CY – Chapter 6

Chapter Six

Along the way, Zhang Xiaotian organized his thoughts and finally couldn’t help but ask, “So, what have you been up to these past two days?”

“You finally asked me,” Lu Bai said, as if expecting praise. “I listened to you and found something to do.”

How did he become even more childish in college than in high school? Zhang Xiaotian felt like laughing at his smug expression.

“What did you do?”

“I joined the school’s basketball team,” Lu Bai said. “From now on, I’ll have training on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and sometimes we’ll have games against other departments. You should come watch!”

“Okay,” Zhang Xiaotian agreed.

“Then can I pick you up after class when I have time?” Lu Bai asked again.

“Why would you pick me up? I can find my way!”

“Otherwise, I’ll be bored. Can’t I go to self-study with you?” Lu Bai snatched Zhang Xiaotian’s bag and put it on his shoulder. “Promise me, or I won’t give your bag back!”

“Whatever, come if you want,” Zhang Xiaotian said.

Five minutes before the end of evening self-study, the Class Monitor started a brief class meeting.

“Given how poor our class’s participation in activities has been, we’ll be assigning roles for events like lectures and knowledge competitions sequentially based on student ID number.”

A chorus of complaints rose from the students.

“I have no choice,” the Class Monitor said, hands on his hips at the podium. “Some of the school and department activities don’t offer academic credits, but they do require a few students from each class to liven up the atmosphere. But our class never has anyone sign up, and we can’t always ask the same few accommodating people to be the scapegoats. Please be considerate of each other.”

“This time, there are two activities: one is a fire safety awareness campaign, and the other is a Red Ribbon lecture. Each activity requires two people and is worth 0.5 academic credits. There’s also a campus safety skit, with no limit on participants but at least five people. If we can place in the top three at the university level, there’s a reward of 0.5 to 1 academic credit. We’ll start with student IDs ending in 1.” The Class Monitor quickly assigned the tasks and ended the meeting before the bell rang.

“Tian’er, I remember our student IDs are pretty close, right?” Lu Bai walked beside Zhang Xiaotian, carrying his bag. “I’m number 4, what about you?”

“Number 5,” Zhang Xiaotian said.

“Number 5, let me calculate…” Lu Bai did a quick count. “Then it’s the skit.”

Since there was no limit on participants but a minimum of five, number 5 was definitely required to participate. Zhang Xiaotian nodded.

“It’s fine, they say it’s easy. We’ll just act it out casually,” Lu Bai said.

“We should still be a bit serious, it’s for academic credits,” Zhang Xiaotian said. Since he switched his part-time job to tutoring, Zhang Xiaotian had more free time. He might as well find something to do, and no university student could refuse the allure of academic credits.

“That’s only if we get to the university level,” Lu Bai said. “Besides, it’s not that easy to get into university-level competitions. I can accompany you to more lectures later.”

“We won’t know unless we try.”

So, for the next few days, whenever Zhang Xiaotian had free time, he would take out the script and memorize a couple of pages, his seriousness second only to preparing for a pop quiz.

“I really admire people like Xiaotian who act as soon as they decide,” Zhou Bin, whose student ID was 7 and was also participating in the skit, said. “I looked at the script and my head started to ache. With such little time, can we really remember all these lines?”

“I understand, Bin. For you, whose brain cells have all died from your erratic sleep schedule, memorizing these few pages is a bit too much to ask,” Xu Yan said, comfortably lounging on his bed playing on his phone after just showering.

“Ah, Mother Xu, don’t you care about your Bin anymore?” Zhou Bin pretended to wipe away tears. “Xiaotian, look at Mother Xu, she doesn’t care about us at all!”

“Huh?” Zhang Xiaotian, who had been memorizing, turned to Zhou Bin. “What were you two just saying? I wasn’t listening closely.”

“Damn, it’s nothing,” Zhou Bin walked over and flipped through Zhang Xiaotian’s script, looking greatly surprised. “I didn’t expect you to be so serious, Xiaotian. With you here, I think I’ve definitely secured my academic credits.”

“Don’t get your hopes too high,” Zhang Xiaotian turned back to his script. “I just hope we don’t make too much of a fool of ourselves on stage.”

“What were you guys talking about?” Lu Bai came out of the shower, water droplets clinging to him. “I just heard Zhou Bin wailing, did he get beaten up?”

