Give Me a Hug

Chapter 18: Library

The library wasn't very crowded, with plenty of empty seats available since it wasn't close to the end of the term. Following behind Liang Sunian, Xie Jiaran went inside, and they found a seat by the window on the third floor.

Liang Sunian spent nearly an hour explaining the remaining half of the exam paper from yesterday, pausing a bit longer on a typical question and pulling out a notebook he had brought along.

The notebook had a blue and white cover and looked well-used.

"I took some notes during class that you might find useful. The beginning has all the basic concepts. You can review it in your spare time or do some exercises. You should be able to pass the final exam."

Afternoons tend to make people lazy, and listening to logical problems made Xie Jiaran sleepy. He had been fighting drowsiness for a while, so his reaction was slow. He absentmindedly flipped through the notebook Liang Sunian handed him, noticing the neat handwriting and orderly format, but what caught his attention were the fruit illustrations on the margins of each page.

It was undoubtedly a very girly and cute notebook, completely at odds with Liang Sunian's image.

Seeing him staring at the margins, Liang Sunian chuckled, "I bought it at the stationery store near the school gate. The cover looked simple, but I didn't expect the inside to be so decorative. Since I already bought it, I just used it."

"It's pretty," Xie Jiaran said slowly, his voice carrying a hint of drowsiness.

Liang Sunian said, "Yeah, I got used to it and found it cute after a while, but not anymore."

Xie Jiaran turned his head and asked, "Why?"

"Because without a comparison, there's no harm."

Liang Sunian pointed to the notebook and said, "Those pictures aren't as nice as the ones you draw."

With a smiling face, it was hard not to feel like he was just blowing smoke.

As the sun sank lower, its light spread in arcs, illuminating each floor.

Liang Sunian asked Xie Jiaran what he wanted to drink and went downstairs to find a vending machine. While paying, he ran into a classmate, who looked at him in surprise.

"This is rare. Our top student in the law department is actually in the library? Is this a first? Am I seeing things?"

Liang Sunian bent down to retrieve two bottles of soda water and glared at him. "Why? Can't I come to the library?"

"It's not that you can't. It's just unusual." The classmate said, "You haven't been to the library since freshman year. What brought you here today?"

"It's not just for show." Liang Sunian thought for a moment and clarified his purpose, "You could say I'm doing some precise one-on-one temporary tutoring."

"Tutoring?" The classmate laughed, "Who's the lucky person getting one-on-one tutoring from the top student in our law department?"

"Well... A future artist with rich artistic talent but a slightly lacking logical mind for science."

When Liang Sunian returned to the third floor with the drinks, the future artist had already fallen asleep on the desk.

The hand supporting his head was resting on his colorful notebook, and his right hand still loosely held a pen.

Noticing the pen was about to touch his face, Liang Sunian reached over to gently remove it. As he did so, his pinky and ring finger were unconsciously grasped by the sleeping person, who curled his fingers around them.