It was already the middle of the night when Tong Qiu finally got home. Not only was it cold outside, but the inside of his apartment was cold as well.
It being late February, the central heating in the building should have been running. He didn’t know if it was because his landlord wasn’t paying the utility fees or if the heating system was just that terrible, but his apartment was always as cold as an igloo at night.
He quickly showered and climbed under the covers with his electric heat pack in his arms. He tossed and turned but still couldn’t fall asleep and eventually shifted the heat pack lower to cover his freezing feet.
Tong Qiu couldn’t help but think back to last winter. It was around when he and Huo Zhixing had just gotten married and Huo Zhixing had returned in the middle of the night after his shift, bringing the cold air in with him. Huo Zhixing had been worried about transferring the cold to Tong Qiu and had ended up just sleeping on the couch.
At first, Tong Qiu was completely unaware of Huo Zhixing’s sleeping arrangement, but one night, after being woken by his bladder, he had come out of the bedroom and discovered Huo Zhixing covered in a blanket, fast asleep in the living room.
Since that day, Tong Qiu started setting an alarm for himself whenever Huo Zhixing had the late shift. On those nights, Tong Qiu would sleep extra early and at around midnight, he would wake up and wait for Huo Zhixing. It was around then that Tong Qiu also got into the habit of preparing a hot cup of water to help Huo Zhixing warm up when he came home.
It felt like it all happened just yesterday, but in reality, almost a year had passed since.
This routine remained the same for the rest of their marriage and Tong Qiu still found himself waking up at midnight because his body had already been fine tuned to match Huo Zhixing’s schedule.
When Tong Qiu and Huo Zhixing used to share a bed, they each had their own bed covers. Logically speaking, they hadn’t exchanged much body heat, but it had still felt a lot warmer with an extra person in the room.
Right now, Tong Qiu was lying in his own bed, all by himself. He rolled back and forth but his hands still felt cold and his feet were equally frozen.
He couldn’t sleep, so he stared up at the ceiling and recalled his memories of Huo Zhixing at the bar. The more he thought about it, the more he felt that Huo Zhixing looked incredibly sexy in his uniform.
It was the middle of the night but Tong Qiu had gone hard just picturing it.
His sex life with Huo Zhixing while married was almost non-existent. The frequency – or rather infrequency – at which they had sex was almost astonishing.
Given the fact that they were two grown men, one would think their sex drives would be stronger. However, they did the deed about once a month on average and even those rare occurrences were unpleasant.
Tong Qiu got a little angry at the thought of it. It was all because of that Huo Zhixing – making love was an activity that required intensity and passion but the man was always too cautious. It wasn’t as if Tong Qiu were a flimsy sheet of plastic – he wasn’t going to tear in half if he was jabbed a few times, so what was there to be afraid of?
The forever insatiable Tong Qiu always waited until Huo Zhixing wasn’t around to secretly take matters into his own hands – quite literally. He even went and bought a love egg behind Huo Zhixing’s back but after giving it a few tries, he found that he didn’t really enjoy it. Tong Qiu didn’t know where he hid the thing and then subsequently forgot about it.
At this very moment, his body’s reaction was stronger than he could bear so he bit his lip, closed his eyes and reached a hand underneath his pajama pants.
Tong Qiu always used to fantasize about well-built athletes when he touched himself but tonight, for some reason, he couldn’t seem to wipe the image of Huo Zhixing from his mind.
The way Huo Zhixing had looked in his uniform while walking towards him.
The way Huo Zhixing had looked while smoking on the side of the road.
It was sexy enough to drive him wild.
Since Tong Qiu couldn’t erase the images from his mind, he simply gave up trying and when he finally came, it was with thoughts of his ex-husband in his head.
After finding his release however, his heart felt even more hollow when he was forced to face the fact that a thirty-something man like him had to resort to jerking himself off in the middle of the night. Tong Qiu couldn’t suppress a wave of self-pity and he muttered under his breath, cursing, “It’s all your fault, Huo Zhixing!”
—
After a long night of drinking and masturbating, an exhausted Tong Qiu had to down two large coffees the next morning to muster the energy to go to work.
