Qi Yang was pulled up from the ground by Qi Dahai.
Even though he and Mu Yicong were fighting in the alley, it wasn’t a dead zone. People came and went.
When adults passed by and saw two students going at it, fists and feet flying, they’d yell at them to stop. When kids or other students passed, they’d either take a detour or watch from a distance, never getting close.
It was already getting dark. Both of their faces were bruised. Their phones, earbuds, and other small items were scattered all over the ground. They were being watched like a bunch of zoo animals.
Qi Yang wasn’t afraid of embarrassment. Mu Yicong had a vicious hand. He couldn’t even feel the pain anymore.
The initial excitement of Mu Yicong finally ‘answering the call’ had long since been replaced by pure rage fueled by the pain. Now, with blood in his eyes, all he wanted was to win.
After taking another punch to the gut, he fought back the nausea and swung his leg, aiming directly for Mu Yicong’s face.
He had put half his strength into the kick when his collar tightened. A big hand yanked him back hard.
Qi Yang’s feet slipped, his balance completely off. He staggered and nearly fell face-first onto the ground.
“What are you doing?” Qi Dahai’s voice came from behind him, pulling him upright.
Mu Yicong was also being held back by someone. He wiped his nose, his dark eyes still glaring at Qi Yang.
“Let go.” Qi Yang struggled against his father’s grip. Only then did he notice the taste of blood in his mouth.
“Enough!” Qi Dahai pushed him back, bent over, and picked up the phone on the ground. “Why are you fighting like a couple of thugs? You look like beggars. What, you want to scare your mom again when you get home?”
The person holding Mu Yicong looked over and called out with a smile, “Is this your kid, Brother Hai?”
“This one is, that one isn’t,” Qi Dahai said, glancing carelessly at Qi Yang. “Are you hurt anywhere?”
“No.” Qi Yang grabbed his phone from his father’s hand and stuffed it in his pocket.
“What about you?” Qi Dahai tilted his chin at Mu Yicong.
Mu Yicong didn’t answer. He also picked up his phone and walked straight out of the alley.
“Hey.” The person he’d pushed aside laughed. “Got some strength, huh.”
As Mu Yicong brushed past him, Qi Yang still felt like throwing a punch. Qi Dahai grabbed him.
“If you’re not hurt, go home. If you need to go to the hospital or anything, tell your parents to come find me,” Qi Dahai said.
Mu Yicong didn’t even look back. He picked up his bag at the alley entrance and disappeared into the night.
Qi Dahai’s friend shooed away the onlookers. “What are you all looking at? Fuck off!” The crowd slowly dispersed. Only then did Qi Dahai let go of Qi Yang. He smacked him on the back of the head.
“What’s wrong with you?” He didn’t sound really angry. There was even a hint of amusement in his tone. “You just got called in to see your parents a month into school. What’s it about this time?”
“Stay out of it.” Qi Yang wiped the sweat from his forehead. The corner of his eye stung like hell. He must have broken the skin.
“Like I want to be bothered. You’re bothering me.” Qi Dahai pushed him. “Go home. I saw your bike. Tell your mom I’m not eating dinner at home tonight.”
Qi Yang ignored him and went to get his bike from the alley entrance.
“Did you hear me?” Qi Dahai yelled after him.
“I heard you!” Qi Yang yelled back impatiently.
Zou Meizhu was in the kitchen making cold noodles. The AC was set to 20 degrees. She was humming along to the TV.
When she heard the door, she stuck her head out and called, “Who’s home?”
When she saw what he looked like, she held her belly and screamed.
“Can you not yell?” Qi Yang’s head hurt more from his mom’s shrieking than from the fight.
“What happened? You got into another fight?” Zou Meizhu rushed over and circled around him. “Who was it, son? Are you hurt?”
“No.” Qi Yang had experience. He didn’t have any serious injuries.
He avoided Zou Meizhu’s circling concern, grabbed a change of clothes, and went to take a shower.
Zou Meizhu followed him around, asking question after question.
Qi Yang stopped at the bathroom door and turned to his mom. “Dad said he’s not eating dinner at home tonight.”
“He’s not eating at home again?” Zou Meizhu’s voice went up an octave.
His mom’s attention was successfully diverted. She stuck out her belly and went to call Qi Dahai, muttering curses as she dialed. “Never eats at home. I bet he’s got a little mistress on the side now that I’m pregnant… You’re just like your father! You couldn’t pick up a single good habit.”
Qi Yang slammed the bathroom door and turned the water on full blast to drown out Zou Meizhu’s nagging.
When he looked at himself in the mirror and stripped down to check his injuries, he was so pissed off.
The corner of his forehead was definitely scraped. A bruise the size of his thumb.
And it was on his right fucking face again. The cut under his eye from last time had just healed without a trace.
His body was even worse. Mu Yicong always liked to go for his stomach. It didn’t look serious, but the moment he bent over, the pain was indescribable.
Qi Yang had always had a principle when fighting: he didn’t care if he got hurt, as long as he hurt the other guy worse.
But this fight just felt unsatisfying. He felt like he hadn’t gotten the upper hand.
Maybe it was because it was off-campus, so Mu Yicong could let loose more. Or maybe it was just the disgusting feeling of having his uniform pissed on.
It really was disgusting.
Qi Yang stood under the shower, scrubbing his head. He mentally went through Liu Dameng and Lai Jiahao, one by one, but couldn’t figure out who did it.
When he came out of the bathroom, he had to listen to Zou Meizhu complain again.
