CH 52.3

Going to Your House (3)

Ruan Qingmu picked up that set of English papers he still needed to work on. “Fine, I’ll get my English papers done too.”

Chinese, math, and English didn’t have the shifting class system, so the papers were pretty much all the same. He worked on his exercises in silence and finished all his English homework after a while, except for the essay part.

“I have also finished my English homework.” Ruan Qingmu immediately sent a message, wanting to show off. “What’s your progress?”

Qin Yuan replied, “I just sent several pictures. Let’s compare answers.”

Ruan Qingmu scratched his head. “Why don’t we just let it be? It’s too troublesome that way.”

It was simple enough to take several pictures, but it would require too much effort for him to compare the answers one by one using such a small screen.

Qin Yuan was silent for a moment. “Actually, it’s still better to compare our answers in-person.”

Ruan Qingmu stared at that string of words, constantly feeling like Qin Yuan was trying to hint at something. But then, he thought he was being too brazen and was overthinking things.

Which set of homework should he do next? Ruan Qingmu was feeling slightly anxious.

Chinese and English were his favorite classes, but he didn’t have much interest in math, physics, and chemistry.

In the memory of the previous host, he only had the most basic knowledge, enough to barely follow his classes, but he had to concentrate if he wanted to improve quickly.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t concentrate, it was just that he didn’t have much motivation.

Before he could think about it, someone pushed his door open.

The little mute poked his head in from the crack in the door, staring with his large pitch-black eyes, and looking at the opened books on his desk. Instead of hugging Ruan Qingmu’s leg this time, he ran in and climbed onto the bed, hugging the bear and playing silently by himself.

Ruan Qingmu turned to look at him, feeling a slight headache coming on.

This guy was just too similar to his past self.

In his previous life, that child would also keep close to him after he took him in. Whether he was practicing martial arts or going out, he would always follow him silently and could not be driven away no matter what.

He learned it diligently when he found someone to teach him martial arts or some other activity. But when he learned a move or a style, he would immediately come over and show it to him.

Ruan Qingmu stared at the little mute for a while, pointing his finger at the school bag. “Be good and play by yourself. Gege is busy, ah.”

The little mute couldn’t hear him, but he immediately nodded, incomparably smart.

Ruan Qingmu finally opened his phone and wanted to give a reply to Qin Yuan, but that person had already sent him a WeChat message.

“Are you going to have lunch with your family now? I won’t bother you then.”

Ruan Qingmu stared at that message. No matter how he saw it, he knew that he wasn’t being paranoid.

The message was evidently polite and courteous, but there seemed to be vague loneliness emanating from the words.

Ahhhh. Ruan Qingmu became frantic. He must’ve been overthinking again! Why would this strong person behave sulky and lonely, even bothering to put on a spoiled act?! Was he imagining things?

“Yeah, I have a big family.” He replied very slowly, “Me, my mom, two workers in the shop, and a little mute.”

Qiu-ge’s loud voice could be heard from outside. “Li-jie, I’ve bought the braised beef. I’m telling you, it was so close. I just got there and it was the only piece left!”

The phone went silent for a while. This time, the message arriving seemed even colder than before.

“Mm. Go eat quickly. I’ll have noodles here.”

Ruan Qingmu: “…”

This liar.

Last night in the dorm room, the two people couldn’t sleep and chatted head to head. He couldn’t help but ask Qin Yuan how he usually ate alone. The guy clearly said that there was an aunt who specialized in cooking and would come on schedule.

He said that the aunt who cooked the food would make four dishes and one soup on the weekend. If he couldn’t finish it, the food would be dumped the next day and she would make a fresh one every day. What the hell, noodles weren’t even on the menu!

It was almost lunchtime. The dilapidated residential buildings were spaced close together and the smell of food from upstairs and downstairs wafted everywhere.

Looking out of the window, numerous housewives across the street could be seen cooking from the kitchen window. It was unknown who was stir-frying spices in a pan, but the smell mixed with the pan-fried hairtail fishes from his house’s kitchen. The aroma of various home cooked dishes mixed together was warm and hearty, filling the entire room.

On the other side, Mu Wanli had also made several dishes, saying softly outside the room, “Let’s wait for Xiao-Zheng. We’ll eat after he finishes his session.”

Ruan Qingmu clenched his teeth and wrote, “Are you cooking in the kitchen, making noodles for yourself?”

Qin Yuan replied with a: “???”

“Oh right, what about your crutches? The ones I used last time haven’t been thrown away. It’s better to use that than throw them away.”

Qin Yuan was silent and looked down at his foot.

He imagined the appearance of Ruan Qingmu for the past few days and the corners of his mouth twitched for a moment, and he couldn’t help but reply, “Okay… You can bring your crutches to me after we return to school.”

“How about I send them over to you now?” Ruan Qingmu mustered his courage and swiftly typed out, “If not, you’d be forced to jump around for three days!”

Qin Yuan gazed at those strings of words. They were clearly familiar fonts on his phone, but somehow they began to take on the look of jumpy and reckless cursive scripts that were hard to decipher.

He looked at those words in a daze and the haze inside the whole house seemed to dissipate suddenly. Those pent-up frustrations firmly pressing down on the bottom of his heart also melted as if they were snow seeing the light of the sun.

“Okay. I’ll go ahead and text you my house address!”

Ruan Qingmu stood up and rushed over, hugging the unexpecting little mute who was sitting there on the bed minding his own business.

He reached out and stroked the little mute’s head, his heart suddenly jumping a little fast.

He didn’t care that the little mute couldn’t hear him. He lowered his head and said, “Be good. I’ll take you to see an old acquaintance. I want to see if you still remember him or not.”