Chu Mian was walking on the road after school, and out of the corner of her eye, she noticed someone quietly following her behind.
When he passed by a shop, he deliberately stopped for a moment, and through the mirror reflection of the metal plaque at the door, he confirmed the identity of the person following him.
"Yu Ran, come out." Chu Mian shouted at a poplar tree, "How long are you going to follow?"
The sides of the young man's body had already been exposed from behind the tree, and he kept closing his eyes, thinking that Chu Mian couldn't see him. Chu Mian walked over, and was attracted by the embroidery of double dragons playing with pearls on Yu Ran's black schoolbag. Looking up, there was also a huge golden lion head door knocker. It could be seen that this person had very... overbearing taste.
Without saying a word, Chu Mian grabbed the knocker on Yu Ran's schoolbag and dragged him out from behind the tree.
"I'm afraid you'll fall asleep while walking and be hit by a car." Yu Ran shrugged his neck, "I just wanted to go to the station with you, but you still kept walking. Why didn't anyone take you home? Are you worried?"
After a bucket of Star Cup reconciled the two, Chu Mian didn't expect Yu Ran to be quite wide-ranging, so he answered carefully, "I'm not serious enough to be taken care of all the time, you don't need to pay attention to me like this anymore. "
"I didn't take care of you." Yu Ran explained confidently, "I was secretly protecting you."
Chu Mian said lightly, "No need", and was curious about the reason why Yu Ran continued to show affection to herself, so she asked him directly: "It seems that I need to be protected so much?"
"Teacher Bai said that she asked us to care about you and give you warmth in the world." Yu Ran stretched out his arm to explore half a circle, as if he was sowing seeds of hope, "And I, as a freshman in Chengjun Middle School A group of chief male protagonists must shoulder the task of covering you."
What an incredible sense of responsibility.
Chu Mian was indifferent to Ran's answer, stared at him quietly for a while, and then said in a calm voice, "Yu Ran, do you think I'm weak?"
Hearing his serious tone, Yu Ran unconsciously suppressed the sloppy smile on his face, and returned the same serious expression.
Instead of answering Ran, Chu Mian continued, "You just think that I have a strange disease, so I am very fragile and need to be taken care of, and caring about me can satisfy your personal heroism fantasy, right?"
He found that Yu Ran didn't immediately deny it, as if he had acquiesced. Chu Mian was still in a calm mood: "I advise you to put away the meaningless sympathy, and don't treat me as a vulnerable group. I am no different from you except that I sleep more every day."
Probably driven by self-esteem to say these words, Chu Mian suddenly felt a lot more relaxed, and looked at Yu Ran with more calm eyes.
Finally, he said to Ran: "If you can understand what I mean, then we should be able to live in peace in the future."
Yu Ran quickly said "Oh".
He lifted the schoolbag strap on his shoulder, stared at Chu Mian's face thoughtfully, and said slowly, "So you're afraid of being cared about."
The fluffy conclusion accurately hit Chu Mian's insignificant arrogance. He subconsciously wanted to refute Yu Ran, but he couldn't find any more powerful explanation in his heart except for the three words "no", so he had no choice but to speak. He stopped turning his face away, ignoring the other party.
"Chu Mian," Yu Ran called to stop him, "I understand what you mean, if you don't like to be worried about, then I believe you can do it alone. But whether you think you are weak or strong, I will continue protect you."
This undeniably bright tone made Chu Mian speechless, Yu Ran smiled again, and said in a natural tone: "Who made us classmates."
Chu Mian was dumbfounded.
He found that Yu Ran had a kind of sincerity that would make people feel absurd. He neither seemed to condescend to pity anyone, nor did he seem to show himself grandstanding, but for Chu Mian, this kind of caring was very important. It's a bit cumbersome and tricky.
After all, he no longer needed such a thing as "friendship".
"Okay, I'm going home for dinner now, bye!" Yu Ran hasn't gone through the voice change period yet, but his voice is still loud and clean, "Where are you going now?"
Chu Mian turned around and faced the biggest store on the street, "It's right here."
Yu Ran raised his eyes, and saw the words "Tongquetai Business Club" glittering in gold.
"Ah! I know this place!" Yu Ran opened his eyes wide, "My mother said this is a 'chicken coop', why are you here?"
"I'm here to find someone." Chu Mian walked directly to the store door.
From the first time he saw the double-headed mutated Honduran milk snake during the summer vacation to the first week of school, he would come here from time to time to look for the man named Xu Si, but every time he was turned away by the staff because he didn't adult.
"Looking for someone...?" Yu Ran repeated Chu Mian's words suspiciously, and then he suddenly realized, "So you are a regular visitor here."
