Are All You Straight Men Like This? - Chapter 18.1

The atmosphere inside the private room was oppressive and deathly silent.

Even the few boys who had grown rowdy from the alcohol belatedly sensed something was wrong, closing their mouths and swallowing the cheers they had been about to shout.

Lin Ziqian’s words to Ye Ran on the bus that morning were still ringing in everyone’s ears. The club members stole furtive glances at the two of them, then at Liang Feng, who sat shrouded in darkness.

…What’s going on? Why did Lin Ziqian ask Ye Ran that?

Sitting in the corner where the light couldn’t reach, Ye Ran’s mind went blank for a moment. His fingers gripped the aluminum can tightly as he sluggishly lifted his head.

Across the round table, Lin Ziqian’s smile widened. The emotions in his eyes were sharp and distorted—a frantic release that he suppressed a moment later.

…He did it on purpose.

Ye Ran’s throat felt parched.

Perhaps no one else present truly cared whether he liked men or women, except for Shen Shi—

He suddenly felt like he couldn’t catch his breath.

In his peripheral vision, Shen Shi’s posture remained casual, acting as if he hadn’t even heard the question Lin Ziqian asked.

But Ye Ran still felt a wave of dizziness. He should lie; after all, no one else would ever know if he was truly straight or not. He could continue being friends with Shen Shi. Shen Shi would still go to class with him every day, eat with him, and participate in club activities with him.

He could still have such a wonderful friend.

…But I can’t do it.

He couldn’t lie to Shen Shi once and then keep the lie going forever. If the day ever came where Shen Shi personally exposed his lie, it would be far more humiliating than this.

There was no need… to let things get to that point.

His fingers trembled slightly as he forced himself to set the drink down calmly.

“Hey, did we forget to set the rules earlier?” Amidst the silence, the President suddenly spoke up cheerfully. “To liven things up, we don’t necessarily have to answer the questions. The point is to drink! You can just down a glass to get it over with; it’s the same thing.”

The Vice President set down her glass and swept a glance over Lin Ziqian. “I agree.”

Yu Ting added almost instantly, “I agree too!”

Lin Ziqian looked at them with a beaming smile. “Of course, not answering is fine too. However, I’m a bit of a stickler for rules. If you don’t answer, the penalty is five consecutive shots.”

The atmosphere, which had just begun to thaw, froze again.

Five shots… what was the difference between that and forcing an answer?

Ye Ran closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, everyone else was sitting under the bright lights, while he remained alone in the corner.

“I can answer.”

He didn’t look at Shen Shi. With his eyes lowered, he spoke in a very soft voice.

“I am not straight.”

Whoosh—!

A window was suddenly blown open by the wind, making a sharp, piercing sound. Outside, the rain was pouring down in torrents, and the distant, undulating mountain ranges were obscured by thick, heavy dark clouds.

In the quiet room, the Vice President suddenly stood up to close the window.

“It’s too cold,” a girl joked, trying to break the tension. “Winter in the mountains is really something else.”

“Haha, yeah. It’s not even this cold back in my hometown during winter,” her companion added in a small voice.

Everyone was trying to ease the awkwardness. Only Yu Ting swallowed hard, staring fixedly at Shen Shi across from him. He gripped his glass tightly, his brain—which had been muddled by beer—turning ice-cold.

…It’s over.

He had been caught off guard by Lin Ziqian. He had intended to let Shen Shi find out about Ye Ran’s orientation gradually so they could part ways peacefully. Now, everything was ruined.

No one knew better than he did how foul Shen Shi’s temper could be. No matter how calm and indifferent he appeared on the surface, once he made a decision, Ye Ran was definitely in for a rough time.

A gay man following a homophobe around every day… any deep thought on the matter would lead to far-from-kind speculations. Especially since the two had been so close; now that the “fig leaf” had been ripped away, negative emotions would only multiply a hundredfold.

Yu Ting was as anxious as an ant on a hot pan, terrified that Shen Shi would turn cold and walk out right then and there.

For the sake of these past few months, please don’t give Ye Ran a cold face.

If Shen Shi left now, there was no telling how the others would look at Ye Ran.

Yu Ting sighed in his heart. What a mess!

The others continued to chime in to warm the room. Occasional investigative glances drifted toward Ye Ran before quickly moving away. Someone looked at the bottle, awkwardly wondering whether to continue the game.

Ye Ran sat in silence, his hands placed neatly on his lap. His body was tense like a bowstring. The distance between him and Shen Shi felt increasingly vast. His fringe covered his eyes. A few seconds later, his fingers—which had been gripping his trousers—sluggishly loosened. He reached out to spin the bottle.

But at that moment, Shen Shi suddenly spoke: “It’s my turn to be asked.”

