CH 65

After he spoke, everyone from the people on the roofs to the trees to the ground all fell silent.

They all stared at him, like they were in a daze. 

But the silence didn’t last for too long. A few seconds later, Kou Chen put his hands around his mouth and whistled loudly before yelling: “Nice!”

When he started clapping, all the other students followed suit, and the crowd turned noisy again.

Huo Ran clapped and watched the other who was still leaning onto the railing. He had his head down, thinking.

“Never would have thought,” Wei Chaoren clapped loudly and exclaimed, “The third years are fucking brave, even something like this? Nice!” 

Huo Ran turned to look at the teachers.

Most of them were clapping as well, and some were whispering to each other.

His words not only shocked the students, but the teachers as well.

Huo Ran suddenly thought of the classmate Kou Chen talked about. The one that had to beg the teacher on his knees to no avail…

He quickly turned to Kou Chen.

Kou Chen didn’t have much of an expression. He was only staring at the student on the rooftop and clapping loudly.

The reason he whistled and yelled “Nice!” before anyone else wasn’t just because that was just the type of person Kou Chen was, but probably also because he was afraid he would receive a different type of attention.

Kou Chen was the first to show his support, suppressing the others that might not understand or ridicule him. At the moment, all the senior could see and hear was friendly support. 

As the applause and cheers calmed down, he lifted his head again, and his calm voice was slightly emotional.

“Thank you everyone. To the people who clapped, thank you. To the people who were forced to clap, thank you too. I won’t ask for everyone to be able to understand and support it, but it’s fine as long as you don’t insult me to my face.” He smiled. “If you do that, I will fight back. Thank you.”

After he finished, he turned around to leave.

The applause began again. 

When the next student took his place, it was still just barely beginning to fade.

But the next speaker was Wu Xiaochen, so Humanities 1 immediately began to clap again.

“Thank you, I’m mooching off senior’s applause.” Wu Xiaochen called out with a laugh. “I was really surprised, I don’t even know what to say right now…”

“Have Jiang Lei go on then!” Xu Chuan yelled. 

Everyone laughed at that, and Jiang Lei ran to the railing from his corner on the rooftop and pointed at Xu Chuan, mouthing: “Fuck you”.

Huo Ran laughed along with everyone else, and then looked at Kou Chen.

Kou Chen looked a bit distracted as he laughed.

He was probably thinking of that classmate. 

Huo Ran reached out and rubbed the back of Kou Chen’s hand.

But he didn’t think that he was distracted as well.

He didn’t realize at first, he only noticed that Kou Chen was a bit off. Only when Jiang Lei took his place by the railings did he realize with a jolt, that he didn’t hear what Wu Xiaochen just yelled out at all. 

All he could hear in his head was the senior’s words.

When he came back to it, he felt his heart beat frantically and a buzzing in his ears. It felt like everyone else’s applause and cheers were coming through multiple layers of cotton.

“Record it, record it!” Wei Chaoren’s voice sounded from afar. “Huo Ran, record it, I’m gonna yell something, it’s gonna shake if I record it!”

“Huh?” Huo Ran startled before reacting, “Oh, yeah!” 

“I’ll record.” Kou Chen raised his phone at Jiang Lei. “Why doesn’t he stand up straighter? Embarrassing.”

He was dragged back from the bottom of the ocean when he heard Kou Chen speak, and all the noise from everyone rushed at him, turning clear but complicated again.

“I am Jiang Lei, a second year from Humanities 1.” Jiang Lei yelled.

“Jiang Lei, stand up straight!” Hu Yi screamed at him. 

“…Okay.” Jiang Lei hesitated for a moment before straightening up. Everyone laughed, and he paused for a second to look around like he was searching for Lu Huan. When he found her, he raised his head and yelled to the sky, “Second year, Humanities 3, Lu Huan!”

“Yes—?” Everyone from Humanities 1 and Humanities 3 replied in unison.

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“…Who taught him that?” Xu Chuan paused and turned to Kou Chen. “You?”

“No,” Kou Chen said. “All he’s been thinking about these days is this, it’s normal if he says something a little weird.”

Huo Ran looked at Lu Huan, who was standing under a tree laughing with a hand over her face. He was a bit emotional, thinking about how it was both unconditional love… He suddenly realized how much courage the senior must have needed to say those words from the rooftop. 

He could say it in front of everyone, but he may never be able to tell the person he likes.

Because it wasn’t the same.

“Maybe we’ll never see each other again after we graduate and go our separate ways,” Jiang Lei yelled at the sky. “But the memory of your beautiful smile when I was eighteen will always be with me!”

“Perfect!” Kou Chen snapped his fingers, and sent the video in the group chat. 

The cheers were still continuing.

Kou Chen put his phone back in his pocket and stood up: “I’m going to the bathroom.”

