TT Chapter 21. Pursuit

That night, Chen Ting couldn’t sleep. He kept tossing and turning, his mind replaying Pei Yiyao’s confession over and over. Even after he finally fell asleep, the same scene kept playing out in his dreams. Pei Yiyao stood in front of him under the tree, calling his name again and again.

He must have heard it at least a hundred times in his sleep.

When Chen Ting woke up the next morning, he felt like he had developed a nervous condition.

“Ting Ting, what’s wrong?” Yang Shulin looked at the dark circles under his eyes in shock. Chen Ting had always been a great sleeper. He fell asleep fast and never woke up in the middle of the night.

But Chen Ting couldn’t tell him the truth. Yang Shulin was still just a child. How could he burden him with something this heavy? Yang Shulin had always taken Chen Ting’s words at face value, so he let it go after hearing a half-hearted explanation.

But during class, he suddenly leaned over with a serious look and asked in a low voice, “Did you and Pei Yiyao have a fight? Everyone’s saying you two aren’t speaking.”

“Huh?”

Chen Ting was genuinely baffled by how a rumor that far off from reality had gotten around. But then he thought back to how cold and stern Pei Yiyao had looked yesterday when he dragged him away, and it all made sense.

Still, he didn’t feel the need to explain much. “Just a small misunderstanding.”

“It’s not a big deal, right?” Yang Shulin remained concerned about Chen Ting’s interpersonal safety. If something really happened, there was no way Chen Ting and his short arms and legs could win that fight.

Chen Ting shook his head to reassure him, though he couldn’t help glancing at his phone out of the corner of his eye. The screen stayed quiet. Not a single new message.

So this was how Pei Yiyao pursued someone?

Chen Ting couldn’t help grumbling internally. Then he shoved the phone to the bottom of his backpack, picked up his textbook, and decided to focus on studying. Studying brought joy. Studying brought progress. Who had time to worry about relationships?

But what Chen Ting didn’t expect was that even when he went to the café for work, Pei Yiyao still didn’t show up. Not even a single message.

Even Yang Shulin started to look concerned. “Are you sure you and Pei Yiyao really cleared up that little misunderstanding?”

Lately, Pei Yiyao had been showing up so frequently that it felt like he was always hanging around them. He didn’t say much, but his presence was impossible to ignore. And now, all of a sudden, he was gone. It would have been strange if no one noticed.

Chen Ting replied with a dry, “Heh.”

One look at his blank expression and Yang Shulin knew something was wrong. This wasn’t a minor misunderstanding at all. It was obviously a major falling-out.

[Full Winner Takes All Chat Group]

YSL: It’s over. Cool Guy didn’t show up today. Our Beautiful Boys Project is sinking again…

Balala Big Demon King: Has that crappy plan of yours ever not sunk?

YSL: You don’t get it. This is a world where good looks reign supreme. If our N University can outshine the arts colleges with pure visuals, we’ll be legends. We could walk around the entire college town like kings.

Northeast Popsicle: Walk sideways my ass. We stand for depth and substance.

Gou Ge: Did you get anywhere with Gao Duo?

YSL: Not yet…

YSL: But I got his WeChat! Am I amazing?

Nameless Hermit: Are we seriously just a bunch of dudes running a Beautiful Boys Project? Do you not see how gay this sounds?

Gou Ge: Only the gay can recognize the gay.

YSL: Gou Ge is right!

YSL: And even if I were going to be gay, I’d still go after Ting Ting. Why are you all so pressed?

Northeast Popsicle: Pressed? You wish. If Chen Ting ever did go gay, it would be with someone like Pei Yiyao. What does it have to do with you?

Nameless Hermit: Exactly. What does it have to do with you?

Balala Big Demon King: Yeah. What does it have to do with you?

Emo Bro: Seriously. What does it have to do with you?

[…]

YSL: Gou Ge!!!

Gou Ge: Go wash up and go to bed.

Stabbed through the heart by countless swords, Yang Shulin lay in deep grief. He stuck his head out from under the covers and looked to Chen Ting for comfort.

“Ting Ting, if you were gay, would you like me?”

Chen Ting stared at him in silence.

Was he cursed lately to attract nothing but gay men?

Yang Shulin took the silence as a refusal and collapsed back onto the bed like a corpse, heartbroken.

The dorm went quiet for a moment before Bai Yu and Jiang Hai peeked their heads out and asked, “Why didn’t you ask us?”

“I refuse,” Yang Shulin said flatly.

The hint of disdain in his voice was unmistakable. Bai Yu and Jiang Hai immediately climbed onto his bed, wrapped him in his blanket, and gave him a good beating.

“Ting Ting, save me!”

Yang Shulin wailed like an eighteen-year-old girl being dragged into a dark alley by a thug.

Chen Ting turned away. He picked up the phone on his pillow and checked it again. Still no new messages. After a few seconds of staring at the screen, he tossed it into the corner, patted his pillow, and went to sleep.

Chen Ting was woken the next morning by the shrill ringing of his phone.

Caller: Pei Yiyao.
Time: Seven thirty in the morning.

He hung up and went back to sleep. The phone didn’t ring again.

Ten minutes later, Chen Ting sat up like a corpse jolted back to life. He spent ten seconds mentally reviewing the entire timeline of Pei Yiyao’s confession, then realized the guy had only called once and given up.

