Chapter 131 Don't do this. What am I like?
After the scores are released, it's time to fill out college applications. This task is much simpler for Li Leshan. He doesn't have much to think about; he can just sit back and wait for the admission notice to be sent out.
But he was still busy every day; instead of finding college applications for himself, he had to find them for Jiang Yueming. He borrowed two thick sets of college application guides from Zhang Fang; they were so thick they could be bulletproof, like bricks.
Li Leshan carried those two books with him all day long, comparing his ranking with the admission scores of previous years, and copying down all the suitable schools. He didn't want to waste a single point of Jiang Yueming's score. He had worked so hard to get such a high score, and such extraordinary performance was rare; he couldn't afford any mistakes in his college application.
After copying them down and then filtering them, a whole page was filled with dense writing. In the end, only a few were actually selected. Based on the information he found online, Li Leshan ranked these schools in descending order. By the time he finished all of this, it was already 3 a.m.
The next day, with dark circles under her eyes, she made a video call to Jiang Yueming.
Li Leshan smiled and held the paper up to the screen. He was very happy and wanted to show it to Jiang Yueming as soon as possible.
"Lele, Lele," Jiang Yueming hurriedly said, "Put some paper down here, let me see your face..."
Li Leshan was full of doubts, unable to understand what Jiang Yueming was focusing on. Did he have a message on his face? Or had he just not had time to read the words on it? He just obediently put the paper down a little.
Jiang Yueming's face instantly darkened. He had initially thought he was seeing things, since the camera had only flashed by for a second before being blocked, but now he saw it clearly. His voice was also a bit deep, "What were you doing last night? You didn't sleep at all?"
Li Leshan then noticed himself on the screen. Because it was a small screen and he almost never looked at his own face, he realized his dark circles and tired appearance.
Li Leshan forced a smile, put down the paper, and gestured to Jiang Yueming, "I was helping you check your college application last night. It's okay, I'm not sleepy at all."
"That's not something you need to worry about, you know? Where are you right now?" Jiang Yueming looked at the screen, and the environment behind Li Leshan didn't look like home.
"Sister Xiuli, this is it." Li Leshan showed him the surroundings. "I'm in the warehouse now, not outside."
"Oh," Jiang Yueming nodded, "Have you had breakfast?"
"I ate," Li Leshan said, even though he hadn't eaten. He dared not anger Jiang Yueming any further in this situation.
To prevent Jiang Yueming from noticing anything amiss, Li Leshan quickly changed the subject, asking, "Where are you now? Are you still at the hospital?"
It doesn't look like it.
The screen went black briefly, then Jiang Yueming's face reappeared. "No, not at the hospital. I'll go later."
"Are you going to take care of Grandpa again today?" Li Leshan asked, looking at him.
"No, I can't really help take care of my grandfather," Jiang Yueming said. "I'm going to deliver some food to my aunt and the others in a bit, and then I have to relieve her. She's been there all night."
"Okay, then you should take a rest." Li Leshan felt that he wasn't in much better shape either.
“I’ll send you the photos in a bit,” Li Leshan said in sign language. “Remember to take a look; I’ve circled the ones that are suitable.”
Jiang Yueming hummed in agreement. "Okay, I understand."
Li Leshan decided not to bother him any longer, hung up the phone, and put his phone in his pocket. He had only managed to call Jiang Yueming when he had a little free time. He hadn't expected him to be up so early; it seemed he was very busy over there.
It's summer vacation now, and it's always peak season for people. He quickly put on his red vest, tidied his hair, and went back to his work.
The paper, circled and drawn on repeatedly, lay calmly on the stool. Li Leshan had considered all the possibilities, including the three strategies of "boosting, stabilizing, and protecting," but there was one he hadn't considered at all. That was, none of the schools he had chosen were in Beijing.
At midnight, the internet cafe was packed. As expected of summer vacation, it was almost full. Li Leshan was busy the whole time. He glanced at his phone, saw no messages, and went back to work.
"Stop hitting him," Li Leshan said, tapping the doorframe with a beer bottle. He then gestured to Liu Yang, "Come out and get to work."
Liu Yang, who was directly opposite him, glanced at Li Leshan and casually knocked out the "Nine Thousand" card that had just been played.
He gave a perfunctory reply, "Okay, I'll wait."
He took a closer look at the whole deck of cards, glanced at the "seven and eight of Wan" in the corner, and then at the "nine of Wan" that had just been played. He suddenly realized something and played the card that he had just been waiting for.
"Are you stupid?" the blond-haired guy watching the cards behind him exclaimed in surprise, "Why did you play the nine of characters if you had a winning hand?"
"I didn't see it clearly, never mind." Liu Yang looked at the hand of cards, his anger rising. "You draw a couple of hands for me, I'm going out to check."
"Damn it," the blond-haired guy plopped down in his seat, "I'm not trying to be mean, but you'll never win with this hand. You have a kong next to a 6-wan, and you're waiting for a 9-wan, but you just discarded the last 9-wan in the discard pile."
