If You Don’t Go To Hell, Who Will? - Chapter 34

Zhong Yuan asked me: “Mu er, do you like me?”. I didn’t even have to think about it and immediately  blurted out, “ What nonsense! That would be like abusing myself!”

At that time, the teacher on the podium suddenly called out, “ The two students at the back , please pay attention to the class.”

I kept quiet.

As I walked back in the evening, my mind was whirring with the words Zhong Yuan had uttered, “Mu er, do you like me?”

No! Was it possible that I really liked him? That would be horrible!

He was already oppressing me day and night with his incessant demands. If I liked him, this would never be over. And if I liked him and he didn’t, would it not be terribly humiliating?

The most important point to note was that this guy had strange tastes. He had a lofty vision  was always looking down on me. That meant he would definitely not like me. So If I liked him, I was destined to the tolerate the bitterness of unrequited love. I went over y emotions the other day and concluded that it was natural for a girl to feel shy when a guy was kissing her . It did not , in anyway, indicate my fondness of him.

This thought finally calmed me down and I went to sleep

……

Recently, I had encountered a very troublesome thing. I had chosen tennis for this semester’s physical education class, and I soon realised what a big mistake this was. The main problem was that our Phy Ed teacher was a very serious person. She was planning to check our serves next week. Anyone who did not perform well would have their marks deducted. I was very worried about this matter. When I complained to Zhong Yuan , he patted my shoulder and calmly said,  “ I will teach you.”

I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to partner Zhong Yuan in sports and studies, and one of the sports he had selected was tennis. But then I had hidden in the self- study hall all day out of resentment and he had not been able to find me.  So I excitedly pulled his hand and smiled with all my charm, “ Zhong Yuan is so amazing!”

He looked at me trying to butter him up and smiled smugly, “ How will you repay me?”

Yikes! I knew this guy was up to something. Of course as a person who was very familiar with him , I had nothing to say, “ What do you want?”

He thought for a while and then waved his hand generously, “Forget it, just come with me to pick apples in the garden during the weekend.”

I couldn’t help but sigh. Zhong Yuan you are too devious! Then I scratched my head and asked him, “ Aren’t you going to be busy with the shooting?”

Zhong Yuan replied casually, “ Su Yan’s face is still swollen. It is impossible to shoot anything till it goes down.”

Aren’t you even a little bit embarrassed, Zhong Yuan?

……

Zhong Yuan wore a white sportswear with light green wrist bands on the wrists and he looked like a hero. When he arrived on the tennis court, all the females in the surrounding areas turned their attention to him. It seemed that the girls in this year were members of the ‘Looks are all’ club. Actually, I was too.

But Zhong Yuan was not perturbed with all the attention and felt no pressure at all. He calmly held the racket and slowly swung it in the air. Then he started explaining, “ Your body should be at a forty five degree angle. Pay attention to your balance. Stretch your arms to the front. The racket and the body needs to be at the same angle. Then swing the racket. Pay attention to the mesh surface when you swing. Keep moving forward. Use your whole arm instead of just the wrist movement to swing, otherwise you will injure yourself. Don’t stop in the middle of the swing…use the inertia of motion of the racket.. ok.. now you try.”

Zhong Yuan and the physical education teacher spoke at the same time. I understood a bit, but not all of it. At this point, I was strangely nervous. I grabbed the racket  and held it but realised I didn’t even know how to hold the racket properly.

Zhong Yuan shook his head, “ I really admire you. After such a long class, you don’t even know how to hold the racket?”

I was dismayed. I changed my posture and held the racket, but my grip was awkward.

Zhong Yuan sighed. He dropped his own racket, then came forward and put his fingers over mine to correct the grip. As he adjusted my grip, he whispered, “ Why is your hand so small?”

I looked at his slender fingers over mine. I could feel my heart jumping in my chest and my breathing become uneven. Zhong Yuan did not seem to realise my strangeness. He helped me correct my grip, then lifted his hand and knocked on my head. He smiled and said, “ Why are you so lost?”

“ No, nothing” I shook my head shyly, I stepped back a few steps and started swinging the racket for practice.

Zhong Yuan stood in the same position and looked at me. When I was no longer moving my hand he asked me,  “ What happened?”

I pulled my hand and panted. “I am tired.”

Zhong Yuan was clearly gloating, “Didn’t I tell you to follow what I am doing?”

I cried and replied, “ I can’t learn. I thought I understood what you said, but when I try to do it, its difficult.”

Zhong Yuan came over. He grabbed my hand and held the racket. Then suddenly, he pulled me in his arms!

What kind of situation is this ?

