OVTTGTBE Chapter 16

Crowded

Crowded

“Ah–fuck!”

Although both of them were wearing thick clothes, and the speed at which they “slid” down the cement slope together wasn’t very fast, Bai Yao was still a bit startled.

He maintained the posture of being on top of Liu Yucheng after a “smooth landing,” and didn’t dare move for a long time.

While he was recovering, Liu Yucheng took something out of his pocket and put it on Bai Yao’s hands, which were red from the cold.

Bai Yao stared blankly at the gray furry gloves that had appeared on his hands. Only then did he suddenly remember that he always wore gloves when he went skiing as a child.

Liu Yucheng lay on the ground, not saying anything, just staring at him expressionlessly.

“Bai Yao, are you okay? How are you guys?”

Bai Yao was not injured. He looked down at Liu Yucheng, just about to ask him how he was feeling and if anything hurt, when a voice suddenly called out from behind:

“Bai Yao? What are you doing?!”

Hearing this voice, Bai Yao felt a sense of foreboding—it was Teacher Zhou.

He quickly climbed off Liu Yucheng and stammered, “Teacher Zhou, we were… uh, having a snowball fight.”

Li Jinyang and the others also came down, chiming in, “Hello, Teacher Zhou, we’re having a snowball fight.”

“Nonsense! Bai Yao, are you bullying Liu Yucheng again??” Teacher Zhou’s expression was already very unpleasant.

Bai Yao: “…”

What do you mean “again”?

“I caught you red-handed this time! You two slid down from up there, didn’t you?! I saw it, that’s so dangerous!”

“No, Teacher Zhou, we really were having a snowball fight!”

“We were just playing up there, and they probably didn’t notice and accidentally slid down.”

Zhang Yifang and Li Jinyang explained one after the other.

“Oh, so you’re all ganging up to bully him, are you?”

Teacher Zhou was even more angry, pointing at them and questioning, “There’s such a big playground, and you don’t go there. You have to play in front of the teaching building?! You guys, come with me!”

“Teacher Zhou, there are too many people on the playground… If we go there, it’ll be an even bigger free-for-all.” A male student explained.

“Teacher Zhou, it wasn’t them.” Liu Yucheng suddenly spoke.

After standing up, he patted the snow off his body and said calmly, “The only one who took the opportunity to beat me was Bai Yao. Bai Yao started it.”

As soon as he said this, even his roommate Yan Hao was shocked and widened his eyes, let alone Li Jinyang and the others.

“Is that so, Bai Yao? This isn’t the first time, is it? Why do you always have a problem with Liu Yucheng?”

Teacher Zhou glared at him, “Come with me.”

Bai Yao stared at Liu Yucheng in disbelief. The anger, incomprehension, and grievance that had accumulated before seemed to turn into ice at this moment, freezing him in place, making him so stiff that he couldn’t move his legs, nor could he open his mouth to defend himself.

“Let’s go? What are you standing there for?”

After urging him, Teacher Zhou turned her head and instructed the remaining people, “Someone take Liu Yucheng to the infirmary to see if he’s injured. That was too dangerous just now. If you want to have a snowball fight, go to the playground. You’re not allowed to make trouble on these steps in the future, understand?!”

Bai Yao stubbornly held back the warmth in his eyes, took off the gloves on his hands, threw them hard on the ground, and followed Teacher Zhou away without looking back.

“Liu Yucheng, you can know a person’s face but not their heart… We really misjudged you.”

Li Jinyang spat, shook his head, and left with Zhang Yifang and Tao Lin, following Bai Yao.

The others also left one after another, some returning to the dorm, some going to the playground. Soon, only Liu Yucheng and Yan Hao were left.

“Liu Yucheng, not to criticize, but you went a bit too far.”

Yan Hao said in confusion, “Last time you had a fever, Bai Yao accompanied you to the hospital without saying a word. He’s really good to you. I don’t think you were injured, so how could you treat him like that?”

Liu Yucheng remained silent as usual. He lowered his head and bent down to pick up the pair of gloves that had been thrown in the snow.

Bai Yao didn’t accept them, which was to be expected.

