The senior club member had just finished writing out and sending his message when someone's voice suddenly came from behind him.
"Little student."
Lost in his dirty thoughts, the sleazy club member was easily startled and nearly fell sideways right into the water.
The speaker was very nimble and immediately steadied the boat. He smiled and asked, "Little student, did I scare you?"
"Ah, no, not at all."
The club member looked up to see a man with scraggly facial hair who was at least thirty or forty years old. He looked ridiculously unkempt in his white tank top and flip-flops, but there was a bright gleam in his eyes. Who knew what business he had here.
Flip-Flops smiled as he asked him, "Are you using that boat?"
"Ah, the boat?" The club member thought fast, blurting out, "The boat's broken."
"It's broken?"
"Yep, there's a leak at the bottom. It's unusable and can only be docked in the shallow area."
Flip-Flops hummed thoughtfully. "What a coincidence. The rope bridge leading to this island also seems to have broken."
"Sure has." The club member spoke with righteous conviction. "I chopped"—he coughed—"Someone must've chopped it down. Who are you?"
Flip-Flops grinned, baring his teeth. "I'm the school's electrical maintenance worker. As a matter of fact, I got a notice to come to the island to take a look. See, I've even brought my toolbox."
The senior club member felt guilty as soon as he heard that the man was a worker for the school. He cleared his throat a few times, glancing left and right before inching closer and saying, "Dage, I'll be honest with you. There's a nouveau riche student declaring his love on the island today. He's paid to have the whole place to himself. Think about it, wouldn't getting in their way be a dick move? Of course it would."
Flip-Flops understood immediately. His eyes shone as he likewise
responded very foolishly. "Ah, reserving the island to declare one's love?
So romantic. You youngsters sure know how to have fun."
"That's not it." The club member slapped his thigh and raised his other hand to make a money gesture by rubbing his index and middle fingers with his thumb. "The main thing is, he's rich."
Flip-Flops beamed. He was surprisingly understanding. "All right then. When will this boat of yours be usable?"
"Probably after midnight. I'm mostly worried that the little couple won't be able to hold themselves back after he tells her how he feels. You know, tasting the forbidden fruit for the first time and being unable to stop. It's possible that it won't be until a bit later, even." He began to gossip as well when he saw how amiable this uncle was.
Men. When they got together and talked about these types of things, there would inevitably be a depraved glint in their eyes.
The club member lewdly implored the older man, "Uncle, why don't you come back tomorrow morning? They'll definitely be gone by then. One of them is a xueba, there's no way he would skip class."
A gregarious laugh burst up from Flip-Flops' belly. "Fucking hell, not even a beautiful lady can keep a xueba from going to class."
"Well, of course. Otherwise, how can they be a xueba?"
The uncle chatted with the club member for a little longer before leaving with his toolbox. After arriving at a deserted location, he came to a stop, lit a cigarette, and dug a cell phone out of his toolbox. It was the oldest model of brick phone, a product that had almost gone extinct from the market. "Hello. Captain Zheng, maybe push the deadline back a few more hours. I won't be able to get onto the island tonight. Uh, problem? There's no problem. It's just that two students have reserved the island for a bit of romance. Mhm, yes, yes, I know, I'll go early tomorrow morning."
He flicked away some cigarette ash and sighed in exasperation. "Honestly, isn't this spy of ours a little too cautious? Won't even send texts. Every time there's intelligence to be reported, it needs to be fucking written in the student guestbook. And what's with that excuse of 'this won't invite suspicion'… Ahh…screw it, I'm going back to the station. You know, I came here to pick up the intelligence report only to end up being force-fed PDA by bratty children instead. This police officer job of mine sure ain't easy…"
Flip-Flops left in a whirl of disgruntled mumbling.
The cave on Neverland Island wasn't particularly large, and it was very dark inside. If not for the pouring rain, Xie Qingcheng felt that no one would ever bother to come in here. However, it was only when he crouched down like a cat and entered the cave that he realized he was wrong.
By the dim light of his phone, he could see some outdoor recreational gear strewn about the inside of the man-made cave: hurricane lamps, waterproof canvas, oxford cloth folding chairs, Wolf-Eyes flashlights, and even a little camping stove.