Thankfully, there were no mishaps at school. With the entrance exams countdown fast approaching, the normally boisterous, trouble-making bunch of teenagers in his class had more or less settled down to study.
Tong Qiu had no classes to teach in the afternoon and was asked by the math teacher to discuss mock exams for the evening self-study sessions. As soon as he finished, he got a notification from Chu Yao.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Fang Baicheng wants your number.
Qtfc atfs tjv yffc vglcxlcu atf cluta yfobgf, Mjcu Djlmtfcu tjv tlcafv atja tf kjcafv ab jvv Kbcu Hle bc QfJtja. Kbcu Hle tjv qijsfv vewy jcv tjv wjcjufv ab jnblv ulnlcu la ab tlw.
Xgjyylcu tlr qtbcf, Kbcu Hle kfca bearlvf ab yjrx ecvfg atf kjgwat bo atf joafgcbbc rec jcv vljifv Jte Tjb’r cewyfg.
“Should I give it to him?” Chu Yao asked. “I get the feeling that you’re not really into him.”
“You’re right, I’m not feeling it,” Tong Qiu replied. “Besides, I’m not in a rush. I just got divorced so it’ll be nice living the single life for a while.”
“For real? And here I thought you were itching to find another man.”
“Your opinion of me is evidently too complex for words.”
Tong Qiu paused in front of the small convenience store as he listened to Chu Yao’s response. “Then I won’t give it to him for now and we’ll see how it goes. He’s actually a decent guy, though still a little lacking compared to Huo-ge.”
Not just a little lacking, thought Tong Qiu. Fang Baicheng was lacking in several departments, but he didn’t voice his thoughts aloud.
“I’m fine with being friends but if things were to go further…I don’t think that’s a possibility right now.”
“I understand,” Chu Yao said. “So what even is your type? Was Huo Zhixing’s sexual prowess the only issue?”
“Stop talking about how great Huo Zhixing is all the time. He can’t possibly be the only man to enter my gloriously depraved existence.” Tong Qiu complained. “I have to look forward, you know! There’s an enormous field of lush, green grass waiting for me to graze on so why do I have to keep my eyes on him?”
“That’s right, my friend, the world is your oyster and you will surely achieve greatness!” Chu Yao’s laugh made Tong Qiu shiver from head to toe. This woman’s boldness was to the extent that Tong Qiu could find all sorts of hidden meanings behind her words.
“Darling, I gotta run to a meeting now so let’s chat later,” Chu Yao said. “Don’t worry about Fang Baicheng, I’ll take care of it.”
“Your kindness shall be remembered,” Tong Qiu replied. “Your humble servant must now take his leave. The ice cream waiting for him is quickly melting; it cannot wait any longer.”
After hanging up, Tong Qiu walked into the convenience store and bought a box of ice cream. He ate it in the store and sat beside the shopkeeper to watch an episode of an angsty, heart-wrenchingly miserable drama before returning to his office.
When Chu Yao had said she would ‘take care’ of the Fang Baicheng situation, she meant that she would hold him off and stop him from bothering Tong Qiu. However, Tong Qiu suddenly realized that his childhood friend’s words couldn’t quite be trusted because that very evening, as he was heading out to go get dinner, he caught sight of Fang Baicheng outside the school.
The fact that Fang Baicheng somehow managed to track him all the way here was no small feat.
At first, Tong Qiu wanted to pretend that he hadn’t noticed him, but to his dismay, Fang Baicheng saw him and rushed forward to greet him directly.
“What a coincidence,” Tong Qiu said, pasting on a fake smile.
Tong Qiu really couldn’t stand the clingy type and besides, they were in their thirties already. There was no need for Fang Baicheng to act like a persistent vine – couldn’t he just keep his proper distance?
“It’s not a coincidence.” Fang Baicheng’s bluntness was making Tong Qiu’s head hurt. Fang Baicheng continued, “I purposely came here to wait for you. Chu Yao wouldn’t give me your phone number so I had no choice but to come here.”
Fang Baicheng pointed at the school gates. “I’ve been here for a while but because I didn’t have a security pass, the guards wouldn’t let me inside.”
Tong Qiu turned and glanced at the old security guard sitting in the guardhouse. He spoke in a polite, detached tone and replied, “Of course, it’s a school after all. The rules are there to stop loiterers from entering.”
