Chapter 27 “I’ve Always Been Wondering Whether I Should Go to Tsinghua or Peking University in the Future.”

The parents talked for a while. Seeing it was getting late, they prepared to go out and let the two children rest.

Ji Shu: “Little Luo, you should go back. I’ll stay and watch. It’s fine.”

Luo Xueqing: “How could I feel comfortable with that?”

Ye Rongcheng: “You still have work tomorrow. Go back early. If anything happens, we’ll call you.”

Luo Xueqing checked on Luo Yi. She had only finished half a bottle of the drip. There were still two and a half bottles left. It would probably last until two or three in the morning.

She gave Luo Yi a few reminders, then thanked Ye Rongcheng and his wife a thousand times before saying goodbye.

Ji Shu walked over, sat by the bed, and asked Ye Xiaoyang, “Want me to peel you an apple?”

Ye Xiaoyang had no mood for an apple. He said, “Mom, I’m sleepy.”

“Oh. Then sleep quickly.” Ji Shu tucked the quilt around him and said, “Your dad and I will be right outside. Call us if you need anything.”

Ji Shu turned off the light, pulled the door mostly shut, and left.

In the large room, only Ye Xiaoyang and Luo Yi remained.

Ye Xiaoyang’s right hand hurt badly. He couldn’t fall asleep for a while.

Luo Yi was right there. His heart pounded, and he was even less able to sleep.

Silence spread in the dark. Who knew how long passed before Luo Yi’s thin, mosquito-like voice came. “Are you asleep?”

“Not yet.” Ye Xiaoyang lay on the bed. Because his right hand was injured, he couldn’t change position easily. His back was stiff and sore.

“Does your hand still hurt?” Luo Yi asked.

“Mm.” He answered with a breath through his nose.

“Ai.” Luo Yi sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“Why say that?”

“If you hadn’t walked me to the bus stop, this wouldn’t have happened.” Luo Yi felt extremely guilty. She always felt that for Ye Xiaoyang’s injury, she at least had to take eighty percent of the responsibility.

Although Ye Xiaoyang didn’t think this was Luo Yi’s fault, since she thought so, he didn’t want to correct her.

After all, his hand was already fractured. He couldn’t suffer this for nothing.

He was silent for a moment, then asked, “Then will you still run in the future?”

“Run?” Luo Yi didn’t understand what he meant.

“That day,” Ye Xiaoyang started to speak and stopped, but in the end he still asked, “in the water room, why did you run?”

“I…” Luo Yi stammered. How was she supposed to say this? She ran because she was afraid he was going to confess to her?

And the reason she avoided it was that she didn’t know how to face this affection of his.

“Do you hate me?” He almost made no sound, speaking to her only with breath.

That hoarse voice was extremely tempting in the dark. It made Luo Yi’s ears go numb.

“Of course not…” Luo Yi denied it.

“Then—” Ye Xiaoyang thought for a while, then said slowly, “Do you like me?”

When these words fell by her ear, Luo Yi looked toward him in alarm.

At some point he had quietly moved to the edge of the bed. He was less than half a meter from her.

The moonlight was very dim, like a rusted coin hanging in midair. Light rain drifted outside the window. Rain threads silently struck the glass, gathered into droplets, and slowly slid down.

The room was utterly still. Their drawn-out breathing gradually tangled together.

“Not speaking means you admit it.” Ye Xiaoyang gave a soft hum. Luo Yi immediately flushed red all over her face from embarrassment.

Good thing the light wasn’t on. Otherwise he would definitely have seen her at a complete loss.

“I…” Luo Yi wanted to say she hadn’t said anything like that, but there was a new movement from Ye Xiaoyang’s side.

“It hurts—” He sucked in a cold breath.

“Does your hand hurt again?” Luo Yi panicked.

“Not my hand.” Ye Xiaoyang said. “My chest hurts.”

Luo Yi thought, this was bad. Had his chest been injured too? Should she have the doctor come check again?

Just as she was hesitating, a warm palm caught her right hand—in Luo Yi’s mind there was a “boom,” fireworks cracking open.

That uninjured hand wrapped her drip-free hand in its palm and held it loosely, just like when he had taught her the right-hand rule.

Perhaps because of the pain, his palm had sweated a little.

Luo Yi didn’t dare move even a little.

He laced his fingers with hers, palm against palm. Her soft, boneless little hand obediently let him do as he pleased.

