”

“Seriously?” A senior sitting diagonally across from him chortled and said, “I always look a few extra times every time my brother brings home his girlfriend.”

“Tsk tsk, Old Zhang, I can’t believe you’re that kind of person!”

“Hey, who doesn’t like sister-in-laws!”

“Let’s not lead our juniors astray, okay.” The senior sitting across from him looked at Yue Zhishi. “Since you really haven’t thought of it before, then what about…” He pondered for a bit, and then looking as if he thought of a good option: “Just as an example. If senior Nan Jia became your sister-in-law, would you be happy?”

Yue Zhishi watched him in silence. He didn’t respond for a long time, and then he suddenly started coughing. His coughs became worse the longer they went on, and it seemed like he couldn’t stop.

“Senior, you guys are so gossipy,” Shen Mi said. “Senior Nan Jia will definitely be angry again if she heard about this.”

“We’re just joking, it’s too boring to just sit in silence while we eat.”

“Rumours like these better not be true. An enemy like Song Yu is too strong — I still have a chance as long as it’s not him.”

“As if you have a chance!”

Yue Zhishi’s stomach was slightly hurting, his palms covered by a thin layer of sweat. It felt like a stress reaction from the sudden changes in his moods. Doctors had told him since he was a child: even if his asthma was triggered by his allergy, he still needed to pay attention to his emotions. He needed to prevent falling sick as much as possible and maintain a cheerful mood; that was the best way he could minimise his risk of suffering from an attack. He had always been an obedient child, and he’d always requested all this from himself.

But now, it became harder and harder for him to control his own emotions — just like how he couldn’t control his own breathing when he was suffering from an allergic attack.

After they finished lunch, Shen Mi said he needed to pick up a delivery and asked Yue Zhishi to go with him. Yue Zhishi naturally didn’t refuse, and they separated from their seniors that way. Shen Mi actually didn’t have something he needed to pick up. He brought Yue Zhishi into a convenience store, buying him a hot milk tea.

“I’ll treat you to this. All the girls say this is really yummy,” Shen Mi said.

Yue Zhishi thanked him. “You keep treating me to food.”

Shen Mi laughed. “The way you look when you’re eating can really cheer people up.”

Yue Zhishi said thank you again, and the two of them sat on the bar stools, drinking their milk teas. Shen Mi chattered a lot about some amusing things he’d encountered recently, and Yue Zhishi quietly listened to him, occasionally breaking into laughter. As they left the convenience store, Yue Zhishi asked Shen Mi, “Do you think senior Nan Jia and my ge are compatible?”

Shen Mi focused on him for two seconds, and then he let out a laugh. “That’s not up to me to say.”

“Then who does?”

“It’s not up to anyone to say.” Shen Mi smiled. “I can even say we’re the best of friends, but that’s just lips flapping around.”

Yue Zhishi fell silent, and then he said after a little while, “You’re a good friend of mine.”

Shen Mi didn’t comment or respond to his words, but he went with Yue Zhishi the entire way to his classroom entrance, patting his shoulder before he left. “Le Le, don’t think about useless things and end up hurting yourself. Cheer up.”

Shen Mi’s words were always really reasonable, but Yue Zhishi always never truly understood them.

Before his class started, Yue Zhishi sat in the lecture theatre and looked through his previous notes again. He didn’t want to fall behind, and he was consistently able to calm down whenever he focused on his studies. It was almost time to start the class, and more students arrived — Yue Zhishi didn’t even notice them until the class bell rang, and he came back to attention, lifting his head.

Except it wasn’t the fussy old professor standing at the podium. It was Nan Jia.

Though the microphone, Nan Jia’s voice was slightly stricter than usual. “Professor Wang’s attending a seminar today, so he’s not able to lecture. My name is Nan Jia, his assistant, and I’ll be taking you guys through some real life cases. We’ll also review some of the course’s previous content. You can take today as a question and review session.”

She looked at the roster in her hands and decided to place it down. “I won’t call names. Everyone should know what to do.”

A guy joked, “Good thing I came today, we’re getting two things for the price of one.”

All the other students started to laugh, including Yue Zhishi.

He realised he couldn’t hate Nan Jia no matter how hard he tried.

Nan Jia’s grades had always been at the top, and she was very capable, helping them sort through all of the previous course content and completely taking them through the flow of logic. Yue Zhishi felt like he finally understood some of the coursework he previously hadn’t understood, and some of the previously hard to memorise points were now easily digested.

Nan Jia wore a smile the entire time she led the class. Many students greeted her before they left, and she replied to every single one of them. Yue Zhishi packed up his bag, walking over. “Senior.”

“What do you think, were you surprised when you saw me?” Nan Jia unplugged her USB, following him out. “Why do you look so tired? Let me buy you some coffee. There’s a decent automatic coffee machine around the corner of this floor. Have you tried it?”

