Crossdress Ch22part2

At the dorm entrance, Xu Yan waved. “Goodnight, senior. Drive safe.”

Wen Sinian suddenly asked, “Was the cake good?”

He must be referring to the small ice cream cake he’d given Xu Yan at the studio. It was from the same brand as the one Year had given him—just a different filling. One was sea salt coconut, the other camellia.

“It was delicious,” Xu Yan said.

“The chocolate too. I ate all of it.”

Wen Sinian didn’t say anything more.

“Go on up,” he said.

Back in the dorm, lights-out was fast approaching. Xu Yan rushed to wash up and get ready for bed.

When he changed, he still felt heat lingering around his waist—as if those big, hot hands were still clutching him.

He checked in the bathroom mirror. On his smooth skin, there were faint red marks shaped unmistakably like palms and long fingers—wrapping around his narrow waist like some strange, custom-fitted accessory.

He took a few shallow breaths. That wasn’t just “strong grip”—he’d nearly had his waist snapped in half.

Li Huaiche and Zhao Qingji were already done washing up. When they saw Xu Yan scrambling, Li Huaiche asked teasingly:

“Did you two walk that slow, or were you downstairs chatting with Wen-Ge again?”

Xu Yan mumbled through his toothbrush: “Just walking slow.”

“Slow indeed. We’ve been back for ages. Thought maybe you two were hitting it off.”

Xu Yan shook his head.

“How do you guys even know the sports department crowd?” Li Huaiche asked.

Zhao Qingji helped explain: “Zhou Zhengyi once joined us for a shoot. That’s how.”

“Huh, small world,” Li commented.

“We didn’t even plan dinner tonight. Wen-Ge just suddenly said he wanted to treat us, and who knew we’d run into you guys at the first restaurant.”

“Total coincidence,” Zhao Qingji agreed.

“You guys arrived like clockwork—our food had just gotten there.”

“Yeah, we only decided on hotpot last minute too.”

Just then, the dorm lights went out.

Xu Yan finished his night routine using a flashlight and climbed into bed.

He lay there, staring into the dark, spaced out… then opened his alt account.

No new messages.

He reread Year’s last few texts. They didn’t feel like empty threats. Something about them seemed… real.

Anxious, he bit his knuckle under the covers, then typed cautiously:

[Yanyan]: Did you really come here?

It was already past 11.

Year’s reply came immediately—with a photo.

Xu Yan didn’t even need to enlarge it. The image was clearly the North City University campus—the very northern gate he always used.

Year had once said he was busy working in North City. But his IP always showed Haishi. Xu Yan had assumed it was just a short business trip.

He hadn’t expected that Year was still here.

Xu Yan bit his blanket, panicking. His heart raced. His thoughts spiraled. His eyes stared wide and unblinking at his phone, terrified of missing even a single message.

He’d nearly forgotten—tonight he was supposed to break up with Year.

And yet, just one photo of the campus gate had him so shaken that his chest tightened, his fingers trembled, and his breath came out uneven against the blanket.

He really came.

Was he waiting at the school gate?

Or had he already gone in?

What should he do? Should he hide? Maybe not leave the dorm for a few days?

[Year]: You disappeared the whole night.

[Year]: Baby.

[Year]: Do I really have to drag you home and lock you up just to make you talk to me?

Xu Yan didn’t dare doubt him. If Year said it, he’d probably do it.

Just a moment ago he’d said he’d come catch him—and the next second, there he was at the campus gate.

[Yanyan]: Can you go back first, please?

He lied.

[Yanyan]: I didn’t go back to the dorm tonight. I’m not on campus.

[Yanyan]: Even if you wait outside, you won’t see me.

[Year]: Oh.

[Year]: Out at a hotel with someone else, huh?

Xu Yan hadn’t expected him to leap to that conclusion.

And now… he had to keep lying.

[Yanyan]: How could that be possible? The dorms were just locked already, so I went out to stay with a friend.

[Yanyan]: You should go back, seriously.

But his lying skills were terrible, and it seemed Year didn’t believe him at all.

[Year]: Share your location.

A request came through immediately.

