Chapter 31
Setting out a little after five, before Bei City’s rush hour had begun, Jiang Mi spent a little over ten minutes driving to the area near Experimental High School. The car windows had privacy film, so Jiang Mi changed into Experimental High School’s uniform in the back seat before opening the car door, getting out, and walking to the school gate.
His timing was very precise. When he reached the school gate, school had just ended, and energetic high school students in uniform were laughing and joking as they walked out.
But perhaps because there was a basketball game after school today, the school gate wasn’t as crowded as usual.
Jiang Mi tidied his clothes not far away, took a deep breath, then stepped inside.
Sure enough, the security guard didn’t notice that he was a man nearly thirty years old. When Jiang Mi entered, a guard did actually glance at him. At this time of day, everyone was walking out, and very few students were walking in. However, after sweeping his gaze over Jiang Mi’s appearance, the guard assumed this student had forgotten something and was turning back to retrieve it.
Experimental High School was a municipal key high school. However, because it had been built too early, even though it had been renovated in recent years, the campus area wasn’t particularly large.
After entering the school, Jiang Mi turned right, circled around the administration building, and saw the basketball court not far away.
Since today was the second-year basketball finals, quite a few people had already gradually taken seats in the stands beside the court.
Jiang Mi strode over and found a seat in the third row at the very center. After sitting down, he took out his phone and sent Liang Jinyi a message.
Seven or eight minutes later, the stands gradually filled up. On the other side of the court, near the fence, quite a few people were standing too.
A dozen or so high school students holding basketballs rushed down from the teaching building on the south side, laughing and joking as they came to the center of the court and began warming up.
As Liang Jinyi moved his body, he turned his head to look toward the stands.
Jiang Mi met his gaze and lightly curved his lips at him.
Only then did Liang Jinyi withdraw his gaze in satisfaction.
After seven or eight minutes of warm-up, with the PE teacher’s whistle, the basketball game between second-year Class Six and second-year Class Twelve officially began.
The last time Jiang Mi watched Liang Jinyi play basketball was when Liang Jinyi was in elementary school. At that time, Little Brother’s agility and aim had already been far better than ordinary people’s. And in these past few years, Liang Jinyi had also practiced sanda and boxing, so the strength and angles he used to dunk and steal the ball were more tricky than most people’s.
However, after Jiang Mi watched carefully, he discovered that Class Twelve also had two children who played basketball very well. One student was far faster than everyone else. As long as the basketball reached his hands, his speed made it impossible for others to catch up, giving Class Twelve an extra chance to shoot.
There was also another child who was quite good, especially in prediction. He was very capable of anticipating what the Class Six students’ next move would be, thus seizing the initiative first.
In short, in Jiang Mi’s view, the outcome of this match was hard to predict.
And as expected, after half the game, Class Six and Class Twelve’s scores were neck and neck. One moment, Class Six was one or two points ahead of Class Twelve; the next, Class Twelve was one or two points ahead of Class Six.
Jiang Mi watched this children’s basketball game with full concentration.
Suddenly, Liang Jinyi used an extremely tricky movement to snatch the ball from that student who was very good at predicting moves. Then, turning sideways, he leapt and slammed the basketball into the hoop from an astonishing angle.
A huge burst of cheers erupted from the court.
The student sitting to Jiang Mi’s right was even more excited. He slapped Jiang Mi’s shoulder, his eyes shining, and said excitedly, “Did you see that? That one just now was my brother, my good brother!”
Jiang Mi smiled gently at Zhu Yurui, whose face had turned red with excitement.
Liang Jinyi had scored the most beautiful three-pointer on the court today. After bumping fists with his teammates, his gaze moved toward the stands. Then he saw that Jiang Mi wasn’t looking at him and cheering him on. Instead, he was smiling gently at the big fool beside him.
Liang Jinyi narrowed his eyes and noticed Zhu Yurui’s hand on Brother’s shoulder.
“Liang Jinyi, it’s starting. Steal the ball!” A classmate saw Liang Jinyi’s attention had shifted to the stands and hurriedly reminded him.
At that moment, Jiang Mi finally looked back toward the court. Liang Jinyi bent slightly, preparing to steal the ball.
Another dozen or so minutes passed.
Jiang Mi watched the game with rapt attention until he noticed something rolling to his foot.
Over the past two years, Jiang Mi often wore leather shoes, all kinds of leather shoes. But today, in order to match Little Brother’s school uniform, he had worn a pair of white sneakers. A pink hair clip had fallen beside his shoe.
Jiang Mi bent down, picked it up, and handed it to the little girl beside him.
“Thanks.” The little girl took the hair clip and thanked him politely. However, when she saw Jiang Mi’s face, she suddenly asked curiously, “Classmate, you’re not from our school, are you?”
Jiang Mi: “?”
The little girl looked at him carefully, then said with certainty, “If our school had someone who looked like this, there’s no way I wouldn’t know.”
The little girl had an outgoing personality. She smiled and leaned closer to Jiang Mi. “Hey, which school are you from? Is it Third High near our school?”
Jiang Mi avoided answering these questions. “I’m going to watch the game.”
After saying this, his gaze landed on the basketball court. But just as it landed on the court, someone tugged his sleeve.
