040 | (Thirty-nine) Gaze

Xie Qingyan argued eloquently for the sake of the cat, her tone urgent.

Zhou Jianyang chuckled lightly. What's the rush with a stray cat?

The wandering gaze finally settled on Xie Qingyan's face as she argued vehemently. She rested her chin on her hand, her fingernails shimmering faintly under the light, like the phosphorescence of a butterfly, with a glimpse of pale pink pearly hue.

She secretly got a subtle manicure.

For a fleeting moment, a scene flashed through his mind.

I remember that day, our class monitor, Su Xingmao, claimed he had been scratched by a stray cat and was a little late returning to the classroom. He was a class monitor who always followed the rules and was never late.

People of the same sex, especially those who see each other as rivals, are sometimes more perceptive of each other's subtle changes than people of the opposite sex.

Those red marks that still show clearly, spreading from the edge of the collar, were they really the work of a stray cat?

Zhou Jianyang looked ahead.

His upright and tall figure stood out among the stacks of books in the classroom. I remember him as someone who was oblivious to everything around him and quietly writing his exam paper. During the short ten-minute break between classes, he seemed to glance in this direction several times.

With a casual, unintentional glance, the center of their gazes converged on an excessively bright figure.

Zhou Jianyang skillfully caught the intermittent, uncertain gaze, and was surprised for a moment.

It was an interesting discovery, but not enough to support his conjecture.

The school bell rang, and the crowd scattered like birds and beasts.

Zhou Jianyang returned to his seat, propping his chin up with one hand and lazily resting the other hand on the table, a ballpoint pen casually held between his two fingers.

The pen swung up and down between his fingers, drawing circles, spinning, leaping, then smoothly rolling across his slender fingers, finally tapping lightly on his rugged wrist bones, occasionally emitting a soft, annoying sound.

What exactly is the relationship between these two? Earlier this year, he and Xie Qingyan skipped class together. She accidentally fell and sprained her leg, so he had no choice but to take her home. Before the car had even reached the halfway point up the mountain, she suddenly stopped, her previous whimpers of pain abruptly ceasing, and she insisted on walking into the residential area by herself.

Now that I think about it, was I hiding from someone?

With a slight upturn of his lips, Zhou Jianyang felt as if he had inadvertently glimpsed the subtle undercurrent between these two seemingly unrelated people in the class.

If he guessed correctly, then… what about Xie Qingyan? Did she like Su Xingmao? Like such a bookworm? What common ground could they possibly have?

The smile gradually faded, and the attitude of watching the show unconsciously shifted to a sneer.

The change came abruptly and was vague.

Ignoring the strange, almost arrogant, and subtle contempt in his own thoughts, Zhou Jianyang decided to switch his observation target to Xie Qingyan.

However, he stared for a while, and Xie Qingyan finally noticed his gaze and glared back at him without any politeness.

Zhou Jianyang's seat was in front of Zheng Hui and diagonally to the right of Xie Qingyan, not far apart.

During the self-study period, the deliberate noise of the pen hitting its knuckles continued, making Xie Qingyan feel irritated and causing her to frown.

The people around him either didn't care because it was none of their business, or were too cautious to speak up because of Zhou Jianyang's family background.

Xie Qingyan didn't care about anything else. Whoever it was, she slammed the pen down, pulled off the cap, and threw it straight at the source of the noise.

It hit Zhou Jianyang squarely on the forehead.

Xie Qingyan struck hard, and a red mark immediately appeared on his forehead.

The commotion was neither too loud nor too soft, just enough to startle a small group of classmates nearby. Even Zheng Hui gasped, thinking to himself that everyone knew Zhou Jianyang was arrogant and had quite a temper.

Zheng Hui was very loyal. Once you become friends, you share weal and woe. Fearing that his friend might suffer, he stood up and patted Zhou Jianyang on the shoulder to smooth things over. He took a deep breath and prepared a whole bunch of persuasive words.

Just as he was about to speak, he suddenly stopped, his eyes wide with astonishment.

Zhou Jianyang was stunned for a moment after being hit. When he came to his senses, he simply brushed the black hair on his forehead, smiled, and remained calm, showing no anger.

Instead of getting angry, he bent down, picked up the pen cap that had rolled away for her, and with a flick of his wrist, easily tossed it in an arc back onto Xie Qingyan's table.

Be more careful next time.