After returning home, Ye Xi and Li Rui only had one day of rest before reuniting at school.
They sat at their desks staring at each other, still unable to shake off the joy of the final days of break, collapsing onto their tables with twin sighs.
Everyone else around them wasn’t doing much better—most faces looked half-dead.
In front, Liang Zhan was frantically voting for her CP, determined to crush the rival camp.
Next to them, two boys were animatedly reviewing yesterday’s gaming match, pounding the desk in outrage at the heated parts.
The classroom was pure chaos.
But the school clearly had no intention of sympathizing with their misery. Not long after classes resumed, they were hit with a placement exam, and three days later, the results were announced.
A welcome-back gift for the senior class.
Li Rui clutched his test paper like it was the end of the world.
Absurd.
After all his hard work, he had only climbed a measly three places. Now he was ranked 39th. Was this really what he got for all those sleepless nights bent over his notes?
He was devastated. Looking over at Ye Xi’s desk, he expected to find him equally crushed—only to see Ye Xi staring blankly at his English exam.
“What’s wrong with you? Got hit as hard as I did?”
Li Rui patted his shoulder comfortingly. “Don’t worry. Wins and losses are part of the battle. For academic slackers like us, failure’s the norm. We’ll have another chance next time…”
But before he could finish, he caught sight of Ye Xi’s paper—and was horrified to see an English score of 96.
When he looked more closely, he saw that on Ye Xi’s test paper lay his grade slip, with his class ranking in the last column.
Class: 26th.
Grade: 241st.
“Holy crap…” Li Rui was stunned.
Even though their class had only forty students, and the whole grade just over four hundred—with some already guaranteed admission elsewhere—this result for Ye Xi was like strapping himself to a rocket.
Ye Xi had always been steadily in the bottom forty of the grade.
Li Rui, in disbelief, stretched out a trembling finger, his voice shaking: “You… betrayed the organization…”
Ye Xi rubbed his nose and smiled at Li Rui.
He hadn’t expected this either—this was already an extraordinary performance for him.
“Maybe it’s because Bai-ge gave me special training…” he muttered softly. “Before winter break, he even sent me practice questions.”
He said quietly, “I really did study properly with him.”
It wasn’t like every time he went there, it was with the intention of seduction.
Though Bai Yue’s chest muscles were indeed tempting.
And the way he looked in glasses—restrained, scholarly, abstinent—could set a person on fire.
But as an unlucky high school student going for tutoring, he still ended up pressed down by Bai Yue to finish a pile of problems.
Ye Xi stretched out his fingers to show Li Rui: “Look, I’ve even gotten calluses on my hands.”
Li Rui widened his eyes, searching for a while, before finally spotting a tiny rough spot on Ye Xi’s middle finger.
You practically needed a magnifying glass to see it.
Furiously, he slapped Ye Xi’s hand away.
Because of these exam results, Li Rui had no hesitation in extorting a meal from Ye Xi.
The two of them sat down in an Italian restaurant outside the school.
Li Rui, munching on pizza, said while chewing, “Actually, I remember your grades were pretty good in middle school… Thinking about it, it makes sense you’d improve fast now. I remember back then you could get around ninth or tenth in the class.”
After all, they had been classmates since middle school, often even desk mates.
“But then how did you end up mixed up with me later…” Li Rui’s face was blank.
He couldn’t remember anymore—sometime in their third year of middle school, Ye Xi had suddenly started sleeping in class and gaming after class with him.
“Don’t tell me I was the one who ruined you.” Only now did he realize, looking horrified.
Ye Xi nearly burst out laughing.
He remembered Li Rui had asked him this very question back in middle school, looking just as guilty then.
It was only that Li Rui had forgotten.
“No,” Ye Xi forked up some pasta and said casually, “I just didn’t want to study anymore.”
Li Rui still looked doubtful, but seeing Ye Xi’s unwillingness to elaborate, he wisely let it drop and went on devouring his extorted pizza.
While they were talking, Ye Xi’s phone buzzed. He picked it up and saw it was a message from Bai Yue, telling him he had arrived out of town for the preliminaries.