The girls around screamed at this sudden move. I looked up at Zhong Yuan in panic, but this time, he didn’t look at me. I could just see his chin from my vantage point. I was so nervous that my legs were soft. I gulped, ‘ You…”

His voice was cold but clear, “ I am helping you correct your swing. Any problem ?”

My mind at this moment was completely blank. I mechanically replied, “ No, no problem.”

He put his hand over mine holding the racket. His other hand was on my shoulder. He took my hand and rotated it backwards. I couldn’t help but take a step back. Immediately, he complimented me, “ That’s it!”

Then he brought my arm forward. “ This arm doesn’t need to be straight. Just keep it at a certain angle so that you can manoeuvre it. You’re doing great Mu er!”

What was I doing? It was obviously you doing all this from start to finish!

As he swung my arm forward, the movement was smooth. Then he looked down at me and asked, “ Now have you learnt it?”

I didn’t know what to say. Zhong Yuan’s breath was on my neck. Suddenly, I felt a twitch in my neck. I felt a bit hot and uncomfortable. But he kept his position and did not move. I was feeling strange. I looked up at him. His eyes were focussed on me, as if they could penetrate all my thoughts. The heat in it seemed like it would melt anything in its way. I didn’t dare to look directly at him anymore and lowered my eyes.

“ Mu er”, Zhong Yuan murmured, “ You aren’t paying attention.”

I kept my gaze lowered as I didn’t know how to answer this question.

“ You really don’t like me?”

I kept quiet.

“ If that is true, I wont mind”, he whispered softly.

There was a strange sensation rising in my heart.

“ Please, there must be some limit to your ego”

Once I finished saying this, I struggled away from his grasp and turned away, racket in hand.

Zhong Yuan blocked me from the front and I almost hit his chest. He looked at me, “ Are you angry?”

I lowered my eyes, “ Do I dare be angry at you?”

“ You look as if I bullied you.”

I was upset, “ Of course you bully me.”

Zhong Yuan patted my shoulder, “ It’s alright. I was just joking.”

I kept my head lowered with a sullen, “ Doesn’t matter.”

I didn’t know why I suddenly got angry, and I didn’t understand why there was a sense of loss in my heart after Zhong Yuan explained that he was just kidding.

In the evening, as we chatted in the dormitory, I asked all my three roommates, “ Two people were talking to each other normally, suddenly one was angry. What could be the  reason?”

Miss fourth replied, “ It’s likely something poked at that person’s hidden pain.”

Li’l second was pensive, “ My family’s Miss Fourth is so intelligent.”

I felt awkward. What pain ?

Then boss put her hand on my head and asked, “ Blockhead, what emotional problems have you encountered? Why don’t you tell us so we can help analyse it for you?”

I shook my head, pretending a calmness I did not feel. “ No need.”

But my heart was stormy. If I was upset with Zhong Yuan today because he poked at a hidden weakness, did that mean I was fond of him?

My blood ran cold at the thought.

If that was the case, then that would explain why I felt lost when Zhong Yuan explained he was just kidding with me. Do I really like him?

I recalled that in the past few days, whenever Zhong Yuan was close to me, my heart would speed up and my brain would slow down. Whenever, he touched me , I would feel like I was singed by him. And I was always thinking about him. I had never felt this way before. It was as if this person’s existence had encompassed my entire life. Even when he wasn’t around, I would think about what he would be doing, or about all the things we had done together. I thought this was because he was always bullying me and this was my conditional reflex. But now it seemed like there was another reason for the way I was behaving.

There were clear indications that I, Mu er really liked Zhong Yuan. This conclusion made me feel miserable. Oh god! Would the great Mu er finally be vanquished in the hands of Zhong Yuan?

I thought about it carefully. There was no possibility that Zhong Yuan may like me in return. No! Not possible! Zhong Yuan was a very selective guy. He had countless beautiful women chasing after him. I was just some grass among the beautiful flowers. Apart from being trampled, I had no other role in this scenario. Moreover, the two of us were not at the same level.  I would always be the one who was bullied. There was a huge difference of social status between the two of us. If we had feelings, that is, if the bourgeoise and the proletariat had feelings for each other… yes, yes, that is certainly possible!

But the problem was that at this point, only the proletariat liked the burgeoise…

I gnashed my teeth in frustration. I really hated myself! If you had to like someone, why did it have to be Zhong Yuan, a guy who exploited others as if it was his God-given right?

I did some deep self reflection and self criticism, trying to figure out what about Zhong Yuan had really attracted me. But I still could not understand why I liked him. There wasn’t a single feature on his body that I liked, except that he was really handsome. But what would I do with his handsomeness? And everyone knew that this little one was the most insecure creature in the world.

So I decided to ask a few people why they liked someone.

Boss said, “ Because he is good to me.”

