076 | (Seventy-five) Can you keep me company?
Xie Qingyan's fingers trembled slightly as she typed rapidly on the screen, quickly pressed the send button, and then read aloud the reason she had just prepared, word by word: "My mother asked me to thank you for bringing me back, so I pulled you out. Don't think it was my idea."
—It looks like an attempt to cover something up.
Xie Qingyan felt remorse and immediately long-pressed to withdraw.
A text input window pops up at the top of the screen.
[XX]: I saw it.
Xie Qingyan cursed inwardly, wishing she hadn't withdrawn the message; now it only made her seem more dishonest.
[XX]: What are your thoughts?
Xie Qingyan replied without hesitation.
【Long Live the Cat Cult】: What else can I think?
[XX]: You dislike me, hate me, and don't want to see me, right?
Xie Qingyan hesitated for a moment, thinking that it wasn't that she didn't want to see him. If her mother didn't value grades so much in the future, and Su Xingmao wasn't so annoying, she could still tolerate him for a while.
After all, his body is so alluring, and she can feel pleasure when she plays with him.
Xie Qingyan's face flushed again, though what she thought in her heart was something else entirely.
[Long Live Cat Teacher]: You know that's good.
[XX]: Oh, I see.
The other end replied casually.
Xie Qingyan didn't know what he meant. After thinking for a long time, she decided to send an emoji to cover up her feelings at the moment.
Unexpectedly, a red exclamation mark appeared when the message was delivered.
Xie Qingyan was stunned for two seconds, not even able to react.
This guy actually dared to block her?! Didn't Su Xingmao say he liked...?
Xie Qingyan was furious. He hadn't begged her, so she shouldn't have pulled him back so easily!
She rolled out of bed, barefoot, and strode to the window. Without thinking twice, she flung the window open, grabbed something at random, and smashed it against the closed window in a fit of rage.
Su Xingmao dared to block her. Xie Qingyan was the one who always blocked others; this was the first time in her life that she had been blocked.
Xie Qingyan looked down again at the line of small text under the bright red symbol: "Message sent, but rejected by the recipient."
My heart is on a roller coaster, tossed up and down.
The more she looked, the angrier she became. She had finally taken the initiative to be nice to him, how dare he block her? Her eyes welled up with tears, and Xie Qingyan felt both wronged and angry.
Enraged, he grabbed whatever he could reach and threw it at his window one after another.
If it weren't so late at night, and she didn't want to wake Xie Jinyu, she would have smashed open his window, grabbed his collar, and started cursing him.
I wonder when the window over there will open.
Without the lights on, in the dim light of the day, a figure stood silently, like a lonely pine tree, towering majestically. His face was obscured by the fluttering gauze curtain, making it impossible to see clearly. Only a thin white shirt could be seen fluttering in the wind, like a crumpled cloud.
A toy, carried by the wind blowing through the mountains, landed on him. His shadow stirred, bent down to pick it up, held it in his hand, and gently dusted off the dust.
He stood by the cave-like window, gazing across the courtyard and the dim night, like a trapped spirit unable to escape.
Xie Qingyan was in a daze, thinking he had seen a ghost, and his expression was blank.
He gently stroked the doll's smiling face with his fingertips and asked, "Don't you want it anymore?"
The sound was raspy, tinged with weariness and a slight nasal tone, somewhat hoarse, like the old tape recorder they used to tinker with together when they were kids, the tape cable jammed, the sound cut off, accompanied by the hissing static of electricity.
It doesn't sound good at all.
Xie Qingyan felt a heavy weight in his heart, and something was stuck in his throat, making it impossible for him to speak.
She wanted to question him about why he had blocked her, but she didn't want him to see her reddened eyes and the tears she was trying to hold back. She tilted her head back and turned her face away, pretending to be strong: "Just throw it away."
What if I don't want to lose it?
"Do whatever you want, it's none of my business." Xie Qingyan turned her back, clenching her teeth so hard that her cheeks ached.
With your palm on the window handle, pull it outwards to close the window.
The mountain wind carried his words.
"Xie Qingyan, I miss you so much."
Su Xingmao stared straight ahead. The light in her room was on, and he could see clearly that the person with her back to him was trembling slightly on her thin shoulders.
She wasn't the only one who couldn't sleep that night.
After returning home alone, Su Xingmao cooked a meal. National Day is the busiest time for his parents, and he was the only one left in the spacious villa. He ate alone, washed up, went to bed, and closed his eyes.
He closed the window that had always been open, like a wounded clam tightly shutting its shell, thinking that this would heal him.
After the lights are turned off, as darkness swallows the light and the warm yellow light across the street can no longer be seen, my heart is devoured even more thoroughly. It's not just this house that's empty, but also him.
Su Xingmao took out his phone.
His phone and contact list were as clean as a house. Apart from a few pre-installed apps and essential study apps, there was nothing else. His wallpaper was also the original one, but he changed it to a photo a while ago. It was a corner of the classroom that a classmate had unintentionally taken. In the small corner of the photo, a girl with a ponytail was leaning against the blackboard, her face turned to the light, smiling oblivious to everyone around her. The sunlight fell on her face, bright and radiant.
He saved the photo, enlarged it, and cropped it to use as wallpaper.
The image was expanded to an inappropriate size, leaving blurry noise on the phone screen. Su Xingmao touched those noises with his fingertips, as if he could touch real skin through the electronic screen.
He clicked on the pinned post, and their messages hadn't been from a week ago.
It was then replaced by a red exclamation mark.
My gaze wandered over her grayed-out profile picture.
He stared blankly at her invisible homepage as usual, when suddenly a new circle of friends appeared.
...
But Xie Qingyan still said she disliked him.
Why is it that my chest feels like something is stuck, a dull, suffocating feeling, it's so uncomfortable?
He was distressed, and she was even more distressed than by the incomprehensible calculus.
Why can't Xie Qingyan like him?
He opened his eyes and listened to the howling wind in the mountains.
I thought it would just go on like this until dawn.
Then, the window rang.
She came. Upon seeing her, the joyful wind quieted down, and the surrounding noise subsided, for the heart pounded even louder.
He stood by the window, his white shadow like a wisp of a departing ghost.
Even shadows close their eyes, their eyelashes casting a double shadow beneath their eyes, their lips move, and they speak from their hearts.
…
The action of closing the window stopped.
Xie Qingyan's eyelashes were wet. She turned her head slowly, her expression stiff as she tried to maintain it.
"Can you come to my house and keep me company?"
He said dejectedly, his heavy nasal tone altering his voice, making him sound ill and revealing a rare vulnerability.
Xie Qingyan twirled her fingers behind her back and didn't reply: "You've already blocked me."
"sorry."
“If I don’t do this, you won’t listen to me.” Su Xingmao’s tone was as calm as water, flowing slowly toward her.
They looked at each other through the window, and Lingquan Mountain was still the same mountain as before.
This mountain, this window, this curtain of moon hidden in the clouds—so many years of history have flowed by.
They talked like this countless times. When they were little, she was so boisterous, and it seemed like she had endless things to say to him.
Why do people grow up? Why do they talk less as they grow up?
He was puzzled.
But tonight, he really wanted to talk to her.
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