TSIBAMS Chapter 124
by VolareIn the stairwell of Qi Guang’s building, Shuai Xiaoyun was twirling Qi Guang’s motorcycle key, bouncing down the stairs, followed by Lu Yueyang who was strolling down leisurely.
Meanwhile, Ye Xing was frantically rushing upstairs like a headless fly.
As they instinctively prepared to make way for each other, their eyes met, and all three of them froze.
“Sister Xiaoyun? Teacher Lu?”
“Ye Xing! When did you come back?”
After Shuai Xiaoyun informed him that Qi Guang wasn’t home and explained in detail the reason why, Ye Xing’s eyes visibly dimmed.
Then, she delivered another piece of bad news, “I found an old phone with a SIM card on his coffee table. Guess what? When I called Qi Guang, that thing actually rang!”
“So, that’s why I couldn’t reach Qi Guang?”
“Yep!”
Ye Xing leaned against the wall, his chest still heaving uncontrollably from the excessive running. He was out of breath, wanting to lecture this seemingly unrestrained older sister on behalf of justice, but he found he didn’t even have the strength to utter another word.
Helpless.
Shuai Xiaoyun couldn’t help but laugh at his appearance, “Kids these days… Don’t be so impatient!”
After a while, Ye Xing finally spoke up, “So, the older sister lured away her own brother just to occupy his class teacher and his motorcycle!”
As soon as he finished, he regretted being too quick-tongued. Although Lu Yueyang was like a friend to them, he was still their teacher. It was okay to banter with Shuai Xiaoyun in private, but doing so in front of others was a bit awkward.
“Tsk!” Shuai Xiaoyun shook her head, showing a helpless look of “you can’t teach a blockhead,” then turned to look at Lu Yueyang.
Lu Yueyang didn’t say anything, just smiled and left first.
Shuai Xiaoyun had no intention of leaving. She raised her chin and said to Ye Xing, “Anyway, Qi Guang isn’t here. Wanna hang out with us?”
“Taking me out for drinks? Are you afraid Qi Guang will duel you when he gets back?”
“Just like a kid, all you think about is drinking. How childish! We’re going to see the stars!”
“Stars?” Ye Xing subconsciously looked up, and only when he saw the ceiling did he realize they were in the stairwell, “Do we need to pick a special place to see them? Aren’t stars the same everywhere?”
“I really like your ignorant look,” Shuai Xiaoyun “tsk”ed dramatically, adding, “It’s not bright enough here. Go about ten kilometers west, you can see the Milky Way.”
Ye Xing’s eyes lit up instantly.
“The Milky Way?!”
Shuai Xiaoyun crossed her arms, looking down at him, seemingly satisfied with his reaction, “There are no villages there, the air transparency is good, completely away from light pollution.”
No villages?
No light?
Ye Xing didn’t even dare to imagine it, since Chen Town was already the most remote place he had been.
“Aren’t you two girls a bit too brave?”
“That’s why we’re bringing you along!” Shuai Xiaoyun patted his shoulder, “Anyway, you can’t contact Qi Guang. Tomorrow, I’ll buy you a ticket, I’ll treat you to see him!”
Ye Xing was already yearning for the so-called Milky Way. When he heard “you can’t contact Qi Guang anyway,” his determination to go to Qi Guang’s house wavered even more.
He held the key, his thumb unconsciously rubbing it, “But… This motorcycle can’t fit three people!”
Seeing his almost-compromised look, Shuai Xiaoyun didn’t bother wasting any more words. She grabbed him and walked out of the stairwell, “Looks like we’ll have to let Lu drive. We’ll get out and walk a bit where the car can’t go.”
By the time he arrived in S City, Qi Guang had cursed Shuai Xiaoyun five hundred and eighty-nine times along the way.
By the time he arrived at Seattle Garden, it had risen to six hundred and sixty-five times.
But when he pushed open his door, turned on the lights, and saw the router still blinking, he suddenly felt a surge of gratitude for Shuai Xiaoyun, as if he had seen an oasis in the desert.
This sister finally did something human.
——Guess it wasn’t a waste to give her the keys.
As soon as he connected to the Wi-Fi, his phone started ringing non-stop.
Qi Guang lightly tapped the screen, scrolling through his WeChat messages, he found many classmates he hadn’t contacted in a while were trying to reach him, occasionally interspersed with messages from Brother Xu and the others.
He didn’t have time to read them one by one, so he went straight to Ye Xing’s profile and clicked on it.
