Chapter 95: Beyond Expectations

The night before Song Yu headed out with Professor He for the first time, Yue Zhishi spent a long time in the apartment, packing.

“Maybe you should bring a down jacket, would it get really cold over there? It gets really cold here.” Standing in front of the closet, Yue Zhishi hesitated — his left hand held a black down jacket while his right hand held an electric blue one. “Which one of these would match better with the ash grey woollen sweater just now?”

Song Yu found him ridiculously amusing, so he stood behind him and rested his chin onto Yue Zhishi’s head. “I’m going out for work, not to attend fashion week.”

“That’s true.” Yue Zhishi smiled and twisted his head up to look at Song Yu. “You can’t dress too nicely, or else what if someone ends up falling in love with you?” He returned the electric blue jacket to the closest and held the black one in front of Song Yu’s body. “Mn, this one’s a bit more common-looking.”

Song Yu raised an eyebrow, so Yue Zhishi immediately changed his words and said, “As in, it doesn’t show off your handsome looks as much.”

There were way too many people after Song Yu. If Yue Zhishi had his way, he would hang a sign on Song Yu’s neck, and it would say [Owned by Yue Zhishi, strangers stay away].

But of course, he could only think about doing so.

Yue Zhishi folded the down jacket and placed it into Song Yu’s suitcase, stuffing a rolled up scarf into the empty gaps. “You have to wear this, okay — you’ll be warmer with something around your face. Let me give you a woollen hat, I have lots of them..”

“Yue Zhishi.” Song Yu walked over and sat in a chair, pulling Yue Zhishi to stand in front of him. Holding onto the sides of his waist, Song Yu lifted his eyes to look at him. “You’re seriously acting like a little housewife.”

Yue Zhishi’s eyes widened slightly as though they were expressing his surprise at Song Yu’s description. Song Yu very quickly changed his choice of wording. “My better half.”

“W-What..” Suddenly stammering, Yue Zhishi had a fairly large reaction to those words, and he couldn’t stop explaining himself. “I’m just worried you’ll get really cold when you’re there, like last time you went to the northwest region. Plus since you’re leaving early tomorrow morning — I was thinking of helping you pack some things, but you’re just sitting here and not doing anything.”

“I don’t want to pack.” Song Yu gazed at Yue Zhishi with his face upturned and clear of emotion. He said in a matter-of-fact voice, “There’s nothing worth bringing.”

In Yue Zhishi’s eyes, Song Yu had always been very orderly and self-disciplined, rarely procrastinating, so he wasn’t acting like himself at all. Yue Zhishi stroked his arm through the top of his sweater and fiddled with his watchband. “But you have to bring something.”

Song Yu nodded thoughtfully, as though he’d been persuaded. “Then I’ll bring one item.” He lightly pinched Yue Zhishi’s cheek after he finished speaking, watching his eyes as he said, “I’ll bring you.”

Yue Zhishi felt a bit shy, hearing those words, but he didn’t hide his own thoughts. He plopped onto Song Yu’s body like a small animal, and with an adorable smile on his upturned face, he said, “Take me along, then.”

Song Yu deliberately scooted back a bit. “Never mind.”

Holding onto Song Yu’s face with both his hands, Yue Zhishi tugged it forward until their noses were touching. “Why’d you change your mind?”

“You’re too attractive.” Song Yu knocked their foreheads together. “You’ll bring back a bunch of rivals for me if I take you out.”

“What do you mean?” Yue Zhishi was very dissatisfied with what Song Yu said; it sounded as though Yue Zhishi had tried to make him jealous. He immediately got off of Song Yu and said, “I’ve never intentionally flirted with anyone before.”

“Just your face is enough.” Song Yu truly felt like Yue Zhishi didn’t understand what he looked like.

And as expected, Yue Zhishi said to him, “It’s not like everyone will like my kind of looks.”

Song Yu ignored the topic of aesthetics, because to him, Yue Zhishi was already loveable enough to anyone who met him — to the point it actually troubled him. He poked Yue Zhishi’s cheek, his finger sinking into softness, and said gravely, “I’ll write the character for ‘Song’ here, and the character for ‘Yu’ on the other side.”