“I’m being bullied by this script,” Zhou Bin covered his face in mock pain.

“Don’t drag my Tian’er down,” Lu Bai walked over to Zhang Xiaotian and rested his chin on Zhang Xiaotian’s head. “Memorizing so diligently, my little disciple?”

“Stop messing around, wipe yourself dry,” Zhang Xiaotian was busy with his lines and didn’t have time to pay attention to him.

“Alright, he’s really career-minded.” Lu Bai stood up, tidied Zhang Xiaotian’s messy hair, and asked, “When is the performance?”

“Next Monday,” Zhang Xiaotian said. “At seven-thirty in the evening.”

“Then I won’t be able to see your competition, I have to go to a lecture,” Lu Bai said.

“I’ll record Tian’er’s heroic stance for you,” Zhou Bin said, gesturing a few times in front of his eyes. “With these sharp eyes of mine.”

“Whose Tian’er?” Lu Bai playfully swung a fist at Zhou Bin. “He’s my Tian’er, you don’t get a share.”

“Alright, alright, your Tian’er,” Zhou Bin rolled his eyes at him, only to receive a flick on the forehead from Lu Bai.

As it turned out, Zhang Xiaotian’s last-minute cramming was not in vain. Their class actually won first place in the department and would represent the School of Medicine in the university-level competition. On Tuesday evening, before evening self-study, Zhou Bin excitedly shared the good news with everyone.

“You have no idea how amazing we were on stage. It was like this!” Zhou Bin spoke with great passion, then raised his thumb to show everyone. “Our acting skills alone conquered everyone from the adjacent Film and Television department!”

Zhang Xiaotian tried to stop his wild exaggerations, but it was too late.

“So you’ll be participating in the university-level competition?” a student asked.

“Forget university-level, we’re not afraid even if people from the city come!” Zhou Bin was still gloating. He looked up and saw Lu Bai entering through the back door.

“Lu Bai, Xiaotian made it to the university level!” Zhou Bin quickly went to greet him. “You should have seen Xiaotian’s performance yesterday, he almost won an Oscar!”

Zhang Xiaotian couldn’t stand it anymore. “Zhou Bin, stop talking. I just memorized the lines well…”

“Don’t be modest, Xiaotian. Compared to everyone else who couldn’t even memorize their lines, our class was outstanding!”

“I just memorized it a few more times because I was afraid of embarrassing myself,” Zhang Xiaotian said. “I didn’t expect that even this would make us stand out.”

“Getting into the university level is indeed great news, but our current level won’t rank us high in the university competition,” the Class Monitor said, scrolling through his phone and showing everyone the list of participating classes. “Let’s go for it! Brothers, it looks like we need to practice more.”

“Practice more, Class Monitor!” Zhou Bin said with a mournful face. “Please let me go…”

Lu Bai sidestepped Zhou Bin, who was arguing with the Class Monitor about reducing practice sessions, and walked straight to Zhang Xiaotian.

“Made it to the university level, Actor Zhang?”

Zhang Xiaotian tried to nudge him with his elbow, but Lu Bai grabbed his arm, and he couldn’t pull it free. He let Lu Bai hold it and used his other hand to swipe through his phone, seeing a new message from the Class Monitor in their skit group chat.

“Tomorrow afternoon, during our free period, let’s find an empty classroom in the Annex Building to rehearse. Everyone be there early!”

“You guys have a lot of practicing to do,” Lu Bai’s voice came from above. “The Class Monitor seems very enthusiastic.”

“Perhaps he didn’t expect our class to get this far either, and he’s a bit excited now,” Zhang Xiaotian replied, not looking up. “Received.”

“Then when is the next competition?”

“In two weeks,” Zhang Xiaotian said.

“I’ll skip self-study the day after tomorrow to watch,” Lu Bai said.

“Just don’t get caught,” Zhang Xiaotian reminded him.

“Then I’ll accompany you to the rehearsals for these two days too!” Lu Bai draped his arm over Zhang Xiaotian’s shoulder.

“No need, don’t come,” Zhang Xiaotian said. “Just come on the day of the competition.”

After self-study ended, almost as soon as the bell rang, more than half of the study hall was empty. Zhang Xiaotian wasn’t in a hurry. While packing up, he said to Lu Bai, “When we get back to the dorm, you shower first, I…”

Before he could finish, Lu Bai received a call. He held up his phone to Zhang Xiaotian and turned to go out to answer it.