That guy had only sent one message, and it was from several hours ago, pitifully buried under countless new messages at the very bottom.
-I’m going to Chen Town now.
Qi Guang, who was slumped on the sofa, almost fell off.
Crap!
He tapped the video call button, quickly fixed his hair in front of the camera, and while waiting for the other person to answer, he organized his thoughts on how to coax his boyfriend.
But after waiting for a long time, he only got a line of white text—the other party’s phone may not be nearby, please try again later.
These words made him feel like he had been relentlessly teased by fate all day. So, he found the instigator—Shuai Xiaoyun’s WeChat—and tapped on the video call button.
This sister’s WeChat was also very competitive, lasting until the moment the line “the other party’s phone may not be nearby, please try again later” appeared.
Qi Guang bit his lip, frowned, and clicked into Brother Xu’s chat, but when this brother’s WeChat also appeared to have been cursed, displaying the same line, he completely lost his patience.
The phone was thrown onto the sofa, tumbling over several times.
To hell with it!
Ten minutes later, Qi Guang, with a sliver of hope that “maybe Li Ke went to Chen Town with Ye Xing,” opened Li Ke’s chat and tapped the voice call button.
The good news was, the call went through.
“I didn’t expect the last person to answer my call would be you,” Qi Guang laughed bitterly.
The other party’s reaction was surprised, “Qi Guang? I thought Ye Xing borrowed your phone to call me.”
So, the bad news was—
“You guys aren’t together?” Qi Guang jumped up from the sofa, “Where is he?”
“Didn’t he go to find you? I was planning to ask him to hang out, but when I contacted him, he was already on the train to Chen Town… You two didn’t get in touch?”
“No.”
“He probably ran out of battery. When I called him, he told me to make it quick and not waste his phone battery…” Li Ke, listening to his anxious and then frustrated tone, quickly comforted him, “It’s okay, he’s probably there by now and will be knocking on your door any minute.”
“I’m in S City,” Qi Guang sighed.
Now it was Li Ke’s turn to be anxious.
“You two… Are you filming a movie? Man! Even I, who watch movies, can’t take it anymore! Can you guys just have the finale already?”
“Huh?” Qi Guang was a bit confused.
“Stanning your CP is worse than stanning the couple next door!” Li Ke’s frustrated voice came from the other end of the phone.
This made Qi Guang even more puzzled.
“Who are they?”
“Bai Shu and Xu whatever!”
The air froze for a few seconds.
The first few seconds were because Qi Guang hadn’t reacted, and the next few seconds were spent processing it.
Then, it took a few more seconds to organize his words, “Li Ke, you’re something, I didn’t realize you’re such a…”
He didn’t finish; or rather, he couldn’t find the right word to describe it, he could only rub the goosebumps on his arms.
Li Ke “tched” and said, “Yes, I’m just that optimistic, open-minded, and I’m willing to die to live. It’s like the tequila spirit in your bar!”
Qi Guang laughed at that.
This world was truly amazing. There were those who, like him and Bai Shu, were obsessive and would rather suffocate themselves than bother others, and then there were people like Li Ke and Brother Xu who were naturally carefree and easygoing.
Of course, there was also Ye Xing, who was somewhere in between… a silly dog.
Before he could praise Li Ke’s live-in-the-moment spirit, the other party started sharing his opinion, “That’s why I can’t stand how indecisive you guys are. Every time I saw Ye Xing looking hurt or self-blaming, I just wanted to fast-forward.”
Qi Guang paused, listening carefully to every word, and solemnly “hmmed” in agreement.
“I know, if it wasn’t because you’re looking for Ye Xing, you would never have a chance to chat with me alone in this life. Since God gave me this opportunity, I naturally need to speak my mind.”
The background noise on the other end of the call was a mix of car horns and heavy metal music, clearly from outside a bar.
So, Li Ke happened to answer his call because he was drunk and went outside to get some air or smoke, and he was being so talkative today because of the alcohol.
Qi Guang got up and went to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator door, picked a bottle of beer from the pile of colorful drinks Shuai Xiaoyun bought, and gulped it down in a few mouthfuls as if finally quenching his thirst, before exhaling a few words.
“Tell me.”
Li Ke seemed to have received the order and opened the floodgates, “Although I haven’t known Ye Xing for as long as you have, and I’m not in a position to say that I know him better than you, there are things that only I have seen but you’ve missed. I know, Ye Xing is a kid who has always been guileless and doesn’t consider things as thoroughly as you do. Many times he’ll get hot-headed when provoked and make decisions that he’ll regret later.”
