What respectable man and woman would go looking for thrills in a hallway? Song Xinya had not misjudged Tiantianquan and Chen Siyan in the slightest. When a wave met a rattle drum, the two of them simply went wild together.
Whatever went on between them was their business. As long as they were happy, that was all that mattered.
Song Xinya stopped asking about them and instead said, “What do you think of the neighbor across from you?”
Tiantianquan replied, “Aside from his gloomy air and mysterious demeanor, I’ve never seen him do anything illegal. How about this? I have connections all over the neighborhood. I’ll ask around for you.”
The next day, Tiantianquan came back with the results of her investigation.
“The guy across from me probably isn’t a problem. The auntie who sweeps the neighborhood says she often sees him going out in the middle of the night to do good deeds, like putting the electric scooters that people park haphazardly back in order.”
That day, Song Xinya went to teach him, and nothing unexpected happened.
After finishing the lesson, she returned home without incident.
She crossed another day off the calendar.
Only four days remained until Qin Yuhe came back!
That evening, while video-chatting with Qin Yuhe, she watched his fingers dance nimbly across the black and white keys. The skin on his palms was smooth and unblemished.
She asked delightedly, “Is your hand completely healed?”
Qin Yuhe replied, “Even if I hold a pen for a long time, it doesn’t hurt anymore.”
“Really? It’s all better!”
“When I get back, I’ll play the piano for you.”
Song Xinya’s arched brows and eyes curved like a shattered galaxy. “I’ve been waiting for so long.”
Only four more days.
In just four days, they would be able to see each other!
They chatted for a while longer. When they were about to hang up, Qin Yuhe asked, “Are you still going to that client’s place across from Tiantianquan tomorrow?”
“Yes. According to the rules, I’ll give one more trial lesson tomorrow, and then we’ll sign the contract.”
The next day, Song Xinya was teaching the twelfth-grader when she suddenly heard a commotion outside the door.
At first, she paid it no mind.
The twelfth-grader reminded her, “Teacher Song, it sounds like your best friend, Tiantianquan, is back.”
“How do you know Tiantianquan and I are best friends?”
His answer was as airtight as ever. “I saw you walking Tiantianquan home in the neighborhood before, so I knew you were best friends.”
“How do you know the neighbor across the hall is called Tiantianquan?”
“I often hear the grandparents who clean the neighborhood calling her that. It’s a very memorable name, so I remembered it right away.”
Song Xinya stood up and walked toward the door.
When she opened it, Tiantianquan greeted her with a brilliant smile. “Surprise! Are you happy to see me, bestie?”
Song Xinya really was surprised. “Didn’t you say you wouldn’t be back for another two days?”
“I came back early just to see you.”
“You came back so suddenly. I was even planning to buy you a bouquet and pick you up at the airport.”
“We were thinking alike. I brought you a bouquet.”
Song Xinya asked happily, “What kind of flowers did you bring me?”
Tiantianquan spun around three times, then pressed both hands to her cheeks and batted her eyes. “This sunflower right here.”
Song Xinya groaned, “Ugh—!”
Tiantianquan: “...”
“What’s wrong with you? The moment you see me, your stomach gets upset. Am I Helicobacter pylori or something?”
“You’re worse than Helicobacter pylori. You’re Helicobacter ugly-pylori.”
Tiantianquan turned her face away with a huff. “Hmph! I’m not giving you any of the delicious food I brought back from Korea.”
Song Xinya coaxed her, “You’re a gorgeous beauty.”
Tiantianquan huffed again, turned around, took out her keys, unlocked her own door, and marched straight inside.
Song Xinya followed her in. “You’re really not ugly. You’re the most beautiful person in the world. You’re Helicobacter beauty-pylori.”
Tiantianquan: “...Stop complimenting me. You’re praising me into something that isn’t even human anymore.”
Tiantianquan opened her suitcase, and the two of them squatted beside it, happily sharing snacks.
By the time they came to their senses, they had no idea when the twelfth-grader had entered the room.
They looked toward the door again and realized that, at some point, it had already been closed.
At once, alarm bells began ringing in both girls’ minds.
Tiantianquan stood up and stared at the twelfth-grader. “Your home is across the hall. What are you doing in mine?”
The twelfth-grader apparently felt there was no longer any need to keep pretending. A damp, sinister smile spread across his face.
“Because I like both of you, so I came in.”
Tiantianquan actually laughed. “You like both of us? Who do you think you are, the male lead of some wish-fulfillment novel? You want to have two women in your arms and enjoy the blessings of having them both?”
“Why not?” The twelfth-grader’s gaze roamed back and forth over Tiantianquan’s and Song Xinya’s chests and buttocks. He licked his lips. “I don’t just want to hold both of you in my arms. I want to sleep with both of you at the same time.”
“Ugh, get lost!”
Tiantianquan pointed at his nose and launched into a tirade:
“Your thoughts are like excrement in a public toilet—apart from being filthy, they’re completely useless. Don’t mistake being vulgar for being funny. That isn’t humor; it’s the mess your parents made by failing to raise you properly. Take that reek of your lower half and shove it back where it came from. Don’t pollute the air. You look like a dirty rag, your taste is garbage, and your brain—both the big one and the little one combined—couldn’t amount to more than five centimeters. Every word out of your mouth proves what a lowlife you are. You can’t live like a decent human being, and you won’t even manage a proper corpse when you die. Have you never seen a woman before? Is harassing women the only way you can satisfy that pathetic excuse for self-esteem? At your core, you’re nothing but a worthless piece of trash with no manners, no upbringing, and no boundaries. Your head is full of garbage, and every time you open your mouth, you spew sewage. You pollute the environment and disgust every normal person around you. I suggest you make an appointment at a psychiatric hospital and get that filthy excuse for a brain examined. You come out every day just to embarrass yourself, and you don’t even realize how utterly despicable you are. You’ve gone completely insane with your own shamelessness!”
While Tiantianquan was cursing him out, Song Xinya quietly moved to the side and picked up two baseball bats.
She kept one and tossed the other to Tiantianquan.
Tiantianquan raised the bat. “Get the hell out of my house! You waste air while you’re alive, waste land when you’re dead, and waste money when you’re half-dead, you piece of trash!”
The twelfth-grader gave an evil smile. “You think holding a bat will stop me?”
“I was so desperate to sleep with both of you that I couldn’t sleep at night. I had to go outside and rearrange the electric scooters in the neighborhood to burn off all that restless energy.”
“I pretended I needed a private tutor to lure Song Xinya to my apartment. In reality, I dropped out of school long ago. I never intended to take the college entrance exam.”
Only then did Song Xinya realize that his entire identity had been fabricated.
This man was far more calculating than he looked!
The man took off his jacket and threw it onto the floor, his greedy gaze sweeping over the two women.
“Are you two going to let me have my way with you willingly, or do you want me to beat you into submission first and then have my way with you?”
Tiantianquan spat on the floor. “Who the hell do you think you are? Go screw your mother!”
She raised the baseball bat and swung it at the man’s head. “Aah! I’ll beat you to death!”
The man caught the bat with one hand, without the slightest effort.
Tiantianquan blinked. “Oh, he caught the bat.”
No matter. Song Xinya had already circled behind him. Gripping her baseball bat with both hands, she raised it high and brought it crashing down on the man’s head.
Bang!
