Daydreaming about Me

Chapter 37

Shen Juan sat in the stands of the sports field, holding He Songnan’s phone, staring at the dark screen, feeling somewhat dazed.

After having lunch with Lin Yujing and the others, they didn’t immediately return to the sports field but went to the North Building to find He Songnan.

The sports meet had nothing to do with the senior students. While the freshmen and sophomores were bustling around the sports field, the seniors were quietly working on their exams in the North Building.

It was as lonely as snow.

Others’ excitement was theirs alone and had nothing to do with him.

He Songnan was in agony.

He felt that the only pleasure in his painful senior year, filled with endless exams, was lunch breaks with his friends and the bi-weekly PE classes.

But now, his friend didn’t even eat lunch with him regularly anymore.

After sacrificing himself, willing to suffer to protect his friend from losing his desk mate, what kind of friend was this?

He Songnan was furious.

So when the first period of their rare PE class in the afternoon began and Shen Juan came to find him, He Songnan unleashed a barrage of scolding.

“Shen Juan, what kind of friend are you!” He Songnan stood next to the class bulletin board, pointing at him. “I sacrificed myself, and now I have people watching me every day at the classroom door. I’ve accepted that. But now you don’t even eat lunch with me? How many days has it been since you last looked for me?”

Shen Juan sat on his desk, his feet on the back of a chair, looking impatient. “Are you a girl? Do I have to eat with you twenty times a month?”

He Songnan laughed. “No need for that. You only attend classes for twenty days a month, little junior.”

Shen Juan clicked his tongue.

Noticing Shen Juan’s unusual mood, He Songnan bounced over. “What’s wrong? Who provoked you, Master Juan?”

Shen Juan slapped the phone onto the desk. “I have a question for you.” He Songnan respectfully replied, “Ask away.”

Shen Juan asked, “Why don’t you date your childhood friend?” “Because I don’t have one,” He Songnan replied.

Shen Juan stared at him blankly for three seconds before continuing, “Then imagine you have one.”

He Songnan asked, “What does she look like?” Reluctantly, Shen Juan slowly replied, “Pretty, very pretty.” He Songnan said, “Then of course I would date her.”

Shen Juan: “…”

He clicked his tongue again, clearly dissatisfied with the answer.

“Okay, I wouldn’t date her,” He Songnan quickly changed his tune. “We’re still in high school; we should focus on studying. What kind of romance are we talking about? I wouldn’t like anyone.”

Shen Juan didn’t respond, but his mood seemed even worse than before.

Frustrated, He Songnan slapped his phone on the desk. “Brother, what do you want to hear? Tell me, and I’ll say it.”

Shen Juan didn’t know what he wanted to hear.

Normally, He Songnan seemed like a love expert, adept at various techniques to attract girls. But now, Shen Juan thought he was an idiot.

Shen Juan, surrounded by unprecedented confusion, had numerous thoughts racing through his mind:

What if my deskmate has two very handsome childhood friends?

Would she date one of them?

Is she not interested in other guys because her childhood friends are too good-looking?

But what does this have to do with me?

Shen Juan pondered more relevant thoughts.

Who does my deskmate think is more handsome, Lu Jiaxing or me?

His temples throbbed painfully, and he started to get a headache.

The bell signaling the end of PE class rang. Sighing, he got off the desk, grabbed his phone, and headed towards the sports field.

Back at the stands of Class 10, Lin Yujing was chatting with Cheng Yi, her head tilted attentively, not noticing her surroundings.

It was Cheng Yi who saw him. They exchanged glances, and Cheng Yi suddenly asked, “If one day Shen Juan gets a girlfriend and you have to keep your distance from your only friend here, would you be unhappy?”

Shen Juan paused mid-step.

“I’d be so happy I’d buy him two 500-shot firecrackers to celebrate,” Lin Yujing said.

Shen Juan: “…”

He chuckled angrily.

Ignoring Lu Jiaxing and Cheng Yi’s subtle glances, he sat down expressionlessly, pulled out his phone, and pretended to be unaffected, as if he hadn’t heard anything.

When he pressed the home button, Lin Yujing turned her head.

Shen Juan saw a wallpaper of a seductive, busty girl with a six-digit passcode. For a moment, he was confused.

When did I have this wallpaper?

It took him half a second to realize.

This was He Songnan’s phone.

They had the same phone model and neither liked using phone cases, so with the screens off, they looked identical. He hadn’t noticed when he left.

But now Lin Yujing was staring at him.

What was He Songnan’s damn phone password?

Under Lin Yujing’s gaze, Shen Juan blindly tapped on the screen, pretending to play with the phone, completely ignoring her.

Fortunately, Lin Yujing soon went to discuss her events with the sports committee and accompanied Wen Zihui to the registration area. Shen Juan lowered his eyelids, locked the screen, and headed towards the North Building.

The campus was quiet. At this time, He Songnan’s class should be in session, so Shen Juan had to wait until they finished to exchange phones.

With his hands in his pockets, Shen Juan slowly walked past the basketball court.

He recalled the events from the start of the school year when he first met Lin Yujing until now.