Jiang Mi turned his head. It was still that little girl from just now. The little girl looked at him with a bright smile and coaxed, “Classmate, just tell me what school you’re from. If you tell me, I won’t bother you anymore.”
Jiang Mi felt that compared to when he was studying, girls nowadays were much harder to deal with.
However, he was still more than ten years older than her, so Jiang Mi had a high degree of tolerance toward children. He said, “Yunde.”
“Holy crap, a key high school.” The girl pressed again, “Then who’s your school’s principal?”
Jiang Mi: “?”
The girl said confidently, “What if you just casually named a middle school to brush me off?”
Although Jiang Mi had graduated nearly ten years ago, some time ago, when he met up with old friends, they had talked about bits and pieces from high school. Naturally, he knew that their school hadn’t changed principals in the past ten years, so he said the principal’s name.
The girl knew when to stop and was also afraid of making this classmate dislike her. “Watch the game, watch the game. I won’t bother you anymore.”
Liang Jinyi looked toward the stands again. Seeing that Jiang Mi was still the same as a minute ago, still talking to the girl beside him, he violently threw the basketball in his hands.
Jiang Mi’s gaze landed on the basketball court. Then he saw that next, Liang Jinyi was much fiercer than he had been in the first half, his aggressiveness especially strong. Class Six and Class Twelve’s basketball abilities had originally been on par, which was why they had been pulling back and forth before. Now that Liang Jinyi had become harsher and fiercer, Class Twelve failed to keep up.
This game ended with Class Six’s victory without any suspense.
They were all young people around seventeen or eighteen. Although the students of Class Twelve felt regretful about losing the game, they weren’t furious. Instead, they smiled and joked around with the students of Class Six. They even asked Liang Jinyi, who had been the fiercest player of the entire game.
“Liang Jinyi, did you take drugs in the second half? Why were you playing with so much anger?”
Liang Jinyi tossed the basketball in his hand to a teammate, picked up the school uniform hanging on the railing, and said, “I’m leaving first.”
After saying that, he strode toward the stands.
Zhu Yurui had already been unable to wait to welcome Liang Jinyi. Seeing that Liang Jinyi was also walking in his direction, Zhu Yurui hugged his schoolbag and went forward. “Brother Liang, after this battle, so what if your grades aren’t as good as that guy surnamed Sun? You’ll definitely be steady as… Hey, where are you going?”
Liang Jinyi walked past Zhu Yurui without looking sideways.
“You played pretty well, Jinyi.” Jiang Mi, wearing the blue-and-white high school uniform, stood on the high school basketball court with both hands in his pockets and said to him with a smile.
“Hey, you two know each other?” Zhu Yurui followed Liang Jinyi. Hearing this, he asked curiously.
Hearing this, Jiang Mi turned his gaze to the still-blank-looking Zhu Yurui and asked with amusement, “Little friend, did you really forget me completely? We’ve met.”
Zhu Yurui scratched his head and racked his brain. “You are…”
Seeing that the other party really couldn’t remember, Jiang Mi could only honestly say, “I’m Jinyi’s older brother. I came to school last month to pick Jinyi up, and you introduced yourself to me.”
Of course Zhu Yurui had an impression of Liang Jinyi’s older brother who drove an Audi. Not because of the car. That Audi was only a few hundred thousand yuan and wasn’t expensive. The main thing was that he remembered Brother Liang’s older brother was very good-looking. Different from Liang Jinyi’s sharp beauty, this brother was gentle and elegant, and because he wore a suit, he had that elite flavor.
“Ge, after you changed into a school uniform, I didn’t even recognize you!” Zhu Yurui wasn’t someone afraid of strangers, and he even pressed further, “How old are you this year, exactly?”
“How old do you think I am?” Jiang Mi asked.
“Maybe one or two years after graduating university? Twenty-three, twenty-four?” Zhu Yurui said.
Jiang Mi was just about to answer when someone else suddenly walked over beside them. It was the girl who had been sitting to his right earlier.
Jiang Mi looked at her in confusion.
The girl smiled at him, raised her phone, and said, “Hey, classmate, add me on WeChat. I have a childhood friend who’s also from Yunde High. We can hang out together in the future…”
Liang Jinyi had truly endured for a long time. He had endured until now and really couldn’t endure anymore, especially since there were still some girls standing not far away secretly looking at Jiang Mi. He grabbed Jiang Mi’s arm and coldly replied to that girl, “He doesn’t add people.”
Then he grabbed Jiang Mi’s wrist and pulled him outside.
“Hey, hey, Brother Liang, your schoolbag is still with me.” Zhu Yurui hurriedly followed.
Liang Jinyi tightly gripped Jiang Mi’s wrist, turned around, walked to Zhu Yurui, took his schoolbag, then led Jiang Mi away quickly.
“Hey, Jinyi, this isn’t the direction to the school gate, is it?” Although it seemed like no matter which way they went, they could reach Experimental High School’s gate, in this direction, it was getting more and more remote.
As Jiang Mi thought this, he saw Liang Jinyi throw his schoolbag and jacket onto the ground. Before Jiang Mi could react, Little Brother, wearing a red basketball jersey, pressed down on his shoulders and pushed him against the thick trunk of a banyan tree.
Author’s Note
Congratulations, my babies. Today you met Shorty-kun.
