The Nth Day of Being Able to Read Minds

Tao Ran had never experienced a moment that felt longer than the second he saw the group chat message.

What do they mean the university was now under lockdown? The dorm was closed off?

He and Jiang Yu Heng getting locked in together?

His spirits were at its highest earlier, but now it got knocked down so violently like a powerful smash. His happiness last night contrasted with how dead he felt right now.

It took a while for Tao Ran to slowly come back to his senses. He bit down hard on his lips before slowly turning around to look at Jiang Yu Heng. He was still holding that thick book in his hand.

Jiang Yu Heng seemed to have noticed the stare, he slightly looked up and gave him a smile.

He asked in a friendly manner too, “Have you seen the group message sent by the counsellor? You shouldn’t be able to go to the library today.”

[Not just today.]

Tao Ran wasn’t sure why, but he could hear happiness in that inner voice of his. It was the kind of happiness built upon someone else’s suffering.

Tao Ran faked a smile back but it collapsed after a moment, “I’m not blind.”

He turned around with a stomp, looked at application form he had just filled last night on his table with a death stare and finally shoved it in his drawer with force.

Tao Ran got through an extremely difficult weekend being bored in bed the whole time.

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When the thought about how long he would be forced to live with Jiang Yu Heng in this room, he felt like there was a million horses running through his mind.

Troubles never come singlehandedly. His frustration reached its peak when he saw a message from Wu Hao on Monday morning.

Wu Hao: Tao Zi, the group we formed on Friday was separated by the lecturer.

Tao Ran: ?

Wu Hao: He said he’s implementing the new rule and rearranged the groups based on dorms, so you’re in the same group with Jiang Yu Heng.

Tao Ran: ….?

Wu Hao:  [Group Assessment Grouping 1.txt]

Tao Ran was lying down then, but as soon as he read that, he threw his phone to the side. It sunk into whatever nest the blanket had formed.

He laid flat on his back, limbs spread out around him. After a long time, he scratched his head and ran his fingers through his hair before sitting up in the laziest, boneless way, much like a fish to search for his phone.

Tao Ran carefully tapped into the file Wu Hao sent to him and searched for his name in the most attentive way.

His attentiveness certainly paid off.

He was rewarded with an extremely clear row of words: Group 7 members – Jiang Yu Heng, Tao Ran.

Hah. His name was right next to the legend of the school. How great, how amazing. What a sight to behold.

Tao Ran’s eyes wandered around before he threw his phone away again, burying his face into his pillow.

But no matter how hard he tried to ignore reality, Jiang Yu Heng still showed up after a morning of online classes.

Tao Ran was eating the delicious lunch box that was dropped off for them when he saw a large shadow looming over his desk.

He was chewing on some shredded potatoes while wearing headphones, so he choked hard when he noticed.

Tao Ran turned around in annoyance, the lunch box in his hands. The uninvited guest, Jiang Yu Heng was standing right behind him.

He was holding his laptop in one hand and the other hand tapped on the keyboard to open the group assessment file. “Have you seen it?”

Tao Ran only just swallowed the food in his mouth when Jiang Yu Heng pulled his chair over to sit next to him. “You can continue eating, let’s just talk about the topic selections.”

Tao Ran stood up suddenly, his whole body screaming in resistance and rejection, “You can see that I’m eating too. You can just message me what we’re doing, no need to bother me now.”

His face was red with anger and he couldn’t stomach his lunch anymore, so he went to bed and started scrolling his phone.

He tapped into Weibo again and the comments were still going on about dragging him into BL and all that cult-like discussion – mostly about him and Jiang Yu Heng’s cult.

[76th commenter: Tao Zi has the potential to be the bottom for sure.]

Where and how could they even tell that? He was most definitely an aggressive top, okay?

Wait no, he’s obviously straight!

Tao Ran’s face was filled with frustration and annoyance – what kind of nonsense are these?

The more he read, the more his expression slowly changed from a raging “fuck off” to “Heh, say whatever you want. I’m a straight man anyways” – a puddle of calm water, basically immune to it now.

He began to calm himself, then thought about the feasibility of these suggestions.

