CH 12

“S-Sorry for intruding…”

The three of us exchanged gazes in a sequence. The girl flashed us an embarrassed, awkward smile before taking two steps back and started to run away.

However, she came to a sharp brake after running for a few steps. Then, in small steps, she carefully picked up the spilled drink on the ground while saying, “L-let me clean it up for a bit. You guys can continue and pretend that I don’t exist.”

How can we do that? It’s not like I’m blind!

The current situation at hand couldn’t be summarized with just a sentence. I pushed him to the side and felt the urge to cover his face as I jump out of the window to escape.

But wouldn’t this be even harder to explain if I did that?

One doesn’t have to be afraid of his shadow bending if his body is truly straight, one doesn’t have to be afraid of his shadow bending if his body is truly straight, one doesn’t have to be afraid of his shadow bending if his body is truly straight…

I recited that three times in my heart, then took a deep breath before walking towards her.

The girl was squatting on the ground while trying to clean up the spilled soy milk. It felt wrong and inappropriate to just speak up like that, so I took out some tissues to help her clean up first.

The liquid on the floor was quite a lot. It soaked through the tissues and stained my hand, so I casually waved them a bit and wiped my hand on my pants. When I looked up and wanted to speak, “Miss, actually you mis…”

My words were halfway through when my hand was suddenly grabbed by someone.

I turned my head to check it out. I don’t know since when, but this guy squatted before me and is holding a wet tissue to wipe my hand while clutching on my wrist. In meticulous actions, he wiped the stains clean off of my fingertips.

Even when he was stared directly at by two pairs of eyes, he still remained unhurried and focused on the matter at hand. As if the awkward atmosphere did not faze him at all. He stood up after he was done, then patted my head while looking down at me, “I’m going ahead first.”

While watching that tall, straight back disappear at the other end of the corridor, I slowly turned towards the girl who had her mouth open in a daze. Then only I was able to finish my sentence, “Actually you misunderstood…”

“I’m sorry, Xiao Xia. I really didn’t know you two were like that…”

“No…”

“I can understand why you hid something like that from me. Don’t worry, I’ll definitely keep this a secret for you!”

“Thank you, but…”

“The photos and weibo account that I asked from you before, just treat it as a joke. Don’t mind it. And be happy, you two!”

I opened my mouth but closed them again silently.

Why is it that no one is always willing to listen to the truth?

It was still alright if she didn’t mention the photos. But now that I remembered the photos I took in a hurry last night, I still didn’t know if I managed to take any good ones.

Half an hour later, I sat in the corner of the last row in the conference hall, turning sideways to avoid my female senior who sat next to me and secretly opened my photo album.

The first few photos were just a dark blur, but then huge, white chest pecs came into view right after.

The excessive visual impact made my hands shake and my phone ended up falling to the seat one row in front of me.

Facing up.

I quickly bent down to pick it up, but a hand reached out to pick it up before I could.

My female senior smiled and handed it back to me. When she saw the photo on the screen, her expression froze.

…I’m done for.

In that moment, it was as if a large, open closet door showed up in front of my eyes.

Was today the national coming out day?

My female senior’s reaction was much calmer than expected. She quickly tapped on the power button to turn off the screen and passed my phone back with an unchanged expression.

I was overwhelmed with gratitude and wanted to express it to her, but then she leaned in closer and said in a whisper, “I never expected it, but Xiao Xia, your boyfriend’s body is pretty fit.”

“…”

Then she went on to say, “It’s better to lock such private photos away with a password next time though. Or save it to your cloud. It’s not a good idea to let anyone else see it, you know?”

I tried to clear up the misunderstanding, “That’s not my boyfriend…”

“Huh?” She froze a bit, then looked at me with a weird expression. “Then…it’s your fuck buddy? Haha…it’s okay, that’s normal too.”

The expressions on my face right now must be as interesting as firecrackers crackling brightly in the sky. I gritted my teeth and struggled to stay firm. “No…that’s my boyfriend.”

