Becoming Friends
Jun Yue looked at Fang Anyu, then looked at the few words Fang Anyu had written. She felt as if there was something wrong with her comprehension. What did he mean by “Don’t be anxious, I washed it”?
With trembling hands, she took the little notebook and shakily wrote:
— You… how did you wash it?
After Fang Anyu read it, he took the notebook and replied seriously:
— I saw it in a book. To clean bloodstains, you soak them in cold water first, then scrub them with soap and it’s fine.
Jun Yue tilted her neck and stared at Fang Anyu’s little notebook as if she could not understand it. Then she saw him write again:
— The soap didn’t smell very good, so I scrubbed it again with scented soap.
Fang Anyu handed the notebook to Jun Yue, but Jun Yue did not take it this time. Instead, with her face flushed red, she looked at him with an indescribable gaze. A complicated feeling slowly rose in her heart.
Was it really necessary? Just to get close to her, he was even willing to do something like this?
Jun Yue had encountered many pursuers before, but she had always treated them as if she were watching a show. Yet Fang Anyu’s strange, unconventional approach left her a little unable to handle it.
Fang Anyu was especially patient. Because communication was difficult for him, it was rare for anyone apart from his family and teachers to be willing to pay attention to him. So he treasured an opportunity to communicate like this. Jun Yue did not take the notebook. She only looked at him without speaking. But as long as she did not get up and leave, even if she sat there for most of the day, Fang Anyu could quietly wait.
Jun Yue really did hesitate for a long time. In her heart, it was not exactly that she was moved. She herself was not the type of person who would waver just because she was touched. Otherwise, she would have gotten together with Wu Zhenfei long ago.
But if one said she liked him? She and Fang Anyu had only interacted a few times, though the scale of each interaction had been rather extreme… Still, for him to suddenly come over and say he wanted to be friends, Jun Yue could not quite figure out her own feelings. She could not agree so rashly. After all, this would be her first love!
And Fang Anyu’s way of pursuing someone was far too strange!
Jun Yue had now completely misunderstood Fang Anyu’s meaning. She had distorted his “being friends” into becoming boyfriend and girlfriend, rather than simply becoming a friend he could communicate with. Fang Anyu had no concept of that at all.
Jun Yue thought for a long time. She was not someone who could not make sense of her own feelings. Toward Fang Anyu, whether because of their similar experiences or because of how she felt when she was with him, it was indeed a little too soon to call it liking. But she truly was somewhat moved by his actions that made her both angry and amused.
So Jun Yue called and cancelled her plans to go out with her girlfriends. Then she solemnly took the little notebook and wrote:
— Becoming friends can’t happen this quickly. We’ve only met a few times, and…
Jun Yue looked at Fang Anyu’s quiet brows and eyes, then wrote:
— You should at least do it properly. Be a little romantic. Don’t do all these strange things. At the very least, give me some gifts, smile at me more, hug me, kiss…
Jun Yue quickly crossed out the words “hug” and “kiss.” Her face turned as red as a big tomato. She had no idea what nonsense she was writing, and she did not dare turn her head to look at Fang Anyu. The hand holding the pen was gripping so hard that her fingers had gone pale.
Fang Anyu kept staring at the little notebook. After understanding it, he acted quickly enough. He turned sideways and reached out to hug Jun Yue.
Jun Yue: …I already crossed it out! This lecher. He really is just pretending to be pure!
While she was howling inwardly, Fang Anyu kissed her on the side of her face.
It was very light, but Jun Yue still stiffened like a wooden club.
She turned her neck stiffly and met Fang Anyu’s eyes from up close. Although Fang Anyu felt that something seemed a little off, this was also his first time making a friend. Previously, when he had seen his younger brother’s friends, they were always putting their arms around him too. As for whether they kissed or not, Fang Anyu had happened to see that before as well.