His voice was flat, ringing out clearly in the medium-sized room. The crowd went silent instantly, and Ye Ran’s hand froze mid-air.

“Uh,” the President struggled to smooth things over, “the bottle hasn’t been spun yet.”

Shen Shi tilted his chin slightly. The lights from the disco ball were cut into various shapes, flickering over his pale, handsome face. He kept his eyes low, saying casually, “Look closely. The bottle is pointing between the two of us.”

‘Us’…? Yu Ting keenly caught that word.

Everyone followed Shen Shi’s gaze and saw that the bottle was indeed pointing at the gap between Ye Ran and Shen Shi. It was slightly more toward Ye Ran, but if one insisted on the angle, it truly included Shen Shi as well.

Lin Ziqian became the center of attention once more. He rested his chin on his hand with a bored expression, a lady’s cigarette dangling from his fingertips. Suddenly having another chance to ask a question clearly caught him by surprise, but he flashed an inscrutable smile a second later.

“One more question, huh?” he said with interest. “Then let’s ask the same thing. Since you two have such a good relationship… Shen Shi, what about you? Are you a straight man?”

Shit—!

The veins on Yu Ting’s forehead throbbed. He looked at Lin Ziqian as if looking at a lunatic. He suppressed the rage inside him, wanting nothing more than to jump up and shut the guy’s mouth.

Not done yet, are you? Give you an inch and you take a mile?

Many others also realized how malicious Lin Ziqian’s question was and began to frown. Another bout of extremely awkward silence followed. Only the sound of the wind and rain outside could be heard in the room.

Everyone’s eyes fell on Shen Shi. Shen Shi was leaning loosely against the back of the sofa, acting as if he didn’t think the question deserved an answer. One arm was draped over the armrest, his eyelids weren’t even lifted, and his expression was very flat.

In his inexplicable silence, the atmosphere gradually became strange.

Lin Ziqian slowly narrowed his eyes. The next moment, Shen Shi straightened up nonchalantly, grabbed the alcohol from the coffee table, and downed five shots in a clean, efficient row.

“Hiss…” a girl gasped, unable to keep her voice down.

…What does that mean? Does it mean Shen Shi isn’t straight either?

Holy crap. The Campus Grass isn’t straight? For real?

Everyone’s minds were racing, frantically exchanging looks. Yu Ting was also stunned, unable to believe his eyes.

Something was wrong. Shen Shi was acting very strange.

Yu Ting suddenly had an extremely bad premonition. Across the round table, Shen Shi finished the alcohol but didn’t put the glass down. Instead, he lazily tapped the side of the glass and cast a glance at him.

That glance was incredibly dark and heavy, with a cold hostility like the churning, thick black clouds outside the window. Yu Ting shuddered instantly and immediately understood Shen Shi’s meaning: “…Continue, continue! But which of you two is spinning the bottle?”

“I will,” Shen Shi said.

Having said that, he turned his head in front of everyone and asked Ye Ran, “Is that okay?”

In the darkness, he seemed to accommodate Ye Ran’s bowed head by leaning over slightly. His voice was very soft—soft like a patient sort of reassurance.

“…Okay,” Ye Ran replied half a beat late.

He looked at the distance between himself and Shen Shi, which had narrowed into a line again. His mind was a continuous blank.

This can’t happen. Shen Shi doesn’t like people of the same sex being too close to him.

He wanted to straighten his body, but Shen Shi had already pressed down on the bottle. The already short distance between them vanished as they touched. Ye Ran went quiet instantly, sitting as rigid as a statue.

Click—click—

In this Truth or Dare game that was taking on an increasingly strange flavor, the brown bottle stopped once more. The long neck wobbled and wobbled before pointing directly at one person.

Shen Shi carelessly set the glass down with a soft clink. He looked at the stiffly smiling Lin Ziqian.

“Wait,” Lin Ziqian said as he met Shen Shi’s emotionless dark eyes. The hair on his back stood up, and his heart felt like it was sinking with a heavy stone. He said immediately, “…I pass! I’ll take five shots.”

“That’s your rule,” Shen Shi said. “My rule is: if you pass, you take ten shots.”

Ten shots. That was enough to drink someone under the table.

Lin Ziqian went completely silent. The frivolous smile on his face gradually turned gloomy. After staring at Shen Shi for a few seconds, he leaned back and scoffed, “Fine. Ask away. There’s nothing I can’t say.”

Shen Shi acted as if he didn’t hear the subtext in his voice. In the silent room, only his flat, unemotional question could be heard: “Last weekend, I saw you and a guy booking a room at the Swan Hotel.”

Vroom—

Lin Ziqian’s face turned pale almost instantly. His blood flowed backward through his body. He looked up sharply, his lips trembling: “Sh-shut up! I pass…”

“Who was that guy?” Shen Shi lifted his eyes and finished the question. “A friend?”

