With the wind beneath my feet
Actually, things aren't complicated. Chen Wanyi and Bai Yi'an are both easygoing and act as mediators in the dormitory. Even Lu Xi, who doesn't like to participate in conversations, sometimes says a few words.
The two slept in since they had no classes before getting up. After a quick tidy-up, they wandered over to the cafeteria for lunch. When they left, they noticed Lucy's curtain was closed, so they assumed she was still sleeping and locked the door behind them. After lunch, they spent two hours in the study room before heading back to their dorm.
To their surprise, as soon as they reached the door, they saw Lucy standing there with a dark expression, clutching her bag. When she heard footsteps, she turned her head and glared at them with red eyes, clearly furious.
They weren't in the same major as Lucy, rarely interacted, and were completely unfamiliar with her schedule. It was only because Lucy would always pull back the curtains to let in some fresh air before leaving the room that they misunderstood.
As soon as Bai Yixia got off the car, she rushed back to her dormitory. Although she was always a little angry with Lu Xi, she still wanted a harmonious dormitory atmosphere.
But as she approached the door, Bai Yixia slowed down, took a breath, and then pushed it open. "Wow, it's so cool outside! It's so hot outside today..."
Bai Yixia realized she had made a mistake halfway through her sentence. Chen Wanyi, standing behind Bai Yi'an and Lu Xi, closed her eyes in despair, clasped her hands together, and bowed to her.
Bai Yixia coughed lightly and said, "Well... Xiaowan and Xiaobai didn't mean it—"
"Did they complain to you again?" Lucy interrupted her coldly, her gaze not exactly gentle.
Bai Yi'an, who was sitting with her back to Lucy, suddenly stood up, the chair leg scraping an unpleasant sound on the floor, but no one noticed it at the moment.
Bai Yi'an said, "What do you mean by 'reporting'? What does this have to do with Xiaxia? Why are you taking your anger out on her!"
"It's okay, why are you so eager to send her messages to call her back?" Lucy also stood up. She was taller than Bai Yi'an, but also thinner. Her bangs covered her eyebrows and eyes, making her look somewhat gloomy.
Bai Yi'an took a deep breath. "Lucy, I've already apologized to you. I was wrong to do this." She frowned. "But didn't you send us a message? Why did you have to stand there pitifully outside? What, were you trying to make us feel a little guilty?"
Bai Yixia wanted to speak but didn't know what to say. Her mind raced, but her eyes involuntarily fell on Lu Xi's hand. She gripped the hem of her clothes tightly, paused for a moment, and then managed to squeeze out a sentence: "I posted it. Have you guys seen it?"
Her voice wasn't loud, but it was exceptionally clear in the quiet dormitory.
Bai Yixia was taken aback and quickly opened her phone to check her messages. She was in many random groups, and her messages were always over 99 every day. Sometimes, people she didn't contact often would get pushed to the bottom of the messages.
Sure enough, Lucy sent her a message at noon, asking when she would be back because she didn't have her keys.
“Back then, I didn’t look at my phone much…” Bai Yixia said.
The other two also awkwardly put down their phones, probably because sending messages to Bai Yixia wouldn't make any difference; Lu Xi had sent them two more messages. However, neither of them had the habit of checking their phones while in the study room.
Bai Yi'an's expression was somewhat unnatural. She said, "I'm sorry, I had Do Not Disturb enabled at the time—"
Lucy didn't let her finish speaking, and gave a cold laugh.
Bai Yi'an's temper flared up again instantly. "What do you mean? Lu Xi, to be honest, we don't owe you anything. We've apologized and admitted our mistake. I just don't understand why you're still being so stubborn. You sent the message and there was no response, couldn't you have called? Don't you have your own key to the dorm? You didn't bring it and you're blaming others for not coming back to open the door for you? Get this straight, we have our own things to do, we're not supposed to revolve around you, okay?"
The barrage of words left Bai Yixia somewhat bewildered. Bai Yi'an had never shown this side of herself before; she was always all smiles and had a very good temper. Lu Xi was speechless, choked up for a long time without uttering a single word.
She pushed her chair aside and started to walk out. Bai Yixia grabbed her wrist, but she shook it off and ran away without stopping.
Chen Wanyi was patting Bai Yi'an's back to calm her down when she noticed Bai Yixia standing there in a daze. She asked in surprise, "Xiaxia, what's wrong? Did she just bump into you?"
Bai Yixia came to her senses but didn't say anything. Just now, when Lu Xi passed by her, she saw that Lu Xi's eyes were red, which was why Bai Yixia had stopped her.
Bai Yixia sighed wearily and shook her head: "No. What happened? She's not an unreasonable person."
Bai Yi'an was still angry, so she wasn't very polite. "What else could I do? I came back and politely opened the door to apologize to her, but she didn't say a word at first, and then she started making sarcastic remarks about me."
Bai Yixia asked in confusion, "Huh? Me?"
Bai Yi'an and Chen Wanyi exchanged a glance and nodded. "I guess so. We just mentioned that we didn't know if you had your keys, and she said something..."
Chen Wanyi cleared her throat and whispered, "'If she can only think about Bai Yixia, then I deserve to be locked out.' My god, does she have a problem with you?"
Now Bai Yixia was truly confused. She walked to her desk, put her things away, and her eyes lingered on Lucy's seat several times, hesitating and pacing back and forth.
Chen Wanyi noticed her movement and turned to look at her. "Xiaxia, are you going to find her?"
Bai Yixia said, "A little."
Bai Yi'an waved her hand, "Don't mind her. Aren't you going home? It's almost 5:30. You should hurry up, or it'll be rush hour." She turned around and leaned on the back of the chair, "When she comes back, we'll talk to her properly. Everyone has some issues today, but it doesn't really concern you, so don't worry about it."