"A secret utopia."
"What?" Xie Qingcheng turned around.
He Yu shone his phone flashlight over one of the cave walls. "That's what this says."
Only then did Xie Qingcheng discover the masterpieces written on the damp walls of the cave, left behind from the ancient past for successive generations of intrepid explorers—they were all the graffitied scribblings of students who had discovered this secret place by mistake.
The biggest words were the ones that said, "Secret Utopia."
Xie Qingcheng wasn't interested in these scribbles. After glancing at it briefly, he sat down at the entrance of the cave to watch the rain fall.
But He Yu was a student of writing and directing and was more than willing to read all the words that appeared before him with care.
"Buddha saved the people by bringing them to the shores of enlightenment, yet why does he not ferry me out from the sea of academia?"
"Zhou-xiansheng is the love of my life, but how can it be that when we met, he had already become the husband of another? I long for him, yet I cannot have him, and I become mad, so unspeakably mad, as the only thing that remains for me is endless waiting."
He Yu lifted his phone, casting light on the walls as he read the words out loud, and shook his head. "So poetic, so wretched."
Then he illuminated the other side.
Now, that side was something else—filled with all kinds of content. He read, "May advanced mathematics get the hell out of the curriculum soon."
"Graduating soon, I hope I can become a famous director. Jiayou."
"In sheltering here for rain, we…" He Yu's voice trailed off, and he stopped reading.
This only piqued Xie Qingcheng's curiosity. "We what?"
"…Nothing."
Xie Qingcheng didn't believe him, so he turned to look and was immediately left speechless.
"In sheltering here for rain, we fell in love. Thanks be to the heavens for bestowing us with this fateful opportunity."
These two illicit lovers had even left their names underneath, encircled in a massive heart.
Given this situation, awkwardness was inevitable. No wonder He Yu didn't finish reading it. Xie Qingcheng spoke apathetically, "It's only been a few years since we last saw each other, yet now you've developed dyslexia. No choice but to read everything out loud."
"Don't you think it's quite interesting? Who knows where these people are now—they might have entirely forgotten about what they've written here." He Yu reached up and stroked a line of mottled handwriting.
"Maybe some of them have already turned to dust, yet these words still remain."
Xie Qingcheng said coldly, "Then why don't you leave your own written masterpiece for later generations to admire?"
He'd only meant to mock He Yu and was a bit surprised when He Yu picked up a thin shard of stone from the ground, chose a blank spot on the wall, and said thoughtfully, "You're right. What do you think I should write?"
He Yu even shot a glance at Xie Qingcheng. There was a hint of irrepressible disdain in his eyes. That's right… Here, we take shelter from the rain and join in love, thanking the heavens for bestowing us with this fateful opportunity—how many quintessential classic love stories started like this? The White Snake smiling as she asked to borrow an umbrella from Xu Hanlin in the boat, while Benigni laid down an entire red carpet for Nicoletta in the rain so that she could descend the steps.
If this were Xie Xue, perhaps he would find this night much more pleasant. Perhaps they could have followed the example set by their predecessors and carved the words "so did we" beneath the handwriting of their xuezhang and xuejie who had gotten together because of the rain.
Too bad the person trapped on the island with him right now was Xie Qingcheng.
It was exceedingly boring for two straight men to be stuck together, especially when they weren't on particularly good terms with each other.
Xie Qingcheng sensed his grumpy gaze and adopted an even crabbier expression in response. "What are you looking at me for?"
"I'm sorry, but there's no one else I can look at." He Yu tossed the rock into the air a couple of times, then carelessly scratched out a few words. "May my dreams come true."
Powdered stone fell with a whisper as he worked.
When he finished writing, He Yu tossed the rock away and turned around. "Doctor, why don't you also have a go at a little immaturity?"
Xie Qingcheng's eyes lit up slightly, but in the end, he shifted his gaze back to the downpour outside. In the mist-like, hazy warm light, his silhouette was as thin as a sheet of fine calligraphy paper that could be dispersed by a mere gust of wind.
