Afterward, Qingye sat alone on the small stool checking her phone. She suddenly remembered He Leling’s recent social media post, so she opened their chat and sent an emoji with a message: “I’ve left Beijing. How have you been?”

He Leling replied shortly: “I heard about it. It was quite sudden. I’m the same as always, attending classes every day. When are you coming back?”

Qingye stared at the question “When are you coming back?” for a while before typing: “Not going back for now. By the way, are you dating someone? Do I know them? [mischievous grin.jpg]”

However, this message sank like a stone – He Leling didn’t reply for a long time. Qingye stared at her phone waiting, thinking maybe she was in class. Their old school’s teachers often liked to give surprise tests, so maybe He Leling was busy. Unlike her – with her computer broken, she was practically blind. She’d been here for over ten days and had never heard of any cram schools or training institutes. Thinking about it, it made sense – the people here didn’t seem like they’d spend extra money on education.

Qingye put away her phone and looked up at Xing Wu. He sat with his legs crossed, holding cards, left-handed as usual, with that bold, arrogant stripe shaved into his temple. She wondered how the teachers at An Zhong allowed him to come to school with such a hairstyle.

She could sense that people here were quite afraid of him. She remembered the day she arrived when Li Lanfang told her that Xing Wu was poor at studies but very strong at fighting and causing trouble.

In her eighteen years, Qingye had lived a relatively simple life and had never dealt with gangsters before. Who would have thought her cousin (though not blood-related) was a gang leader? A gang leader who attended high school and was skilled at repairs? The gang leaders here were unique.

The room was thick with smoke. After just twenty minutes, Qingye found it hard to breathe. But it was too hot outside, so she coughed once and walked to the curtain, breathing through the gap where the air was slightly better.

Xing Wu lifted his eyes to study her silhouette. Her long black hair, silk-like, was tied back with a light pink hairclip. Her figure was graceful, the light-colored dress against her porcelain skin almost dazzling. If he hadn’t seen her, Xing Wu would never have known a girl could be so fair and flawless.

He raised his hand and hit Da Hei on the left. Da Hei’s hand trembled as he asked in confusion, “Brother Wu, why did you hit me?”

Xing Wu said coldly, “Put out your cigarette.”

Da Hei stared stupidly at his freshly lit cigarette. The standing tattooed man snickered, “Watch yourself, Da Hei. Keep winning Brother Wu’s money, and you won’t make it home today.”

Unexpectedly, Xing Wu lazily lifted his eyelids to stare at the tattooed man: “You put yours out too.”

The tattooed man was bewildered – he wasn’t even at the card table winning money, so why make him put out his cigarette?

Xing Wu’s expression darkened, and they didn’t want to get into trouble, so they obediently extinguished their cigarettes. Qingye looked back at Xing Wu, who kept his eyes lowered on his cards, seemingly paying no attention to her.

Qingye ended up waiting for an hour. After their card game finished, Xing Wu finally stretched lazily and unhurriedly stood up, telling Quanya, “I’m heading out.”

Quanya asked, “Coming back tonight?”

“Yeah.” With that, Xing Wu pushed aside the curtain and walked out, with Qingye following behind.

The evening was sweltering, the sun setting, the sky hazy with a sense of yellow sand filling the air, making Qingye very uncomfortable. Even more uncomfortable was returning to Xing Wu’s room with no air conditioning – she didn’t know how she’d survived each day, with even the electric fan blowing hot air.

By now, the card-playing group had come out one after another, and after holding back for so long, they immediately lit up cigarettes upon exiting.

Xing Wu straddled his Doraemon-decorated Angel motorcycle and looked at Qingye. She walked over automatically, but as she lifted her leg to get on, she suddenly realized her dress was too short – mounting normally would expose her.

The men standing at Shunyi’s entrance stared at her gleaming white legs, their eyes glowing. Just as Qingye was feeling embarrassed, Xing Wu glanced back at her dress and said, “Sit sideways.”

Qingye pulled at her dress hem while moving onto the Angel, not holding onto Xing Wu but gripping the edge of the back seat tightly.

Da Hei and the others rarely saw such an attractive girl, and their minds were already running wild, but since she was riding Xing Wu’s motorcycle, they didn’t dare act on their thoughts even if they wanted to.

As soon as Qingye was settled, Xing Wu revved the engine and took off. He rode incredibly fast, and with Qingye sitting sideways, her balance was already precarious. She cursed internally – why did everyone here ride like they were on a suicide mission?

Fortunately, Xing Wu didn’t take her on the dirt roads, instead weaving through streets on cement paths. But unlike the asphalt roads in the city, these cement roads were full of potholes and bumps.

Xing Wu skillfully guided them around the holes large and small – he knew where every pothole was even with his eyes closed. However, his serpentine movements weren’t very comfortable for his passengers.

On his third sharp turn to avoid a hole, Qingye finally grabbed his clothes in fear and shouted, “Can’t you slow down?”

“Don’t you mind the sun?”

“…” She did mind the sun, but her life was more important.

Qingye couldn’t care about anything else and just kept clutching his shirt hem. Xing Wu looked down at his T-shirt, now stretched to his neck, and said irritably, “Let go before you tear it.”

