Just like her retired math teacher with the bald head and jacket, who spent all day with a glass teacup.
But when Wen Shaoyu noticed Ji Shuhe starting to avoid him, he quickly figured out why.
He had already explained her weak points. Overloading her would only backfire. If he scared the little sprout into a wilt, she'd learn even less.
Wen Shaoyu started pretending to sleep—or maybe really sleeping.
He'd lie face-down on his homework, pick a thick book that could stand upright, open it to shield himself, and close his eyes, pretending to be asleep.
He played tutor by day, and at night, he had to study on his own.
Though Wen Shaoyu didn't like being controlled, he was very clear about his situation. Studying, getting into college, finding a good job—cliché as it was, this was his only way to change his circumstances.
He had no grand dreams. When Ji Shuhe asked which university he wanted to attend or what major to choose, he was clueless. The person he wanted to become in elementary school essays had been replaced by hatred and stubborn desires. His only goal in life was to have nothing to do with his father.
Forever and completely irrelevant.
As for which university or major, or to fulfill someone's wish, it was all the same.
With the "overseer" asleep, Ji Shuhe took the chance to slack off.
She considered herself an uninteresting, boring person—she didn't like competitive games, had no particular hobbies, and was at the age where she liked to wallow in melancholy.
Killing time, she read novels and essays, from Hesse to Borges. The seemingly beautiful and philosophical translations passed through her brain but left nothing behind.
Ji Shuhe wondered: was the text itself empty, or was she the empty one? She couldn't understand why the Arctic Ocean would merge with the Nile, or why the moon would fall after a grand summer.
But this summer was bright for her.
By the window, sunlight streamed down onto both of them. Ji Shuhe's gaze had somehow shifted from her pen to the book in front of Wen Shaoyu.
A hardcover black book with white lettering on the spine: *A History of Chinese Architecture*.
The pen twirled between her fingers and then fell to the desk. Ji Shuhe frowned in confusion. Why was he reading this now?
"Thump."
She was lost in thought when the black book toppled over, hitting the desk with a dull sound.
Startled, she looked around apologetically, but no one noticed. Relieved, she turned to Wen Shaoyu.
He was still "asleep" behind the book, lying on his side toward the window. His face, bathed in the summer sunlight, furrowed unconsciously—perhaps disturbed by the bright light or the noise.
But such a commotion and he still didn't wake up... Ji Shuhe squinted. Had he been out doing something shady last night? How much sleep did he get to be this tired?
Her brow furrowed in turn. She felt like poking him awake. They were in the library to study, not to sleep!
She was a woman of action. But just as she reached out, her eyes caught the scratch paper beside his hand.
It was full of scribbles: math calculations, physics formulas, chemical equations, all written casually. He wrote with heavy strokes, sometimes tearing the paper, leaving raised, inky pits.
But what caught her attention weren't those messy numbers and letters. It was a sketch of her in the corner of the scratch paper, done with a few strokes.
It must be her. It was her profile, looking out the window at some point. Only a few lines, messy, but it captured her expression perfectly.
Ji Shuhe's gaze shifted back to Wen Shaoyu's face.
She had always known he was good-looking, and she was a shallow appearance person—otherwise, she wouldn't have handed him a tissue when they first met.
Later, she got used to his face and became immune. His sarcastic mouth made her so mad that she had no energy to pay attention to his useless good looks.
Plus, he was quick-tempered and stubborn, like a stone with sharp edges. He never compromised himself for others, making him the complete opposite of Ji Shuhe.
At first, she disliked him. He was someone so different from her, someone she wanted to become but never could.
But Wen Shaoyu was way too perceptive. Every time she felt down and needed to get through emotional lows alone, he'd inexplicably show up by her side, as if he had timed it.
Whether he distracted her or comforted her, her bad moods dissipated quickly because of him.
And then, every intense heartbeat started to be connected to him.
Like right now, in her eyes, Wen Shaoyu was bathed in sunlight, with only the shadow of the window frame falling across his eyes, like a black blindfold.
The sense of déjà vu was so strong that Ji Shuhe began to wonder if he was really blindfolded.
He was asleep. He was blindfolded. He wouldn't know what she was doing.
Under this strong mental suggestion, Ji Shuhe reached out, inch by inch, toward Wen Shaoyu's hand that was resting on his homework, fingers extended and drooping.
Her heart was racing wildly.
Outside the window, the wind rustled the lush green camphor leaves, producing a rustling sound.
Probably because the library was too quiet, every sound entered her ears. Ji Shuhe began to feel that her own heartbeat was too loud.
Until her hand finally touched his.
An icy hand, only daring to lightly grasp Wen Shaoyu's fingertips.
It was a strange feeling.
He always liked to tease her by calling her "Miaomiao," a nickname no one else used. He knew her taste, knew she'd rather sacrifice her own preferences to please others. He understood all her sensitivity and bitterness, and he had helped dispel too many of her unknown emotions.
Flipped.
At the moment she held Wen Shaoyu's fingertips, Ji Shuhe suddenly thought of that word.
The youth was like jade, and her heart flipped.
She seemed to...
Ji Shuhe's hand trembled. Naturally, she didn't notice that the hand she was holding was also trembling.
Meanwhile, under the table where they sat facing each other, someone who should have been asleep subtly shifted his numb foot. His breathing became shallow and stiff. The closed eyes on that face should have been clenched tight enough to kill a mosquito.
Such a terrible acting job—it couldn't fool anyone except Ji Shuhe, and even she was too preoccupied with her own thoughts to notice.
The phone on the table suddenly vibrated. The noise from the vibration against the wooden surface was even louder than the book falling earlier.
Ji Shuhe snapped out of her daze and yanked her hand back. Aware of the attention around her, she gently shook Wen Shaoyu. "Wake up. Granny's calling."
Wen Shaoyu stiffly hummed in response, pretending to wake up slowly. He seemed dazed, rubbed his eyes, and looked at the phone. The screen showed his grandmother's contact.
It wasn't convenient to answer inside, so he pointed outside to Ji Shuhe, got up, and walked out of the reading room.
The phone buzzed insistently, making his heart pound. He rushed to the door and answered. What came through was a chaotic noise.
He didn't hear Granny Zheng's voice. He softly called out twice, but still no response. His intuition flared again. Something was wrong.
Just as he was about to ask again, Ji Shuhe's grandmother's anxious voice came through.
"Xiao Yu, come back quickly! Something's happened!"
Author's Note: [blush] VIP update with ten thousand characters. Comment section has red envelopes dropping! Don't miss it!