𝗗𝗔𝗬 𝗗𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗠, zhong chenle

三

THREE — day dream.

Yuyan placed herself behind Renjun, wondering how he even knew her name and why he chose her, specifically. There were way better basketball players in her class yet he chose the brunette. What shocked the girl even more was how the students on her team were talking to her normally. They called her by her name whereas usually, they wouldn't even talk to her.

She quickly looked at Meiling, who was as surprised. Meiling, for her part, was taken in Chenle's team. She didn't understand what was happening earlier, but she now saw what Yuyan was talking about. They always had been outcasts, but today, it was as if they went from the status of invisible students to "normal" students. But nothing was normal. Nothing has been the same since Yuyan woke up.

Once the teams were formed, Renjun took his team's jerseys and passed them over. Yuyan took hers while staring intensely at a scuff mark on the floor, not wanting to meet the boy's gaze. Afterwards, he briefly explained the team exercises.

The brunette tried her best to do them, although her best can't even be considered good. But it's the efforts that matter, right? Soon after, people on her team helped her with the exercises, which only reinforced her incomprehension. "What are they actually trying to do?" she asked herself, brows knitted together.

The teacher hung up the order of the tournaments, and right before the game started, Chenle came to encourage a Yuyan who couldn't hide her surprise or her red cheeks. She searched for Meiling's gaze, trying to pass the message—her incomprehension—to her. The other teenager quickly understood and signaled that she didn't understand any more than her.

During the tournament, Yuyan didn't have time to think about what was happening; between the quarters tiring her, Renjun and the others trying to start a conversation with her, and the glances Chenle was throwing at her. She just wanted to go back home and sleep.

The class ended too slowly for her taste, but at least she could go home now. On the way back, she had all the time to ask herself the questions trotting in her head. Why was everyone nice to her? Why was everyone suddenly friendly? But mostly, why was the most handsome guy in her school talking to her? It didn't make any sense.

Within half a day, her high school life had drastically changed. She wasn't too worried about it, by the next day it'll probably all go back to normal. The brunette was left to think that people in Beijing had a shifting mood.

When she opened her house door, she felt a huge stroke of fatigue. Yuyan laid down and attempted to sleep, but she couldn't fall into the arms of Morpheus, with too many thoughts bothering her. Although she tried convincing herself earlier that everything would go back to normal the next day, there were still "what ifs" that ran through her head.

Knowing she won't be able to fall asleep, Yuyan decided to go on with her day. She took a shower, put on pyjamas, and watched tv. When her parents came back from work, they ate together, and the girl went to sleep immediately after.

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The brunette suddenly lifted her head and was shocked by her surroundings; she woke up in the middle of her classroom. What? Her classroom? What was she doing here? Two minutes ago, maybe two hours, she was in her bed. She was dreaming. She couldn't think about it in any other way.

While she was slowly awakening from her slumber, she saw Chenle, Renjun and a red-haired girl sitting together at the other extremity of the classroom. They weren't paying attention to her. Yuyan also noticed that there was no Meiling in sight. She was probably... Actually, no. She didn't know what her friend was doing nor where she was.

And she didn't know what she, herself, was doing there, because she fell asleep in her bed. Yet the whole situation seemed so real, it looked just like a regular lunchtime in her high school. Chenle and Renjun were just like they always had been. It was a totally normal situation, practically.

Yuyan was feeling unwell. Her vision became slightly blurry because of a sudden headache. One hand was holding her head, while the other was clutching her stomach.

She returned to the same position as before, head wrapped in her arms, looking for sleep. It seemed it wouldn't have worked but only a few minutes later, she was sound asleep.

⋆⋆⋆

Yuyan woke up in her bed this time. It was indeed a dream. She felt better than the previous day and was less tired. She got ready and ate with no enthusiasm, as usual. The girl was telling herself that she was going to have to undergo another weird day, once again, and she really wasn't feeling like it. She didn't have the energy to do that. But she had to.