"No need. My wish is a fantasy."
"Oh?" He Yu said offhandedly, "Then why don't you tell me what kind of daydream it is. Can I ask? I hope I'm not offending you."
For some time, the only sound was the howling of the wind and the shower of rain outside. Just when He Yu thought that he didn't want to bother with talking to him anymore, Xie Qingcheng spoke in a calm voice as he gazed at the rivulets of rainwater streaming over the rocks beyond the cave. "I didn't want to be a doctor."
"Nor are you one, right now anyway."
"I never wanted to study medicine when I was young."
At this point, He Yu was a bit perplexed. He raised his almond eyes to examine the older man. "Then what did you want to study?"
Xie Qingcheng got up and walked deeper into the cave. He stared at the "May my dreams come true" that He Yu had carved, then said, "It's been too long, I can't remember anymore."
This was a lie spoken without the slightest bit of sincerity, entirely perfunctory to the point that he didn't even bother to hide the frustrated disappointment in his eyes. He Yu almost suspected that he was using this as an opportunity to insult his intelligence.
Xie Qingcheng turned away, as though he didn't want to address this subject any further. He returned to the center of the cave and asked He Yu, "Is there anything to eat?"
It was indeed dinnertime by now. The only food He Yu had brought onto the island was the mango mousse cake he had originally made for Xie Xue.
But now, it looked like it would need to be sacrificed for the sake of their rations.
He Yu didn't have much interest in Xie Qingcheng anyway, so if Xie Qingcheng didn't want to talk about his former life plans, then he likewise had no interest in asking him.
He took out the cake and passed a piece to Xie Qingcheng. Xie Qingcheng must have been starving, as he wolfed the dessert down immediately without even sparing it a glance.
"Do you have any napkins?" Xie Qingcheng was a stickler for cleanliness, so after he finished eating, he even asked Secretary He for napkins.
Secretary He looked around and spotted a first aid kit on the canvas table. Thinking that this type of kit might have napkins and such inside, he went over and rummaged through it. The light was too dim, so he searched by touch and, when he found a package that seemed to be roughly the right size to be napkins, he tossed it to Xie Qingcheng.
Xie Qingcheng caught the package and was just about to open it when he suddenly realized the texture wasn't quite right—why was it a paper box instead of the usual plastic wrapping?
He examined the box, then sighed. "What?"
Without a word, Xie Qingcheng tossed the Durex box back to He Yu.
"Do you have eyes or not?"
He Yu looked at it, paused for a few seconds, then quietly put the box back into the first aid kit.
Fucking fantastic.
And it was even the textured kind with a delay lubricant.
Granted, both of them were rather thick-skinned in this area. Generally speaking, it was difficult to faze He Yu, and this was just a mistake, so it wasn't anything to make a fuss over.
As for Xie Qingcheng, he was calm and steady by nature and rarely let his emotions get the best of him. Besides, he was already a man who had gotten married and divorced. Though he wasn't particularly interested in these kinds of things, seeing adult products could hardly offend his delicate sensibilities.
Xie Qingcheng merely furrowed his brows. "Why are all you students these days so depraved?"
"This isn't so bad," He Yu said mildly. "You haven't even seen the worst of it yet."
As he spoke, he noticed a notebook lying next to the medical kit.
Utopia Guestbook
These notebooks usually served as anonymous confessionals, with writers adding on to previous comments over time. Even if previous writers might never see the ensuing comments, those who came later could carry on the discussion and add their own juicy tales. Reading these tomes from cover to cover was also quite interesting, especially considering that these books usually ended up containing exciting stories of romance or friendship.
He Yu was suddenly struck with an idea. He picked up the notebook and asked Xie Qingcheng, "Would Doctor Xie like to see? This notebook should have a lot of content that'd help you better understand the ways of modern youth."
With nothing else to do, the two of them began to read it together.
As expected, the notebook was chock-full of all kinds of different handwriting. The contributors wrote mainly about declarations of love, the beginnings of friendship, secret confessions, and the like.
They were leafing their way through when He Yu let out a sudden hum of surprise.
"Xie Qingcheng, someone's mentioned you here."