Zhang Xiaotian finished packing and went out, looking in a few places before finally finding him in the pantry. Lu Bai was still speaking softly on the phone. Seeing Zhang Xiaotian standing at the door, he covered the receiver and said, “Wait for me.”

Zhang Xiaotian didn’t make a sound, just mouthed “no rush” and stood at the door, taking out his script to memorize.

Fewer and fewer people were in the building, and gradually only Lu Bai’s soft voice on the phone could be heard. Zhang Xiaotian didn’t know when he stopped memorizing, but he maintained the posture of looking down at his phone, his attention actually focused on Lu Bai.

“…It’s only been a few days since school started. Over a month? I didn’t even notice,” Lu Bai said softly. The person on the other end seemed angry because Lu Bai hadn’t called in a while. “Okay, I’ll call every week from now on.”

“The school food is quite good, I can eat it.”

“…I’m quite adapted. There are old classmates here, so you don’t need to worry about me.”

Old classmates? Zhang Xiaotian guessed Lu Bai was referring to himself and couldn’t help but look up. Lu Bai also happened to look at him and smiled, “Mom, I’ll hang up now. My classmate is waiting for me to return to the dorm. I’ll definitely call you next week.”

After hanging up, Zhang Xiaotian walked over to him. “Was that your mom calling?”

“Mm,” Lu Bai walked alongside Zhang Xiaotian towards the stairs. He looked down and saw the script in his hand.

“How’s the memorization going?” Lu Bai asked him. “Do you need me to run lines with you?”

Zhang Xiaotian handed him the script. “You do it.”

Lu Bai took it, flipped to a page, and read aloud: “I’m a bit short on cash lately, can you lend me some money… Damn, I can’t take it, it’s so awkward to read it out loud!”

“You can’t take it? Then it’s good that it’s not you on stage.” Zhang Xiaotian reached out to take the script back, but Lu Bai dodged him.

“What is this plot about?”

“It’s about campus loans.” Zhang Xiaotian tried to snatch it again. “Are you going to quiz me or not? If not, I’ll continue memorizing.”

“Wait, wait, let me see.” Lu Bai dodged and looked, then asked, “This person asking you for money, is Zhang Ting your girlfriend?”

“In the script!” Zhang Xiaotian hit him. “Give it back!”

“Ow, be gentle!” Lu Bai flipped through the pages. “Is she the only girl?”

“You can see for yourself,” Zhang Xiaotian said.

“I still haven’t met everyone in our class,” Lu Bai muttered.

Zhang Xiaotian felt something was a bit strange, but he couldn’t pinpoint what it was.

“Really impressive,” Lu Bai nodded as he read. “You memorized so many lines. Why didn’t I see you being this serious before?”

I’m serious many times, Zhang Xiaotian thought of glaring at Lu Bai, but when their eyes met, he couldn’t help but look away. “I just didn’t want to be too embarrassed on stage.”

“A serious man is the most charming,” Lu Bai said. “You’ve captured my heart. I’m now completely devoted to you.”

“You’re something else,” Zhang Xiaotian waved his hand at him.

“Lu Bai!”

After training, as Lu Bai was heading towards the locker room, the captain jogged up behind him.

“How was it? Tired from training? A few of us are going out to eat later, want to join?”

“No thanks, Brother,” Lu Bai slowed down to walk alongside him. “I have evening self-study later.”

“Oh, oh, evening self-study…” The captain paused, then continued, “Next week, we have a game against the School of Chemical Engineering. Some of the senior students have classes that day and can’t play. I think you’re pretty good, can you fill in?”

“What day is it?” Lu Bai asked.

“It hasn’t been set yet, we’re still coordinating,” the captain said. “Are you playing? Give me a definite answer.”

“Not sure yet,” Lu Bai said. “Once the specific time is confirmed, I’ll let you know, Captain.”

“Hey, you kid?” The captain frowned. “You have to seize opportunities. Our School of Medicine doesn’t have many activities, and you won’t have a chance to participate once your classes get heavier.”

“Mm,” Lu Bai didn’t look up, tapping his phone to check the time.