Shen Juan had never been in a relationship, but he wasn’t an idiot. His attention and care for Lin Yujing seemed excessive.

At first, it was because she tried to hide her sharp edges but still stood out, always pretending to be unaffected despite looking utterly defeated. This contradiction made him find her interesting.

But later on, was it because he found her truly interesting?

This didn’t explain why he felt irritated around her male friends or why he had an awkward reaction when she called him brother.

Before his break from school, many girls had pursued him, covering all types. Besides finding it annoying, he had no other feelings.

Lin Yujing was different.

But exactly how, he couldn’t say.

Or maybe he had long sensed that his abnormal possessiveness was due to something.

But he didn’t want to admit it.

Why?

Because Lin Yujing had no such thoughts about him.

Her every move and word indicated that she purely trusted him and considered him a friend.

I see you as a deskmate and want to be good friends with you, but you have all these inappropriate thoughts. You even react when I call you brother.

That’s terrifying.

Shen Juan reached the North Building entrance, leaned against a pillar, and sighed. Until Wen Zihui’s shot put competition ended, Shen Juan did not reply to the message. Lin Yujing began to regret it.

Thinking it over carefully, she felt that her question was too direct.

Maybe Shen Juan thought she was abrupt, and their relationship hadn’t reached that level yet.

But since the question was already asked, there was no way to take it back. Since he didn’t reply, she was too embarrassed to say anything more; otherwise, it would be superfluous.

Lin Yujing returned to Class Ten’s stands and found that Shen Juan was nowhere to be seen.

She looked around but didn’t see him. She turned to Cheng Yi and asked, “Where’s my deskmate?”

“He left right after you did,” Cheng Yi said nonchalantly. “I thought he went to find you.”

“Oh,” Lin Yujing sat down, elbows on her knees, head propped up. After a while, she responded again, “Oh…”

She lowered her eyes dejectedly and pursed her lips. She regretted it. She shouldn’t have asked anything. Was he angry?

Cheng Yi and Lu Jiahang had been hanging around for two days. They initially planned to stay until the weekend, but that evening, Cheng Yi received a call from his dad. He had forgotten his grandfather’s birthday was on the weekend, and his father scolded him harshly.

So the next day, Lin Yujing asked for leave from the sports meet, saying she had fallen and didn’t feel well after sleeping. Liu Fuxiang approved it without a word.

She spent the whole day with Lu Jiahang and Cheng Yi, and in the evening, she saw them off at the airport, not having any time to think about Shen Juan.

It wasn’t until she was on the subway back to the city center from the airport, when it suddenly became quiet around her, that she remembered the matter.

Lin Yujing sat in the subway, swinging her legs, and sent a message to Li Lin: [Boss Li, did Shen Juan go to the sports meet today?]

Boss Li replied quickly: [No! I thought you two had sneaked out to play together.]

Lin Yujing put away her phone.

Shen Juan didn’t live on campus. Since he wasn’t at school, he was probably at the studio. Lin Yujing didn’t go back to school either, but changed lines and headed home.

When she got off the subway, it was 5:30 PM. She didn’t go home but walked to the entrance of a 7-11 convenience store, stopped, and then started walking towards Shen Juan’s studio.

At the entrance of the alley, Lin Yujing looked inside but didn’t go in. After watching for a while, she continued walking to the 7-11.

She wanted to create a chance encounter. She didn’t believe Shen Juan wouldn’t come out to buy cigarettes or dinner.

She walked back and forth between the convenience store and the alley to the studio three or four times until it got dark.

The streetlights were bright, and the car lights on the street formed long lines of yellow dragons stretching into the distance.

On her fifth pass by the 7-11, Lin Yujing finally felt like she was acting like a lunatic. Walking back and forth on the main road, humming songs, wandering aimlessly.

Lin Yujing suddenly thought that maybe those who seem mentally ill aren’t really mentally ill; they might also be looking for a chance encounter!

She sighed, stood in front of the large glass window, and sneakily peeked inside.

There was a tall, thin boy in a black hoodie by the refrigerator. Lin Yujing’s view was partly blocked by the shelves; she could only see his hoodie and the back of his head. His hairstyle was the same as Shen Juan’s, and his shoulders looked similar too.

She stood at the entrance of the 7-11, tiptoeing and bouncing around, sometimes to this side, sometimes to the door, trying to find an angle to see the boy’s profile and confirm if it was Shen Juan.

After bouncing around for a while, when the cashier started giving her strange looks, the boy finally turned around.

He was quite handsome, but not Shen Juan, more of a gentle and delicate type.

Lin Yujing sighed, turned around with her head down, and saw a pair of white sneakers close by.

Startled, she looked up.

Shen Juan stood behind her, looking down at her with an indifferent expression.

Lin Yujing had been almost sure that the person inside was him. But it wasn’t. No matter, the next second, the person she had been trying to encounter since 5:30 PM, and for whom she had circled until her stomach was growling, appeared right behind her.

So close, silently, who knows how long he had been standing there.

Lin Yujing’s startled expression hadn’t faded yet, mixed with the embarrassment of being caught doing something sneaky. She stammered, “Sh-Shen Juan?”

“Is that guy your type?” Shen Juan asked calmly..