Two tears fell silently on the snow, leaving two small pits that no one could notice.

Bai Yao, I’m sorry, really sorry…

But I’m actually not worthy to stand by your side, and the Peach Milk Tea who’s been deceiving you is even less worthy. Liu Angran and his family are just vampires. Once they remember you and latch onto you, you’ll be the only one who suffers.

So hate me as much as you want, and forget about Peach Milk Tea, happily be your sunny young master again, and return to your original happy life. That’s enough.

…

Inside dorm 319, the atmosphere among the three people was extremely heavy. Li Jinyang sat in his seat and sighed non-stop.

“I don’t know if Bai Yao will be punished this time.” Zhang Yifang said worriedly, “He shouldn’t be expelled, right?”

“It shouldn’t come to that.”

Li Jinyang felt angry just thinking about it, “That Liu Yucheng just slid down, he didn’t bump into anything, you tell me, how could he… treat Bai Yao like that? Bai Yao likes him so much, he’s such an ungrateful bastard!”

“Just now, I saw…”

Tao Lin said softly, “Bai Yao seemed to be crying from anger.”

He must be heartbroken.

“No way? Bai Yao is so tough, how could he cry over something like this? You’re thinking too much.”

Li Jinyang said this, but he had actually seen it too. When he followed Teacher Zhou to the office, Bai Yao’s eyes and the tip of his nose were red.

“He definitely wasn’t crying from anger, he must be cold.”

Zhang Yifang said, “He didn’t wear gloves when he started the snowball fight, and his hands were frozen red. Hey, let’s boil some ginger tea and let him warm up when he comes back, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll go get some hot water.”

…

An hour later, Bai Yao returned to the dorm.

The good news was that he wasn’t expelled, because Liu Yucheng was not substantially injured, not even a scratch, so today’s incident was defined as “having a snowball fight in an inappropriate area, a close call.”

The bad news was that he and Liu Yucheng were criticized in the school, which would not be included in their records, but they had to write a 5,000-word self-criticism and notify their parents.

Liu Yucheng was such a green tea in front of the counselor, and he was also punished, which made Bai Yao feel much better.

“Why are you guys looking so gloomy?”

He had returned to his original indifferent expression, “Someone like me who fights often, being criticized… I’ve experienced it since I was a kid, it’s nothing.”

“Bai Yao, try to fight less in the future.”

Li Jinyang patted him and said earnestly, “We were all scared to death just now, we thought we were going to lose you… Here, this is ginger tea that Tao Tao and the others made for you, drink it while it’s hot, and don’t catch a cold.”

“Thanks.”

Bai Yao held the big bowl of ginger tea, feeling incredibly warm inside, and his nose was a little sore, “You guys are so good to me… I…”

“Look, Bai Yao is falling in love with us.”

Li Jinyang smiled and livened up the atmosphere in the dorm, pretending to be shy, “Bai Yao, we’re straight guys, don’t look at us like that.”

“You’re so cheesy!”

Bai Yao was amused by him, “To be honest, you guys should just be your straight selves, don’t become gay like me. There are no good men.”

“That’s for sure, I even dislike myself.” Zhang Yifang took off his shoes, picked up his feet and smelled them, “Ew, it stinks… Oh no, it smells great, Tao Tao, come smell it?”

“Get lost!” Tao Lin dodged to the side with a disgusted expression, “You’re so disgusting!!”

Dorm 319 returned to its usual cheerful atmosphere.

But as the night wore on, Bai Yao inevitably suffered from insomnia. On the one hand, it was because of his mother, Bai Junyi. She should already know about the trouble he had caused recently, but she had not made any move or contacted Bai Yao.

In this situation, other people’s children would probably be very worried, wondering if they would settle the score when they went home for vacation. But Bai Yao didn’t think so, because Madam Bai Junyi didn’t take him seriously at all. She only cared about her career.

On the other hand, it was what Bai Yao discovered when he was about to delete Peach Milk Tea’s friend request—Peach Milk Tea had changed his original raccoon avatar and posted a Moments update.

