TSIBAMS Chapter 63

Chapter 63

After Fang Rong returned the phone to Ye Xing, which she had retrieved from the bodyguard, they checked into another hotel. To be honest, aside from traveling, he had never experienced staying in a hotel with Fang Rong, and the feeling now was completely different.

There was no feeling of home, only a sense of displacement.

But it was different from the feeling of collapse he had felt when he first learned the truth. Now that the truth was laid bare before him, he mostly just felt numb.

Perhaps Fang Rong was right; he had changed too much in the past few months.

“Where will you stay tonight?” Fang Rong asked, “Back at the dorm or here?”

He actually wanted to spend more time with Fang Rong, but because of the estrangement of the past few months, he couldn’t bring himself to say words like “I miss you.”

Ye Xing looked at her, speechless for a long time.

“I’ll send you back to the dorm. I have an early flight tomorrow,” Fang Rong said.

Ye Xing was a little surprised, “Where to?”

“There are still a lot of things that need to be taken care of,” Fang Rong said, not looking at him anymore.

“I thought…” Ye Xing frowned, “Everything was taken care of. Didn’t that person just say that everything was resolved?”

Fang Rong shook her head. “It was just temporarily calmed down. We’ve paid back some of the money, but it’s impossible to pay it all back at once, since there are so many people involved…”

“Did you go to Singapore to borrow money from Uncle Xu?” Ye Xing asked.

“Uncle Xu?” Fang Rong smiled, with a hint of disdain in her eyes, “He doesn’t deserve to be called your uncle. If it wasn’t for him, your father wouldn’t have fallen to this state!”

Ye Xing’s eyes widened.

“He partnered with your dad back then, and all those bad ideas were his. In the end, when things went wrong, he ran off overseas with the money!”

“Why didn’t you sue him?” Ye Xing thumped the table.

“It’s too difficult. There are many things you don’t understand. That man is very cunning. He heard the news before anything happened and secretly made a lot of moves to clear himself of any involvement. It’s also your father’s fault for trusting him too much and not noticing his tricks. It wasn’t until he slipped away to Singapore and became unreachable that he realized he’d been had,” Fang Rong sighed. “I didn’t go to borrow money this time. I went to get back the money that should have been ours, to pay back those people. At first, he didn’t want to meet with me. I went through many law firms, and finally found one with some clout that managed to intimidate him. He agreed to settle privately and slowly pay back the money.”

“Settle privately? What about my dad then?” Ye Xing didn’t quite understand.

“Getting him to agree to pay back the money is already the best outcome. Your dad… he also made mistakes. At the time, I had no idea what he was doing with Lao Xu. If I had known it was illegal, I would have stopped him from going down this path, making one wrong move after another! All he ever thought about was making money, and he was so vain!” Fang Rong’s eyes were red. “Although I don’t want you to hate us, sometimes I feel like I hate him. If he had focused more on our family, he wouldn’t have been blinded by these unreliable things.”

Ye Xing didn’t say anything. He had thought he was calm enough to accept these things like a mature adult, but his heart was churning at the moment.

Although he couldn’t hate his father, seeing the suffering Fang Rong had endured in the past few months made him feel a bit miserable.

He raised his hand, hugged Fang Rong, and patted her gently. It was the most comforting action he had ever experienced, and he knew it worked well.

When he returned to the dorm, Li Ke had already gone to the art studio. It was obvious that the room had been cleaned up; the desk was spotless, and even his dried laundry had been neatly folded by Li Ke and placed on his bed.

But when Fang Rong looked at the cramped space with two beds, she couldn’t help but frown. “Should I rent a place for you outside?”

“No need!” Ye Xing waved his hand.

“Leave me your teacher’s phone number,” Fang Rong took out her phone.

Ye Xing opened his contacts and copied the number to her.

“You’ve never lived in a dorm before. Are you used to it? What are your roommates like?” Fang Rong completely forgot that she had praised the boy in front of her for growing up not long ago.

After all, in the eyes of parents, even if you are an adult, you are still a child who is in danger of crossing the street alone.

“I’m very used to it, and I get along well with my roommates. Besides, it’s easier for the school to manage students who live together. Our teacher is strict, you either live at home or in the dorm. If you want to play around and rent a place by yourself, he won’t let you into the art studio,” Ye Xing smiled. “And the dorm is cheaper, so I don’t have any pressure.”

Finally, the last sentence reminded Fang Rong, and she looked at Ye Xing. “Where did you get the money?”

Ye Xing was stunned for a moment. “I do commissions, I’ve earned some money. Although it’s not much, the teacher at the art studio allows me to pay tuition slowly, so I can manage for now.”

Fang Rong was silent for a long time, not knowing if it was because of self-blame for being helpless, or the relief of seeing him suddenly become independent, or perhaps both.

After she left, Ye Xing went to the bathroom to change out of his dirty clothes and take a shower. When he came out, he saw that Fang Rong had sent him five thousand yuan on WeChat.

Before, he didn’t have much of a concept of money, but now these five thousand yuan looked exceptionally important.

-I’ve arrived.

When Ye Xing received Qi Guang’s message, he had just arrived at the art studio for the evening class.

-Are you still having evening self-study today?

-I’m not going. I’m having dinner with Brother Xu and the others, then going home to sleep early.