Since I have been forced out of the closet, there’s no difference whether he’s my boyfriend or not. At the very least, I have to retain my innocent reputation.

She can’t possibly know who the person in the picture is anyways.

There weren’t any tasks assigned to me in the afternoon. Due to the exhaustion and shock I experienced last night, I decided to return to my dorm to catch up on some sleep as well as comforting my wounded heart and body.

Lying on my bunk bed, I tossed and turned and couldn’t fall asleep somehow. It might have been due to the hot weather. Turning my phone screen on and off, I didn’t know what I really wanted to do.

The seventh time I turned on my phone, my thumb accidentally tapped the bottom button. The familiar photo album appeared in front of my eyes again.

Shit! No wonder I felt something was off! I forgot to delete the photos!

If someone else saw it again, how am I supposed to live?

In lightning speed, I quickly deleted the first few black blurry photos. But when I scrolled to the back, my fingers froze in place.

It caused a havoc from just viewing one of these photos earlier on. I wonder what else were taken after that…

Excluding the blurry photos, the remaining few photos didn’t capture his face either. It was only his collarbone and chest pecs that got caught on frames. Truly, it was unpleasant to look at.

The last photo did capture his chin, as well as the half-covered tattoos on his front chest and neck. They extended to the top of the photo all the way to his chin.

If these kinds of photos were uploaded on a dating site, it would probably receive quite a lot of phone numbers.

For the first time, I realized how high pixels my phone camera had. The photos were so clear that I could even see a bead of sweat slowly rolling down his Adam’s apple, a wet trail running down his chin down his neck line. It looked damp and dangerous.

With a long press on my phone screen, the option to delete the photos popped up. Yet, I couldn’t find it in myself to delete them.

Because I realized, I was fucking and shamefully hard again.

I got hard, over one photo.

And it was a photo of a fucking man too.

And it was a photo of a gay dude whose face wasn’t even fucking showing.

I fell into a complete breakdown.

My brain somehow split into two then. One half was still struggling against this unbelievable confusion while the other half had uncontrollably taken over my body. As I stared at the photo, my hand slowly slid under the thin blanket.

To be honest, after entering university, I haven’t done this for a long time due to my studies and part-time jobs taking up my time. I didn’t have any extra energy left after those. Even if I had any left, I would vent it out with games. It somehow even felt unfamiliar and rusty to do it myself this time around.

After moving around on my own for some time, I was gasping for breath but weren’t getting anywhere. I frowned and memories of last night resurfaced…

When that guy pressed me down on the bed, how did he do it again?

As if I was possessed, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. In a trance, I thought back to that moment when he pressed his knee firmly between my legs, bit my lower lips and then let out a muffled laugh.

I wasn’t sure where exactly did I brush against then, but with a shudder, I had my release.

My hands were soiled and wet. In a daze, I swiped two sheets of tissues and wiped them clean before falling asleep right away.

I had another nightmare after that.

At the start of the dream, I was locked up in a small space. It was hot and stuffy, uncomfortable as hell. I was afraid I’d die from being suffocated so I clung to the wall and knocked on it with all I had. After some time, some footstep sounds finally echoed from outside. A ray of light filtered in through the gap on the door before the door was finally opened.

I jumped out with joy and fell right into the arms of the person outside.

It was hard. I opened my eyes and looked up, it was the face of someone I knew all too well.

I panicked hard and subconsciously tried to escape. Yet, I was firmly hoisted up and pressed against the door behind me.

The ground was filled with a field of beautiful red spider lilies, reflected in the beautiful, dangerous eyes of the person in front of me. I couldn’t help but shout, “You vixen! Y-Y-You, don’t come over! I’m a straight guy!”

He raised an eyebrow but did not say anything. Instead, he reached one hand out to knock on the wooden board next to me. I turned towards it and realized where I just came out from…was a vertical wooden closet.

He laughed, “You just came out of here, yet you still say you’re straight?”