The people around them were as silent as cicadas in winter.

…Holy crap. A massive scoop.

The people who had previously lamented that Lin Ziqian and Liang Feng’s love was as solid as gold looked at them in unison. They only saw Liang Feng’s face, which was as black as the bottom of a pot, and Lin Ziqian’s bloodshot eyes.

Judging by Lin Ziqian’s expression, that guy definitely wasn’t Liang Feng.

Last weekend… Ye Ran didn’t come to the club activity; I heard the painting major had a dinner party? Then Liang Feng should have been at that dinner party too.

The previously invisible Liang Feng clenched his fists tightly under the sympathetic gazes of everyone. He could deal with Lin Ziqian, and he could endure Lin Ziqian’s stubbornness. The only thing he couldn’t stand was having his dirty laundry aired and his dignity trampled in front of everyone.

“…Lin Ziqian,” he said word by word, as Lin Ziqian’s eyes filled with uncontrollable panic. “That night at the Swan Hotel… did we sleep together or not?”

The subsequent games continued in an orderly fashion, but the atmosphere remained stuck at an awkward center point. The bottle never spun toward Ye Ran again.

He quietly put on his coat and wrapped his scarf. The night’s farce had left him mentally exhausted. With half of his face hidden in his scarf and his eyelids lowered, his expression was quiet and stoic.

At one point, while everyone was laughing at a very lame joke from the Vice President, he stood up quietly. He told the girl on the other side “I’m going to the restroom” and left the darkness.

The girl responded blankly, watching his retreating back and feeling an inexplicable sense of sadness.

…It’s all Lin Ziqian’s fault, she thought suddenly with anger. Using the game as an excuse for his own filthy thoughts.

She withdrew her gaze and was about to take a sip of water to calm her anger when she unexpectedly met Shen Shi’s gaze. Shen Shi’s look was heavy and powerful, making people afraid to resist. “What did he say to you?”

“He said he was going to the restroom…” she answered instinctively.

Shen Shi nodded and stood up to put on his clothes. “Thanks.”

Across the round table, Lin Ziqian and Liang Feng had already departed, presumably to handle the “new boyfriend” that had inexplicably appeared between them.

The Hotel’s Back Garden.

Lin Ziqian stood on the corridor, head down as he smoked. The thin lady’s cigarette was half-burned. He knew Liang Feng was looking for him, but he didn’t want to see him at all. Making Liang Feng anxious was for the best; anyway, they were about to be over. This time Liang Feng definitely wouldn’t let him off, and he had to think of another way to drag it out.

…Shen Shi was actually at the Swan Hotel that night.

Thinking of Shen Shi, his expression turned into a grimace. He crushed the cigarette almost violently, staring neurotically at the rain.

Damned Shen Shi. Damn you, damn you!

The corridor had no rain shelter, so the wind and rain swept through the eaves, soaking his clothes. He was only wearing a trench coat. He rested his Doc Martens on a nearby stone bench and suddenly heard footsteps from behind.

The sound of footsteps was muffled and fragmented by the torrential rain. He smiled; he was actually a bit happy. Liang Feng had arrived quickly this time.

He pulled out another cigarette, looking at the black, churning clouds on the horizon. A terrifying clap of thunder exploded from the clouds—BOOM—as the cloud layer seethed like boiling water, shifting and changing.

The footsteps soon stopped behind him. Lin Ziqian said casually, “You’re here. You got here fast this—”

THUD—!

His pupils dilated instantly. He was sent flying into the corner of the corridor by a savage kick. Intense pain immediately radiated from his back through his entire body; even his bone marrow felt like it was being pierced by needles.

He couldn’t catch his breath and immediately turned his head through the agonizing pain.

Amidst the raging wind and rain, Shen Shi stood against the light. His tall, upright silhouette cast a large shadow. He stood looking down like he was looking at a dead man, watching him with a calm, dark chill.

A massive sense of crisis surged in his heart. Lin Ziqian never expected that Shen Shi—who always appeared indifferent to everything—would actually take direct action.

His palms scraped against the ground, a stinging pain. His mood took a sharp turn for the worse, but he still maintained a frivolous smile: “What’s wrong? Can’t handle the game?”

“Yeah,” Shen Shi said, walking toward him without haste, his tone flat. “I can’t handle it.”

Another punch landed on his face. The intense pain seeped deep into every corner of his features. Lin Ziqian groaned in agony, his body curling into a ball.

Shen Shi is crazy. How does he dare…?

His collar was roughly hoisted up. The wind outside the eaves was as savage as a ghost, and rain droplets the size of soybeans pelted down on both of them.

Only after being crushed and beaten with his dignity underfoot did Lin Ziqian see the dense, gloomy hostility in Shen Shi’s expressionless face.