Qi Guang listened attentively to each word, solemnly “mm-hmm”ing in response.
“The time you broke up with him, do you know how long he was in a daze after he got back? He had so many things weighing on him – going back and forth between the hospital and school, having to cook, to take care of his mother, and to study. He didn’t dare to deal with the two of you, or else he might not even be able to keep up with the current life,” Li Ke said, as if empathizing, he paused for a while before continuing, “Although he was giving you the cold shoulder, he was working hard on his side to bring you back together. Besides convincing his mom, he also took her for psychological counseling and even made the decision to take over the coffee shop on his own. Maybe all you see is that his temper is getting worse, but you don’t know that he’s also becoming more and more contradictory, saying harsh words to you while trying to get closer to you.”
Qi Guang listened quietly, lost in thought.
Actually, he could guess most of what Li Ke was talking about, but it was a different feeling to guess and to hear someone state the facts.
Even though Li Ke had been very restrained, he had also inadvertently revealed his own emotions.
You bastard, do you know how awful it was when you broke up?
My Ye Xing’s love is just so humble!
You two better not mess things up again this time, please!
——Qi Guang felt every word was like a hard slap across his face.
Li Ke expected Qi Guang to have some reaction, but the only thing he could hear on the other end of the phone was the sound of breathing, proving that he was listening.
With such a person, with such a silent character, Ye Xing had countless times in anger and resentment raised his fist only to hit cotton.
Thinking this way, Li Ke decided to take the risk of being assassinated by Ye Xing and push him a little.
“Do you know why he suddenly and inexplicably came out on Weibo? He’s someone who cares so much about his privacy. Even though I can call myself his good friend, I can still sense the boundaries he sets up, so why did he get hot-headed and come out to so many netizens, not only having a partner, but a male one?”
“I haven’t asked him,” Qi Guang said.
“At the time, their school was spreading gossip about him and a female classmate, and it sounded so real. But he was so cool, not saying anything on the surface, but secretly letting the world know that he not only had a partner, but the partner was a guy.”
Logically, he shouldn’t be jealous of Li Ke, but he had indeed missed too much of Ye Xing’s life, and too many of his feelings.
Thinking of this, Qi Guang felt a sense of unwillingness and self-reproach.
If only everything hadn’t piled up at that time, if it hadn’t been so chaotic, if only he had calmed down a bit and been willing to discuss solutions with Ye Xing…
But he chose the worst way to handle it.
And the other person, who had been on the receiving end of the whole thing, was still like an innocent child, pure and clean, without hesitation, and had never wavered in his trust in him from beginning to end.
Qi Guang laughed, as if mocking himself, “He has always been very brave.”
“He is very brave, much braver than me. Once he’s decided, he puts all his eggs in one basket and charges forward. Even when you were so resolute about breaking up, he was so scared but he still charged forward. Unlike me, I can come and go freely with anyone, goodbye and that’s it, the next one will be better.”
“Your kind of personality is not bad either, everyone gets what they deserve.”
Qi Guang threw the empty beer can into the trash can, then picked up another bottle that seemed to have a higher alcohol content, took a sip, and the bitterness made him smack his lips.
“Anyway, I hope you two can be together this time, I stayed at his place for one night before the New Year, and there was one thing he said that was quite profound.”
“What did he say?” Qi Guang asked.
Li Ke sighed. They said that people reveal secrets when they are drunk, but he hadn’t even drunk much and he was about to sell out his friend’s secrets.
“At that time, his situation with his mother was at its peak, so I asked him to think carefully whether he liked you because you were a guy, or just because he liked you. If it was the latter, then he should cut his losses in time.” Li Ke finished and then paused to add, “Sorry, I might not be using the right words. You might think I’m being unfair, but as someone who’s been through it, I know this road is not easy, and I was only reminding him for his own good.”
“I know, I don’t blame you,” Qi Guang urged him, “What did he say?”
“He said,” Li Ke cleared his throat, trying to recall his exact words, “He only knows that, besides you, it wouldn’t make any difference who he was with.”
The sudden, intense heartbeat made Qi Guang almost lose his balance, and he had to grab the refrigerator door.
He realized he had been holding his breath when he finally had something to lean on.
Then a sudden surge of emotion welled up in his nose.
The voice on the other end of the phone continued, “I didn’t try to persuade him anymore either, I know what he meant, it was only forced if it was anyone other than you, regardless of gender.”