His current avatar was a white background with black horizontal and vertical patterns on it, very scribbled. The internet said that to decipher this type of picture, you need to rotate your phone to see the text clearly.

But Bai Yao held his phone and turned it countless times, and he still didn’t understand what was written on this picture.

As for the Moments update, it was posted late at night. There were no words, only a picture of an empty coastline. The sun was shining brightly on the beach, turning the sand into a white-gold color.

Bai Yao hesitated for a long time, but in the end, he didn’t delete Peach Milk Tea’s WeChat, but he didn’t plan to contact him again.

After this recent period of entanglement, Bai Yao felt that it was even harder to let go than when they first broke up. Why not just let him lie in the friend list and slowly cool down, just like those other classmates or friends who never contacted him.

Bai Yao hadn’t been on the game recently either. Even if it wasn’t for studying for the final exams, he didn’t want to go back to that virtual world, let alone relive the moments when the two of them played the game together.

After the exams, the school notified all boarding students to take all their belongings home before the winter vacation. If they couldn’t take them all, they could move them to the designated storage classroom first, and then register their items with the administrator.

For some reason, the school suddenly decided to switch the dormitory buildings for male and female students next semester. Bai Yao and the others would move to the girls’ dormitory building across the street next semester.

Because the layouts of the two buildings were different, the counselor specifically @mentioned everyone in the Goose Group, instructing that there may be changes in the number of people in some dorms after the start of the semester, and other changes would have to wait for the school’s announcement.

Regarding the changes in dormitory personnel, Bai Yao was actually very nervous. He didn’t want to be separated from Zhang Yifang, Li Jinyang, and Tao Lin. They had a very pleasant semester together, and everyone didn’t have any conflicts. He wanted to continue being roommates with them next semester.

He boarded the return flight with his luggage. It was difficult to grab plane tickets during the New Year, and Bai Yao didn’t buy a first-class or business-class ticket; the economy class was too crowded, and he couldn’t sleep at all, so he simply took out his phone to study Peach Milk Tea’s white background with black line avatar.

A middle-aged uncle sitting in the next seat inadvertently glanced at Bai Yao’s phone screen and said with a smile, “Little brother, you’ve been studying this picture since you got on the plane. Even I can see the words on it, haven’t you deciphered it yet?”

“Huh??”

Bai Yao asked in surprise, “Uncle, what’s written on it?”

The middle-aged uncle reached out and slightly adjusted the angle of his phone.

“You’re just spinning it around, you can’t see it clearly like that. You not only have to turn the phone horizontally, but also adjust the angle.”

“Like this, can you see it?” the uncle asked.

Having not understood the correct way to read it before, Bai Yao finally saw the two lines of text clearly.

Looking at the phone horizontally, the content was: Crowded, I miss you so much.

Looking at it vertically, it was: I’m sorry, I love you.

During the four-hour flight, Bai Yao didn’t close his eyes the whole time.

He would never forget how sad he was on the day of the snowball fight.

Now, the person who made him so sad was wearing the Peach Milk Tea persona and doing all this sappy stuff. What was he trying to do?

Before getting off the plane, the kind-hearted uncle who happened to be sitting next to Bai Yao smiled and advised him, “Young man, don’t be too sad, wipe away your tears. In life, you always have to experience these things. It will always get better in the future, so take it easy.”

“Thank you,” Bai Yao said solemnly.

After picking up his luggage and turning off airplane mode on his phone, Bai Yao clicked on Peach Milk Tea’s WeChat and sent him a voice message directly:

“You are such a big—idiot!!”

“Either change this crappy avatar in 30 seconds! Or get out of my WeChat friend list! And stay out forever!!”

Bai Yao was almost roaring.

After roaring, he didn’t even wait 30 seconds before clicking on Peach Milk Tea’s personal information and deleting him.

To decipher this crappy avatar, he had been worried for many nights and couldn’t sleep well; now that he had deciphered it, he felt even more upset—he always felt that Liu Yucheng had done it out of helplessness that day. But even so, he could not forgive him.

After deleting him, Bai Yao felt like his soul had been purified and become much clearer.