“Huh? Did I write the wrong homework?”
Jing Ximing was only half-awake.
“I have absolutely no memory of that. That shouldn’t be right. I remember it being really easy when I did it on Friday.”
“Whatever, whatever.”
Luo Zhiyu was running out of patience.
“I’ll just make things up.”
After cobbling the homework together, Luo Zhiyu turned off the lights, crawled into bed, and set an alarm on his phone for the next morning.
It was already late at night when, unbelievably, a new message arrived on his phone—
[Stinky Orange]: Smile.jpg. Little Cicada, are you asleep?
[Not Cicada]: What are you doing?
[Stinky Orange]: What did you say this afternoon? If I lost my homework, what would happen?
[Not Cicada]: If you lost it, I’d compensate you with myself. But you didn’t lose it, did you? There are six books in total. I counted them before I left them there for you.
[Not Cicada]: It’s the middle of the night. Why aren’t you sleeping? Are we close enough to be chatting this late at night now?
[Stinky Orange]: [Photo] This one doesn’t seem to be my workbook. Upside-down smile.jpg.
Luo Zhiyu enlarged the photo Xiao Yan had sent and saw the familiar Little Red and Little Blue.
Luo Zhiyu: “???”
[Not Cicada]: AAAAAAAAAA.
So he had spent the entire night doing Xiao Yan’s workbook. He had even sincerely cursed out whoever had written the exercises.
It wasn’t that the homework was being sarcastic.
He had simply picked up someone else’s questions from the very beginning.
[Stinky Orange]: Blame the school for printing the homework covers without any words on them. Blame both of us for not writing our names on our homework. Blame me for only remembering this homework now. Don’t blame yourself, okay? I’ve already come up with the lines for you.
[Not Cicada]: That doesn’t make sense. Bro Yan, didn’t your class already finish the course last month? Why do you still have homework?
[Stinky Orange]: It’s extra homework. Last time, that whole group of alphas in our class pulled some ridiculous stunts and made Teacher Xu furious. She punished everyone in our class by making us complete an extra booklet.
Luo Zhiyu rolled over and burrowed deeper into his blankets as they continued chatting.
[Not Cicada]: Bro Yan, let me tell you a sad story.
[Stinky Orange]: Why am I suddenly a little nervous?
[Not Cicada]: I just forced myself to do your homework.
[Stinky Orange]: …
[Not Cicada]: From Little Red the omega’s perspective.
[Stinky Orange]: …
The next Monday morning, after morning self-study, Xiao Yan went downstairs to Class Three to find Luo Zhiyu and exchange their homework.
“I did all of yours for you. It should be fine. You can look through it yourself. It’s all basic knowledge.”
Xiao Yan handed Luo Zhiyu’s workbook back to him. On the inside cover, Xiao Yan had also written his name for him.
“Yours has some problems…”
Luo Zhiyu was so sleepy that he seemed to float as he walked.
“I tried my best to correct the multiple-choice questions and stuff. But I genuinely didn’t know how to do the big questions. I did my best to fill up the answer boxes.”
“It’s fine. I’ll finish them myself when I get back.”
Xiao Yan took the homework.
“Go back and lie down for a while. You look completely exhausted.”
“Okay.”
Luo Zhiyu rubbed his eyes and left.
As it turned out, everyone was exhausted on the Monday after the sports meet. The first class that morning was still English. The English teacher taught in a perfectly ordinary manner, his voice calm and completely without ups and downs. Luo Zhiyu dozed off with his textbook propped up in front of him, and everyone around him was in roughly the same state.
[Not Cicada]: Oh my god, I’m so freaking sleepy.
[Wall Grass]: Me too, a little.
[Not Cicada]: Tell me something interesting to wake me up.
[Wall Grass]: The monthly exams are the week after next, and after that comes the final exams.
[Not Cicada]: …
[Wall Grass]: And then it’s New Year!
The fourth period on Monday morning for Senior One Class Three and Senior Two Class Three was physical education. The teacher for Senior One Class Three was on leave, so the teacher from Senior Two Class Three was brought in as a substitute, and the two classes had PE together.
Since the sports meet had just ended, after the usual warm-up, the teacher let the students move around freely on the field and choose whatever form of exercise they liked. After putting the class monitors from both classes in charge of discipline, the PE teacher lazily went back to the office to sit.