Tong Qiu lifted his hand and feigned a look at his watch, then started walking briskly. A normal person would have recognized it as a sign that Tong Qiu was in a hurry and to ‘stop wasting your breath, don’t bother me’. However a loiterer like Fang Baicheng actually followed him, as if he was completely unaware of Tong Qiu’s silent rejection.
“Are you free? Do you want to get dinner together?”
Tong Qiu gave him a look and said after a beat, “Sorry, I really can’t. I’m in charge of a class of third years so there’s lots of work left to do. I just came out to grab a quick bite to eat and I’ll have to hurry back.”
Fang Baicheng was clearly disappointed but still flashed a smile and nodded. “Then how about tomorrow evening after school?”
“It’ll be too late then,” Tong Qiu replied. “School lets out at nine o’clock for me.”
There was little persuasiveness to his argument. After all, Tong Qiu was out at a bar that late just yesterday and hadn’t even started drinking by nine.
Thankfully, Tong Qiu was the type of person who could say anything with an air of self-confidence and conviction. “Let’s take a raincheck. I really can’t find the time for the next little while.”
This kind of rejection was actually extremely obvious but Fang Baicheng clung on desperately and even dug out his phone. “If it’s like that, then let me at least have your WeChat or your phone number. Otherwise, wouldn’t I have come all the way here for nothing?”
Tong Qiu thought, ‘it’s not as if I forced you to come here!’
However, he knew he shouldn’t act so high-handed and silently reminded himself that as a teacher of the people, it was his duty to remain calm, composed and cordial.
A teacher of the people could not carelessly destroy the fragile spirit of a man in love.
And so Tong Qiu said, “alright then” and took Fang Baicheng’s cell phone to enter his phone number. After he handed it back, Fang Baicheng immediately gave him a call.
“Now you have my number too. Feel free to call me if something comes up.”
Tong Qiu smiled politely, then quickly ducked into the closest shop.
He had initially planned on eating fried rice noodle for dinner but quickly changed his mind and decided to grab some ramen and head back to his office.
Dealing with Fang Baicheng was more exhausting than dealing with the little brats in his class. As soon as Tong Qiu returned to his office, he sprawled across his desk, his appetite having disappeared completely.
“What’s the matter, Tong-laoshi?” asked the homeroom teacher next door. She was a matronly woman in her forties who often liked to chat with Tong Qiu because she found him interesting. She had a stack of exercise booklets in her arms and asked with a smile, “Your face is screaming ‘there’s nothing in life worth living for’. Who’s out there harassing our languages department’s resident Romeo?”
Tong Qiu laughed and waved a hand. “Tell me, Yu-laoshi. Why is life so wearisome?”
“I’m afraid I don’t have the answer you’re looking for.”
“Huh?”
Yu-laoshi, poured him a glass of water and placed it in front of him. “You’ll just have to raise your glass and ask the skies.”
—
Tong Qiu couldn’t help but feel that Fang Baicheng was a freak of nature. Over the next few days, Fang Baicheng was incessant in his pursuit and kept asking him to meet up. Despite suffering defeat in every battle, Fang Baicheng fought onward, undaunted by setbacks. Tong Qiu has never encountered someone so unwaveringly persistent and he kind of wished his own students would learn a thing or two and approach their studies with the same attitude.
Fang Baicheng called him a dozen times but Tong Qiu didn’t pick up a single call. Fang Baicheng then sent him two dozen messages and the most he did was give a few one-worded answers. However, the man was as unremittingly tenacious as before and Tong Qiu suddenly understood how he managed to earn his doctorate degree – if one was determined, even an iron pestle could be ground into a fine needle.
Unfortunately, Tong Qiu was not a pestle and Fang Baicheng didn’t have any right to grind him.
Fang Baicheng wasn’t the only annoying thing to happen to him this week. Tong Qiu had no idea why but every afternoon, he would get migraines so bad that even painkillers were ineffective. It hurt so much that he couldn’t even fall asleep.
On Friday, he sat in his office at lunchtime grading papers. His phone chimed but he knew that if he checked his notifications, he was sure to see a message from Fang Baicheng.