“Our School of Medicine’s basketball team isn’t like other schools. It used to be just for show. Since your year came, it’s finally started to look like a team. If you could show a bit more enthusiasm, I’d even consider making you the next captain.” The captain lamented to himself, unable to find anyone to echo his sentiments. “I joined the team with dreams of a vibrant college life. Although I haven’t experienced much youthfulness now, since I’m doing it, I have to do it seriously. You should also be more serious!”

“I know,” Lu Bai was unyielding. “I’ll consider it.”

“Decide in the next couple of days!” the captain pouted.

Lu Bai nodded. Seeing the time on his phone tick over to the hour, he quickly bid farewell to the captain and turned to leave, opening Zhang Xiaotian’s contact as he walked and sending him a message.

Where are you? I’ll pick you up for self-study.

Zhang Xiaotian replied a while later: We’re rehearsing, probably one more run. Don’t come, I’ll see you directly at the study hall later.

Lu Bai didn’t agree. He still asked for Zhang Xiaotian’s location and immediately rushed over. When he reached the door, on impulse, he didn’t go in directly. Instead, he walked to the back door and looked through the window.

The Annex Building usually had few people. Even a crack in the double-paned glass window remained unrepaired. From outside, the crack divided the rehearsing people inside into two groups. Zhang Xiaotian stood alone on the left, leaning on a prop, while the others were on the right, laughing and joking. Lu Bai found Zhang Xiaotian amusing and wanted to take a photo, so he took out his phone and zoomed in on him. Coincidentally, Zhang Xiaotian also smiled, and Lu Bai was stunned. He saw Zhang Xiaotian smiling, crossing the crack, and standing with the others. Zhou Bin said something when he saw Zhang Xiaotian approach, making everyone laugh even harder. The laughter faintly came through the door.

On the left side of the crack, there was no one left.

Lu Bai felt a sense of unease for no reason. Zhang Xiaotian looked the same as before, equally quiet, equally serious about his work, his eating habits, preferences, temper, and tone of voice were all exactly the same as before, yet something was different. Lu Bai stared at Zhang Xiaotian for a while, then turned and left.

Zhang Xiaotian had expected Lu Bai to come find him soon, but he didn’t expect Lu Bai to not show up even after they finished. He kept thinking about it, feeling like the clock on the wall was ticking slower than usual.

“That’s all for today,” the Class Monitor said after another run-through. “If we stay any later, the cafeteria will be closed.”

“I’m too tired, Class Monitor!” Zhou Bin said flippantly. “I’m not coming tomorrow.”

“Come if you want, but if you drag everyone down on the competition day, I’ll deal with you,” the Class Monitor said, rolling up the script and pointing at him. Zhou Bin quickly raised his hands in surrender.

“I was wrong, Class Monitor, I’ll definitely come tomorrow!” He quickly packed his things and bolted out the door. “I’m leaving!”

The remaining few people also started to leave one after another, leaving only Zhang Xiaotian behind. Zhang Xiaotian was still contemplating whether to call Lu Bai when Lu Bai’s message arrived:

I’m waiting for you at the study hall. I brought you dinner.

Zhang Xiaotian arrived at the study hall and easily found Lu Bai sitting in the back row. He tapped the table, and Lu Bai looked up, smiling at him. “I brought you some fried rice. You must not have had time to eat.” Lu Bai pushed the food over. “Eat up.”

Zhang Xiaotian didn’t take it, instead asking, “Did you eat?”

Lu Bai blinked. “Guess?”

“I’m not very hungry. You eat first,” Zhang Xiaotian pushed the food back. “Didn’t you have training today?”

Lu Bai shook his head. “You never finish your food, so I can just eat your leftovers.”

What was the deal with always eating his leftovers? Zhang Xiaotian really couldn’t understand why Lu Bai insisted on this. It was confusing enough before, and he couldn’t let it continue like this. He took the lid off the fried rice container, scooped out a small portion onto it, and pushed the rest back.

“Is this enough? If not, we can go eat something else during self-study later.”

Lu Bai hadn’t expected this and paused for a moment.

“Why do you always pick at my leftovers?” Zhang Xiaotian said. “Isn’t it better to eat our own food?”

Lu Bai looked at him, silent.

“Eat up, it’ll be time soon,” Zhang Xiaotian handed him the chopsticks. “When you get a girlfriend, go pick at her leftovers.”