Qi Yang had no appetite anyway. The more he heard, the more annoyed he got. He just pushed his bowl away and stopped eating.
He went to his room and locked the door, leaving Zou Meizhu outside. He then went to sleep, planning to ask Liu Dameng what happened tomorrow.
But he hadn’t even slept through the night when he was woken up by a buzzing sound coming from somewhere.
Qi Yang sat up, his hair a mess, his whole body sore.
He glanced at the alarm clock on his desk. It was only 8:30 in the morning.
He looked around his room and finally fished his phone out of the outer pocket of his school bag. It was a call from an unknown number.
Just as he was about to hang up, he squinted at the screen and felt like the number looked familiar.
Wait, isn’t that my own number?
Sure he wasn’t seeing things from getting beaten on the head, Qi Yang frowned and swiped to answer.
The person on the other end seemed to have been waiting for someone to answer, about to hang up himself. When he heard the call connect, he paused for a moment, then a voice came through. “Qi Yang?”
“What the fuck…” Qi Yang was wide awake now. He sat cross-legged on the sofa and looked at the screen again. “Who the hell is this?”
The other end went silent again.
“If you’re not gonna talk, I’m hanging up. Fucking scammer.”
He was about to hang up when a clear throat came through the phone. A voice that was unmistakably familiar, also tinged with annoyance, spoke. “We grabbed the wrong phones.”
It was Mu Yicong.
Qi Yang blinked at the ceiling. He pulled the phone away and looked at it carefully. Then he thought about the messy fight in the alley yesterday, all the junk that had been scattered on the ground.
“Oh.” He laughed. “So I have your phone now?”
“Where do you live?” Mu Yicong asked, cutting straight to the chase. “I’ll come get it.”
“What, you got little secrets on your phone you don’t want me to see?” Qi Yang was in no hurry.
He switched to speakerphone, turned Mu Yicong’s phone over in his hands a couple of times, and tossed it up and down.
“You had no problem finding where I live to ambush me after school yesterday. How come you don’t know where I live now?”
“Are you that bored?” Mu Yicong asked.
“No.” Qi Yang held the phone up to his face. “If you’re in a hurry, call the cops. If you’re not, wait until school starts and come find your daddy.”
Having gotten a little verbal jab in, he hung up before Mu Yicong could say anything.
He figured Mu Yicong would call back, but for the rest of the National Day holiday, he didn’t call a single time. He didn’t even send a text.
And not only did he not call to ask for his phone back, but during the whole holiday, no one else seemed to call that number either, except for one text.
The sender of that text wasn’t saved in the contacts, but based on the tone, it was probably Mu Yicong’s mom.
The content was just a few words: Congcong, Dad and I are at a conference in Beijing. You can stay with Grandma on your mom’s side or Grandma on your dad’s side.
Congcong, huh.
Qi Yang snickered at the nickname. When Zou Meizhu called him “Yangyang” from outside, his face fell.
He scoured Mu Yicong’s phone from top to bottom. From the photo album to the text messages, he couldn’t find anything interesting.
The apps were pitifully few. Not only no games, there wasn’t even a QQ.
He started treating Mu Yicong’s phone like his own, downloading a bunch of stuff.
When he got bored, he copied the text and forwarded it to Mu Yicong—on his own phone number.
Then he sent Mu Yicong another text to piss him off: Congcong, your mom’s telling you to go to your grandma’s house.
The text disappeared into thin air. Mu Yicong didn’t even reply with a ‘fuck you’.
Qi Yang waited for a bit. Then, with a nasty streak, he saved his own number in Mu Yicong’s phone under ‘Dad’.
For the entire National Day holiday, Qi Yang stayed at home. He didn’t go anywhere.
He waited until the bruise and the scrape had almost healed, then school started again.
Qi Yang arrived at school early.
The class was in full swing, everyone scrambling to finish their homework. He hadn’t written a single word. He sat with his legs crossed in Mu Yicong’s seat, waiting for him.
“What are you guarding over there?” Liu Dameng ran into the classroom, a bun dangling from his mouth. When he saw Qi Yang, he called out.
Qi Yang pointed at him. “I’ll ask you later.”
“What?” Liu Dameng blinked innocently.
Mu Yicong walked into the classroom and saw Qi Yang sitting in his seat, acting out a sign language conversation with Liu Dameng across the room.
Like two deaf-mutes.
He walked over, put his bag on the desk, and stared at Qi Yang.
Qi Yang, for once, didn’t give him a hard time. He took out Mu Yicong’s phone and put it on the desk. “Where’s mine?”
Mu Yicong glanced at his phone. He took Qi Yang’s phone out of his pocket and tossed it into his arms. “Get lost.”
“What’s the rush?” Qi Yang pointed at the desk. “Take a look at the new wallpaper I set for you.”
Mu Yicong seemed to have already guessed that Qi Yang would play a prank on his phone.
So when he turned on the screen and saw ‘I, Mu Yicong, am a big dumbass’ handwritten on it, he didn’t even flinch.
Qi Yang got annoyed just looking at his bored expression.
They were staring each other down again when the homeroom teacher came in, hands on her hips, yelling, “Hand in your homework!” He slowly got up from Mu Yicong’s desk and pressed the button on his own phone.
Nothing.
“Dead battery?” He turned his head and asked Mu Yicong.
“I don’t know,” Mu Yicong said.
“How can you not know if it’s got battery or not? You didn’t even charge it all this time?”
“Couldn’t be bothered to touch it.” Mu Yicong lifted his eyelids, his tone dripping with contempt. “It was dirty.”