Of course Xu Yan didn’t dare accept. If he did, it would reveal he was lying in bed inside one of North City University’s dorms.

[Yanyan]: I don’t want to.

[Yanyan]: You said before that if I didn’t want to meet, you wouldn’t force me.

[Year]: Share.

Just one cold, curt word.

Seeing it, Xu Yan felt even more aggrieved. His eyes stung again, and as he typed, a wave of sadness and frustration welled up, making his vision blur.

Even if it was just an online relationship… even if he had never met Year in person… even if turning off his phone meant they’d never find each other again—everything they had shared over time, all those conversations and companionship, couldn’t be fake. There was no way his heart hadn’t been touched.

Xu Yan had never been in a relationship before. He wasn’t even sure if this counted as his first love. He never imagined it would end like this.

All the sadness and hurt he’d bottled up exploded in one burst of emotion:

[Yanyan]: No.

[Yanyan]: You don’t actually like me.

[Yanyan]: Everything you said before was a lie.

[Yanyan]: You said if I didn’t want to meet, then we wouldn’t meet. You said you wouldn’t come looking for me.

[Yanyan]: But you still came. You’re forcing me to share my location. You just want to find me and figure out who I really am.

[Yanyan]: Why do you have to look for me? Can’t you go find someone else?

[Yanyan]: The person you like is really important, right? Do you threaten them like this too?

[Yanyan]: You’re awful.

[Yanyan]: I really, really hate you.

[Yanyan]: I want to break up.

[Yanyan]: I never want to talk to you again.

[Yanyan]: I hate you!

After sending those messages, he tossed his phone aside, buried his face in the blanket, and curled up under the covers with soft sniffles. He rubbed at his stinging eyes with his fingertips.

After a while, the stinging lessened. He wiped away the faint dampness with the blanket and poked his head out, ready to sleep.

But the phone beside him kept lighting up non-stop like the sky was falling—messages flooding in one after another.

Annoyed, Xu Yan stuffed the phone under his pillow. Out of sight, out of mind.

He had said the breakup out loud. Whether the other person accepted it or not, he didn’t care anymore. He had class at 8 AM. He needed to sleep early.

But after lying there for a long time, he couldn’t fall asleep at all.

Frustrated at himself, he squeezed his stuffed bunny hard, then fished the phone out from under the pillow.

Twenty unread messages, all from Year’s alt account.

He bit his lip, then opened it.

He just wanted to see—now that he’d broken up, had the other person left? The campus gates stayed open all night. Cars could still come in. Hopefully, Year had already driven off.

The flood of messages made his eyes go blurry. He read through them one by one, eyebrows gradually furrowing.

[Year]: Don’t be scared, baby. I won’t go inside.

[Year]: Breaking up is impossible.

[Year]: Everything I said before wasn’t a lie.

[Year]: I really like you. Only you.

[Year]: You’re not allowed to break up with me. You’re not allowed to ignore me.

[Year]: But you can hate me if you want.

A photo followed—of a random street. The person in the car had taken it from the driver’s seat, one hand holding the phone while the other rested on the open window. The image captured the steering wheel and windshield ahead.

There was no face reflected in the side mirror, just a long, slender hand under the night sky. It was sharply contoured, with visible veins—so large the phone looked like a toy in its grip.

He really had left the school gate and was now somewhere unfamiliar.

[Year]: Can you relax now, baby?

Then came a few more messages trying to coax him, until the tone suddenly changed—

[Year]: Why did you say the person I like is important?

[Year]: Who told you I went looking for someone else?

[Year]: There’s only you, baby.

[Year]: Want me to prove it to you?

Attached was a WeChat screenshot.

Although it wasn’t just the chat with Yanyan, that conversation was pinned to the top. There were a few group chats and some contacts without nicknames, but all the recent messages were from yesterday or earlier. Nothing seemed suspicious.

What surprised Xu Yan was that the WeChat account Year used to talk to him… wasn’t even a secondary account. And Year had saved his contact name as:

“Stupid baby.”

Xu Yan flushed with a mix of embarrassment and annoyance.
How dare he call me stupid!?

So rude. Rude, rude, rude!