SYU 18. Unnecessary Expectations

“Wha… what?”

Wu Jinshan could only hope he had hit his head hard enough to start hallucinating.

“I said, I’m going to get a girlfriend,” Chen Xiucheng repeated. “I’m not gay. Why the hell would I be fooling around with you in a dorm room?”

This time, Wu Jinshan heard him clearly. But it still struck him as bizarre. Just a moment ago, the guy had been all over him, licking his chest. How did it suddenly turn into he’s getting a girlfriend?

As far as Wu Jinshan was concerned, licking someone’s chest wasn’t just fooling around. No so-called straight guy would do something like that if he didn’t mean it.

His head throbbed. He sat on the bed for a while to clear the dizziness before managing to respond. “This has nothing to do with being gay or not. Normal people have sex drives, right? Or are you trying to tell me you’re impotent?”

“Fuck you, you’re the one who’s impotent.” Chen Xiucheng kept his head down, fiddling with his rumpled clothes and doing his best not to look at Wu Jinshan, or the wet spot on his own chest.

Wu Jinshan pressed on. “Besides, you’re still a virgin.”

“I’m still a virgin?” That snapped Chen Xiucheng’s head up. He stared at Wu Jinshan in disbelief.

“Yeah. Let me ask you, since you keep saying you’re straight, have you ever fucked a woman?”

“…No.”

“Then you’re a virgin. What else would you be?” Wu Jinshan’s tone was matter-of-fact.

Chen Xiucheng kept staring at him and shot back, “What about you? Have you fucked anyone?”

“I can’t fuck women. I was born to fuck men.”

There was a short silence.

Then Chen Xiucheng slapped a fist into his palm, like something had just clicked. “Then that’s even more reason for me to go find a girl and break this dry spell.”

“If it’s just about breaking the dry spell, then you can do that with me too. In fact, it might be even better. We’re both men. I know exactly where you’re sensitive, what feels good. No one knows a man’s body like another man.”

Up to this point, Wu Jinshan truly believed he could keep coaxing Chen Xiucheng with his signature logical arguments and lead him to the conclusion he wanted.

But Chen Xiucheng said calmly, “Yeah, but I don’t like men. You’re gay. You like men. I don’t.”

This I don’t like men landed heavier, more directly and forcefully than all the times Chen Xiucheng had casually thrown around the word straight like a catchphrase.

Wu Jinshan had always been indifferent to other people’s preferences. He didn’t care whether someone liked him or not. But right now, hearing I don’t like men come out of Chen Xiucheng’s mouth made him realize that he couldn’t accept it.

It felt like something was strangling him. Like an invisible hand had wrapped around his throat and pressed down on his lungs.

Seeing Wu Jinshan fall silent, Chen Xiucheng became even more self-righteous. “I’m an adult. Can’t an adult have a girlfriend? You control what I eat, what I drink, and now you want to control who I date? You’re stricter than my mom.”

A sharp ringing suddenly pierced his ears, followed by a wave of dizziness. Wu Jinshan had to brace himself against the bed to keep steady.

Chen Xiucheng wasn’t wrong. From the start, it had just been two lonely, bored guys using each other for comfort, both getting what they needed. But at some point, Wu Jinshan had started to expect more.

“You? Find a girlfriend? What girl’s blind enough?” Wu Jinshan sneered as he jumped down from the bed. One hand gripped the rail at the foot of the bed, the veins standing out sharply across the back of his hand and forearm. He looked like he was about to beat someone to death.

Chen Xiucheng instinctively backed up a few steps toward the door. In terms of height and build, he had no chance against Wu Jinshan in a real fight. The pressure bearing down on him now made him want to bolt.

“What the hell does that mean? I’m not missing an arm or a leg, and my face isn’t deformed.” But Chen Xiucheng wasn’t the type to back down. Even with death looming, his mouth would keep running.

“I just happen to have a lot of faith in the judgment and taste of the general female population.”

“If women really have judgment and taste, then you’re the exception. You’re a fucking idiot, brain-dead, and blind.” Chen Xiucheng had officially entered full-on insult mode.

Wu Jinshan didn’t understand how everything had gone off the rails. He’d had it all planned out. So how did it end up like this? What were they even arguing about?

He hated this feeling of losing control. He hated when things went off script. And he hated that look on Chen Xiucheng’s face, the one that said he wanted to get as far away from him as possible.

“Brother Cheng, Lin Lu told me to come find you. He wants to know if you’re still going to KTV. He said you hung up on him, and then he couldn’t reach you after…” Zhao Xi’s voice suddenly came from outside the door.

Chen Xiucheng rushed to open it, grabbed Zhao Xi’s arm, and bolted down the stairs with him like he was fleeing for his life. As he ran, he still turned back and shouted, “Just wait! Your big brother will bring your sister-in-law back for you in a few days!”

“Great! I wish you all the best!”

Wu Jinshan stood there, seething, watching the two of them disappear down the stairwell. Then he grabbed the mug from his desk and hurled it at the end of the hallway.

His head hurt even more now. His temples throbbed, and he felt nauseous. He thought maybe it was from being pissed off by Chen Xiucheng. He took a shower to try to calm down, but it didn’t help. Still feeling sick, he gave up and went to bed early.