“Mhm,” Xu Chuan nodded and got out his card, “Buy us some water from the shop, my treat.”

“Okay.” Kou Chen took the card and headed off. 

Huo Ran looked back at him, hesitant. Two seconds later he stood up as well and followed Kou Chen off the roof.

Kou Chen always loved to treat them, and even if he agreed to let someone else do it he would always grumble a bit, but he didn’t put up a fight at all just now. Just that would be unusual in itself, but he didn’t even ask him to go to the bathroom together…

It was a bit mysterious, but Kou Chen would always drag him along no matter where he went.

Kou Chen must not be in a good mood right now. 

Huo Ran followed Kou Chen for a while. They were surrounded by other students, and he didn’t know what to say either. When they were pretty far from the gymnasium and there was nobody else around, he quicked his steps and caught up to Kou Chen.

“Ah,” Kou Chen turned around, “Why are you here? Scared me.”

“…Are you okay?” Huo Ran asked directly. 

“Yeah.” Kou Chen walked, but not in the direction of the washroom. Instead he was heading to the back of the school buildings. “I just… suddenly thought about my classmate, the one I told you about.”

Huo Ran guessed that too, so he didn’t say anything as they walked together.

They walked to the fence to the side of the school buildings in silence. Nobody usually came here except for the janitors. Kou Chen stopped and leaned against the wall, taking out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

“Want one?” Kou Chen put one in his mouth and looked at him. 

“No.” Huo Ran said.

“I don’t really wanna smoke either, actually.” Kou Chen lit the cigarette and held it between his fingers, watching the smoke rise from it. “It just feels fitting right now.”

“Why?” Huo Ran laughed.

“I feel all this adrenaline right now, I don’t know why, it’s not like I was the one that went up there.” Kou Chen moved the hand holding the smoke closer to him. “Look.” 

Huo Ran could see that his hands were trembling.

“I always looked down on you top school students. Stereotypes, I guess.” Kou Chen took a drag. “I just thought the teachers were serious and stubborn, and all the students did was study… Funny, right?”

Huo Ran didn’t say anything. He put his hand on Kou Chen’s shoulder and squeezed gently.

“Thinking about it now, if my classmate was here, at Fuzhong. Maybe his secret wouldn’t be out even if he had to beg on his knees. Maybe he would be able to yell it out in front of everyone, and there would be people clapping and cheering for him.” Kou Chen said before sighing. “Forget it, there’s no point in what ifs. His grades are even worse than mine, there’s no way he would get into a top high school.” 

That last sentence made Huo Ran laugh.

Kou Chen chuckled with him, before turning to look at the hand that had stopped squeezing his shoulder. “Do it properly, don’t slack off.”

“Oh.” Huo Ran smiled and continued his massage.

Kou Chen didn’t say anything else, he only scrolled through his phone with the cigarette in his mouth. 

Huo Ran glanced at the screen, seeing that it was open on their group chat, and Jiang Lei was going on about something nonstop.

A piece of grass somehow landed on Kou Chen’s neck, so Huo Ran made to flick it away.

When his fingers brushed Kou Chen’s neck, he suddenly felt a little flustered.

Even their normal hugs and embraces and even kisses never made him feel this way, and now he was going crazy because of a little touch. 

He quickly took his hand back, and checked his phone: “Should we go buy the drinks?”

“Mhm.” Kou Chen looked at him, “Are you okay?”

“What?’ Huo Ran looked back at him.

“…You’re acting kinda weird.” Kou Chen said. 

“Am I?” Huo Ran asked.

“Is it me then?” Kou Chen tsked and put an arm around him. “Let’s go.”

There was only one person in the store, and he was choosing ice cream from the freezer. 

Kou Chen paused, and looked at the person.

Huo Ran looked as well, and at the same time the person turned around with ice cream in hand.

It was the senior.

Seeing the two of them, he opened the freezer again, took two ice creams and handed it to them. 

They both started, and Huo Ran reached out first to take them, followed by Kou Chen.

The senior went to pay, and he patted Kou Chen on the back lightly when he walked out of the store: “Thanks for earlier.”

It took a moment for Kou Chen to turn around and reply: “No problem.”

He was already long gone. 

“What’s his name?” Kou Chen asked Huo Ran quietly.

“Lin Wuyu.” Huo Ran opened the ice cream packaging and neatly ate off the chocolate shell. “The great room has no corners..”

“Oh.” Kou Chen nodded.

“Oh what?” Huo Ran laughed, “You know it?” 

“‘The great room has no corners; The great vessel takes the longest time to form’, or something like that. My dad has a book of it.” Kou Chen stared at him, “Underestimated me, didn’t you.”

“Yup.” Huo Ran nodded.

“Are you gonna do it again?” Kou Chen continued staring.

“I won’t.” Huo Ran said. 

“Here,” Kou Chen ripped the packaging off of his own ice cream and gave it to him: “Eat away.”