Jing Ximing and the others, as usual, took badminton rackets and started playing.
“Want to join us?”
“You guys go ahead.”
Luo Zhiyu tossed the shuttlecock to them.
“I’m going to sit over there for a while.”
The weather was gradually turning cooler, and the sunlight had little warmth left in it. Luo Zhiyu found a tree, hugged his knees, and watched Jing Ximing and the others play.
The boys from Xiao Yan’s dorm in the neighboring class were playing too. Because he was tired and sleepy, Luo Zhiyu’s vision gradually doubled as he watched.
Someone came over from a distance and sat down beside him. They reached out and pushed him, straightening his body, which had been leaning halfway over.
There was a hint of teasing in the person’s voice.
“This is the first time I’ve ever seen someone get so sleepy they almost fall over and hit the ground.”
“Hey.”
Luo Zhiyu knew who it was just from the voice.
“Go play your ball. Don’t bother me.”
“I came over because I wanted to play with you, but you’re secretly taking a nap here.”
Xiao Yan did not leave. Instead, he chose to become a slacker during PE class along with him.
“I still remember that grudge from last time when you smashed a badminton shot right onto my head. Should I add it to the IOU too?”
“I slept for about three hours yesterday because I picked up the wrong homework.”
Luo Zhiyu said, “I made stuff up and cobbled it together until two in the morning, then got up at five-thirty and tried my best to redo the questions from Little Blue’s perspective. And the porridge in the cafeteria wasn’t even good today.”
Whenever he was with Xiao Yan, Luo Zhiyu always talked more than usual. He was also more willing to ramble about trivial little things, bringing up whatever random nonsense came to mind.
Xiao Yan had just handed in a homework assignment that morning, patched up until it was practically destroyed with transparent tape. Seeing Luo Zhiyu like this made him both exasperated and amused.
“You would’ve been better off not correcting it. A lot of the things you corrected for me were still wrong. Is that really how you explained final marking?”
“Hey!”
“I did my best. We haven’t even covered that part in class.”
The wind on the field was a little strong. Luo Zhiyu hugged his knees and curled himself into a ball.
“I’ve never experienced it.”
“You make it sound like I have.”
Xiao Yan was indignant.
“One day you’ll get to experience it. I, Luo Zhiyu, have absolute faith in your pride.”
When Luo Zhiyu was tired, his voice took on a slight nasal quality, and he dragged out his words at the ends. He himself did not seem to realize it.
Xiao Yan studied him for a moment before finally speaking in a quiet, drawn-out voice.
“Cicada, I’ve been meaning to say this for a long time. Could you stop making dirty jokes at me with such a straight face every single time?”
Luo Zhiyu ignored him.
He was sleepy. The tree trunk behind him was uncomfortable to lean against, and Xiao Yan had conveniently delivered himself right to his door, so Luo Zhiyu unceremoniously rested his head against Brother Yan’s shoulder and fell asleep.
The weather in late autumn was chilly. Whenever the wind slipped into someone’s collar or sleeves, it was enough to make them shiver for a while. But Luo Zhiyu was too sleepy to care.
Xiao Yan’s first reaction was to worry that he would catch a cold. At the same time, he couldn’t bear to wake him, so he supported Luo Zhiyu and adjusted him into a more comfortable position.
The relationship between their two families was so bad that the children from both families had developed a slight sense of hostility toward each other from childhood.
The first greeting gift Luo Zhiyu had given him in kindergarten had been a set of teeth marks on his wrist.
After that, whenever Xiao Yan saw Luo Zhiyu, he wanted to bully him. Not the kind of bullying that came from disliking him, but because he found it fun and wanted to tease him.
Luo Zhiyu was probably the same. Even if he saw Xiao Yan from across an entire street, he would find a way to follow him over and provoke him.
But somehow, at some point, the meaning of this “bullying” seemed to have changed.
It had nothing to do with pheromones and nothing to do with an alpha’s instincts.
He simply wanted to be close to Luo Zhiyu himself.
Xiao Yan’s right hand slowly lifted. He hesitated in midair for a moment before finally lowering it to Luo Zhiyu’s waist, trying to pull him a little closer and shield him from the cold wind blowing across the field.
Even asleep, Luo Zhiyu knew where it was warm. He naturally shifted closer into Xiao Yan’s arms, perfectly content, and continued sleeping.