He was too lazy to check and had already set Fang Baicheng’s WeChat messages to ‘do not disturb’.
Tong Qiu did feel that his own reaction was a bit overboard but Fang Baicheng had never outright told Tong Qiu that he liked him and had also never declared his intention to pursue him. As a result, Tong Qiu couldn’t just reject him directly – in fact, it would make it seem as if he were the one with one-sided feelings and that was a kind of embarrassment Tong Qiu refused to endure.
So he just decided to ignore all of it. As the saying went, ‘running away from your problems may feel disgraceful but it still works’.
“Tong-laoshi, if you don’t feel well you really should go to the hospital,” the teacher sitting across from him said with a worried look. “You look very pale, and you already threw up twice already today, isn’t that right?”
Tong Qiu wanted to respond that he was close to throwing up for the third time.
However, he didn’t manage to get out a single word before he had to run to the bathroom and throw up again.
Tong Qiu didn’t know what was wrong with him. When his migraines worsened, he would start vomiting like there was no tomorrow. If he didn’t know for a fact that it was biologically impossible, he might even have suspected that he had gotten himself pregnant.
When it was nearing one o’clock, Tong Qiu finally decided that he couldn’t hang on anymore. If he tried to endure it any longer, he just might make the news tomorrow with the headline ‘High School Teacher Dies Days Before University Entrance Exams’.
In order to avoid being on the local news, Tong Qiu admitted defeat and abandoned the idea that ‘surface wounds are no excuse for retreating behind the line of fire’. It would probably be best if he got himself checked out to see what exactly was wrong with him.
Tong Qiu asked Yu-laoshi to sub in for him for his afternoon class. After gathering his things, he decided to head to the hospital.
While he was on his way out, Tong Qiu thought back to when he used to watch Korean dramas with his mother when he was little. It was always ‘cancer this’ and ‘tumour that’ in those dramas and he suddenly wondered if there might be a tumour growing inside his brain at that very moment. Maybe it was even a malignant tumour.
The more he thought about it, the more he freaked himself out. Just as he was about to start reciting poems lamenting his own demise, his cell phone suddenly started ringing.
Because of Fang Baicheng, Tong Qiu was starting to become afraid of picking up his phone. Thankfully, it was only Huo Zhixing this time.
“Are you busy right now?” Huo Zhixing asked.
“If I was busy I wouldn’t have picked up.”
The person on the other end let out a laugh and Tong Qiu actually felt as if the ‘tumour’ in his head had shrunk a little. Apparently, he not only had a uniform fetish but seemed to have developed a freaking voice fetish too.
“Is there something you need from me?” The two of them hadn’t seen each other in a week, and hadn’t stayed in contact either. Tong Qiu thought the frequency of their interactions was pretty normal and really wished Fang Baicheng could learn a few tricks from Huo Zhixing.
“I didn’t have work this afternoon so I went to visit my mom. She gave the two of us some food and since your school is on they way, I thought I’d ask if you’d be around so that I can drop it off.”
Huo Zhixing’s parents had always been extremely kind to Tong Qiu and treated him like he was their own son. He and Huo Zhixing hadn’t shared the news of their divorce with their parents for fear of upsetting them.
“I’m…” Tong Qiu was about to make up an excuse and pretend he was too busy, but before he even reached the front gates, he caught sight of Huo Zhixing in uniform, holding a large bag in his hand.
Those destined to meet couldn’t dodge fate even if they tried – Tong Qiu had no choice but to accept it as fact. He felt as if the ‘tumour’ in his head had disappeared; he probably wasn’t a character in a k-drama after all. If his life really was a k-drama, this would be the part where the main characters would be like ships passing in the night – they certainly wouldn’t have run into each other by chance.
Tong Qiu muttered under his breath, “This kind of scene isn’t dramatic at all. Aren’t you supposed to get here right after I’ve left?”
“What was that?” Huo Zhixing asked. He stood outside the gates and waited for Tong Qiu.
Tong Qiu flashed a helpless smile. “It’s nothing. It just feels like the two of us are the epitome of the saying, it's a small world.
—
The author has something to say:
Some people might have to wait for a long time just to see your face but other people are fortunate enough to run into you the moment they arrive.