For example, this comment: [I genuinely think Tao Zi should start writing a different genre. If this keeps on going, he’ll lost everything without any return. The BL community is huge and active. Most readers are also women. Your bickering with your roommate comes out of love – these readers love seeing this kind of enemies to lovers troupe. Thank you, I’ve already begun drooling over it.]

He was able to digest the first half of the comment, but then it took a turn and then another turn.

Tao Ran’s line of sight started flickering the second he saw ‘your bickerings are out of love’, as he almost stared a hole out of the screen.

Putting aside most things, Jiang Yu Heng really did have the characteristics and looks of a novel protagonist.

Tall, rich and handsome. Excellent grades with a long line of suitors. The façade he put on really was in line with the standard of a campus legend.

Well, what category would he fall under then? The gentle, doting…top?

Or the top with hidden motives. That seemed to fit Jiang Yu Heng better.

It wasn’t that Tao Ran looked up to him that much. But it was mainly because he couldn’t associate Jiang Yu Heng with a bottom. Even slightly thinking about that possibility made him feel extremely weirded out and scared.

In conclusion, Tao Ran felt like Jiang Yu Heng was indeed a good character material.

So if he slightly borrowed his image, it shouldn’t be that bad, right…only using him for fictional gay relationships…it’s not real…

Tao Ran scratched his cheek a little. The more he thought about it, the more he felt guilty.

Although he wasn’t used to Jiang Yu Heng’s antics.  But at most, he was only whining about it in his heart. At most, he would rant about it anonymously on Weibo. He has never done anything else that was more substantial than this.

It felt like it would truly be too damaging to turn a stereotypical straight real person into a fictional gay one.

Tao Ran agonized over it for ten minutes or so, finally constructing the story outline and character profile after concluding it with ‘it’s not like he’ll find out anyways’.

During this time, his face kept turning red. He wasn’t sure if it was out of guilt or embarrassment or being shy and nervous over his bold assumptions.

Tao Ran thought that he knew Jiang Yu Heng very well. In no time, he had finished writing out his character profile.

He looked at the portrayal he had of Jiang Yu Heng on his screen. Feeling immense satisfaction, he secretly sighed at his own good writing while admiring it.

Especially the world ‘pretentious’. He had simply brought out the essence of Jiang Yu Heng with that.

As soon as Tao Ran finished writing, he quickly took a screenshot of it and uploaded it on Weibo for his fans’ feedback.

[1st comment: Tao Zi, are you writing a male lead or a villain? Hahaha. Can you use more positive adjectives to describe him?]

[A peach butt replied: …Didn’t I write that. Tall, rich, handsome.]

[2nd comment: Hahahahhahaha. How damn fickle! Being pretentious sure is funny!]

[A peach butt replied: ? Didn’t you guys just said this character isn’t well written? Why is it funny now?]

[3rd comment: This is Tao Zi’s roommate, right? Right? Tao Zi listened to our advice, yay! I can clearly see the overflowing love towards your roommate in between these lines~]

Tao Ran: “……”

Tao Ran swore he absolutely did not have the intention of writing Jiang Yu Heng in a lewd way.

He pulled open the curtain just to see what Jiang Yu Heng was up to. From this angle, he so happened to be able to see who he was chatting with on his laptop. There was that Italian book placed on the side of his table too.

Generally, when a book is placed squarely on the table, the number of pages flipped through would have creases or folded. But that book, only had one page in that state aside from the book cover.

Hmph, guess the book that Jiang Yu Heng had been holding the past three days – he had only read the first page.

Truly, pretentious.

Tao Ran was annoyed to death. Even though he survived the past year like that, but he somehow just couldn’t accept how he still had to see Jiang Yu Heng every day when he so close to changing his room.

Ever since the semester started this year, it felt like whatever he did had Jiang Yu Heng involved in it. Like how he kept running into him by chance. Then stepping onto his shoe by accident. Realizing he could read minds too…

How can he escape from Jiang Yu Heng’s strange clutches?

He felt like if he continued to stay near him, it would result in a death ending on either side for sure.