He spoke so seriously. Yue Zhishi nabbed his hand, thinking his desire to hang a sign off Song Yu’s neck was too small compared to what Song Yu wanted to do.

“How would I leave the house then?”

“Just stay at home. You’ll be very safe since you won’t see anyone.”

For no reason at all, Song Yu abruptly remembered a memory that couldn’t quite be considered as beautiful — he couldn’t help but chuckle, laughing at himself.

He did that often; he’d remember some past memories while he looked at Yue Zhishi. It didn’t matter if the memories were from five years ago or ten — they were all so vivid.

But Yue Zhishi keenly caught the shift in his facial expressions, and he instantly started to use different kinds of tactics, bribing and threatening, wanting to know what Song Yu had been thinking about, what he’d been laughing about. Song Yu didn’t plan on telling him, so Yue Zhishi asked every fifteen minutes until he’d finished packing Song Yu’s luggage. He continued tenaciously asking as they showered and climbed into bed, ready for sleep.

Song Yu couldn’t handle it anymore, in the end, and he said to Yue Zhishi in defeat, “When you were in elementary school, a girl actually came up to the house wanting to be your friend.”

Yue Zhishi flipped onto Song Yu’s chest from his original posture of lying on his side. “Really? Why don’t I remember?”

“Because I drove her away.” There wasn’t a single shred of guilt on Song Yu’s face. Rather, there was the tiniest, most indistinct wisp of pride.

“How’d you do that? Which year was this?” Yue Zhishi had no memory of it at all.

“I was in first year of junior high, and you were in fourth year of elementary.” Song Yu skipped over how rude he’d been, because he tacitly felt like Yue Zhishi was very clear on how he normally treated other people. He said simply, “She came to look for you on a weekend morning and wanted to treat you to McDonalds. I asked if she’d already made plans with you, and when she shook her head, I drove her away.”

After he finished the story, Song Yu felt like it sounded a bit familiar — his mind searched around, and then he realised he’d done something similar to Shen Mi. Shen Mi had just been more crafty.

“Song Yu, you’re so scary.” Yue Zhishi tutted a few times. “How could you bully a young girl?”

“To be precise, I didn’t bully her.” Song Yu justified himself rather calmly. “I only said to her that you were sleeping, that you wouldn’t have a great temper if you were bothered awake and that I hoped she would make plans with you in advance next time.”

“She definitely must’ve cried.”

Song Yu gave him a solemn assessment of how that girl had looked. “She didn’t cry. Her eyes just turned slightly red.”

Yue Zhishi couldn’t believe it. “Just how many times have you been secretly jealous?”

“If you’re talking seriously, then not that many, since you matured rather late and kept clinging to me. You didn’t really care about other people.” Song Yu’s face was faintly pleased. “And besides, there weren’t all that many competent rivals.”

Seeing how genuinely Song Yu was taking the conversation, Yue Zhishi couldn’t stop his laughter from spilling over.

“Is that funny?”

Yue Zhishi cleared his throat and shifted back down to hug Song Yu’s arm. “Not funny at all. Let’s sleep, let’s sleep, we still have to wake up early tomorrow.”

“Mn.” By force of habit, Song Yu pulled Yue Zhishi into his arms to sleep. The room was quiet for a good while, and then Yue Zhishi blinked open his eyes in the dark. He couldn’t help but ask, “Would you like a competent rival?”

Two seconds later, he heard Song Yu’s deep voice. It sounded slightly scary.

“Yue Zhishi, you go ahead and try.”

He thought it might be best if he didn’t poke at the border of danger — even though it was really quite interesting.

In the past, Song Yu had always been cold and indifferent, and Yue Zhishi had gotten used to how his face and voice never seemed to change. But once they’d truly gotten together, Song Yu had removed the armour on his body — and Yue Zhishi realised he could now find and discover so many faint changes in Song Yu, in his emotions. Sometimes he could even clearly sense Song Yu’s happiness and pain, even if Song Yu hadn’t shown much of it on the outside.

This made Yue Zhishi feel extraordinary proud.

Of course, no one else agreed with him.

“Song Yu? Cute?” Nan Jia had just eaten a bite of the ice cream Yue Zhishi had bought for her, the chill of it making her temple ache. She kept shaking her head and took advantage of Song Yu being away to scoff, “He’s the most cold and dignified guy I’ve ever seen. I’ll always remember how frozen our first meeting was — it was icier than the ice cream I’m eating now.”