Huo Ran paused: “Eat what?”

“The chocolate, you ate yours even faster than a squirrel, want more?” Kou Chen said.

“…It’s fine,” Huo Ran quickly said, “You can give me another piece of chocolate if you want.” 

“You think I sell chocolate or something? That I have it on me all the time…” Kou Chen grabbed a bunch of drinks and then went to pay, taking a chocolate bar as well.

Huo Ran ate the whole thing before they even got back to the gymnasium.

Eating chocolate helped calm him down when his emotions were unstable. 

The event was still going on as strong as ever, and Jiang Lei and Xu Zhifan had already returned to the roof of the equipment room.

Kou Chen and Huo Ran handed out the drinks and sat back in their spots.

“Fuck, my legs finally stopped shaking.” Jiang Lei said. 

Hu Yi put a hand on his leg: “It’s still twitching slightly.”

“Good enough for me.” Jiang Lei said. “Xu Zhifan had to help me back down, I would’ve fell down the stairs without him.”

“Toughen up,” Wei Chaoren said. “The senior came out of the closet in front of everyone and he was fine. Yours wasn’t even a confession, what are you nervous for?”

“If I was coming out of the closet I might not be nervous either, it’s already out there, so what’s the point?” Jiang Lei took a drink. 

“Then go up there and come out.” Xu Chuan laughed and nudged him.

“No way,” Jiang Lei pointed at Kou Chen and Huo Ran. “Even if I do come out it would be after these two.”

“Fuck off.” Huo Ran and Kou Chen replied at the same time.

They all burst out into laughter. 

The event went on for two hours, and everyone was disappointed when it ended. If there was no time limit, they could probably take it all the way until the evening. The longer it went on, the more people got the guts to go up. Not everyone was as confident and brave after all, they needed people to lead the way.

The event was pretty successful. Because they weren’t restricted to any topics, everyone who went up spoke from their hearts. So the resulting atmosphere was a lot better than the other schools who held a similar thing.

The students were all happy, and their applause lasted for minutes after the event ended. 

After that was getting to the cafeteria before the good food was all gone. Due to all the excitement, everyone was starving. They rushed to the cafeteria like it was life or death.

The lunch lady at the third window was smiling the whole time as she filled up their plates heartily with a steady hand.

The Seven of them all lined up the third window, and all of them sat down with full plates. 

“Auntie Li is great,” Kou Chen said. “She corrected her problems right away.”

“Today’s food tastes better than usual?” Xu Chuan said.

“Yeah,” Xu Zhifan said. “I just saw the GA manager come out of the kitchen, maybe he was here to improve the food quality?”

“I gotta brag about this today,” Hu Yi took a picture of all of their plates. “Even the cafeteria food is better than the food my dad’s little lover makes.” 

They all paused and looked at Hu Yi.

“What’s the situation like now?” Xu Zhifan asked. “You always say it’s fine, you’re dad’s showing off her food now?”

“They’re living separately.” Hu Yi stared at his phone. “My mom went back to my grandma’s, so I go there on the weekends. My dad just started his new life.”

They all sighed, they really had no solution for that situation. 

“I’m a lot better now,” Hu Yi said. “Actually, I kinda wanted to go up there today. I would’ve cussed out my dad first, but then I thought about it and decided there was no point. Then I wanted to complain about how my parents never considered my feelings when they fought, but again, who said that parents have to think about their kids at a time like this, so I didn’t.”

“You’re maturing, Carrot.” Xu Chuan said. “You’re not the Carrot that hid a knife behind your back months ago anymore.”

Hu Yi smiled a little embarrassedly.

“What’d you do with the knife?” Kou Chen asked. 

“I took it home.” Xu Zhifan said. “My mom said it’s pretty useful.”

“Then we’re having noodles at your place this weekend.” Jiang Lei immediately said.

“Okay.” Xu Zhifan nodded.

The cafeteria was packed, and a lot of people were still discussing the rooftop confession event, giving thumbs ups when they saw anyone that participated, or just glancing at them a few more times.

But Lin Wuyu was the most shocking and admirable one without doubt. Many people were talking about him as well.

He knew that not everyone would be able to accept what Lin Wuyu revealed today, and that even as self-proclaimed open minded teens of today, there would still be some stubborn people. Huo Ran knew that there would be unkind words, but when he heard some second years call Lin Wuyu ‘gross’ when talking about him, he felt suffocated.

And a bit afraid. 

A second later, Huo Ran thought of Kou Chen. As he turned to watch Kou Chen’s reaction, he had already stood up.

He picked up Xu Zhifan’s tomato egg soup with his left hand, and opened a cold drink with his right.

And then before anyone could react…

Kou Chen dumped the bowl of soup on top of the person who spoke, and then he grabbed the back of his shirt and stuffed the drink in, pouring ice cold liquid down his back.