-Aren’t you tired? Why don’t you order takeout at home?

-I’m already in Bai Shu’s car. I left without saying goodbye last night, so I guess I’m going to be lectured today.

-Then you should be more flattering to Bai Shu now, let him take your side later.

-Don’t even mention it, he just laughed at me for failing to save someone and coming back alone.

-Did you tell them?

-I didn’t say, and they didn’t ask too much. They just knew you had some trouble, and I went over to help.

At this moment, Teacher Xia suddenly appeared beside him, and he quickly said goodbye to Qi Guang before his phone was confiscated.

Probably Fang Rong had called and said something, because Teacher Xia didn’t ask about his skipping class and just acted like nothing had happened, assigning him the task for the day.

Ye Xing was a little distracted, not knowing if it was because he was interrupted while chatting with Qi Guang or something else.

Then, Teacher Xia patted him. “Focus! Thinking about your girlfriend?”

He suddenly realized, they didn’t seem to have officially confirmed their relationship!

Although he knew Qi Guang wouldn’t joke about such things, he was still determined to make things clear next time they met. It would be best to have Bai Shu and the others around as witnesses.

“I looked at your paintings this week; you’ve made great progress. Let’s try something new today,” Teacher Xia said.

Ye Xing looked at him questioningly, “What’s new?”

“We won’t be doing life drawing this time; let’s do a self-portrait!” Teacher Xia smiled, then turned around and walked away. “I’ll go get your ID photo.”

For ugly people, a close look is cruel.

Ye Xing remembered the previous evaluation of his own work, the retribution had come a bit too quickly.

“When is Ye Xing coming back?” Bai Shu stopped the car at a red light and looked at Qi Guang.

Qi Guang was leaning back in the reclined seat, resting his eyes, “A week at most, he didn’t say.”

“Is he bringing a lot of things? Do you want to go pick him up?” Bai Shu’s gaze accidentally swept over the Buddhist beads on his hand. He was a bit surprised. “What’s the situation between you two now?”

Qi Guang suddenly opened his eyes.

He had long known that Bai Shu was particularly perceptive because of his orientation, but he hadn’t expected him to be so quick. He suddenly felt a little nervous.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust him, but he didn’t know what Ye Xing would think. What if he minded, and he had already made things public? That would be the end of them. The best-case scenario might just be a fight, the worst case might be never speaking to him again.

An even worse case would be a fight and then never speaking to him again.

After all, he had actually experienced it before.

Just as his mind was racing, the red light turned green, and Bai Shu lightly stepped on the gas pedal and drove off, smiling forward. “He’ll have to explain things properly when he comes back.”

It had to be said that Bai Shu was quite skilled at speaking sometimes. He knew when to stop, not making anyone feel awkward by being too direct, nor did he pretend to be dumb and make the other party seem stupid, leaving everyone room to maneuver.

Qi Guang let out a sigh of relief. “I’ll sleep for a bit, wake me up when we arrive.”

He closed his eyes, feeling a bit deflated as he thought about not being able to contact Ye Xing for a whole week.

It was about a steel straight man falling in love, and how he was turning into a little wife who longed for his return step by step.

At that moment, the phone in his pocket suddenly vibrated inappropriately. He took out his phone and answered when he saw Shuai Xiaoyun’s name. “Hello.”

“You actually know how to answer the phone. I’m only a year older than you, and I feel like I’m your elder, it’s not easy!” Her voice was much louder than usual, her demeanor like she was there to collect rent.

It was easy to figure out that Lu Yueyang had told her.

“Sister Xiaoyun’s lung capacity is increasing, do you want to come have dinner together?” Qi Guang said with a smile.

“Stop pretending with me! You skipped class yourself and still want to drag me down with you? Let me tell you, don’t think that just because I’m about to take the college entrance exam, I don’t have time to deal with you!” Shuai Xiaoyun cleared her throat, “And don’t think that you can slack off just because you placed twentieth in the midterm exam! Even if you get first place in the grade, if you dare skip class again, I’ll drag you back!”

He had skipped plenty of classes before, and Shuai Xiaoyun had always turned a blind eye and never cared about him. He didn’t know what had happened recently. Maybe it was because she had befriended Lu Yueyang, she had gone from being the school beauty to a school principal. Principal Lu would lose her job soon.

“Okay!” Qi Guang responded, “If I skip class again, come and catch me. Let me off the hook this time.”

After hanging up the phone, he couldn’t help but hum.

“Let me live alone…”

Ugh, bad luck!

He flipped through the car’s cassette tapes and inserted a CD of “Western Classic Tracks” into the car’s CD player. Soon, the intro to “Can’t Help Falling in Love” played on the speakers.

This is the song for falling in love!

Bai Shu glanced at Qi Guang, who had a strange smile on his face, and hummed along with him.

Wise men say only fools rush in,

but I can’t help falling in love with you.

Shall I stay

would it be a sin

If I can’t help falling in love with you.

The familiar scenery outside the car window, passing in reverse, had become enchanting. Every flower was vibrant, every leaf was dancing, and even the dilapidated walls looked unique. It had been a long time since he had felt this way, since the time in elementary school when a group of them had been excitedly led by their teacher on a spring outing.

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