Yue Zhishi shook his head. He said this course was a bit hard, and he was a bit sick, so he wasn’t feeling very energetic.

“Ah, I was the same when I was taking this course. My head was always floating around in the clouds.” She whispered to Yue Zhishi, “This professor is really amazing, but he’s not great at teaching. I have his course notes from before. There’s been some slight changes since then, but they should be roughly the same content as now. Do you need them?”

“Yes!” Yue Zhishi cheered up and then complained, “He doesn’t give course notes anymore.”

Nan Jia took him to the automatic coffee machine around the corner and bought him a caramel macchiato, saying this was the nicest flavour — it had a very rich, nutty taste.

“We don’t have time today, but next time I’ll take you to try some freshly ground coffee.”

As they spoke, a girl walked by and called out Nan Jia’s name from far away. “How come you’re here!”

Nan Jia looked over. “Yueyue.” She showed her the cup of coffee in her hands. “I just finished my teaching assistant class. I’m just perking my junior and myself up with some coffee. You said our dorm was leaking water during lunchtime — has it been fixed?”

Yue Zhishi looked at the senior called Yueyue and guessed they were dorm mates. They seemed very close. She walked over and also gave Yue Zhishi a friendly greeting. “I know you, you’re Yue Zhishi, right? You’re Song Yu’s brother.”

“Hi, senior.”

“Hello, hello. You’re too famous, you became our law faculty’s faculty grass as soon as you came in. So many people are talking about you.” She was very bright and cheerful, her face filled with animation as she spoke.

Yue Zhishi shook his head in embarrassment, not knowing how to continue the conversation.

Yueyue stared at Yue Zhishi and then looked back at Nan Jia, giving him a meaningful look. “Hey, you have a pretty good relationship with Song Yu’s brother. Are you planning something?”

Nan Jia frowned. “What nonsense are you saying? This has nothing to do with anything.”

“Why are you holding back for, seriously.” She smiled at Yue Zhishi again. “Let me tell you a secret. Your senior Nan Jia has liked your brother since first year.”

A small dull pain flared in Yue Zhishi’s heart. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but she spoke before he could.

“You should help out your senior sister.”

Without waiting for Yue Zhishi to react, Nan Jia found an excuse to leave her dorm mate behind and pulled Yue Zhishi away.

They came out of the classroom building to sit on a bench in the little garden behind the building. During this time, Nan Jia kept saying to Yue Zhishi, “My dorm mate’s quite careless with the way she speaks. Don’t take her seriously, everything she said were just jokes.”

Yue Zhishi sat down as well. The coffee in his hand had now cooled down a bit, and he could finally drink it.

He didn’t drink much, but the caffeine worked faster than he’d expected — his fingers started to slightly tremble. Yue Zhishi was a bit cold — maybe he wasn’t wearing enough clothing.

Nan Jia said she had never able to avoid being teased. Not only just about Song Yu, but also about other people. She started to laugh as she spoke. “There are even some people joking about you and me. Isn’t that really funny?”

The way she explained it seemed to confirm their jokes.

Yue Zhishi raised his eyes, shifting his gaze to Nan Jia. “Senior, do you truly like my ge?”

Nan Jia quieted down and then sat next to Yue Zhishi. She looked down at her cup of coffee, head lowered, and spoke only after a long while passed. “Yes, I’ve liked him since first year. But…”

She lifted her head and looked at Yue Zhishi. “Le Le, I don’t need you to help me.”

Yue Zhishi wrinkled his eyebrows. “Really?” He even smiled uncontrollably at Nan Jia, saying words even he thought were very fake. “I can help you. I used to help people give him love letters and deal with girls who looked for me after they couldn’t add his contact details. This is nothing.”

He wanted to say, if it’s you, I’ll be even more delighted, but Yue Zhishi, at the end, wasn’t able to say it.

He found himself even slightly enjoying the feeling of hurting himself — as though he wouldn’t feel so lost if he was in a bit more pain.

Nan Jia tilted her head over and smiled at Yue Zhishi. “The reason why I said I didn’t need your help is because I’m slowly giving up right now. This has always been an unrequited love. Other than my own emotional investment, I actually haven’t put in anything. I liked him by myself, and now I’m giving up by myself — from the beginning to the end, nothing will affect Song Yu and other people.”

Yue Zhishi couldn’t understand. “Give up?”

He felt like giving up Song Yu was the hardest thing to do in the world.

“Can you really give him up?”

Nan Jia gazed at his eyes, her voice relaxed. “Does it sound shameful to give up? But actually, I had my own considerations when I made this decision.”

Her finger lightly tapped on the paper cup. “To me, there are two things I should judge when deciding to give up on someone. One: how likely is he to accept me? Two: the ‘like’ I have for him — is it worth me spending a large amount of time and effort to force him to like me back?”