Qingye didn’t want to fall to her death, so she boldly grabbed his waist instead. Xing Wu’s body stiffened – he hadn’t expected this girl to be so daring, touching him directly. If anyone else had touched him like this, he would have thrown them off the bike already. But at this moment, the sensation at his waist was so intense that he could feel her soft, fair fingers through the fabric. He ran his tongue around his mouth – this feeling was truly maddening.

Holding Xing Wu’s waist made Qingye much more stable. She was surprised that despite his tall, broad appearance, his waist was quite narrow and firm. Back when she first started high school, her deskmate had shared a romance novel about an overbearing CEO, which described men with chests much broader than their waists, where the torso quickly tapered from ribs to hips, as having a “wolfhound waist.” The book claimed men with such proportions were extremely sexy. Qingye had just read it then, unable to picture it, but now touching Xing Wu’s waist, she suddenly understood.

As for why she was having such indescribable mental images on the street, she didn’t know. Thankfully, sitting behind him meant Xing Wu couldn’t see her blushing.

However, her fingertips could feel how hard his waist was, and she wondered if she could squeeze it.

So when they avoided another pothole, Qingye took the chance to squeeze his waist. Xing Wu wasn’t usually bothered by heat, but at this moment his chest felt uncomfortably warm. He said harshly, “Why are you squeezing me?”

Qingye was suddenly speechless – she could hardly tell him she was testing if his waist was squeezable, could she? Even she couldn’t understand why she’d done such an absurd thing.

She quickly changed the subject: “Do you always sleep at that place at night?”

“Sometimes.”

“Sometimes” meant not always there – so where did he go when he wasn’t sleeping at Shunyi?

Qingye didn’t pursue it, changing topics again: “Do you work there?”

“Part-time,” Xing Wu answered directly.

After that, Qingye stopped asking questions. When they reached home, just as she got off the bike and was about to go in, Xing Wu said while locking up: “I’ll bring your computer back when it’s fixed. Don’t go over there unless necessary.”

Qingye turned back, blinking: “Why?”

Xing Wu straightened up, the dazzling sunset reflecting in his pupils, showing traces of fatigue: “Didn’t you see how those men looked at you like wolves? If anything happens, I’ll have to deal with it. Troublesome.”

“Huh…” Qingye gave a cold laugh and turned to enter the barbershop.

Troublesome – this wasn’t the first time she’d heard that word from Xing Wu’s mouth. In his eyes, she was just trouble, so much trouble that he didn’t even want to come home.

If she had any choice, would she want to come here? Would she want to share a bathroom with such a bizarre group of people? Would she want to stay every day in a room without air conditioning?

Qingye was in a foul mood and went straight upstairs to her room. Li Lanfang had finished her mahjong game, and not knowing what had happened, saw Qingye’s poor mood and pulled Xing Wu aside: “What’s wrong with Qingye? Is she okay? That Zhao Mazi can’t do anything right, even managed to break Qingye’s computer while getting water.”

Xing Wu frowned: “Uncle Zhao did it?”

“That’s right. I heard from Liu Nian that her computer was quite expensive. How much will repairs cost? Qingye said she wanted him to pay for it. Old Zhao went home to ask his wife for money, and couldn’t even focus on playing mahjong.”

Xing Wu glanced at the stairs and told Li Lanfang: “Don’t worry about this.”

Unexpectedly, that evening Zhao Mazi came knocking on the rolling door, saying he wanted to find Qingye to ask how much the computer repairs cost.

When Qingye came downstairs, Xing Wu sat silently in the barbershop. She walked over and saw Zhao Mazi clutching some crumpled bills. Although Xing Wu had charged her five thousand, looking at Zhao Mazi, who couldn’t even afford a second set of clothes, telling him five thousand would probably frighten him to death.

She said lightly, “The boss was kind and didn’t charge me. Keep your money, it’s not needed.”

Zhao Mazi sighed in relief: “Oh, that’s great.”

As soon as Zhao Mazi left and Qingye turned to go upstairs, Xing Wu, sitting in a hallway chair with his long legs stretched out blocking the way, said with a smirk: “Paper tiger.”

Qingye glared at him. Xing Wu curled his lip: “My mom said you were quite tough when asking him for money?”

Qingye kicked him: “You think I’m like you?”

Xing Wu raised his eyebrows, lazily stood up, stretched, and left.

Without her computer, Qingye could only write English essays on scrap paper the next day out of boredom. Suddenly her phone rang. She picked it up to see a refund notification – the five thousand she’d transferred to Xing Wu yesterday hadn’t been accepted and was returned.

Qingye simply sent him a message: “Forgot to accept?”

When Xing Wu received this message from Shunyi, he had just finished reassembling Qingye’s laptop and successfully turned it on. The screen lit up to show a desktop with pink heart bubbles – animated ones at that – making him frown in distaste.

The desktop was crowded with study materials that gave Xing Wu a headache. After checking that everything worked properly, he was about to shut it down when he noticed a folder named “Most Loved.”

He’d repaired many computers and never randomly opened other people’s files – he had that much principle. But for some reason, looking at that folder now, he was suddenly very curious about who this girl who looked down on everything loved most.

He stared at the desktop for a few seconds, tapped the touchpad twice, and clicked into it…