Xiao Yan thought that Luo Zhiyu really was a little unfair with his double standards.
But, for some reason, he liked him exactly like that.
The wind blew through Luo Zhiyu’s hair. A few mischievous strands brushed back and forth against Xiao Yan’s neck, but he did not reach up to move them away.
With Luo Zhiyu this close, he could already smell the faint scent of peaches on him. It was like soft, lingering little feathers, gently tickling at someone’s heart.
After all, they were outdoors, so Luo Zhiyu did not sleep very soundly. Half-conscious, he muttered something. Xiao Yan only caught three words clearly.
“Stinky Orange.”
“You’re still calling me Stinky Orange?”
Xiao Yan spoke quietly.
“Stinky Orange isn’t going to be your pillow.”
Perhaps Luo Zhiyu thought his “pillow” was about to leave. He frowned in his sleep and grabbed Xiao Yan by the waistband of his pants.
Xiao Yan: “…”
“Xiao Yan, want to play ball?”
Fan Yue had searched half the field before finally finding the pride of their dorm by the grass.
When he saw Luo Zhiyu sleeping, he pointed at him and carefully mouthed to Xiao Yan:
“Is he asleep?”
“Shh. Let him sleep.”
Xiao Yan shook his head, signaling for him not to wake Luo Zhiyu.
Fan Yue understood and turned around to go play by himself.
Luo Zhiyu was awakened by the bell signaling the end of class.
His first feeling upon waking was that he was alert.
His second was that his “pillow” from earlier seemed a little unhappy.
“You can sleep all you want, but your hands weren’t well-behaved. You kept tugging on my waistband. Even when you’re asleep, you’re still a pervert.”
Xiao Yan reached out and pulled him up from the ground.
“Come on. Let’s go eat.”
“Did I?”
Luo Zhiyu conveniently forgot everything.
“I didn’t do it. I don’t know anything. I’ll pay for this meal, then. Give me your card and swipe whatever you want.”
The two of them ran into Director Wu, who had come to eat, at the entrance to the faculty cafeteria. They both took the initiative to greet him.
“You two have been getting along pretty well lately?”
Director Wu continued his daily habit of caring exactly zero percent about the actual details of their relationship.
“Any fighting?”
“Pretty good.”
Luo Zhiyu took a step closer to Xiao Yan. He had successfully caught up on his sleep, so he was in an excellent mood, and there was a smile in his eyes whenever he looked at people.
“That’s good. You haven’t been making Xiao Yan do your homework for you again, have you?”
The director asked one more question, still not reassured.
“You still need to complete your homework independently. You’re both excellent students. I don’t need to say more than that.”
The two students, Xiao Yan and Luo Zhiyu, held hands and firmly shook their heads.
“No!”
They hadn’t made Xiao Yan do it alone.
They had merely done each other’s homework.
After catching up on his sleep during PE, Luo Zhiyu came back to life. His efficiency in class that afternoon was excellent, and with his abundant energy, he studied all the way through evening self-study.
“Tonight is the middle-school student physiology and health class.”
Their homeroom teacher, Teacher Qiu, came over to inform them and brought the workbooks along.
“Hand out the homework.”
The class monitor took the homework from the teacher and began distributing it according to the names.
“Luo Zhiyu, yours.”
“Throw it over, throw it over.”
Luo Zhiyu was hunched over his seat, buried in a math problem.
“Just don’t hit me in the head.”
“You wrote the wrong class, hahaha.”
Li Jinyan, the class monitor of Senior One Class Three, laughed.
“You even managed to get this wrong.”
Luo Zhiyu: “?”
Luo Zhiyu: “Did I?”
Xiao Yan had casually written his name and class on it that morning. There was no mistake. He had written it beautifully, too.
“You wrote Senior Two, Class Three.”
The classmate handing him the homework said,
“How did you suddenly become a student from Xiao Yan’s class?”
“It’s all Xiao Yan’s fault for coming over to play every day. Our Class Three’s Luo Zhiyu has been kidnapped upstairs to Senior Two, Class Three.”
Someone else joined in the teasing.
“I even saw you two together during PE today.”
“Someone get a few people to pack Luo Zhiyu up and send him upstairs. We don’t want him anymore in Senior One, Class Three.”