Chu Mian abruptly stopped, and cast a complicated look at Yu Ran.
"Don't be like this, Chu Mian." Yu Ran grabbed Chu Mian's arm anxiously, and pulled him back hard, "This kind of thing is dirty! You're still young, you're right."
Chu Mian couldn't help giving him a sneaky look, and calmly grabbed Yu Ran's wrist, "I have business to do."
Yu Ran followed Chu Mian suspiciously. They were all carrying schoolbags, and they were stopped by someone as soon as they arrived at the entrance of the clubhouse. Before the waiter opened his mouth, Chu Mian took out a few pink banknotes from his pocket and patted them on his suit.
Even if they are minors, they will be respected for such a big move. The waiter collected the money and let them in through the back door.
But Chu Mian didn't want to stay here any longer, the smell of perfume and alcohol permeated the air, a bit pungent. He went directly to the manager of the lobby and asked straight to the point where the other four Xu were.
The female manager brushed her hair impatiently, "Why are you here again? Didn't I tell you that he's busy outside?" With her palms down, she waved her fingers together as if to drive her away, "Let's go, this Not a place for a kid like you to come."
Chu Mian calmly said, "When I came in, I saw his followers, they weren't there before."
"So what?" The female manager curled her lips, "Xu Si works for our boss, if he goes out to do some errands, he can take care of his family? Don't worry, I didn't lie to you, you just want to find Xu Si Buy that long worm, what's the rush."
Chu Mian asked her Xu Si's contact information, but she shook her head and refused to give it. Even if she took out the money and handed it over, she didn't bother to look directly at her, she just lowered her head and picked her nails perfunctorily, "You are a minor, don't make trouble for me, hurry up which door If you can be honest, the next time I see Xu Si, I will help you and ask him where he got those things from."
"Those things" refer to reptile pets, and Chu Mian's ball python, Fiona, also belongs to this category.
Before leaving, Chu Mian asked persistently, "Have you seen how long Xu Siyang's double-headed snake is?"
The woman naturally didn't pay attention to such details, she hadn't had time to avoid that scary pet, but Xu Si did bring the snake to the store to show off and play with, she recalled that at that time, she gestured with her fingers, "He put the snake Put it on this bar, from here to here, so long."
Chu Mian measured the length with her eyes, nodded her thanks, and was finally willing to leave this romantic place.
Going back outside to breathe fresh air again, Yu Ran stretched out relieved, "So you are looking for the person who fought with you in the Internet cafe last time... I thought you came to 'that'."
Chu Mian flicked her sleeve vigorously, trying to disperse the remaining smell on her body, and casually said, "It's not impossible."
"Ah?" Yu Ran stopped in the middle of yawning, his nose itching unbearably, "Damn, I misread you! Fang Zhao and the others also said that you are a high-cold male god and you are quite pure. Why, why are you now Just come here, you, you are too..."
Seeing that he took his joke seriously again, Chu Mian glanced at Yu Ran, and two words silently came to mind: Muggle.
The two returned by the original route, halfway there, Yu Ran asked curiously: "Why are you looking for that man? Do you want to buy something from him?"
Chu Mian was silent for a moment, her thoughts intertwined with the wind.
After a while, he told Yu Ran: "When I was in the first grade of junior high school, I raised a very rare two-headed snake. I took it to a trade fair, but it was stolen."
"God... Did you call the police?"
"I didn't dare at that time, because I was afraid that my parents would find out, but they still found out after a few days." Chu Mian casually slowed down, looking at the dark blue sky where the afterglow was about to fade away, "My father said that the responsibility lies in my negligence, My mother didn't bother and bought me a new one. The police didn't help me find it later, so let's just forget it."
"How can it be forgotten?" Yu Ran reacted a little fiercely, "Pet also has a life, isn't it the same as abducting and trafficking children if it is replaced by humans? You are equivalent to a poor mother! Mother and child are separated, why don't they help you? "
Chu Mian was immersed in the memories of the past and savored the sadness over and over again, when he suddenly heard Yu Ran's indignant tone, he was pulled back to reality.
"It's not that serious. After all, snakes don't have feelings and don't recognize their masters. Moreover, the double-headed snake is a genetic mutation, and its body structure is destined to not live for too long..." Chu Mian's Adam's apple rolled up and down, "But I have been sleeping sick since this incident Attack, I am not reconciled."
Chu Mian didn't want to think carefully about the depressed mood during those days. Not long after losing "Marika", he became lethargic.
At the beginning when he was sleepy, Chu Mian thought that he was tired because of crying too much, but then he fell asleep after taking a shower, and even closed his eyes and fell asleep while answering questions in class, scaring the teachers and classmates to call for an ambulance .
