"Well, it seems like everyone has settled nicely."
A new voice sliced through the fragile quiet of our coffee group, a voice so grating I had the immediate, visceral urge to shove one of Maruyama's extra-pointy pencils deep into my own ears to make it stop.
Kai sauntered into the common area, that annoying, perpetually knowing grin plastered on his face followed by Haruki. It was a look that made my fingers itch. He moved with a languid arrogance, as if he owned the very air we were breathing, his eyes scanning our little tableau of Hongbing's quiet despair and my failed attempt at comfort.
"Nothing like a bit of caffeine to smooth over the... adjustment period, is there?" he continued, his gaze lingering a little too long on Hongbing's white-knuckled grip on his coffee mug.
I said nothing. I merely took a slow, deliberate sip from my own cup, using the bitter liquid to wash down the sharp retort that sat on my tongue. Any response would be a victory for him. Hongbing, for his part, didn't even look up. He just stared deeper into the dark pool of his coffee, as if hoping it would swallow him whole and spare him this new, social form of torment. Everything, honestly, was putting me in a foul mood these days. and now the deadline for that damned university survey I'd received this morning was hanging over my head like a executioner's sword ready to drop. The weight of it all was a dull, constant pressure behind my eyes.
"Well, I just wanted to say hello! Don't look so peeved, man!" Kai's voice was a jarring chirp in the midst of my brooding. Before I could react or shift away, he draped an arm over my shoulders.
Everything around me slowed down and the voices around me became slurredMy eyes widened for a fraction of a second before I reacted, In a split-second decision my body made up what it wanted to do before my mind could catch up. My hand shot up, grabbing his wrist as my body twisted, using his own momentum to fling him backwards and away from me. He stumbled, his annoying grin wiped clean and replaced with pure, uncomprehending shock.Never in my entire life had I been touched with such presumptuous familiarity. My entire being had screamed in unison. Every instinct, honed by a lifetime where such a casual approach from anyone less than a sworn brother or anyone I knew could end with a dagger between the ribs, had seized up. The feeling of his arm across my back, the weight of it, the gross invasion of my space; it just screamed WRONG!! WRONG!!! WRONG!!!! and other parts like DANGER!!! DANGER!!! DANGER!!!! GET AWAY!! GET AWAY!!! GET AWAY!!! and the alarm that shot through my veins was colder than any mountain stream my flight or fight responses kicked in faster than I could even admit.
Gabriel stared at me, his phone forgotten in his hand, his mouth slightly agape. The sharp sound of my voice, followed by Kai's stumble, had acted like a stone thrown into a still pond. I could faintly here Haruki shouting my name, From the periphery of my vision, I saw other students in the common area stop their conversations and turn to look. I think I heard the distinct clatter of a ceramic mug hitting the floor somewhere to my left.
And the person in question was still on the ground, no longer shocked but now glaring up at me from the polished floor, a flush of humiliation and anger rising up his neck. That friendly mask he put was gone, completely stripped away.
"Don't," I repeated my breathing was heavy like I had run for a few hours. "Touch me."
"Damn it, man, seriously! You're no fun at all!!!" Kai spat the words, brushing off his jeans as he got to his feet. He shot me a final, heated glare before turning on his heel and stalking away, the collective gaze of the common room following him out.
The tension in the air didn't dissipate though; it simply just changed its form, shifting from violence to some sort of awkward shock. I slowly lowered my hands, forcing my clenched fists to relax, and returned to my seat. The coffee in my cup was now cold and unappealing.
"Okay, dude," Gabriel began, finally finding his voice, his eyes wide. "What in the ever-loving F was that?"
Before I could muster a reply, another familiar presence approached. "I saw the commotion earlier. Jincheng, you right, mate?" Michael came over, his usual grin replaced by genuine concern etching his features. He looked from my face to the path Kai had taken, his brow furrowed. He tried to take my hand in his but I swatted it away out of instinct
"Sorry.....I am fine really" I managed to muster a weak excuse, the words feeling automatic and hollow. I brought a hand to my face, pressing my fingers against my temples where a true headache was now beginning to pound in earnest.
'Why did I even do that?'
The question echoed in the silent chamber of my mind, drowning out the murmurs of the other students. Maybe my body had reacted with the ingrained instinct of a soldier in an enemy territory or it was about the loss of control. In that single, visceral moment, the pressure of everything around me and the sheer exhausting effort of pretending to be normal it had all coalesced into that one, explosive reaction. It was an invasion to my space, one I didn't like and someone crossed it and now look at the mess that created!
---
"Ahem...."
Haruki's voice cut softly , interrupting my spiraling thoughts. He stood a few feet away, looking apologetically between me and the space where Kai had been. "Uh... sorry for everything, I guess. I just wanted you guys to know that there was a survey given in your university group chat. You might have to fill it out now...?"