Ye Xi couldn’t help smiling as he quickly typed a reply.
Li Rui clearly guessed who it was, but still asked deliberately: “Who is it?”
“Bai-ge,” Ye Xi answered without looking up, then couldn’t resist sharing, “He’s gone to compete—just arrived.”
“Ohhh~”
Li Rui deliberately stretched out the syllable, twirling some pasta and glancing at the oil painting on the wall with narrowed, mysterious eyes.
All the way back to the dorm, Ye Xi kept chatting off and on with Bai Yue.
But because his hands were full, he occasionally sent voice messages.
“Mm, I’m in the dorm.”
“My hair’s a bit long, tied it up. When the holiday starts the day after tomorrow, I’ll need to get a haircut.”
“Are you guys having a group dinner? Okay.”
The more Li Rui listened, the higher his eyebrows rose.
Honestly, was no one else finding these conversations suspicious?
This wasn’t “just friends” talk—it was sticky sweet, full of nonsense, bubbling with pink sparkles.
Meanwhile, Sheng Yuhe had never once spoken to him so gently.
Thinking of that, Li Rui angrily ripped open a box of biscuit sticks and crunched into one.
When Ye Xi finally finished chatting and pulled out his test papers to start homework, he turned his head and saw Li Rui’s twisted expression.
“What kind of face is that?” Ye Xi asked, startled.
Li Rui’s expression hovered somewhere between “I think I’ve uncovered a cosmic-level secret” and “I’m so annoyed I need to beat someone up.”
He stuffed more spicy strips into his mouth. His bad moods always drove him to junk food, pimples be damned.
Ever since they’d come back from the snowy mountain town, he’d been dazed. Every time he saw Ye Xi and Bai Yue chatting, there was a mountain of words in his throat.
But he never dared speak them, worried he’d just dreamt it all up.
Still, his look of melancholy left Ye Xi baffled.
Putting down his papers, Ye Xi first checked on his friend: “What’s wrong? Did Sheng Yuhe piss you off again? Or is the homework too hard?”
Neither.
It was your secret affair with Bai Yue that’s keeping me up at night.
Li Rui bit through another spicy strip, licked his reddened lips, and finally couldn’t hold back.
Looking at Ye Xi’s pale, beautiful face—its mix of coldness and shyness so alluring—it seemed only natural Bai Yue would fall for him.
He cautiously asked: “Actually, I’ve been struggling with something for a long time… Don’t you think Bai Yue treats you kind of special?”
His eyes blinked, willing Ye Xi to catch his wavelength.
But Ye Xi only looked confused: “A little, I guess. We’ve known each other for years, and I’ve been tutoring with him these past six months. He’s always taken good care of me.”
“That’s not what I mean!”
Li Rui was breaking down, glaring at his oblivious friend.
He pressed his thumb and finger close together, holding them up to Ye Xi’s face.
“Don’t you feel like…” he coaxed, “Bai Yue sort of likes you?”
“?”
Ye Xi’s eyes widened, his body unconsciously leaning back. He thought Li Rui had gone insane from too many exams.
“No.”
He shook his head honestly.
What a joke. He and Bai Yue had only really gotten close last year. If Bai Yue could fall in love that fast, he’d already have an eighteen-part romance record.
Li Rui was about to explode.
“I’m serious,” he said, tossing his spicy strips aside. He rummaged through Ye Xi’s bag, knowing exactly where Ye Xi kept that polaroid. He snatched it out and shoved it in front of his face. “Look at this photo. You really don’t see anything weird? Bai Yue’s eyes are practically glued to you.”
Ye Xi blinked at the picture, dumbfounded.
Honestly, Li Rui’s photography skills were impressive—the photo was dreamy, romantic, carrying an almost couple-like intimacy.
Ye Xi couldn’t help but praise him: “You did shoot it really well. But Bai Yue always looks like that.”
This wasn’t slander.
Back in school, an upperclassman had once angrily remarked that Bai Yue gave people the wrong idea—when he smiled, he looked deeply affectionate no matter who it was.
