TSIBAMS Chapter 108
by VolareArriving at 1984, the various styles and colors of motorcycles and electric bikes parked at the entrance suggested that the business inside was indeed better than before.
Qi Guang had to get out of the car first to help watch as Xu Ge reversed.
Xu Ge, while watching the rearview mirror, turned the steering wheel, “By the way, when we get in, you’ll see a waiter about your age named Xiao Ma…”
“I’ve already met him. Turn left, turn the steering wheel all the way, good, good, straighten it out!” Qi Guang watched carefully as the car’s rear slowly moved, “If it wasn’t so sudden today, how long were you planning to hide him?”
Xu Ge was taken aback, then smiled knowingly as if he had guessed something, “It’s not hiding.”
“Xu Ge, you don’t have to be so cautious about my feelings, I’m not that sensitive.” Qi Guang patted the roof of the car, “Brake, take the keys out!”
“Okay,” Xu Ge replied.
He didn’t want to say much about the Xiao Ma matter. With Qi Guang’s intelligence, he definitely understood his intentions. The reason he hadn’t mentioned it before was also because he was like Xu Ge—considering everything for the people he cared about was instinctive, but if it had to be brought out to be commented on, it would be too dramatic.
If they were to talk about saying “thank you”, they’d have to endure some awkwardness.
Fortunately, there were rarely awkward moments when getting along with Qi Guang. His deliberately understated attitude was proof of this.
“I probably won’t be so free later. I need to focus on the college entrance exam for the last half of the year. I already feel overwhelmed during this time. It’s too tiring.” Qi Guang stood outside the car door, pulling it open for him, “But I’ll still come back sometimes to relax and help out. Just don’t pay me anymore.”
“Huh?” Xu Ge, still in the driver’s seat, didn’t get out and looked at him, puzzled.
“I don’t spend much money usually. The money I’ve saved, though not much, is enough to last me until graduation. As for things after that, I’ll wait until after the exam to talk about them.” Qi Guang said.
Seeing that Xu Ge remained in the same position, he simply took the keys, pulled him out, and closed the door in one smooth motion.
“Don’t worry, I won’t starve to death.”
“Alright, don’t blame me if you starve to death.” Xu Ge playfully patted his stomach.
After attending a few campus recruitment fairs, Li Ke followed Ye Xing to his city, strolling around and checking out some famous attractions. Neither of them was particularly enthusiastic.
Although they weren’t in the mood to enjoy the scenery, Ye Xing was happy that Li Ke was there. After all, having someone to be with could save him a lot of time for self-doubt and overthinking. At least, putting on a brave face in front of someone made things a little less bad.
Putting on a brave face in front of Li Ke was better than doing it in front of Fang Rong.
Fang Rong was recovering well. Seeing Ye Xing’s friend at home, she had ordered a lot of dishes online and was now busy in the kitchen.
The TV in the living room was on. One person was watching absentmindedly, while the other was scrolling through his phone. A casual glance made Ye Xing realize Li Ke was booking a hotel on his phone.
“Aren’t you going back today?” Ye Xing asked.
“No,” Li Ke replied, without looking up.
He had been very quiet all day. Ye Xing hadn’t asked much, but seeing him silently booking a hotel made him realize that something might really be wrong.
“Aren’t your family urging you to come back?” Ye Xing looked at him, adding, “It’s almost New Year in two days.”
Li Ke’s gaze lifted from his phone and landed somewhere blankly. Then, he scoffed, “That family, as long as my brother is there, it’s enough for their family reunion.”
Although Li Ke was usually frivolous, he clearly wasn’t joking.
Ye Xing wisely didn’t ask any further, reaching out and snatching the phone away, “You’re staying here, don’t book a hotel.”
“We’re sleeping in one bed? That’s not appropriate, right?” Li Ke glanced at him sideways.
“What are you thinking?” Ye Xing glanced back, lightly glaring at him, “The sofa is yours!”
Li Ke nodded, closing his eyes.
Then, he sighed with a hint of helplessness and satisfaction, “Thank you, Boss Ye, for taking me in.”
Most of the people at 1984 tonight were young faces. Qi Guang carefully observed a few people and found that many were actually Shuai Xiaoyun’s classmates.
And Shuai Xiaoyun was clearly enjoying being the center of attention. She was steadily singing an unknown English song on stage. It had a very warm vibe, like rolling in the snow with friends wearing thick down jackets.
“There are more people here today than usual?”
“Thanks to your sister, she’s been saying she’s ‘making a comeback’ everywhere, and it’s almost like we’re hosting a class reunion in our store. I think it’s about the same amount of people as the last graduation gathering.” Bai Shu smiled and shook his head.
“Where’s Xu Ge?” Qi Guang asked, “He mysteriously disappeared after entering. Have you seen him?”
“He’s over there!” Bai Shu raised his chin towards a corner, “He’s been chatting with that girl for a long time, saying that she can use her ‘face card’ at our store from now on, no need to pay.”
After hearing what he said, Qi Guang couldn’t help but interject before he could even look, “Oh, why does that sound a little off to me?”
Who knew that Bai Shu would frankly say, “It’s very accurate, stop provoking! Look, it’s that girl.”