Yue Zhishi didn’t agree at all. “Perhaps, but as long as you observe him, you’ll find that he actually has a lot of changes in his facial expressions.” He thought of a comparison. “Sister Nan Jia, have you had a cat before? He’s just like a cat, you just need to keep an eye on him and then you’ll notice his little faces.”

“I’m very pitiful, I don’t have a cat.” Nan Jia took another bite of her ice cream cone. “And besides, I once had a period of time where I was always watching Song Yu. You know why. But I realised his face never changed when it came to me. So when it comes down to it——”

She patted Yue Zhishi’s shoulder, voice meaningful and sincere. “Le Le, he’s your brother. I’m not the same as you, I’m not worthy.”

Blinking, Yue Zhishi silently thought it was a pity others couldn’t see how good Song Yu was. But when he thought about Nan Jia’s words, a different emotion unavoidably grew: he didn’t want Nan Jia to continue misunderstanding the relationship between him and Song Yu.

Nan Jia was like his older sister; Yue Zhishi could ask her for help whenever he came across anything troublesome. She was essentially his best female friend.

He thought of what Song Yu had asked before, of whether Yue Zhishi had wanted others to know about their relationship.

Yue Zhishi actually wanted others to know, very much — he didn’t like how other people looked so greedily at Song Yu. Since he’d changed research labs, Song Yu now had a new social circle, and the amount of people asking about him once again started to increase.

And the most annoying thing was: because a certain portion of people knew about him and Song Yu, the people spying for information had already started searching at Song Yu’s hometown.

Asking Song Yu’s boyfriend about whether Song Yu was single. It made Yue Zhishi feel truly awkward and jealous.

Being able to date Song Yu had been like a dream, to the him in the past. Every single embrace in the hidden corners had felt like a luxury, like he was stealing and eating the sweetness that had never belonged to him to begin with.

And it had given him happiness — and it had also given him pain. There had once been moments when he’d yearned for Song Yu to constantly appear at night, so that he could linger, and stay, with him in the darkness for just a while longer.

But now, he was no longer satisfied with stolen happiness.

Yue Zhishi thought of how Song Yu had said before he’d left that he wanted his name on Yue Zhishi’s face; Yue Zhishi remembered his own strange thoughts, of wanting Song Yu to carry a sign on his neck and not wanting Song Yu to wear clothes that were the slightest bit pretty.

When they’d hidden themselves from even their parents, it had felt like only the two of them in the entire world had known of their relationship. They’d been locked within a small black box, and since they hadn’t been able to see the sky anyway, they hadn’t thought anything was wrong.

But now there was a tiny crack in the small black box. Rays of light were visible, and it made Yue Zhishi unable to keep his hands back, wanting to pull open that crack even further.

He really wanted to see the sun — he really wanted to stand with Song Yu underneath the sunlight, utterly and completely.

Even though he knew there would always be people who would be disgusted with them because of their love, Yue Zhishi wasn’t afraid. At the very least, he didn’t want to keep lying to his friends; he didn’t want to keep using the briefest of lies to wave away their questions as they asked, in genuine care, about his love life.

And he also didn’t want Song Yu to be jealous anymore, even though a jealous Song Yu was very cute. Allowing his lover to feel secure was what a good boyfriend should do, Yue Zhishi thought.

Nan Jia had finished eating half of her ice cream when she noticed that Yue Zhishi’s shoelaces were undone. She mentioned it to him, and Yue Zhishi came out of his thoughts, letting out an ‘oh’, and immediately knelt down to tie them up.

Qu Zhi called as she stood there and waited for him to finish. Putting in a bluetooth earbud, Nan Jia accepted the call and heard Qu Zhi directly asking where she was.

Without giving Nan Jia the chance to speak, Yue Zhishi stood up and caught her arm with a very serious look on his face. “Sister Nan Jia, do you still like Song Yu?”

Nan Jia was completely surprised, the ice cream almost falling out of her hand. She was a bit flustered, saying, “W-What?”

Over the phone, Qu Zhi let out a meaningful single syllable noise.

