The New Deskmate

Wednesday afternoon, after finishing classes with the other sections, Zhuang Fangqin walked back to the office with her lesson plans.

She raised an eyebrow slightly when she saw the person leaning against her desk.

"Oh, a rare guest." Zhuang Fangqin took off her lapel mic and set it on the desk.

Yu Fan: "Didn't I come by yesterday?"

"I mean you rarely come on your own initiative." Zhuang Fangqin sat down. "Alright, what's up?"

Yu Fan got straight to the point: "I want to change seats."

"To where?"

"Last row, next to the podium, anywhere."

Zhuang Fangqin took a sip of water. "Either give me a valid reason, or don't waste both our time."

Yu Fan: "My new desk mate is affecting my studies."

"?"

Zhuang Fangqin stared at him in surprise, unable to figure out how he could say something like that with a straight face.

"How is he affecting you?"

"His writing's too loud, he smells bad, he looks down on bad students—"

"Bullshit!" Zhuang Fangqin smacked him with her lesson plans. "This seating arrangement was something Chen Jingshen personally asked me to set up. How could he look down on you?"

Yu Fan was silent for a moment, then repeated: "He personally asked for it?"

Zhuang Fangqin: "What else?"

Fuck.

Why is this guy so annoying?

"Why does he get to sit wherever he wants?" As soon as Yu Fan said it, he felt the words sounded familiar.

Zuo Kuan had said something similar yesterday.

"What do you think?" Zhuang Fangqin said. "The top student in the whole grade voluntarily offers to help a classmate who's struggling academically. Isn't that a great thing?"

"Give that great thing to someone else. I don't want it."

"It's not up to you." Zhuang Fangqin waved the pen in her hand and said bluntly, "Go back to the classroom. Come talk to me about changing seats when your math score has a zero added to the end. Then you can sit wherever you want — even if it's in Director Hu's office, I'll find a way to make it happen."

"..."

Yu Fan's face was dark when he got back to the classroom.

When he saw the person sitting next to his seat, it got even darker.

During the break, people in the class were either sleeping or chatting, and some had gone to the cafeteria to buy food. The only person still sitting upright doing problems was Chen Jingshen.

"Yu Fan, where'd you go?"

Wang Luan'an had been moved to the next group over. Since both of Yu Fan's front desk mates were gone right now, he'd taken someone else's seat.

Yu Fan sat down without glancing at the person next to him. "Bathroom."

"Oh, why didn't you call me to go with you?"

"Call you for what? To keep watch?"

"Not a bad idea." Wang Luan'an turned around to sit, his arms resting on the back of the chair. He complained, "Hey, you have no idea how miserable I am. That Discipline Officer desk mate of mine doesn't watch anything in class, just stares at me the whole time. I can't even use my Mobile Phone... No way, I have to ask Fangqin to switch seats. Whoever wants this cursed seat can have it."

"I'll take it." Yu Fan said. "Wanna swap with me?"

Wang Luan'an froze for a second and instinctively glanced at the person next to Yu Fan.

Chen Jingshen's eyes were lowered, his pen not stopping.

He peeked at the question bank Chen Jingshen had under his hand. Damn, one look and he was already sleepy.

He felt like there was something weird between this new transfer student and Yu Fan, but it wasn't what Yu Fan had said.

"That's not a bad idea either." Wang Luan'an went along with it. "But shouldn't we ask the senior if he's okay with it?"

Yu Fan frowned. "What does he have to do with it..."

"No swapping." A low voice drifted over from beside him.

Yu Fan: "."

He hadn't expected Chen Jingshen to respond, and Wang Luan'an was also taken aback.

"No swapping, no swapping, we were just talking casually. Fangqin's seating arrangements basically can't be changed by anyone." Wang Luan'an shifted a little closer and seized the chance to ask the question that had been bugging him all night. "By the way, senior, yesterday you said 'if you like looking, sit closer'... what were you looking at?"

"Bang."

Yu Fan's hand jerked, and the phone he'd just taken out fell to the floor.

Chen Jingshen said, "Looking at—"

Yu Fan: "Director Hu."

Chen Jingshen: "."

Wang Luan'an: "..."

Wang Luan'an squinted in confusion. "Director Hu? Fatty Hu? What does he have to do with this seat?"

"Yeah," Yu Fan said without batting an eye, "from my seat, if you stand up you can see the office downstairs."

Wang Luan'an: "How come I never noticed?"

Normal. Even the person involved hadn't noticed.

Chen Jingshen glanced at Yu Fan's mouth, wondering how this guy could still spin such bullshit.

Wang Luan'an stood up and tried. "Can't see it."

Yu Fan: "You're too short."

"Damn." Wang Luan'an looked at Chen Jingshen. "Senior, you like Fat... Director Hu? Why? He doesn't even teach our class, does he?"

Sensing the fierce glare from the person next to him, Chen Jingshen held his pen between his fingers and was silent for two seconds.

"Yeah," he said flatly, "I like the math handouts he writes."

Wang Luan'an: "..."

Yu Fan picked up his school jacket, spread it on the desk like a pillow, and started shooing him away. "Go back to your seat. I'm gonna sleep."

The break ended, the bell rang, and the physics teacher walked in with the textbook.

The Class Monitor called for everyone to stand, and Chen Jingshen got up, only to find the space beside him empty.

Yu Fan was lying on the desk, already asleep.

He'd been sleeping face-down with his jacket wrapped around him, but when it got stuffy, he twisted his head to reveal half his face.

The boy's eyes were closed, his nose bridge straight and prominent, the two small moles at the corner of his eye and on his right cheek maintaining a delicate balance — much less aggressive-looking than when he was awake.

So moles don't grow with age.