Li Leshan witnessed the whole thing and felt a little embarrassed. "Did I interrupt your card game?"
"No." Liu Yang patted his shoulder generously. "We wouldn't have won anyway."
As I got up, I glanced at the cards the guy next to me was playing. Luckily, I didn't play the card I wanted to play, otherwise I would have been caught out. I guess I could call it a blessing in disguise.
“One.” The blond-haired man was puzzled.
"Damn it, don't shoot, don't shoot..." Liu Yang hurriedly said.
"Kong!" The guy next to me was overjoyed. He never expected to be able to win at the last minute. He went to draw the last card, and as luck would have it, "Sorry, I won."
"Hurry up and let's go." Liu Yang grabbed Li Leshan's arm without hesitation. "Pressing the bar and then drawing the winning tile yourself, this combination is terrifying. If we're even a second later, we'll have to pay up."
“There are so many people outside,” Liu Yang glanced at the crowd, frowning as he was choked by the smoke. “Go back to your seat, don’t stay here and inhale secondhand smoke.”
Li Leshan glanced at him, said nothing, and turned back to the front desk.
Li Leshan hadn't checked his phone until now, and only then did he notice the message from Jiang Yueming. He quickly opened it, and a line of text caught his eye.
Jiang Yueming: I've read the application.
Jiang Yueming: Lele, will you be angry if I don't choose from these?
Li Leshan's heart tightened. He quickly took out the piece of paper from his pocket, flattened it, and carefully read through the information on it again. He had already included all the possibilities. The probability of being admitted to any of these schools was very high. They were the best schools Li Leshan could think of, and they were also located in the south, very close to where he was.
What does Jiang Yueming mean?
Does he have a better solution?
Li Leshan quickly replied: Do you have a better school?
After a long pause, I finally received a reply: No, I didn't.
To be honest, I really couldn't find a better school than Li Leshan found; it was a perfect fit. The location was excellent, the school was excellent, the program was excellent—there was nothing wrong with it.
Jiang Yueming: I want to go to Beijing.
Jiang Yueming: I want to be closer to you.
Something exploded in Li Leshan's heart with a "boom," and those few dozen seconds felt like an eternity. He hadn't considered this, nor did he have time to consider it. Beijing...? Li Leshan hurriedly flipped through his college application forms, searching through them countless times among schools of similar ranking, but none in Beijing were suitable.
A while later, another message came from over there.
Jiang Yueming: Actually, I didn't want to tell you before, because I was afraid you wouldn't agree. I wanted to do it first and tell you later, even though it would ultimately be impossible, but as long as I could be closer to you, I was willing.
The messages kept popping up.
Jiang Yueming: Lele, the distance from Guangdong to Beijing is too far. Didn't you already know that all year?
They'd met so few times that year, you could count them on one hand. Every glance, every missing one, felt like a loss. Jiang Yueming couldn't imagine living like this for another four years.
Li Leshan took a deep breath, and after a long while, he typed: "Call, make a phone call, let's make a phone call and talk."
Jiang Yueming: I can't call, it's not convenient for me here. Just say what you want to say, I'm listening.
Li Leshan: I can come to you. When I don't have classes, and during holidays, we'll go back to Shengping. If you don't want to come back, I'll go to your place.
Jiang Yueming: We'll have to run back and forth like this for four years, me going to your place and you coming to mine.
Jiang Yueming: And then continue, I don't know anything, I'm completely clueless. Do I have to ask your classmates and teachers for help to find out? But that won't work either, this isn't Shengping, I don't know them.
China is so big, how could he possibly know everyone? Without Shengping, he wouldn't know anyone.
Li Leshan's throat tightened as he recalled that past incident, but it would never happen again. He quickly replied, "No, I won't hide it from you anymore."
The dense handwriting on the paper stung Li Leshan's eyes. Which school in Beijing? A third-tier university, or something else? He didn't know, he didn't know. And he dared not know.
He knew how much effort Jiang Yueming had put in to get here, and he knew Jiang Yueming clearly had better options. He couldn't just watch Jiang Yueming's hard work go to waste. He... he couldn't hold Jiang Yueming back any longer, could he?
He knew all this perfectly well, so he couldn't remain indifferent. No one's journey is easy, and it was precisely because the road was fraught with thorns that he couldn't just stand by and watch.
The plot of giving up one's future for a lover is something that only exists in novels, and even in novels, it would be heavily criticized.
People will say I'm stupid, that it's not worth it, that the author is a moron, that he's never been to school, that he's a slacker who missed out on nine years of compulsory education.
Li Leshan struggled for a long time, repeatedly deleting and re-deleting, and finally typed out four words, "Don't do this."
After a long while, they finally replied.
Jiang Yueming: What about me?
Jiang Yueming: What am I, exactly?
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Author's Note: Reading this makes me really want to play mahjong!!! Mahjong, mahjong, I love you, like a mouse loves rice~
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