Seeing Yue Zhishi a bit bewildered, Nan Jia smiled and explained, “Let me talk about my first point. I can clearly sense Song Yu doesn’t like me; he has absolutely no interest in me at all. It’s already very hard just with this. Then, I need to consider my second point. There’s nothing wrong with me liking him, but just for this ‘like’ — should I waste my energy, giving up my every day life, just to eagerly chase after him like in one of those idol dramas? Will he respond to me and like me back just by me doing so?”

The wind blew, a leaf drifting onto Nan Jia’s long skirt. She didn’t brush it away. “You know, so many people think once a girl likes someone, she’ll lose all her reason. They think she’ll like someone to the point she’ll give up herself. But I don’t think I can do that — there are too many things I want to do, too many goals I want to reach.”

“So you think if there isn’t much hope for something, we can choose to give it up, right?” Yue Zhishi asked.

“No. Rather than putting it that way, it’s more that if I have to choose between him or me, I chose myself.” Nan Jia gazed at him. “Compared to liking him, I love myself more. I don’t want to give myself up, so I’m giving up Song Yu.”

Yue Zhishi found Nan Jia very clear-headed. She was very similar to Song Yu in that sense, but she was even more unwavering and steadfast than Song Yu.

“Senior Nan Jia, you’re truly amazing.” He sounded a bit envious and yet also very sincere. “To be able to make a decision so rationally.”

Nan Jia smiled wryly. “Who wants to remain level-headed when it comes to feelings? It’s just because I haven’t received any special treatment.”

She took a sip of coffee. “Actually, I vaguely feel like Song Yu has someone he likes. It might be an unreliable gut feeling.”

This slightly upset Yue Zhishi. His hand braced against the bench, his nose a bit blocked, and it felt like his cold suddenly worsened. He pretended to look curious, lightly asking, “Really? Who do you think it is?”

“If you don’t know, then I definitely won’t know.” Nan Jia laughed, but after a moment, the smile on her face gradually ebbed away. “I just feel like, there are so many times Song Yu would do something to distract himself — like the basketball shooting I talked about last time. Sometimes he’d daze off, as if he’s thinking of someone. Girls are very sensitive to these things, we can sense it.”

Yue Zhishi’s heart felt very complicated. When Nan Jia admitted she truly liked Song Yu, he felt very miserable, as though they were about to get together and Song Yu was about to leave him. But when Nan Jia said she was giving up, Yue Zhishi suddenly felt a sense of relief even he himself found despicable. He’d visibly relaxed.

But now, he changed again: he impatiently, eagerly wanted to know if Song Yu really had someone he liked, and if he did, who that person was.

It was awful — Yue Zhishi couldn’t wait even for one moment. No matter how he tried to convince himself, this way of thinking was truly unhealthy. It was abnormal, and it definitely wasn’t something a little brother should have.

“Le Le, don’t tell your brother any of the things I’ve told you.” Nan Jia pleaded with him with her eyes. “I just wanted to explain to you so things don’t get more troublesome in the future. Besides, if he knew, he might find it awkward.”

Yue Zhishi nodded. “I understand.”

“And…” Nan Jia released a breath, patting Yue Zhishi’s shoulder. “All of the things I said about love — they were all directed to myself. I’m very selfish, always calculating about how much I’ve invested and how much I’ll get back in return. And plus, I can feel that the other person’s heart belongs to someone else. But——”

Her voice turned solemn and filled with encouragement. “If you meet someone you like, don’t be like me. If you truly really like that person, you should be brave.”

He didn’t know why, but Yue Zhishi’s eyes suddenly started to burn. “Really?”

“Yes. Who knows, that person might be carrying the same feelings for you. It would be a pity to miss each other.” Nan Jia raised her head, looking up towards the clouds in the sky, and said to herself, “Song Yu is a really good person, but I’m not bad either. I’ll definitely meet someone who’ll make me overlook the cost versus the return, someone who’ll give me a reply.”

Yue Zhishi looked at the side of Nan Jia’s face, hesitating. In his heart, Nan Jia was someone who could help him push away his foggy confusion. She was clear-headed yet sincere, and Yue Zhishi subconsciously trusted her.

Or maybe he truly had nowhere else to turn and chose Nan Jia without noticing. From her, he hoped he could find a lifeline, or maybe a knife to sever his thoughts.

“Senior.”

Nan Jia looked back. “Hm?”

Yue Zhishi frowned, his voice very soft. “The feelings you have towards someone — how can you tell if it’s ‘like’ or something else?”

Seeing Yue Zhishi’s eyes, Nan Jia was silent for two seconds, and then she used a not too relaxed but very calm voice to answer, “Le Le, if the feelings you hold for someone is something else, you’ll find that person very, very good. You’ll be very happy and feel very warm as soon as you see them, as soon as you think of them.”

“That which makes you feel uncontrollable pain — only then is that like.”