By the second day, Liang Meiyu already dreaded sitting next to Zhao Yichen.
He was late to class—again. He strolled in five minutes after the bell rang, hands in his pockets, offering a lazy excuse the teacher didn't even bother to question. He dropped into his seat beside her like he owned the entire back row.
"Still here, new girl?" he said, glancing sideways.
Meiyu didn't look up. "It's Meiyu. Not 'new girl.'"
"Oh?" He tapped his pen against her notebook. "Cute handwriting. Tiny. Like your voice."
Meiyu pulled her notebook away with a small glare. "Why are you so... irritating?"
Yichen grinned. "Because you make the best faces when you're annoyed."
Her jaw dropped. "You—!"
Before she could finish, the teacher called for silence. Meiyu huffed and turned back to her textbook, while Yichen leaned back in his chair, smirking like he'd won a prize.
From that day on, it became a pattern.
He'd borrow her pens and forget to return them.
He'd nudge her desk with his foot when she was writing.
He'd lean in too close and whisper sarcastic comments during class just to make her squirm.
"Do you highlight every word or are you just trying to kill the marker?"
"Do you always eat lunch alone? Or is it part of your mysterious loner routine?"
Meiyu tried to ignore him. She really did.
But when she got frustrated, when she huffed or argued back—he looked oddly satisfied.
And for reasons she couldn't understand, her heart beat just a little faster every time he smirked at her.
---
At lunch, she sat under a tree in the courtyard, hoping for a moment of peace. She opened her lunchbox and smiled at the small bunny-shaped onigiri her mother had made.
Then, a shadow fell over her.
Yichen.
He had no lunch, just a carton of strawberry milk.
"You seriously eat like that?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "You're a walking anime character."
She stared at him. "Why are you here?"
He sat down beside her without asking. "Nowhere better to be."
"…Don't you have friends?"
He shrugged. "They talk too much. You're quieter."
"That's because I don't want to talk to you."
He laughed, a low, amused sound. "There it is. The fire behind the shy. I knew it."
Meiyu bit her lip, flustered.
She didn't know what he wanted from her. She didn't even know why he kept showing up. All she knew was that ever since he started picking on her, she hadn't felt quite so invisible anymore.
And Zhao Yichen, arrogant or not, was the first person in this whole school who looked at her like she wasn't just the "new girl."