Li’l Second answered, “ Don’t ask me, I only like computer games.”

Miss Fourth replied, “ Because I am terribly unlucky.”

When I thought about it, I found Miss Fourth’s reply the most appropriate. Why do I like you ? Because I am terribly unlucky! That’s why I am still entangled with you.

But I was even more depressed once I figured out the answer. Because the problem of bad luck was not something I could remedy. In other words, I didn’t like the idea of  liking Zhong Yuan but there was nothing I could do to rectify that. It was a very sad realisation.

There was another problem I was grappling with. The problem was whether to let Zhong Yuan know that I liked him. I thought that once he knew about this, there could be several possible scenarios. If he was being kind, he would not laugh at me. Or, if he felt awkward with me, the distance between the two of us would increase. He would move further and further away from me, while I would stand silently looking at his back . None of these situations were palatable to me. So I decided to keep this truth from him and to pretend that nothing had changed between the two of us.

Basically, if he knew I liked him, I would be under a lot of pressure.

To summarise, I really liked Zhong Yuan, though I had no idea why. Although there was no way I could remedy the situation, I would keep it a secret and never let him know

Finally, I went to sleep.

……

In this season, all the picking garden would only have apples for the picking. In the morning, we took a taxi and after almost an hour, we finally arrived at our destination – the Green Garden Picking garden.

This place was primarily for tourists. I had heard there was an experimental garden here where they were growing the Red Fuji variety of apples. This variety was imported from Japan and grown organically. No fertilisers or pesticides were used. Obviously, these were very expensive, but there were some arrogant rich people who were happy to be fooled. Zhong Yuan was one of them.

When we came to the park with Red Fuji, I was transfixed. The trees looked like they were on fire, with red apples clustered around their branches. Because there were many fruits, the branches needed to be supported with artificial struts. As I stood on the mound overlooking this section of the park, all I could see was the colour red. It looked like a sea of fire.

I screamed with joy and ran down to the orchard. I touched one, patted another one and circled around a third tree, I was so crazed by the apples. Zhong Yuan was not as affected as me. He just stood at a distance, taking photos with his phone.

After going around like a crazy person for a while, I finally took a basket and started picking the apples. Fresh apples tasted different. Each one was full of vitality and eating it improved people’s moods. I picked so many apples that after a point, I could no longer move my basket. Then I sat down under a tree and started eating. Fortuitously, Zhong yuan had the foresight to bring a fruit knife with him.

He snatched the first apple as soon as it was cut. Given that he had bought the tickets to the tour, I was too embarrassed to say anything. He ate the piece slowly and then threw away the core. Then he lay down on the grass under the tree and closed his eyes. I bent forward slightly to see this beautiful vision. The grass under him was dense, some of it already yellowed. The uneven grass covered his face partially. From my vantage point, I could see his forehead and his nose. Whichever way you looked at it, his face was like a work of art. The autumn sun rays fell on his body through the trees. It looked as if his body was covered with burnished gold, glowing slightly but not blatantly. His chest rose up and down as he breathed, and the motion gradually slowed and evened out. It seemed like he had fallen asleep.

So I leaned in closer.

I had never understood why Zhong Yuan seemed more and more handsome in my eyes. Now I knew. It was because I was falling in love with this kid. I tried to compare Lu Zijian and Zhong Yuan a few days ago to pull me back from this obsession. Sadly, I found out that in my eyes, Zhong Yuan was more handsome than Lu Zijian. Not only had he bullied me physically, he had even distorted my sense of aesthetics..

So now as I faced the beautiful man I had been obsessing about, I could no longer control myself.

Zhong Yuan’s face was serene. He was breathing evenly and I suspected he was in deep sleep. I knelt beside him, gently stroking his eyelashes with my index finger’

“ His eyelashes are longer than mine”, I murmured to myself.

Then I used my finger to smoot his eyebrows and murmured again, “ Infact, if he isn’t furrowing his eyebrows, they are quite pretty.”

Then I murmured praises about his five senses till my gaze landed on his lips. An evil thought suddenly rose in my heart. I’ve heard it said that you can secretly kiss a sleeping person without being caught. I was shocked with this idea that had suddenly come to me. What if…it wasn’t safe? But I really liked him. And I had this strong wish…. It was safe, I had seen it done on TV many times. There was no way I could ever do it openly. I didn’t dare to be upright and honest. So, it made sense to do it secretly. Besides, this beast had taken my first kiss. It was time to pay him back.

I shook him slightly and called out, “ Zhong Yuan, Zhong Yuan…”

In response, he moved a bit but did not wake up. So I held my breath and bent forward so that our faces were now really close to each other. AT this point, my heart was beating so rapidly that I felt I would faint at any time.

This was when the accident happened…