Orange and the smug little orange happily went out to have fun.
With the New Year approaching, the shop windows in the city center had all been decorated with auspicious red, and the pedestrians coming and going along the streets seemed to carry a little more warmth and cheerfulness too. Luo Zhiyu usually came here with his family, and he would normally get bored halfway through shopping. This time, though, things were a little different.
The KTV Fan Yue and the others had chosen was behind a shopping mall in the city center. After Luo Zhiyu got out of the car with Xiao Yan, he took the initiative to use the map on his phone to find the way—
[Continue straight along the current road for 50 meters.]
“Brother Yan.”
Luo Zhiyu stood in front of a wall and stared seriously at his phone screen.
“I feel like something’s wrong. This map is telling us to walk straight through this wall.”
Xiao Yan: “…”
“Give it here. Let me look.”
Xiao Yan took the phone from Luo Zhiyu.
“There’s no road here.”
At the top of Luo Zhiyu’s phone screen, a new message notification from the family group chat popped up.
[Luo Sixue]: Luo Zhiyu, are you really that bored lately? You keep deleting the security footage. There are gaps everywhere.
[Luo Sixue]: I just want to see which one of the blue cats used my new bag as a scratching post.
[Luo Sixue]: I’m so pissed off.
Xiao Yan silently swiped the notification away and continued looking at the navigation map Luo Zhiyu had pulled up.
When it came to this matter, the two of them were equally guilty.
After all, the security footage at Xiao Yan’s house had also been deleted so thoroughly lately that it was full of gaps. It was just that his parrot hadn’t been causing trouble recently, so no one was paying attention to the cameras.
“Come with me.”
Xiao Yan pushed Luo Zhiyu in another direction.
“It should be this way.”
[You have deviated from the route.]
Xiao Yan: “?”
Luo Zhiyu: “?”
When Fan Yue finally found the two of them at the mall’s food street, they were sitting opposite each other at a table with utterly defeated expressions.
Xiao Yan was holding the last skewer of meatballs, and while Xiao Yan was greeting Fan Yue, Luo Zhiyu lowered his head and bit one of the meatballs off the skewer.
“…Here, have them all. Eat slowly.”
Xiao Yan handed the bamboo skewer to Luo Zhiyu.
“They’re all yours.”
“You two are seriously something. You can even get lost like this?”
Fan Yue pulled out a chair and sat down.
“The navigation probably hasn’t been updated. There really was a road here last year.”
He had come rushing over, panting all the way, afraid of keeping the two big shots waiting.
Yet the two of them seemed to be getting along perfectly well here at the food street.
The KTV was filled with people from the Student Union. The private room carried the faintly sweet scent of sparkling water.
Luo Zhiyu knew most of them, so he didn’t feel out of place. But when he and Xiao Yan walked into the room together, quite a few people stared at them as though the entire scene had suddenly frozen.
“They live in the same residential area, so they came over together,” Fan Yue explained.
The group received a perfectly reasonable explanation, and the frozen scene started moving again. The horribly off-key singing resumed.
Most of the people who came today were Grade 11 students. There were a few Grade 10 students scattered among them, along with one or two bold Grade 12 students.
Everyone was wearing casual clothes today. Unlike school uniforms, which had different colors for different grades, casual clothes made the distance between them feel much smaller.
“Zhiyu, come sit here.”
Yan Zihan waved at Luo Zhiyu.
“I’ll introduce you to my new boyfriend.”
The two Grade 10 omega members of the Student Union’s Arts Department were both close to Luo Zhiyu. Besides, Luo Zhiyu was addicted to Yan Zihan’s spicy-strip-scented pheromones, so whenever there was an event, the two of them would squeeze together.
Normally, Luo Zhiyu would have been more than happy to go over.
But recently, he had gotten attached to Xiao Yan.
The fresh, big Orange he hadn’t been able to rub against for so many days was right in front of him. He wanted to get his fill of free pheromones first.
Little did he know, Xiao Yan was thinking exactly the same thing.
Luo Zhiyu hesitated over whether he should walk over, but Xiao Yan grabbed his wrist first.
“Where are you going? Didn’t you say you wanted me to teach you how to write?”
He stopped and tilted his head, thinking for a moment.
That did seem to be one of his reasons for coming out.
“Let’s sit over here.”
Xiao Yan brought Luo Zhiyu to another corner of the room. There were only the two of them on the sofa beside the song-selection console.
He called out to Yan Zihan, “We won’t squeeze in with you guys.”
A bunch of students had been going crazy trying to hold themselves together at school. Now that they finally had a chance to relax during vacation, they were singing, chatting, and having fun in the private room.
