Orange Storm chapter 12
To find someone
Perhaps because the previous night Fang Xing’s whole body and mind were in a tense state, after applying the medicine, he went to bed and fell asleep. He didn’t feel particularly exhausted. It wasn’t until the early morning of the next day that he woke up, and the soreness all over his body almost prevented him from getting up.
Breaking his usual habit, he allowed himself to lie down for ten minutes before getting up to fetch his clothes. His muscles ached, making him somewhat weak. Upon leaving his room, he found that Jiang Zhijin had already changed and was sitting at the dining table, playing with his phone.
It was the first time he had seen Jiang Zhijin, who usually woke up close to afternoon, wake up so early, causing him to subconsciously check his phone to confirm if he had misread the time.
Jiang Zhijin’s phone wasn’t on silent this time, and even from a few steps away, Fang Xing could hear the distinctive cheerful sound effects of Candy Crush.
“Great!” “Excellent!” “Unbelievable!”
Amid the exaggerated musical sounds, Jiang Zhijin glanced up at Fang Xing. “Morning. If you didn’t come out in another 10 minutes, I was about to apply for leave for you.”
Breakfast was already set on the table, with milk and a plate of steamed frozen custard-filled buns. Fang Xing sat down and took a sip of the warm milk.
“Do I really not need to apply for leave for you?”
“No need,” Fang Xing swallowed the milk. “I’m fine now.”
“I’ll drive you to school later.”
Fang Xing instinctively wanted to say it’s not necessary, but he restrained himself from uttering those words at the last moment.
He remembered what Jiang Zhijin had said last night.
Be a bit more arrogant, Fang Xing.
Fang Xing tilted his head back, finishing the milk and placing the cup down.
“Let’s go.”
It was still early on the way to school, and the traffic wasn’t heavy. Jiang Zhijin was still driving, and Fang Xing sat in the passenger seat, opening the window to let in the morning breeze.
Street cleaners, elderly people doing morning exercises, vendors selling breakfast by the roadside, and even a few students in school uniforms riding bicycles swiftly across the street.
The cool and vibrant atmosphere of early autumn morning.
When they reached the school gate, Jiang Zhijin looked at FFang Xing getting out of the car and said, “Study well, don’t worry, I’ll handle this matter.”
Fang Xing, who was about to walk away, heard this and immediately turned around, staring at Jiang Zhijin outside the car.
“How will you handle it?”
“Just focus on studying, leave the adult matters to me.” Jiang Zhijin smiled in response.
Seeing Fang Xing not moving, staring at him disapprovingly, he continued, “Rest assured, it will be resolved peacefully, and nothing will happen.”
Fang Xing looked at Jiang Zhijin with a bit of disbelief, but the school had already started ringing the preparation bell, so he could only say, “Take care.”
Jiang Zhijin nodded, “Got it, go on.”
Fang Xing walked towards the school but couldn’t help turning his head when he reached the entrance. He felt like he was being overly concerned.
Jiang Zhijin’s car was still in the same place. It wasn’t until he walked a bit into the school that the car turned on its indicator lights and slowly drove away.
He withdrew his gaze and didn’t look back.
He was indeed a bit late today. Xu Hang had already been sitting at his desk memorizing “Yueyang Tower Inscription.” When he saw Fang Xing, he quickly stood up, pulled out a chair for him, and warmly greeted, “Good morning, desk mate! Have you eaten?”
Fang Xing, who had been thinking about how Jiang Zhijin would handle the matter, had his thoughts interrupted by this remark.
“…Yes, I have.”
“The English class representative collected homework just now. I handed in yours along with mine. Thanks a lot for saving my life.”
It was then that Fang Xing remembered lending his homework to Xu Hang last night.
“Don’t mention it. Did you randomly change a few answers?”
Xu Hang made an OK gesture, “Don’t worry, I’m proficient in my job. I changed two questions for every ten.”
The weekend English homework was a special English report designated by the school, focusing on thematic training, including cloze tests and reading comprehension, totaling one hundred and fifty questions.
Fang Xing was stunned for a moment, turning to Xu Hang and asking, “…How much do you usually score in English?”
The usually shameless Xu Hang surprisingly seemed a bit shy, “There’s a bit of a distance from the passing line… around fifty or sixty.”
Fang Xing fell silent for a moment and finally said, “Congratulations.”
Xu Hang was puzzled, raising his hand to say, “Thank you.”
Fang Xing: “…”
It wasn’t until the afternoon English class that Xu Hang understood the meaning of Fang Xing’s congratulations.
The English teacher, Ms. Li, was young and tall, quite beautiful, always smiling. Some students even added a character in private, calling her Li Bingbing.
In addition to being good-looking, she was also very dedicated to teaching. For example, other teachers might let students cross-edit their homework, but she always marked them herself, leaving comments.
On the podium, a stack of English reports was pressed under Ms. Li’s hand. There were bright red marks all over them.
After reviewing the lesson on tense conversion for a session, in the last few minutes, she finally mentioned the homework left from last week.
“I spent the morning correcting your homework, and it’s still the same issues. Some students lack vocabulary, can’t understand the meaning, have difficulty distinguishing tenses, and frequently make errors in subject-verb-object agreements…”
She paused, then continued with a smile, “However, some students have made significant progress, which surprised me.”
Ms. Li’s gaze swept in this direction.
“For example, student Xu Hang, who usually hovers around fifty or sixty in exams, surprisingly scored 114 on this assignment.”
