two players; lin yanjun

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third person pov

Xiulan silently sat at her desk in her room learning English from her books. She was so frustrated and wanted to learn as fast she could, but she knew she needed to be patient with herself.

A knock sounded and she turned in her desk chair, "come in."

The door slowly opened and Hunter peaked in to see her desk a mess. Papers and open books covered the desk along with pencils and pens.

"Hey, I brought dinner. Melinda won't be home till late cause work," he said, entering the room with a plate of cheese pizza.

"Thank you," she bowed as he handed it to her. His eyes flicker to her English learning books and he hesitated as his hand dropped to his side.

"If you want...I could help you with your English," he offered with a shy smile. It had been a couple weeks since she had came to live with them. The two of them were awkward with one another and Xiulan was struggling.

She hated asking for help and never did. Her pride always got the best of her, but this was different. He asked if she want his help.

Plus, summer would end soon and she needed to learn more English before she went to school.

"Please," she muttered.

Hunter nodded with a friendly smile before leaving the room. Xiulan was confused at first, but was relieved when he came back with a chair. He sat it on the end of the desk and looked around before picking up a book of hers. When he felt her eyes on him, he looked up at her.

"You should eat before we start."

Xiulan nodded her head and ate her food. Her eyes flickering to him every now and then as he looked through her book to see what she was learning.

"Do you...go to university," she asked, pausing from her food.

"No...I'm going to the same school as you. I got held back for fighting, but I'll be graduating next year for sure," he replied staring at the book then his eyes widen and he looked up at her. "I-I don't just throw myself into fights for no reason. I would never hurt someone just because. I just...some people say stuff about Melinda and my friends."

"Why would they talk about Melinda...?"

Hunter shouldn't have brought it up. He felt dumb for it, but now there was no turning back. "Melinda came from the bad part of Atlanta...Georgia. A home of drug addicts so a lot of people say things about her...she doesn't do that kind of stuff, but it hurts her feelings."

"Oh. Okay..."

"Don't worry about it though. She a good mom. She's not-"

"I know," Xiulan chuckled, stopping him from rambling on like she knew he did when he was nervous.

"Sorry."

"It's okay."

Silence filled the room until he spoke again.

"But please don't be scared of me. I promise I won't hurt you."

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"You couldn't keep it."

"What was that, Jiejie," Chengcheng looked over to her as he, Scarlett, Justin, and Zhengting sat on the couch watching a movie. The four of them were the only ones home since everyone else went to visit their families for the holidays.

"N-Nothing," she stuttered, sitting up in her spot.

"I'm bored," Justin whined, lying on the floor on his stomach.

"It's too quiet..."

"Just how I like it," Zhengting sighed and Scarlett moved her foot, kicking the eldest off the couch. "Hey!"

"Hi," she chuckled, waving at him from his spot on the floor.

"Oh, I know," Chengcheng got up from the couch with an excited look on his face.

"We're not playing guess the meme," Justin groaned on the floor.

"I...wasn't going to say that."

"Sure," the others said with a collective sigh.

"I wasn't! Let's go to the park," Chengcheng jumped up and down.

"It's cold," Zhengting stated.

"Like Jun-ge's jokes."

"Why'd you bring him up," Zhengting nudged Justin with his foot. "You know Scarlett feels lonely without him."

"Really," Scarlett narrowed her eyes at him then pulled herself off the couch. "Let's go to the park."

"Yay," Chengcheng cheered and the two boys on the floor grumbled. "We can play hide and seek."

"We're too old for that," Justin looked up at him.

"Stop saying that!"

"I'll show you my secret hiding spot," Scarlett spoke up and all their heads whipped towards her.

"Really?"

"After three thousand years?"

"Are you lying to us," Zhengting narrowed his eyes at her and the two other boys did too.

"I'm serious."

"How serious?"

"As serious as Jing-ge is with food."

"Let's go."

a/n:
regarding last chapter, I think that's as sexual as it's going to get because I don't really want to write that stuff in this book and on this account... I kinda regret even writing it, but whateva. my backup account is linyanjunpls btw.

also, I'm going to try to finish this book before I move. I live in Hawaii, but I'll be moving to Texas on July 4th and I'm excited/scared. I haven't been to Texas in almost 5 years and the two places are so different!

where are you all from?

- ellie