He changed Pei Yiyao’s contact name to “Liu Wa,” after the sixth child in Calabash Brothers, because Liu Wa’s special ability was invisibility.

Meanwhile, far away in the UK, a black sedan had just pulled out of the airport. Inside, Ruan Xin looked in surprise at her son, who had been staring at his phone with a furrowed brow ever since they got off the plane.

“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Did you finally run into something you couldn’t handle?”

Pei Yiyao didn’t react to her choice of words. He simply shook his head.

After a while, his hand hovered above the screen, still unable to press send. He rubbed his brow, then gave in and decided to seek help from outside.

Of course, he wasn’t going to ask Ruan Xin. He sent the question to Xu Yiming, who prided himself on having abundant romantic experience.

Pei Yiyao: Let me ask you. If you confessed to someone and said you were going to pursue them, but then suddenly disappeared… what would happen?

YogurtYiming: Hahahahahahahaha are you trying to get yourself killed?

YogurtYiming: Who’s the idiot that pulled that off?

YogurtYiming: Introduce me. I want to meet this legend. Hahahahahaha…

[You are not friends with this user. Please send a friend request. You can chat once the other party accepts.]

Pei Yiyao removed Xu Yiming from his contacts.

After thinking it over several times, he finally sent a long WeChat message to Chen Ting, explaining everything from beginning to end.

Liu Wa: I’m in the UK now. Yesterday, one of my mom’s close friends had a serious accident. He was also a teacher I deeply respect, so we had to come back and see him. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I couldn’t send messages on the plane, so this is the earliest I could explain. I hope I can still keep the right to pursue you. I mean it.

Chen Ting didn’t see the message until after the first class of the morning. His phone had been in his bag the whole time.

By the time he had read Pei Yiyao’s explanation three times, his face was burning.

“Ting Ting, what are you looking at? Why are you blushing?” a classmate teased from the side.

“It’s nothing, really.” Chen Ting quickly shoved his phone back into his bag like he was hiding something. After a while, he sneaked it back out again and sent Pei Yiyao a reply.

Ting Ting: Got it.

Pei Yiyao stared at the message in silence. So… did that mean Chen Ting was letting him keep pursuing? Or was it a no?

Well, he didn’t say no. That meant yes.

Yes. That had to be it.

Time passed quickly. Three days later, after much internal negotiation, Chen Ting felt like he was finally in a good place emotionally. He could now face Pei Yiyao with a calm heart. That thought alone made him feel lighter.

It was only logical. He didn’t have any special feelings for Pei Yiyao in the first place, so there was no reason to care so much about him vanishing after a confession. If anything, he should feel relieved and relaxed.

By the time Pei Yiyao came back from dealing with his matters, maybe he would have cooled off too. Maybe he would realize it was just a moment of impulse and stop pursuing him altogether.

That was what Chen Ting kept telling himself. So when another café shift came around, he thought he had let it go completely. Forget Pei Yiyao. Focus on studying. Work hard every day. In no time, he would be back to being the cheerful, carefree Ting Ting.

But things rarely go as planned.

The moment Pei Yiyao stepped into the café with that cold evening breeze still clinging to him, and fixed his eyes on Chen Ting with that unflinching gaze, Chen Ting felt everything from that night rush back. That feeling of being quietly cornered by something he could neither accept nor refuse.

“You… you’re back,” Chen Ting said, trying his best to sound casual.

Pei Yiyao looked right at him. “I came back to keep pursuing you.”

At the word pursue, Chen Ting felt a jolt down his spine. He immediately glanced around and shot Pei Yiyao a glare. “Don’t say that in public.”

Pei Yiyao gave a small nod. “One Americano. One milk.”

Afraid he might say something even more ridiculous, Chen Ting rushed to ring up the order and make the drinks. But when he handed both cups over, Pei Yiyao pushed the milk back toward him.

“It’s for you.”

“I’m not thirsty,” Chen Ting mumbled.

“If you don’t want it, I’ll throw it away.”

Chen Ting had no choice but to accept the cup. He quickly tried to send him on his way. But Pei Yiyao stayed rooted to the spot.

“I’ll wait for you to get off work.”

“What for?”

“To walk you back to the dorm.”

Xu Yiming, who had wailed and begged his way back onto Pei Yiyao’s friend list, finally realized that the clueless idiot he had roasted was actually his own Yiyao-ge.

To redeem himself in Pei Yiyao’s eyes, he spent an entire night pouring his soul into a heartfelt masterpiece titled How to Date Like a Rational Human Being.

Also known as The Modern College Student’s Guide to Love.

One of its most important rules was that, as a boyfriend, no matter how late it got, you had to walk your girlfriend back to the dorm every night.

Chen Ting wasn’t exactly a girlfriend, but Pei Yiyao thought back to that incident where someone had tried to pick a fight with Ting Ting. He figured the rule still applied. What if something like that happened again while Chen Ting was on the way home?

He would have no choice but to beat the guy up.

Once Cool Guy made up his mind, not even the entire student body of N University could stop him. So Chen Ting ended up letting him wait at the café every night to walk him to the dorm.

He had agreed to let Pei Yiyao pursue him, after all. There was no getting around it now.

Chen Ting couldn’t help sneaking a glance at Pei Yiyao. Under the streetlight, his posture was tall and straight. He had the kind of height Chen Ting could only dream of.

Meanwhile, the campus gossip machine had started up again.

YSL: What? What do you mean they made up again? Why am I the last to know? How did I not know this???