[Senior sister, do you still like senior Song Yu?]

Yue Zhishi thought she didn’t hear him clearly, so he repeated, “Do you still like him right now? You said to me before that you’ve liked him for a very long time.”

[And even for a very long time?]

Nan Jia despaired, and she shook her head calmly as she looked death straight in the face. She gave Yue Zhishi a negative answer three times in a row. “No, I don’t like him, I don’t have any interest in him at all anymore.”

Yue Zhishi was slightly hesitant. “Are you sure?”

[That’s right, are you sure?]

“It’s true. I swear.” Nan Jia lifted up high the ice cream cone in her hand like the Statue of Liberty. “I haven’t had the slightest bit of interest in Song Yu for a long time now. He’s already walked completely out of my life, and he was like the wind flying tracelessly past without leaving behind a single, small wrinkle.”

Yue Zhishi let out a small sigh of relief, seeing how solemn she was. He then took in another deep breath. “Then.. I have something to tell you.”

“You know that Song Yu and I aren’t true brothers.”

Nan Jia had actually already guessed what he wanted to say, but she still pretended, plastering her face with a very expectant look as she waited to hear. “Mn, of course I know. The two of you simply grew up together in the same house.”

“Yes. And..” Yue Zhishi attempted to bring up her memories, saying, “You should remember that there was a period of time where I was really unhappy. I even talked about it with you. About.. about how you can tell if you like someone.”

[Senior sister’s so nice, when can I have a psychological consultation? I also want to know how to tell if I like someone.]

Nan Jia pressed her lips together, enduring, and earnestly nodded. “I remember.”

After struggling for almost ten seconds, Yue Zhishi finally found enough courage. He leaned into Nan Jia’s ear and said very softly, “Actually, Song Yu and I.. We’re a couple.”

As though he thought Nan Jia would rapidly cry out in alarm something like ‘how could that be possible’ or ‘why would you do that’, he held onto Nan Jia’s shoulders ahead of time. He said, “Let me explain first, I.. I know you’re not disgusted with gay people, but Song Yu and I, with our relationship, you probably, probably still think it’s a bit strange. And that’s fine, I can accept that — I just didn’t want to keep hiding it from you since you were the one who initially gave me so much courage.”

As she listened to the words from the bottom of Yue Zhishi’s heart, Nan Jia still did her best to act out the reaction of someone having just listened to another’s coming out — even though she’d guessed ages and ages ago that they were already together and had watched as they started their relationship.

“Oh my god!” Nan Jia covered her wide open mouth with her ice cream, her pair of beautiful eyes also large and round. She stared at Yue Zhishi without blinking. “You guys are actually..”

Qu Zhi mimicked Nan Jia’s tone, also saying a single?oh my god.

Yue Zhishi nodded and hurriedly asked, “Do you find it really strange?”

“No, no.” Nan Jia quickly shook her head. “I’m just really surprised, I completely didn’t realise at all.”

[Completely didn’t realise at all], Qu Zhi echoed.

The two of them were about to separate, having arrived at the female dormitory building, and Yue Zhishi gave Nan Jia a very understanding look. “I understand.”

Nan Jia quickly grabbed Yue Zhishi’s hand. “Le Le, I’m not disgusted at all. I saw how much pain you were in so much pain back then, so I’m so very happy that you can be together with the person you like. Plus Song Yu treats you so differently. No one would be surprised if they just thought about it.”

“If I were him and had grown up with someone like you, I’d like you too.”

Yue Zhishi’s mood instantly recovered. “Really?”

Nodding, Nan Jia said, “Of course. You have to be well. If Song Yu bullies you..” She released a large sigh. “I can’t do anything about it either, I can’t control him. But he definitely won’t, he treats you so, so well.”

Yue Zhishi expressed his agreement at her words. When he lifted his head, he saw a familiar figure walking towards them — it was Qu Zhi, carrying a motorcycle helmet.

He gave her a friendly wave. Nan Jia turned over as well and was slightly surprised; Yue Zhishi gave her an extremely sunny smile when she turned back to him, saying, “I’ll head off then, you guys look like you’re about to go out for some fun.”

“Not really...” Nan Jia cleared her throat. “Le Le, make sure you take care of your body.”