No one paid any attention to the two people in the corner.
The lights in the room were dim, with only a few flickering colored lights turned on.
The high school students who had taken off their uniforms still had a trace of childishness on their faces. They were imitating adults and enjoying themselves, but the things they talked about were still all related to school.
“Director Xu has had that sour face for a whole week! Does anyone know what’s going on?”
“Probably got stuck holding stocks. That’s the only reason I can think of.”
“Director Wu has been bragging about his moral education work every day lately. He’s practically turned the story of Luo Zhiyu and Xiao Yan into a teaching case, hahaha.”
“But they really did stop fighting. Their relationship is actually pretty good now. Of course Director Wu is proud.”
Someone had just come back from cram school and still had notebooks and paper in their schoolbag.
Xiao Yan borrowed some and handed them to Luo Zhiyu.
“Write whatever you want.”
Luo Zhiyu drew an orange with a nose and eyes, then wrote Xiao Yan’s name beside it.
He rested the notebook against Xiao Yan’s shoulder and wrote slowly, stroke by stroke.
His handwriting was much better than usual—a developing form of thin-gold script, already beginning to show its own character.
As it turned out, as long as it wasn’t an exam and he had enough time, when Luo Zhiyu actually wanted to write properly, his handwriting could barely be considered attractive.
It was just that his writing speed couldn’t keep up with the number of questions on an exam.
After one or two questions, his handwriting immediately turned into his own unique form of wild cursive, messy enough to give people a headache.
But that style belonged uniquely to Luo Zhiyu.
It was distinctive enough that whenever Xiao Yan helped a teacher grade papers, he could recognize the little gangster’s exam paper at a glance.
“Here. It’s for you.”
Luo Zhiyu tossed the notebook and pen to Xiao Yan.
“This is probably the best I’ve written in a while. I’m giving you the best one.”
“What does Brother want to teach me?”
Luo Zhiyu’s paw landed on Xiao Yan’s other shoulder.
“I’m not teaching you anymore.”
Xiao Yan folded the paper and put it into his pocket.
“I changed my mind. Just be yourself.”
He didn’t need Luo Zhiyu to change in any way.
The Luo Zhiyu standing in front of him now was already exactly the Luo Zhiyu he wanted.
That statement clearly surprised Luo Zhiyu, and also made him happy.
Following the path that had already been laid out for him, he had lived more than ten years of his life hearing people tell him, “You’re not good enough yet,” and “You can do better.”
No one had ever been like Xiao Yan, telling him to simply remain as he was.
“You said you were going to teach me, and then you changed your mind.”
Luo Zhiyu tapped Xiao Yan’s shoulder with his paw.
“Doesn’t that mean you tricked me into coming out, huh?”
There was no such thing as being tricked.
He simply liked messing with Xiao Yan.
Luo Zhiyu had never known how to have a proper conversation.
Whenever he talked to Xiao Yan from a distance, he had to throw paper balls at him.
Whenever he talked to Xiao Yan up close, he had to put his hands on him.
When it came to Xiao Yan, most of the time he had a very short memory when it came to getting punished. It had only been half a month, yet he had already forgotten the fact that Xiao Yan no longer let him have his way.
Unfortunately, someone at this moment was harboring ulterior motives.
His body had taken it upon itself to interpret every one of Luo Zhiyu’s provocative little gestures as an invitation.
His rational mind couldn’t win the argument, so it had no choice but to give in a little.
“Sit properly.”
Xiao Yan lowered his voice.
“I’m not tricking you. I’ll teach you something else.”
“?”
Luo Zhiyu widened his eyes and looked at Xiao Yan.
“What else do you know?”
The moment he finished speaking, Xiao Yan’s hand followed the scarf around his neck and settled against his throat, touching the gland at the back of his neck.
He lightly scratched it.
Luo Zhiyu shuddered at the movement.
“What are you doing…?”
“I’m teaching you two things.”
Xiao Yan’s fingertips suddenly pressed against the spot where the temporary mark was at the back of his neck.
Before Luo Zhiyu could make a sound, Xiao Yan silently and quickly covered his mouth.
He lowered his voice threateningly.
“First, hide the pheromones I gave you properly. Don’t let them discover that you smell like a little orange right now.”
“If you can’t suppress it, I’m not letting go. You figure it out yourself.”
“Second.”
Xiao Yan’s fingertips moved slightly, and he seemed quite pleased with Luo Zhiyu’s current helpless state.
“Don’t go putting your hands all over other people. I’m the only one who won’t bully you.”