“Yeah right. Bai Yue never looks at me or Zheng Yang like that.” Li Rui slapped the photo on the desk. “And think about it—how many unusual things has he done for you?”
He started ticking them off on his fingers: “Tutored you, made you snacks, let you stay over, spent Christmas with you, went back to high school just to attend the culture festival, called you even when he was out of town…”
The more he counted, the more grave he became, his voice trailing off: “He even sent you a Valentine’s gift, rushed back over winter break for your birthday, and designed a brooch for you with his own hands…”
He turned to Ye Xi, bewildered.
Damn. Talk about missing what’s right under your nose.
When you put it all together, it was overwhelming.
If this wasn’t love, then what was?
They practically had enough love tokens to fill a cabinet!
By contrast, he and Sheng Yuhe were more like complete strangers.
Li Rui let out a tragic wail: “You and Bai Yue must be secretly dating behind my back!”
Ye Xi was stunned into silence.
His lips moved as if to deny it, but Li Rui cut him off: “And don’t give me that line about him treating everyone the same. Look at Zheng Yang—does Bai Yue treat him that way? Back when we went to the snowy mountain, I even saw Bai Yue kick him! And they’ve been childhood friends for over ten years. Did Bai Yue come running thousands of miles to celebrate his birthday?!”
Ye Xi froze.
He thought back to that day, Bai Yue sitting in his family’s lounge with a teacup, smiling at him.
It was true.
At the beginning, if Zheng Yang hadn’t interfered, Bai Yue had actually planned to celebrate his birthday with him alone.
Sitting in his chair now, Ye Xi’s gaze went blank. “But…”
But.
He tried for a long time, yet couldn’t find the words.
The thought was too overwhelming.
His mind was mush, but out of that muddle rose a single memory—Bai Yue’s words, like a wave cresting the water’s surface.
“I said, I hope you’ll still be by my side on my birthday next year.”
In that long wooden corridor, under a sky full of fireworks, Bai Yue had spoken those words to him.
To say that in that instant he hadn’t felt a single stir, hadn’t once fantasized, would’ve been a lie.
Yet when he looked back at Li Rui, he couldn’t help protesting weakly: “But it’s still strange. Maybe you’re overthinking it… For so many years, Bai Yue only came to my house for Zheng Yang, and at school we hardly knew each other. How could he suddenly like me?”
He didn’t have seventy-two transformations—he hadn’t magically turned into Bai Yue’s ideal type.
Li Rui crossed his arms: “How should I know? That’s between you and Bai Yue. Ask him yourself. Who can say the exact moment he fell for you?”
He let out a snort.
After just piecing together Bai Yue and Ye Xi’s interactions, he suddenly felt as if he’d had an epiphany—only for shame and anger to follow right after.
God, his buddy had been sneaking around with his crush right under his nose, and he hadn’t noticed a thing.
What a humiliation!
And Ye Xi still looked so disbelieving, brows furrowed, clearly searching for some angle to refute him.
Unable to hold it back any longer, he finally dropped the big bombshell he’d been suppressing.
“Actually, none of that is the main point.”
Li Rui spoke coldly. In that moment, it was as if he’d become Sherlock Holmes himself, holding onto the only clue of the case, ready to expose the criminal Ye Xi in one decisive strike.
“Do you want to know?” He raised his chin arrogantly.
Ye Xi couldn’t help but laugh.
Resting his chin on one hand, still in a lighthearted mood, he nodded.
“Sure, what decisive evidence do you have?”
He fully understood Li Rui’s bias—wanting nothing more than for Bai Yue to immediately kneel and propose to him.
Just like how he himself hoped Sheng Yuhe would hurry up and confess to Li Rui.
But after thinking it over carefully, he still felt that the idea of Bai Yue liking him was far too far-fetched.
The person you secretly liked, just so happened to like you back—
What were the odds of that?
So he had never expected to be in a relationship with Bai Yue. He only wanted to sleep with him, that was all…
But the very next second, he heard Li Rui say expressionlessly:
“Actually, on the first night in the snow mountains, I saw Bai Yue kiss you.”
Ye Xi immediately choked on his own saliva.
