Honey Stewed Squid

A very odd smile brimmed over from grunt’s lips. Slowly, he turned around and bent at the waist to ask Tong Nian, “Little girl, do you know this guy?” As he spoke, he flicked a glance at Gun from the corner of his eye.
Tong Nian’s eyes were red, and though she did not want to acknowledge this person… she still nodded.
“Then… do you know what his name is?”
She did not really dare state it directly and looked over at Gun once more. The latter still carried on eating his apple and actually had a look of “I want to see what new thing you two can come up with” on his face.
“… Han Shangyan,” she answered softly.
That day… when he came to the Internet café, that was the name on the identity card he had used…
Don’t tell me I got that wrong as well?
Son of a…
grunt straightened back up, clutching at his abdomen in a posture of pain while, at the same time, walking back with delight over a certain someone’s misfortune. With his back to Tong Nian, he dropped his voice and asked beside Gun’s ear, “In our entire club, no more than three people know your Chinese name, much less people outside of the club. You want me to be your scapegoat? No freakin’ way, Con Man!”
Gun felt a moment of incomprehension, but then, he immediately lifted his brow and sent a punch into grunt’s chest.
“Sheet…” grunt abruptly threw a hand over his chest and nearly fell to the ground. “You’re trying to kill off anyone who knows, eh!”
An arm had already snaked onto grunt’s shoulder and was applying a heavy downward force. “Say it again. What scapegoat?”
“… Little lady.” Before he was to sacrifice himself, grunt first removed his glasses and used his most, most innocent and harmless gaze to look at Tong Nian. “If you like someone, be bold and say it out. Let me tell you, this guy here doesn’t even have any sort of female living creature in his life, much less a woman. Even the dog belonging to the male security guard downstairs of his apartment is a male… If you miss your chance with a quality guy like this, it’s going to be for forever!”
……
“I…” The tears in her eyes had not even retreated yet, and now her face suddenly burned up. “Anyway… the person I like isn’t grunt…” Tong Nian lowered her head and firmly fixed her eyes on the toes of her shoes as she stated in a quiet voice, “I came to find you.”
Oh God…
She actually said that out…
Gun’s brows creased together slightly.
His eyes were quite beautiful, with fine, long eyelashes that no man should have. Right at this moment, those deep black eyes were filled completely with suspicion. “You’re still refusing to tell the truth?”
“That is the truth!” This sentence immediately flew out from both Tong Nian and grunt’s mouths as they refuted him in unison.
Was it not obvious enough already?!
It was the first time she had ever given a love confession, aaaah… And it was not turned down, nor accepted, but rather, it was not even believed to be true.
Not believed…
Tong Nian felt she was going to faint soon, filled with feelings of being wronged as well as a sense of defeat.
The room fell into a short, eerie moment of silence.
It lasted until someone cleared his throat and said, “What are you doing still standing here? It’s none of your business now.”
Ah?
Tong Nian’s heart sank, and she lifted her head.
Nonchalantly, he tossed his apple core into the wastebasket, then cast a gaze at grunt.
Huh? He’s not talking to me?
Now that he was at last set free to leave, grunt did not want to stay for even one additional minute. Not bothering to even grab his jacket and wearing only a short-sleeved shirt in the deep of winter, he shiveringly slipped on his glasses. “You and little sis here carry on. I’m outta here.”
Saying that, he hightailed out of the room as if he was flying.
With a click, the door locked shut.
Out of reflex, Tong Nian straightened her back.
Very soon, a pair of black skate shoes appeared before her eyes.
She dared not even breathe, and with her two hands behind her back, she frantically twisted her fingers, so anxious that bursts of sweat were breaking out on her.
He walked up to her, contemplating how he should begin what he wanted to say.
This afternoon in the stadium, the sight of her pulling a suitcase, hurriedly running in after all the important matches had already come to an end, had caused him to suddenly remember that he seemed to have met this girl once before. After all, it was only a small number of girls who would tow a suitcase along and dash all over to watch a gaming competition. This had reminded him of the only girl he had ever crossed paths with in his professional career.
His good buddy, appledog.
The first time he called a girl his good buddy, a brother, that girl had only been fifteen years old and had been Solo’s girlfriend.
That was also the first time he had changed his views on the female gender, that he could actually talk on the same wavelength with the opposite gender and that they could mutually support one another and have a sense of camaraderie. Later… those seemed to have disappeared. In regards to that loss of friendship, it had weighed on his heart all this time. Hence, in that moment, something in him had been stirred. He had wanted to say hello to that young girl in front of him, to encourage her in her passion for eSports.
Afterwards, he discovered something was not quite right.
This… was utterly the type of girl that, in these last twenty-odd years, he was most turned off by. A weak personality that drifted and conformed to circumstance and the crowd. A person who was fond of getting lost in various fancies and blind conjectures and was most skilled in being ruled by emotions. And moreover, someone who liked—
He glanced at her short skirt and white tube socks with cat ears.
… liked to use her limited time on repeatedly trying on clothing, doing her hair, and doing make-up.
……
She lightly, tentatively gave a cough.
Her hair wasn’t mussed, right?
Uh, or did he not like this cute sort of style?
“Do you”—Gun finally found a breakthrough point that he could speak to—“know what my name is?”
Of course… She replied quietly, “Han Shangyan.”
Even though peeking at someone’s identity card was morally wrong…
A brief moment of silence.
“You like me?” He opened his mouth to speak again.
“……”
“What’s wrong? Have I misunderstood?”
“No…”
“What do you like about me?”
“……”
Was she supposed to say it had been love at first sight? T.T…
If fingers could be tied together, hers would have long since been twisted into a jumbled knot.
In front of her eyes, his feet suddenly shifted.
To the right, two steps. Then, unhurriedly, they strolled back.
“Not easy to answer? Let’s do this. We’ll change the question.” Gun tried as much as possible to make himself smile pleasantly and exude a friendly countenance while asking, one word at a time, the question that was stemming from this tiny, hard-to-come-by bit of curiosity. “What is there about me to like?”