Chapter 110 #3
Inside was a stack of bills. He counted them—a total of eight thousand yuan, just the same as he had left for Gu Fei.
Is this what being on the same wavelength means, boyfriend?
He could hardly describe how he felt in that moment. He felt like laughing, but after less than three seconds of staring at the stack of bills, tears started flowing out instead.
Beside him, Zhao Ke turned to give him a look, but didn’t say anything. He turned back to his game.
Without regard for his image, Jiang Cheng stuffed the money back into the envelope and grabbed a tissue to press to his eyes. After he’d forcefully pushed the tears back, he used the spent tissue to blow his nose as well.
Zhao Ke quickly stuck out a leg and kicked a small wastebasket over. Jiang Cheng tossed the tissue inside. As he recovered a little of his composure, he finally managed to feel a little embarrassed. Based on the way he’d acted just now, Zhao Ke probably thought he was desperately poor.
“A windfall?” asked Zhao Ke.
“Uh-huh,” Jiang Cheng answered. It was certainly unexpected.
“Must be quite a sum.” Zhao Ke turned and looked at him. “To move you to tears like that.”
Goddamnit, Jiang Cheng thought as he turned to meet his gaze.
“It wasn’t because you were moved?” Zhao Ke asked. Jiang Cheng remained quiet. “Before I left, my older sister stuffed two thousand yuan into my hands,” Zhao Ke carried on, playing the stupid Memory game, “and moved herself to tears.”
Jiang Cheng hadn’t planned on saying anything, but now he couldn’t help laughing.
Zhao Ke started a new round of click-click-clicking and didn’t continue the conversation.
Jiang Cheng took out his phone, snapped a picture of the red envelope, and sent it to Gu Fei.
- thank you, boyfriend
He didn’t want to ask Gu Fei why he had given him money, nor did he want to be so pretentious as to say something like “I don’t need the money—why don’t you keep it for yourself?
” No matter what reason Gu Fei had for giving it to him, and regardless of whether he actually needed it, the gesture sat like a warm little furnace in his heart.
Gu Fei had probably been asleep. It was a few minutes later when he sent back a reply.
- Don’t hold yourself back whenever you’re craving some good pork belly
- mm, were you napping?
- Not really, I’m drifting in and out. A kid behind me has been crying the whole time
- poor you
- Are you back at the dorm?
- yeah, just me and Zhao Ke, the other two aren’t here
- Hoho
- hoho your ass
- Did you get a good look at him?
- i would’ve forgotten if you hadn’t mentioned it, i’ll check him out later
They chatted like that for more than an hour. When the crying child on Gu Fei’s end fell asleep at last, Jiang Cheng finally put down his phone and let Gu Fei get back to his nap.
Leaning back in the chair, he stretched his back.
This would be his life now, stealing any moment he could to send messages. If he really couldn’t bear it anymore, they could video call…
“Wanna go out and walk around?” Zhao Ke finished his battle with the stupid Memory game and stood up.
“Where to?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Now, at long last, Jiang Cheng saw what Zhao Ke looked like. Not bad. Not as handsome as Gu Fei kept going on about, but handsome enough; you could call him a good-looking guy, someone you could pick out from a crowd with two or three glances.
Still, he couldn’t compare to Gu Fei.
“Around campus,” Zhao Ke said. “To check out places like the cafeteria, the supermarket, the café, and the library. See what they all look like.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t really feel like going out for a walk, if he was completely honest. In his current state of mind, he wasn’t interested in any of those things.
Besides, he didn’t know Zhao Ke that well, and he had nothing to say to him.
Two silent strangers walking around campus together seemed nothing but awkward.
“Let’s go.” Zhao Ke put his laptop in his cabinet and walked briskly out of their room.
“Hey!” Jiang Cheng called out to him, but there was no response. Reluctantly, he stood up, put his things away, and walked out as well.
“Let’s go to the cafeteria first,” Zhao Ke said as he looked at his phone. “We can get lunch.”
“Mm-hm.” Jiang Cheng didn’t have much of an appetite. In his current mood, it was hard to conjure up any positive thoughts at the mention of the cafeteria. Still, it was going to be a very important place going forward, and there was no harm in checking it out.
“There are a bunch of cafeterias,” said Zhao Ke. “Let’s see…the best way to get to them.”
Jiang Cheng glanced at Zhao Ke’s phone. The guy had saved a huge map of the school and marked out various buildings on it. “You…prepared all this in advance?”
“Yeah, and all sorts of guides and stuff. It makes it easier to unlock new terrain,” said Zhao Ke.
Jiang Cheng chuckled. What did a guy who played Memory know about unlocking new terrain?
“We should add each other on WeChat.” Zhao Ke waved his phone. “So we can find each other if anything comes up.”
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng pulled out his phone.
Occasionally, people encountered certain information at the most unexpected time.
Jiang Cheng’s lock screen and home screen were, of course, covered in Gu Fei.
He had changed them as recently as the night before.
He didn’t think much about it at the time, just barreled ahead and replaced all of his displays.
Now, though, in front of Zhao Ke, with Gu Fei’s face showing up again and again on his phone, he realized he had never thought about how he would manage an awkward scenario like this should it ever arise.
He glanced at Zhao Ke. Zhao Ke was looking right back at him.