Fang Xing lowered his head, sighed silently.
Due to the proximity, he heard Xu Hang’s shocked and desperate exclamation quite clearly: “Damn it.”
Mrs. Li looked at Xu Hang, her smile causing chills: “Come, share with your classmates the method of improvement.”
Xu Hang reluctantly stood up, visibly nervous but surprisingly articulate: “There’s no special method, just diligent studying, perseverance, and the guidance of the teacher and help from classmates…”
Laughter, suppressed but audible, started to spread in the class.
Mrs. Li listened earnestly, then nodded, expressing a face of “I believe you now”: “Excellent, there’s a monthly exam this weekend. I hope you can maintain this performance. The teacher believes you can do it. Please sit down.”
Fang Xing felt the despair and collapse in Xu Hang’s heart had flooded the entire classroom. He couldn’t help but lower his head and chuckle, but in the next moment, he heard his own name.
“Fang Xing, the new student who just transferred, right?”
Fang Xing put down his pen, stood up, and looked up at the teacher on the podium.
Mrs. Li’s gaze fell on him, and then she smiled, saying, “Your homework is excellently done. Please sit down—class monitor and today’s duty student, distribute the homework. I’ll give a lecture during the self-study period. Class dismissed.”
She didn’t directly mention Fang Xing’s score. When the test papers were handed out, Fang Xing looked down to see.
146, four mistakes, pretty much as he estimated.
Lowering his head to see which questions he got wrong, he heard Xu Hang, with an expression of shock mixed with despair, mutter, “Damn, this is too unfair.”
When he looked towards him again, Xu Hang’s eyes were filled with admiration.
“Desk mate, you’re really a top student.”
“…These questions are quite basic,” Fang Xing said with a bit of helplessness, “It might be different if they were a bit more challenging.”
“Okay, excessive modesty will only hurt us bottom-tier students even more,” Xu Hang said with a melancholic expression. “No wonder you’re not afraid of parent-teacher meetings. If I scored 146, I’d demand the school to have a parent-teacher meeting every day.”
“…It’s not that serious.” Fang Xing glanced at him, then suddenly asked, “Do you have the last semester’s report card for the whole grade?”
“The whole grade? I don’t have it, but Jiang Xinxin should have a copy. She’s the class committee member,” Xu Hang said, quickly reaching over to pat the back of the chair in front.
“Class committee member, do you have the ranking from the last semester’s exam for the whole grade? My desk mate wants a copy.”
Jiang Xinxin was looking at the mistakes on her own homework. Upon hearing this, she turned around and happened to make eye contact with Fang Xing.
In general, in a class, silent and reserved students were easily overlooked. However, although Fang Xing was incredibly taciturn, since transferring, he had remained an undeniable presence.
The reason lied in his face.
Although Jiang Xinxin was not someone who judged by appearances, when she suddenly made eye contact, she realized Fang Xing’s eyes were exceptionally beautiful—thick eyelashes, pupils like soaked jade, making him appear very focused when looking at people.
She paused, feeling her ears warm up, and after a brief delay, she answered, “Yes, but it’s only available in electronic format.”
“I’ll add you on WeChat, can you send it to me? Thanks.” Fang Xing took out his phone and added a line after a moment.
“Only for the top ten in the grade.”
After dropping Fang Xing off at school, Jiang Zhijin didn’t return home but went to the bar and opened the door.
This street was typically lively with young people reveling, most active from 9 PM to 3 AM the next day. In the morning at 7 o’clock, basically, not a soul could be seen.
Jiang Zhijin cleared the empty bottles and glasses left from the previous night. Disturbing the cleanliness, he casually watered the plants at the entrance, bored.
It was only at this moment that he realized he was tired. After eating a couple of cookies from a drawer behind the bar, he went upstairs to the attic room of the bar.
The attic room wasn’t large, stacked with various types of alcohol. In the far corner, there was a foldable steel bed, just 1.2 meters wide. For a while, things weren’t peaceful, so to prevent accidents, Jiang Zhijin would stay here to manage the bar.
As soon as he touched the bed, he immediately fell asleep.
He slept heavily, only waking up abruptly upon hearing footsteps coming upstairs.
The one coming upstairs was Zhou Hong, who came to open the store. Pushing the door open and seeing Jiang Zhijin, he looked shocked.
“Oh my god, it’s you, Jiang Ge.”
“Yeah.” Jiang Zhijin rubbed his face, checked the time, and found it was 3:30 in the afternoon.
“I thought it was Gu Xun. Why did you come so early? How about we have a meal together later? There’s a new hot pot restaurant just across the street…”
“You and Gu Xun go ahead.” Jiang Zhijin smiled at Zhou Hong and stood up. “I need to go out for a bit.”
“…Sure.” Zhou Hong immediately agreed and couldn’t help but ask, “Where are you going, Jiang Ge?”
“Chang’an Street,” Jiang Zhijin said, standing up and smiling at Zhou Hong, “To find someone.”
Author’s Note:
The answer to the previous question is revealed: Of course, Jiang Ge is fond of the same sex.
If you don’t believe it, go back and carefully read the conversation in a certain chapter with Jiang Ge and Li Xingyan; it’s already quite obvious. He didn’t help Fang Xing apply the ointment because it wasn’t appropriate.
However, it’s not to the extent of not being able to control himself. Currently, Fang Xing still pretends to be a mature little kid (although he is a mature little kid with nice abs and waistlines).