After a long time, Ye Xiaoyang sighed softly and said, “Don’t make me sad, okay?”

Luo Yi’s heart was like a little boat tossing in wind and waves, swaying without settling.

She was very afraid. Her whole body trembled like fallen leaves in the autumn wind.

But she had no way to refuse him. She couldn’t say it.

She absolutely didn’t hate him. But as for liking… fine. Luo Yi admitted she liked him a little. But what could liking do now?

She didn’t dare date him early.

Being criticized in front of the whole school—just thinking about it was unbearable.

She was a coward. She didn’t have the courage to face these things.

Just persuading herself to try to accept his affection had already cost her endless mental energy.

Luo Yi sank into thought.

So what was he doing now? Confessing to her?

But he had clearly asked whether she liked him.

“What’s good about me?” Luo Yi’s voice trembled. Her eyes grew hot.

“Everything is good.” Ye Xiaoyang said bluntly.

“Is that so?” She was very doubtful.

Ye Xiaoyang nodded heavily.

“What do you mean, saying these things to me now?” Luo Yi’s heart beat a little drum.

Ye Xiaoyang: “…”

What else could he mean? Of course he wanted to develop their pure friendship in a direction that wasn’t quite so “pure.”

Qian Zhongshu once said: “A boy of eighteen or nineteen without a girlfriend often hides in his heart a number of women equal to the emperor’s thirty-six palaces. The filth in his heart is sometimes worse than a public toilet.”

“At the same time he holds a lofty idea of love. He hopes for a woman whose heart matches his own, an intimate and pure relationship, pushing physical impulse far away, wrapping it in layers of ornament, not allowing it to show its true face.”

Ye Xiaoyang was a living youth. He was not the lofty academic god outsiders spoke of who had abandoned the seven emotions and six desires. He had feelings, and he had impulses.

Perfection in outsiders’ eyes was often obtained by sacrificing certain instincts. Even if that was not what he wished.

His thoughts toward Luo Yi were completely pure.

In his heart she was a pure, inviolable girl, cold and faintly fragrant, like a graceful narcissus.

This affection came from the inside out.

When he saw her cry, his heart ached with her. When he saw her smile, he was happy with her.

That was all. He didn’t dare hope for more.

Many parents and teachers treated early romance as a flood or a beast, believing it would poison teenagers.

But love was actually one of the most beautiful human feelings. How to love someone, how to accept someone else’s love—these things that mattered so much to the second half of your life would never be in books, and no teacher would come teach them.

Only by loving and being loved yourself could you slowly understand a little.

In this respect, a genius was also an idiot.

“The school doesn’t allow early romance,” Luo Yi argued softly. She didn’t know whether she wanted to persuade herself to cut off this thought, or whether she truly feared the strict school rules.

“I don’t care about those,” Ye Xiaoyang said lightly.

“But I do.” Luo Yi quietly drew her hand back.

“You’re smart. Your grades are good. Even if you date, it won’t affect you at all,” Luo Yi said. “But I can’t. My heart is too small. I can’t use one mind for two things. My grades aren’t that good either. If I date, they’ll only get worse.”

Although Luo Hengzhou had no grade requirements for Luo Yi, Luo Yi herself had always been quietly working hard.

She didn’t want to let herself down.

Little girls often saw romance as more important than everything. A breakup was like the sky falling.

But Luo Yi was not that kind of person. There were many people and things in this world. Romance was only one of them. In her heart, it had never been first.

She even felt she might never be able to love someone with her whole heart, or have a fierce, passionate romance.

“Just because of that?” Ye Xiaoyang’s tone carried disdain.

“Do you know who I am?” He gave a cold snort. The corner of his mouth lifted in a sarcastic smile. “Xishui’s top scorer on the 201X high school entrance exam.”

In this respect he was quite proud of himself. He said, “I’ve always been thinking whether I’ll go to Tsinghua or Peking University later.”

If someone else said this, it would be a joke.

But coming from Ye Xiaoyang’s mouth, it was simply the contempt of a king.

“You want to improve your grades?” he said. “I’ll teach you.”

Luo Yi: “…”

Luo Yi: “Where would you get the time?”

Ye Xiaoyang: “For you, I always have time.”

Ye Xiaoyang wasn’t joking. He said, “For recommendation, the list usually comes out after the first semester of Grade 12 starts.”

“I have a year of spare time. I’ll teach you slowly.” Failing the recommendation wasn’t in his considerations at all. He was confident.