Bai Yixia checked the time; it was indeed getting late. She had promised her parents she would have dinner together. So she said, "Alright, I'll be going now. Please don't argue." With that, she clasped her hands together in a gesture of respect to the two of them.
"Okay, okay, I won't. Be careful."
Despite saying she didn't care, Bai Yixia still went to the large balcony in the hallway after leaving the house, but gave up when she couldn't find anyone.
--
As Bai Yixia walked out of the school gate, she turned on her phone again and noticed a new reply to the "tiger descending the mountain" meme from that afternoon. Zhou Qingchi had posted the image in the group chat, along with a few words.
-Please have some porridge: What's wrong with this one? This one is clearly very cute and energetic.
-Add a Yuan: What kind of look is that? Even with my built-in filter, I can't see the vitality in this photo.
-Add one more Yuan: I only saw a Xia who was very desperate and confused.
-Please have some porridge: Hmph, you can't see that, you just have no taste.
-Add another Yuan: ...?
-Add one more Yuan: @Give him a kiss, but don't ask him to take your picture, it will definitely look terrible.
Watching the two bickering in the group chat, all the conflicts and misunderstandings vanished in an instant. Bai Yixia held her phone, her lips curving upwards uncontrollably, and her pace quickened involuntarily.
As she was pondering how to respond to the chaos, she felt something snag the hood of her sun-protective clothing. Confused, she turned around and her eyes widened in surprise.
The boy behind her looked at her helplessly, "Where are you running off to now? I didn't see you when you came back, and now you can't see you when you come out either?"
The boy was wearing a misty blue shirt with the cuffs rolled up, a watch on his wrist, and beige wide-leg jeans. He exuded a calm yet not rigid aura.
Bai Yixia exclaimed in surprise, "Brother Zhou! What are you doing here?"
Zhou Qingchi straightened her hood and used the same excuse he used to appease his roommate, "I came back to see if Zhou Qingyan had starved to death."
"Don't worry, Xiao Yan is good at finding food. He'll sneak over to our house for a late-night snack after evening self-study." Bai Yixia truly believed her.
Zhou Qingchi asked, "Does he bother you often?"
"No way. I only go back once a week on weekends. At most, he'll ask me to play games with him on weekends." Bai Yixia flipped through the photo album for a while and showed it to Zhou Qingchi. "Look, we beat this game last week."
Zhou Qingchi was much taller than Bai Yixia. He bent down and leaned closer to Bai Yixia, gently taking her wrist. However, his gaze did not fall on the phone screen, but rather on the girl's fingers.
There was a small scratch on the side of my index finger, slightly reddish.
He asked, "What's wrong here?"
"Hmm?" Bai Yixia hadn't even noticed it herself, but after he mentioned it, she realized that the area was sore and itchy. "I probably scratched it quite badly this afternoon."
"fine?"
Bai Yixia examined her finger, looking at the wound that was about to heal on its own, and looked at Zhou Qingchi suspiciously: "You can't expect me to put a band-aid on such a small cut, can you?"
She shook her head. "It's okay, you won't feel it after a while."
"Oh right! There probably isn't any food for you at home. I'll send a message to the housekeeper to ask her to prepare more dishes." As she spoke, she reached for her phone again.
Zhou Qingchi stopped her, took out his car keys from his pocket and waved them in front of her. "I went home first and already told Aunt Lin that there's a share for me."
Hearing him say that, Bai Yixia felt as if a rabbit was hopping around in her heart. She rolled her eyes and smiled, "Did you come here specifically to pick me up?"
Zhou Qingchi glanced at her, a slight smile playing on his lips. "No."
Bai Yixia was taken aback: "Huh?"
“Let me think… I’m here to pick up rabbits.” Zhou Qingchi took two steps forward and pointed to the platform, “The kind that run away as soon as they get off the train.”
Bai Yixia then remembered that he had said he hadn't seen him, and couldn't help but laugh: "You're so vengeful, Brother Zhou."
She walked a few steps to Zhou Qingchi's side, nudged his arm with her shoulder, and pleaded, "My eyesight is terrible, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. I'll drive in a bit?"
Bai Yixia got her driver's license last summer and passed on her first try, very satisfied with her skills. She patted her chest and said confidently, "Master Bai guarantees that passengers will have a ride as comfortable as coming home."
Zhou Qingchi chuckled at her words, but shook his head. "You've been running around all day; you must be exhausted. How about Zhou Tian takes me to the high-speed rail station?"
Bai Yixia was extremely satisfied that Zhou Tian still had time to spend alone with her, and nodded repeatedly.
Then, as if remembering something, she asked, "You saw me but didn't call me? I waited for so long for nothing. What if you got heatstroke?"
“I was going to call you, but you looked so serious, it must be something important.” Zhou Qingchi opened the car door for her and said with his eyes downcast, “Besides, I’d be happy to wait for you.”
It took Bai Yixia a while after the car drove away to recover. She secretly glanced at Zhou Qingchi, wondering if he had been in too many relationships, since he suddenly became so eloquent. But the next second, she felt a little annoyed. According to Nie Jiayuan's information, Zhou Qingchi had dated four girlfriends last year, each for no more than a week.
As a girl, Bai Yixia utterly despised his scumbag behavior; as a friend, she couldn't help but want to find reasons to excuse him. Finally, as someone who secretly admired him, she secretly rejoiced.
Bai Yixia sighed inwardly, scolded herself a few times for being "love-struck," and then opened her phone to send a message to Nie Jiayuan.
- Kiss: Jiajia, you've really worked too hard, I'm sorry.
- Kiss: [Kneeling puppy.jpg]
-Add another Yuan: ?
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