Of course, that had all been in play. A quick smack, just messing around. Between boys, sometimes they would do it deliberately to gross each other out. Fang Anyu had read some books, but he was still in the process of learning many things. There had not been a single book that had clearly told him friends could not kiss, or that only a certain kind of friend could kiss.
Fang Anyu thought that since this was what Jun Yue had asked for, and since he did not understand, he should simply do as she said. So when Jun Yue finally turned her head and looked at him from very close up, he happened to give her a big smile.
Jun Yue had asked him to smile at her.
In all the years Jun Yue had been alive, this was the first time she had been held in a boy’s arms and kissed on the cheek. Her heart was pounding as if several little deer were wildly crashing around inside it.
Her breath mingled with Fang Anyu’s. With a buzz in her mind, all thoughts of how short a time they had known each other, how they had only met a few times, and how rationally speaking she was only a little interested in him, all collapsed in that instant.
What was there to hesitate about? She had never obediently let a boy hold and kiss her like this before. Fang Anyu’s strength could not even be called strength. He was only lightly resting his hands on Jun Yue’s shoulders, yet Jun Yue felt as if she had been bound by six or seven solid iron chains as thick as wrists. She did not want to move at all…
“Forget it,” Jun Yue said, her voice drifting like she was talking to herself. Her lips were less than two fingers away from Fang Anyu’s. “Why go through the process? They’ve all dated several times already. Why can’t I date…”
After she finished speaking, she closed her eyes with trembling lashes. But after waiting for a while, Fang Anyu still did not kiss her. She opened one eye and looked for a while, only to see that Fang Anyu, that second fool, was still smiling at her.
Jun Yue: “…Pfft.”
Fuck. The atmosphere was gone.
She pushed Fang Anyu’s arm away and rubbed her face. Her silly smile would not stop. Fang Anyu saw her laughing and followed along, smiling too. The two of them were like a pair of idiots. After laughing for a while, Jun Yue stopped rubbing her face. Her heart felt as sweet as dripping honey. She turned her head and secretly looked at Fang Anyu, and every time, she met Fang Anyu’s gaze looking back at her.
After being shy for a while, she also looked straight at him. Inwardly, she could not help sighing. Even when staring at Fang Anyu from this close, his looks did not collapse at all. His skin was too good.
Jun Yue suddenly wanted to look in a mirror. She absolutely could not lose when it came to aura!
She picked up her sunglasses and looked. Fortunately, fortunately. Although her skin was not as good as Fang Anyu’s, it was at least not that much worse. Besides, once a girl dressed up, she was always delicate and beautiful.
The two of them sat for a while without saying anything, only occasionally looking at each other and smiling foolishly. It was very magical. With other people, not speaking would make the atmosphere go cold. But with Fang Anyu, there was no sense of awkwardness. It was even rather comfortable.
After Jun Yue passed the initial wave of embarrassment, she began to size up Fang Anyu without restraint. She leaned close to look at him. He did not dodge either. He even smiled at her. He was… kind of fun.
And truly good-looking.
No one was not a visual creature. Jun Yue even planned to take Fang Anyu out and show him off, because among her girlfriends, not a single one of their boyfriends was better-looking than Fang Anyu.
But while Jun Yue was pushing aside Fang Anyu’s bangs to see what he looked like with his fringe lifted, Fang Anyu took another phone out of the bag beside Jun Yue and handed it to her.
Jun Yue looked and saw that it was exactly the phone she had wanted to give Fang Anyu that day, but had not given him in the end and also had not taken back.
Fang Anyu wrote:
— You left this at my house.
Jun Yue smiled. She took the phone, unlocked it, and typed on it:
— This was meant as a gift for you.
Fang Anyu froze for a moment. Then he became so excited that his eyelashes kept fluttering, like butterflies about to take flight. He looked extremely beautiful. This kind of reaction truly gave the person giving the gift a huge sense of achievement. Jun Yue could not help holding Fang Anyu’s head and kissing him on the eye.