The clinician in Ronggang believed that Chu Mian was under too much study pressure and continued to fall asleep. His mother took him to the United States and was diagnosed with "narcolepsy".
It is said that the onset of this sleep disorder is more common in adolescence, the pathogenesis is unknown, and it cannot be cured. It can only be controlled by drugs.
Yu Ran's voice was a bit heavy: "Did that man steal the snake?"
Chu Mian hesitated and said, "I don't know... Two-headed snakes are indeed very rare, but others have raised them before me, and none of them survived."
When Chu Mian saw Xu Si’s snake box during the summer vacation, Chu Mian was not so sure about the snake’s age. Judging by the length described by the manager of the clubhouse, Xu Si’s snake was only about seven or eight months old, and her own Marika If she is lucky enough to be alive, she should be about the same age as a two-year-old Fiona.
Chu Mian adjusted her breathing, as if she had made up her mind: "Even if it's not the same one, I still want to buy it from him."
Yu Ran was puzzled: "Why? Don't you think of such sad things when you look at it?"
"I can take it as Marika." Chu Mian said the name of her pet naturally, "This way I can feel better, and maybe the sleeping sickness can be relieved."
"Huh?" Yu Ran twitched the corner of his mouth exaggeratedly, "Aren't you just deceiving yourself with substitutes?"
"You don't understand." Chu Mian said decisively, "I only have two choices, either keep thinking about it in my heart, or find a chance to forget about it. The former option will make my sleepiness worse, so I choose the latter."
Yu Ran lowered his head and thought for a while, then whispered: "Okay".
He added another sigh: "Fortunately, the snake has no feelings, otherwise it would miss you as much as you miss it."
Hearing this, Chu Mian's suppressed nostalgia surged out again, and his heart became hot unexpectedly, almost bringing tears to his eye sockets. Fortunately, it was already dark, so even if there was light shining in his eyes, Yu Ran would not easily notice it.
"Well, that's why I like snakes." Chu Mian smiled lightly.
When spending time with Marija day and night, Chu Mian always regrets that this low-intelligence animal cannot develop feelings, but after losing it, Chu Mian is extremely grateful that the pain of "separation" can only be borne by himself as a human being. As long as Marijia continues to Just trying to survive is enough.
"Oh... the thief is really hateful." Yu Ran felt the same, "If you didn't lose your snake, would you still suffer from sleeping sickness?"
"Maybe not." Although Chu Mian replied, she knew in her heart that the greater possibility was "yes".
Even if some patients have encountered strong emotional stimulation before the onset, this is certainly not the direct cause of sleeping sickness. Chu Mian would rather believe that he was stimulated than admit that it was pure luck that he encountered sleeping sickness.
Chu Mian saw that Yu Ran had been depressed for a long time, and felt that he might have had another episode of empathy, so she took the initiative to restore a relaxed tone and said to him: "It's okay, I believe in the conservation of luck, and now I am unluckier than ordinary people. Definitely luckier than the average person.”
His calm self-confidence can easily catch Yu Ran's emotions, Yu Ran nodded vigorously and said, "Then I will share some luck with you, so that you can get better soon."
"That's not necessary." Chu Mian looked at Yu Ran with much gentler eyes, "I told you, you don't have to worry about my sleeping sickness, as long as you treat me like an ordinary person like you."
Yu Ran opened his mouth to retort: "I'm not ordinary."
"..."
Yu Ran's voice became clear: "Don't worry, I will treat you as a strong man like me."
Chu Mian smiled lightly, agreeing with Yu Ran's words: "Okay."
Yu Ran breathed a sigh of relief, since Chu Mian expressed that he didn't want to be concerned about his sleeping sickness, then he shouldn't make any fuss about him anymore. It's just that there are still doubts lingering in his heart for a long time, and he can hardly bear his curiosity.
"Actually, I still have a question. I wanted to ask you just now when you entered the Tongque Terrace."
Chu Mian looked back at him, "Say."
Yu Ran cautiously asked: "When you 'that'...would you fall asleep?"
His expression and tone were particularly sincere, and Chu Mian pondered for a few seconds before realizing what topic he was asking, so she immediately answered firmly: "No."
"Why?" Yu Ran asked, "Is it because you were very excited during 'that', so you weren't sleepy?"
The more specific and in-depth question caused Chu Mian's cheeks to heat up, and she said hastily, "How do I know?"
Yu Ran asked the bottom line: "You don't know? Then have you ever had 'that'?"
He immediately realized that his question was too straightforward, so he quickly mobilized his vocabulary reserves, and asked in a more elegant way: "Are you still pure and clean?"
"Yu Ran," Chu Mian's ears gradually became hot, and he laughed out of breath after taking a deep breath, "You really deserve a beating."