Then, he pointed in that direction again. Qi Guang followed the direction he gave. In a dimly lit corner, a man and a woman were indeed standing. Though it wasn’t very clear, the hairstyle almost confirmed that the man was Xu Ge. As for the girl…
Qi Guang squinted, trying hard to distinguish for half a minute.
“Wang Lulu?”
“Yes,” Bai Shu nodded, “Xu Ge even went as far as sending her many gifts to her house, scaring her parents into thinking that he had gotten her pregnant, making the girl have to explain for a long time.”
Qi Guang listened to his whole story with disbelief, then burst into laughter.
Perhaps it was because things had been so bad lately that he became a little exaggerated and deliberate when relaxing. His body seemed to be retaliating—he simply couldn’t stop.
Luckily, the laughter wasn’t out of place in this noisy space. The bar didn’t have much light to attract attention. Even if someone was rolling on the floor, no one would gather around to watch.
He laughed so freely, with a hint of self-mockery and unwillingness, for a long time.
Until he laughed so much that his jaw was about to fall off, he stopped, panting, the light in his eyes instantly dimming, slowly losing focus.
Bai Shu looked at him with some heartache, watching him suddenly withdraw from this liveliness, silent as if the person from just now wasn’t himself.
“Here, take a look. Xu Ge’s new Mexican wine. He plans to make this the main one.” Bai Shu patted his shoulder, picking up a bottle of wine from the bar and putting it in front of him.
Qi Guang instantly recovered, looking over.
It was a rather unremarkable appearance, but upon closer inspection, it was a little exquisite. The bottle’s stopper was a spherical wooden plug. The transparent bottle was filled with a clear liquid. The white packaging with blue lettering was also simple. Placed in a dazzling array of wines, it looked like a lost girl who had stumbled into a brothel.
“T-E-Q-U-I-L-A.” Qi Guang held the bottle by the neck, spelling out the letters on the package, and suddenly it seemed familiar, “Tequila?”
Bai Shu was a little surprised, “You’re a high school student, where have you drunk so much wine?”
“I haven’t,” Qi Guang put the bottle back, “When I lived at Boss Qi’s house, there was a wine cellar. I’ve seen a lot of wines, but I’ve never drunk them. He used them to entertain his cronies or businessmen who were as hypocritical as he was.”
Bai Shu nodded silently.
Qi Guang had no interest in wine and steered the topic back, “What exactly is the situation between you and Xu Ge…?”
Finally, someone had asked this question for the first time.
Bai Shu looked very calm, the kind of calm that was composed and full of hope, with a sparkle in his eyes.
“We’ve been together for so long, there’s no need for anything formal. I just need to know that he cares about me.” He said, a little shyly lowering his head, “We’ll take it slow. After all, as a straight man who was once as straight as they come, he’s still a little confused. I’m not in a hurry. It doesn’t matter when he officially confirms his relationship with me.”
“Tsk, acting like an old married couple.”
Like watching a drama to its finale, Qi Guang felt genuinely relaxed.
Bai Shu smiled, noncommittal. When he spoke again, he had changed the topic, “Want some wine?”
Qi Guang could tell that he wasn’t willing to talk much about his relationship with Xu Ge. It wasn’t because he was treating him like an outsider, but because the person he was talking to was this unpromising guy—Bai Shu and Xu Ge had finally seen the light at the end of the tunnel, and on this joyous day, our classmate Qi Guang had actually lost his partner.
“Okay,” Qi Guang replied.
Bai Shu patted his shoulder and stood up, “I’ll go prepare.”
Prepare?
Qi Guang didn’t have time to ask. What was even more surprising was that Bai Shu’s “prepare” didn’t mean going behind the bar to get glasses. He actually walked straight towards the door and went out.
So mysterious.
Qi Guang suspected that Bai Shu had caught Xu Ge’s strange habits. He sighed and took out his phone from his bag.
On WeChat, although he had long since removed Ye Xing’s chat from the top, since he had almost no one else to contact, the name with the sun avatar still occupied the top of the page, as if declaring its sovereignty.
Qi Guang couldn’t bring himself to delete the chat history. He could only quickly swipe away the page before his eyes could focus on it.
He casually scrolled through his moments with one hand in his pocket and the other emotionlessly swiping, and his thumb suddenly stopped on the screen when he saw Li Ke’s name.
The location tag was Ye Xing’s city.
They were hanging out together today?
The pictures weren’t anything new. Just some ordinary tourist photos with no aesthetic value. It was obvious they were raw, unedited photos. Not only were they not cropped, but there wasn’t even a stylish filter added.
Even though they were photos that would be crushed by all the meticulously edited photos on moments, he zoomed in and out, looking at them repeatedly—the weather was overcast, the ground was dry without rain, and the way the pedestrians were dressed suggested that it was colder than Chen Town.
Besides that, he didn’t seem to be able to conclude anything else about Ye Xing.
—If it weren’t for the corner of a familiar fisherman’s hat that he saw in the last picture.
Qi Guang finally couldn’t help but mutter to himself, “Damn it! Wearing someone else’s hat again!”
The reason he was so sure that the person wearing the hat was Ye Xing and not Li Ke was based on logical reasoning—after all, if Ye Xing was the one taking the picture, the quality wouldn’t be this bad.
After cursing, he didn’t know why he liked the photo.
Then, he sighed deeply in his heart.
He never thought that there would come a day when the only way he could get information about you would be through someone else’s moments.
This is such a dog-eat-dog world!
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