Yue Zhishi gave her a confused look, only for Nan Jia to push him away and urge him to hurry up and go back to his dorm for an afternoon nap. Giving her a foolish ‘oh’, Yue Zhishi twisted his head around to say goodbye to Qu Zhi, and then he walked by himself back in the direction of the male dormitories.

Qu Zhi raised her eyebrows and lifted her hand, her index finger hooked around the helmet and swaying it back and forth. She still remembered what Nan Jia had said at the end, so she purposefully mimicked her as she said, “If I were him and had grown up with someone like you, I’d like you too.”

Nan Jia wanted to cover up her mouth, but Qu Zhi dodged away from her hand, even snatching away the ice cream Nan Jia carried in her other hand. Qu Zhi took a bite, teasing, “Senior sister, your acting’s terrible.”

“Of course it is. I’m so beautiful, so if I could act well too, why bother studying law? I may as well go be an actress.” Nan Jia took away the helmet in Qu Zhi’s hand and pulled it over her head, movements very well-practised. She tugged Qu Zhi, still eating her ice cream, in the direction of her motorcycle.

“Senior sister, wait. I have to finish the ice cream before driving.”

“That’s my ice cream.”

“Oh. The one your former-crush’s-younger-brother-now-boyfriend bought for you?”

“...you eat it, you eat it.”

Once Yue Zhishi returned back to his dorm, he was a bit disappointed when he opened the door to find no one inside. The joy of being able to successfully come out to Nan Jia made him want to also tell his best friend, Jiang Yufan, to strike while the iron was still hot.

But this was slightly hard, because Jiang Yufan was so clear about the relationship between him and Song Yu — he’d known since third year of junior high that Song Yu was his older brother.

Anxious, Yue Zhishi dragged out one of the chairs; the moment he sat down, wrapped in thick cotton clothes, it felt like all of the cotton around him pressed down on him, and he collapsed onto the chair like a large deflated air balloon.

Something so important really should be said face to face — it would make him look more sincere to Jiang Yufan. But once he imagined talking about it to Jiang Yufan’s face, he couldn’t help but feel some awkwardness.

Jiang Yufan’s good heart wouldn’t allow himself to say things like ‘you guys are disgusting’ to Yue Zhishi, but Yue Zhishi would feel hurt even if Jiang Yufan simply drew his eyebrows together in a quick frown.

So he tentatively opened the WeChat conversation between him and Jiang Yufan and drafted a bunch of things to say. He deleted this and got rid of that, and when he finally thought of sending it out, he paused, very reluctant.

In the end, he deleted everything except for two things.

[Le Le: I have something to confess to you.]

[Le Le: I like Song Yu, and we’re together. (If you think that’s weird, please don’t tell me. Ah yes, I bought a barbecue meat wrap for you and left it on your desk.)]

After sending out the messages, Yue Zhishi regretted mentioning the wrap — he felt like it made his message seem insincere, or not serious, and so he pressed his finger onto the screen to unlock it, wanting to delete it.

But then his phone suddenly started to frantically vibrate.

[Jiang Yufan: !!!!!!!!!!!]

[Jiang Yufan: ???????????]

[Jiang Yufan: Are you serious??!!]

[Jiang Yufan: You’re not joking, right?]

Oh no, it’d gone terribly wrong — Yue Zhishi thought Jiang Yufan definitely wouldn’t be able to accept it and might even think his values had been overturned.

Terrified, Yue Zhishi tried to write something to explain himself, but he’d only typed out two words when he once again received a stream of vibrations.

[Jiang Yufan: Please don’t be joking! Last month I bet a pair of AJs with my older sister saying there’ll definitely be a gay couple around me within a month, Xu Lin’s too slow and too unreliable so I’d already given up! Today’s the last day of our bet! I didn’t think there was still you!!!]

[Jiang Yufan: Le Le I love you so much you’re a pair of limited edition AJs dropped from the sky!!!!]

The author has something to say:

Le Le: [dog tilting its head in confusion.jpg] I take you as a friend, but you take me as..

Straight man Xiao Fan: I have AJs! I have AJs! I have AJs!

In a distant faraway cold mountain, Song Yu sneezed twice after being outed two times without knowing and thought, with certainty, that Yue Zhishi was thinking of him.