"Sit down," the physics teacher repeated. He pushed up his glasses and looked at the person still standing in the back row. "Chen Jingshen?"

Chen Jingshen withdrew his gaze and sat back down.

...

Yu Fan was woken up by the sound of a desk being smacked.

The moment he lifted his head, he got a cold glare from Zhuang Fangqin.

Seeing that he was awake, Zhuang Fangqin stopped slapping the podium with her lesson plans and held up a stack of test papers. "Clear everything off your desks. We're using these two self-study periods for a test. You've had such a long break, I want to see how much knowledge you've forgotten. I'm grading this, so take it seriously. The first person in each group, come up and get the papers, then pass them back."

Yu Fan's fingers twitched. He buried his face back in his arms and only sat up reluctantly when the test paper reached him.

Zhuang Fangqin was strict about proctoring, her gaze sweeping everywhere, but she rarely looked in Yu Fan's direction.

Because the teachers all knew that Yu Fan was very honest when it came to tests — he got whatever score he got and never bothered to cheat.

Yu Fan pulled out a pen and wrote his name, planning to go back to sleep once Zhuang Fangqin wasn't looking.

Because he was drowsy, his handwriting was crooked, like a caterpillar chopped into pieces.

A few seconds later, Yu Fan suddenly remembered something. He slowly lifted his head and thought back—

What did Fangqin say today?

If he scored over 90 on the math test, he could sit wherever he wanted.

Yu Fan propped his chin on his hand, and the more he thought, the more awake he got.

He rubbed his face, sat up straight, lowered his head, and for once seriously flipped through the math test paper in his hands—

Great.

Can't understand a single question.

Yu Fan held his pen and, for the first time since the seat change, observed the classmates around him.

The two at the desk to his right were only slightly better than him. To his left were Wang Luan'an and the discipline officer. In front of him were Zhang Xianjing and a short-haired girl who was quiet and reserved, someone he'd exchanged maybe three sentences with over three semesters.

Either he couldn't copy from them, or they couldn't score over 90.

Yu Fan sat there forcing his eyes open for a while.

It wasn't until Zhuang Fangqin shifted her sitting position on the platform that he reluctantly moved his eyes and secretly glanced at the person next to him.

Everyone around him was still stuck on the multiple-choice questions on the first page, but Chen Jingshen had already reached the end of the second page.

Yu Fan didn't struggle much internally. Right now, he just wanted to grab his desk and roll over to sit under the blackboard.

Two minutes later, after confirming that Zhuang Fangqin wasn't looking their way, he propped one hand up to block his own view and sneaked a peek at the test paper under Chen Jingshen's hand.

Thanks to his lack of interest in studying, Yu Fan's eyesight was excellent. He was just about to make out the first multiple-choice question—

Chen Jingshen picked up his scratch paper and lightly covered the part of the test paper he'd already written on.

Yu Fan: "?"

He instinctively looked at the owner of the paper.

Chen Jingshen was focused on his work, not even giving him a sidelong glance.

Chen Jingshen: "Do your own paper."

-

Zhuang Fangqin was proctoring, so he couldn't play on his phone or sleep.

Yu Fan resigned himself, leaned back, stuck his hands in his pockets, and started looking out the window.

"Certain classmates, get your mind back here. Even if you really want to go pick trash, you have to wait until graduation." Zhuang Fangqin's voice drifted coolly down from the platform.

The "certain classmate" turned his head back in boredom.

The test paper was full of lines and numbers that made him dizzy.

So he let his gaze wander and started scanning the classroom.

Everyone else was seriously working on the test. Only two people were distracted like him.

Zhang Xianjing had finished guessing the multiple-choice questions and was now tidying her split ends.

Wang Luan'an... had his hand blocking his face to shield himself from Zhuang Fangqin's view, sneaking a look at the discipline officer's test paper.

Wang Luan'an kept his head still, his eyes twisted at a weird angle. If Yu Fan hadn't been looking closely, he wouldn't have noticed he was peeking.

Of course, the discipline officer didn't notice either.

So how did Chen Jingshen notice? He'd been so careful.

And didn't he say he liked him?

Won't even let him copy the test?

What the hell is the use of these top students' liking someone anyway.

Thinking this, Yu Fan glanced to the side again.

Chen Jingshen had scratch paper under his hand and was still seriously working on the problems. Most people's scratch paper was so messy even they couldn't read it, but Chen Jingshen was different — his scratch paper was clean and neat. You'd think he was writing the final answers.

At that moment, Chen Jingshen's gaze was fixed on the last problem on the paper. His lips were pressed tight, and he raised his right hand to prop up his temple, as if deep in thought.

Just two seconds later, his brow relaxed, his fingers deftly twirled the pen, and he pulled over the scratch paper and started writing.

"One minute until I collect the papers. Put your pens down the moment time's up. Don't write a single stroke more. No one's going to give you extra time in the college entrance exam."

The sound of Zhuang Fangqin's voice snapped Yu Fan back to reality, and he withdrew his gaze.

What a top student — still solving problems in the last minute.

He grabbed his school jacket, ready to leave as soon as the papers were collected.

Suddenly, with a "swish," a sheet of scratch paper full of writing was placed in front of him.

Yu Fan paused in the middle of putting on his jacket. His eyes lingered on the scratch paper for a moment, and he recognized it as the one Chen Jingshen had been writing on. It was densely covered with formulas.

After confirming there wasn't some stupid tutoring book title written on it, he asked coldly, "What's this?"

"The answers and solutions to the test." Chen Jingshen tossed his pen into his pencil case and turned to look at him. "Weren't you trying to see them?"

"..."

Yeah, I was trying to see them. I wanted to see them in the last fucking minute of the test.