The reminder was like a physical blow, snapping me back to the other sword hanging over my head.
"Wait, dude, fill it like right now?" Gabriel exclaimed, his own confrontation with Kai seemingly forgotten in the face of this new crisis. He ran a hand through his hair. "We don't even know which major to even choose to begin with!!!!"
"That part was supposed to be done at home, Gabriel," Haruki rebuked him with a sigh that spoke of long-suffering patience. "How many times have I told you to make a plan before setting out anywhere?"
"Hold on, there's a course survey?" Michael asked, his concern for me shifting to shared confusion. He pulled out his own phone, tapping at the screen.
"Yeah... I just saw it right now," Gabriel said, his thumbs already flying across his device. "I'll send it to your private number in LINE, hold on." With a final flick of his finger, the message was sent.
A moment later, a simultaneous ping sounded from both Michael's phone and my own, the cheerful sound a stark contrast to the dread it invoked. The digital summons has finally arrived.
"Jesus Christ!!!" Michael gasped, his eyes wide as his fingers began flying across his screen in a panicked frenzy. "What even is half this stuff? 'Digital Humanities'? 'Bioinformatics'?"
"How the hell are we supposed to choose a course from this list?" Gabriel whined, slumping back in his chair and staring at his phone as if it had personally betrayed him. "There's almost more than a hundred courses to choose from! Are we supposed to just... point at one? 'Eeny, meeny, miny, moe' with our future?"
Haruki just shook his head, a weary smile on his face. "Welcome to university," he said, the statement sounding less like a welcome and more like a warning to us as to what is in store for us in the future
In the meeting room (more like our dorm room) after breakfast and lots of coffee later Haruki Michael and I sat on the chairs while Gabriel and Hongbing sat on the bed.
"Alright then," Haruki said, clapping his hands together softly as if calling a meeting to order. "Let's just have a collective thinking session and choose a course for all of us. How about that?"
"For real?" Gabriel raised his eyebrows, his phone held limply in his hand.
"Look, we can change our course until the 3rd year rolls around," Haruki explained, his tone pragmatic. "After that, you're pretty much stuck with that course for life. So it's not the end of the world if we pick something now just to get this survey submitted."A flicker of hope ignited in my heart so its not the end of the world it seems.
"Has anybody, like, switched courses before the 3rd year comes in?" Michael clarified, leaning forward.
"Plenty," Haruki confirmed with a definitive nod. "It's normal. People realize they hate chemistry, or can't stand the sight of blood for medicine, or discover a passion for ancient pottery. The system expects it."
"Good," Hongbing said, his voice low but clear, cutting through our anxious planning. We all turned to look at him. He had been so quiet for so long, that the sound of his voice was both a relief and a surprise.
He hadn't moved from his seat, but his posture was different. The rigid tension that had held him captive since he crash landed here with me had loosened a fraction but it was still tense.
"But to be honest....." Haruki began "selecting a course after entering the university is a new system I have never seen before"
"Wait, so this wasnt actually there?" Gabriel asked his eyes a little bit wide"It could be the new rules that were circulating around campus grounds I might need to clarify it again....
After a lot of deliberate planning, which mostly consisted of Gabriel and Michael rapidly just cancelling options, we had whittled down the massive list. 'Business' was cancelled on sight by Gabriel, who declared it "soulless." Michael, in a shocking turn, argued that 'Philosophy' had "no scope," a concept so modern and pragmatic it made my head spin. We didn't know what half the other words even meant, so those were cancelled as well.
The last one that finally, miraculously, made it through the gauntlet was..."Are you sure you want to take that?" Our guide and senior asked, his voice laced with a concern that immediately put me on edge. He was looking at the three of us as if we'd just volunteered to juggle lit dynamite.
"Why not?" Gabriel exclaimed, snapping his laptop shut with an air of finality. "It seems interesting so far! I mean, it's just theories, right? Reading minds and stuff. That's easy!"
I grimaced. I could tell it was going to be far more than 'just theories.' The way Haruki was looking at us suggested it was just more than theories as one might think
Psychology, huh?
The word felt strange and new. A subject that swung in a totally different direction from the engineering and sciences we had been arguing over just hours before. Yet, as I turned the word over in my mind, it began to feel... intriguing.
It felt exquisite whenever I said it silently to myself, the syllables rolling perfectly on my tongue like a polished stone. Psy-cho-lo-gy. Even the definition was perfect 'The study of the mind. The art of understanding why people think and feel and act as they do It even felt like a bit of philosophy was added to it as well"
After living in the army for so long, where orders were clear and a man's mettle was tested with steel and blood, this new world had been a huge formless and frustrating puzzle. But this...A slow, determined smile touched my lips, the first genuine one in days. A battlefield of the mind Where I learn about others? I would gladly tackle that with my own two hands.