Chapter 3: The Basketball Court
Due to insomnia, Xie Jiaran woke up later than usual in the morning and rushed to the studio. When he arrived, there were already many people there.
The class monitor, Su Xiaoyue, was collecting assignments, holding a rather thick stack of sketches in her hands.
Xie Jiaran took out the finished drawings and handed them over. Su Xiaoyue glanced at it and gave a thumbs up in admiration, “As expected of you, the best one today.”
Xie Jiaran politely said thank you and turned to leave. The classmates, who had been sneakily glancing around, immediately surrounded Su Xiaoyue.
“Come, let's have a look!”
“Tsk, it's yet another day of worshiping the great god. My heart is completely unaffected.”
“The color and lines are done so well. What do I do? Suddenly, it feels like I stayed up half of the night just to create a children's painting.”
“Sigh... Diligence truly counts for nothing in the face of talent.”
“What are you saying? That's not an excuse for you to be lazy.”
Su Xiaoyue swatted away the boy's eager hand reaching out for the drawings: “Don't touch randomly, be careful not to smudge it. Quickly return to your seat and continue doing exercises.”
Xie Jiaran habitually headed towards the back row on the left, but before he took a few steps, he noticed Lin Shan waving his hand high from the right back row, gesturing to him, “Jiaran, this way! Over here!”
Xie Jiaran just remembered that he changed seats yesterday.
After a slight pause in his steps, he changed direction and coincidentally passed by a boy. Xie Jiaran subtly side stepped without a trace, narrowly avoiding a collision.
The other party, however, keenly noticed his avoidance, frowned and glared at him unkindly.
Xie Jiaran returned to his seat and sat down. Lin Shan immediately stretched his neck over, saying, “God Xie, how long did it take you to complete yesterday's assignment? Tell me quickly, so I can worship you properly!”
Even though he was leaning in, he still maintained a very appropriate distance.
Lin Shan has a cheerful personality that is a bit too cheerful, and he is overly familiar with people.
During the early days of the school year, when others kept their distance from Xie Jiaran due to his aloofness and OCD, there was someone who enthusiastically insisted on being his friend, claiming they were destined because a random answer from a fortune-telling app on his phone said so.
Xie Jiaran doesn't like physical contact with others, so he firmly keeps his hands to himself. He speaks little, yet Lin Shan can ramble on for half a day alone, a genuine ten-level awkwardness killer. After two years of being classmates, Lin Shan naturally became one of Xie Jiaran's few friends.
“Three hours,” he gave an approximate time.
“Wow! Impressive! You're indeed my idol!" Lin Shan raised a thumb similar to the way of the class monitor, "I spent a whole five hours drawing yesterday and thought I was pretty fast.”
“Indeed, quite fast,” Xie Jiaran said. “In terms of difficulty, to complete this theme very well, the average time needed is about six hours or more.”
He naturally excluded himself from the average time, with a casual tone without any hint of boasting.
“Right?” Lin Shan said smugly. “I knew I was becoming better. Oh, by the way.” He recalled something. “Just now when you met Sun Han, did he give you a dirty look again?”
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Give Me A Hug
RomanceXie Jiaran deals with mild skin hunger syndrome, however, he also has severe mysophobia, to the extent that he even considers whether he has wet wipes on him before shaking hands with others. Thus, whenever his skin hunger breaks out, he can only r...