Fang Anyu held the phone and looked it over again and again. In truth, his mother had given him phones twice before, even two years ago. Unfortunately, he had not been able to learn how to use them either time. Later, his family stopped letting him learn, and he had also become discouraged.
But over the past two years, he had learned more and had started wanting one again. Still, he had never brought it up to his family. Fang Anyu did not want to make himself troublesome.
Seeing him so happy, Jun Yue typed again:
— I went to find you that day specifically because I wanted to give this to you. It’s a limited edition. Better than your brother’s.
Fang Anyu looked it over for quite a while before his expression slowly dimmed. He wrote in the little notebook:
— It’s really pretty. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to use it.
Jun Yue was truly shocked that a family like his did not give him a phone. But in her heart, she had automatically categorised Fang Anyu’s father and mother as wicked parents. She only felt sorry for Fang Anyu.
Jun Yue typed on the phone:
— It’s fine. I’ll teach you.
And so, for most of the day, Jun Yue sat on the bench until her backside went numb, teaching Fang Anyu little by little, over and over, how to type. She taught him how to use little emojis, set his phone to vibrate, and taught him how to answer video calls. If he made a mistake, she would kiss him on the cheek as interest, happily collecting her payment.
By the afternoon, when the two of them got up from the bench, the phone had already run out of battery, and the two of them were much more intimate than before. Fang Anyu’s eyes were extremely bright. He was still looking at the enlarged, annotated paper keyboard for typing on a phone that Jun Yue had written out for him in the notebook.
Jun Yue pressed her stomach and typed on her own phone:
— I’m hungry. Let’s go eat.
Fang Anyu nodded. The phone was tucked into his pocket, and even though it was out of battery, he still loved it too much to let it go. Every now and then, he would touch it, making Jun Yue laugh.
The Jun family’s area was a villa district, but it was not very far from the city. What it valued was quiet within the bustle. As long as one crossed through the park and followed the golf course, one could directly reach a night market.
Jun Yue simply took Fang Anyu and walked over there. Meanwhile, the driver who had brought Fang Anyu had waited the entire day. It was almost dark, yet he still had not seen Fang Anyu. Mother Fang had called several times to ask, and when she heard him say that the Jun family’s young miss had not returned either, she did not say anything else and only told him to keep waiting there.
Jun Yue took Fang Anyu to eat snacks, grilled skewers, all kinds of fried rice, seafood, and other things. She did not often eat this kind of food, but eating it occasionally tasted very good. Fang Anyu had clearly never eaten it before. His appetite shocked Jun Yue. In the end, she was afraid he would overeat and called a stop. Only then did he reluctantly stop, still wanting more.
On the way back, the little path was very dark. Jun Yue had eaten and drunk her fill. The wind blew gently. Holding Fang Anyu’s hand, her heart was so sweet she could die. Ah, she finally understood why all her girlfriends liked dating!
It was really nice. Hehe.
Jun Yue used her phone to light the path. Fang Anyu’s warm palm kept intentionally or unintentionally supporting her. The road was not actually difficult to walk, but this action was truly heart-warming. When they passed through the woods, he even raised his hand beside Jun Yue’s face to prevent her from being scratched by branches.
Jun Yue’s heart grew softer and softer, so soft it almost lost its shape.
Although Fang Anyu could not speak and communicating with him was very difficult, he really was very good.
At her age, she only cared about whether she liked someone or not. Once she was certain, she would go forward without hesitation. She would not consider anything about the future.
So when her heart moved, she acted. Just as they were about to leave the small woods, she held Fang Anyu’s hand and stopped.
She had always heard about all kinds of romantic stories happening in little groves. Since they had come to one, it would truly be a pity not to develop some kind of story.
Jun Yue pointed the phone’s light down toward their feet. She let go of the hand that had been holding Fang Anyu’s and instead wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing herself against him.
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