That’s what they call fate.
Why is it fate, you ask?
It’s because the author’s outline is your fate.
LMAO the author’s note xD
Thanks for the chapter! 🙂
Yes, the author’s notes kill me every time – she’s merciless haha. Thanks for reading!
Ahh.. Love it. Huo Zhi Xing should be go all out to take Tong Xiu back!! I’ll be waiting for more k-drama interaction between them 😜
Yes!! Time for Huo Zhixing to step into the role of the drama’s handsome male lead 😉 Thank you for reading!
When Mc said that may be it was pregnancy . I run to see whether there was a tag mpreg .
Well there was not . However i won’t mind if there was .
I do agree with Mc about k-doramas are really smth that influences brain , cause every time i got a headache i think about those cliche plots
Thank you for an update
Hahaha there’s no mpreg in this one but the author definitely likes joking about common tropes 😉 I agree, K-dramas are definitely very dramatic…sometimes /too/ dramatic haha. Thanks so much for reading 🙂
Lol thank you author for giving them a good fate this time and I hope you’ll keep giving them good fate for the rest of their lives 😁
Thank you for the update ❤
Ahaha yes please be kind towards our protagonists @ author! Thank you so much for reading! 😀
this is so stupid. JUST TURN FANG BAICHENG DOWN. tell him you’re not interested, DON’T give him your number, and look for someone else! why fucking humor him when these kinds of ppl just waltz way past your boundaries unless you give it to them straight out. GOD i hope he goes away, FAR AWAY soon.
It’s really difficult to turn such people down. They’ve already fixated on you, and if they’re obsessive enough to stalk you to your place of work and maybe even your house, turning them down might invite further violence since they feel they have to ‘punish’ you for leading them on.
Honestly just scroll through incel Reddit if you want to just lose faith in men
I think it is because of their culture, in most CN novels I have read they are afraid or don’t like being rude unless the situation demands it.
I wanna read Huo Zhixing’s reaction when he finds the love egg Tong Qiu hid in his house. That’d be embarrasing yet exciting.
I hope Huo Zhixing takes Tong Qiu to the hospital. Your husband needs you!
Thanks for the chapter!
TQ: oh no, what should I do doctor?
Doctor: according to Twitter’s threads about dumbasses falling in love/slow burn, your case can be easily treated by confessing your love to your s/o, but since I don’t do the rules here, you’ll have to suffer with it, until Author decides they have enough of slow burn and initiate the raging inferno fase TQ: ｢(ﾟ<ﾟ)ﾞ?? what?
godamn it, the ENTER didn’t skip a line… I’ll just abadon this comment… Thank you for the chapter! The little Theater is a mess, pleaase don’t look too deeply into it (oT-T)尸
+1 jajajajajaja
Thank you so much for the chapter!(๑´>᎑<)~❤
so cold he couldn’t sleep, got used to waking up in the middle of the night when hubby comes home, head hurts so much he can’t sleep… I bet you miss that bland tepid water that was comfortable to sleep in.
Hahaha.. author is shameless.
Thank you for the update ❤️
People like Fang Baicheng is truly annoying. They just can’t take a hint.
in his shoes i would tell the stalker to stop being a bother and leave me alone
En cuanto a este matrimonio, no entiendo por qué se ocultaron tanto uno del otro, esa pretención de que por ser adulto, hay que ser de determianda manera es absurda… coño cuando convives con alguien es cansado no ser tú, así que TQ también eres culpalble.
Ah, en serio hay moscas molestas, pero se debe dar algo de mérito a su insistencia, en cuanto a la pareja, apuesto que si el que insistiera y llamará fuera cierto marido frío e incompetente en el romance… habría sido bien recibido.
Haha the author’s note😂
The way Chu Yao and Tong Qiu talk was really like how I talk with one of my closest gay friend hahahahahah.
I have a question: (I know the story is already completed) why did they married in the first place? They were like roommates not a real couple in any side of their life together… But I like the plot 😛😛💕
Author has a lot of humor. Someone give her a Kofi.
That guy is really annoying! Chill a little, will you dude?
Thank You for the chapter (｡･ω･｡)ﾉ♡