Love Affairs in Melbourne-Chapter 29 - 28: Don’t Read Books, Read People

"Then what if it was during the time you were writing ’Tombstone Inscription’ when I asked you?" Qi Yi had already adjusted his mood.

"If you had asked me that question three years ago, I would have definitely said yes at that time.

While writing that blog post, I deeply felt that if it wasn’t for my own self-deception, I should have realized that I had fallen in love with you from the start.

I just never wanted to believe that someone like you could truly fall for me as I was then.

Your love made me feel like I was walking on thin ice.

I was afraid it was another kind of unprecedented targeting method.

I was afraid of getting hurt, so I never dared to admit that I had truly fallen for you."

Yan Yan continued to seriously answer Qi Yi’s question.

"Thank you." Qi Yi’s thank you was loaded with too much of the past.

Yan Yan’s recent reply had smoothed over the vicious wound left when they broke up, and Yan Yan had said she had never fallen in love with him.

"Uh– I don’t know why, but now whenever I hear you say ’thank you,’ I just want to laugh." Yan Yan’s tone started to shift again.

"If you want to laugh, go ahead and laugh." Qi Yi appeared indifferent, as if he genuinely didn’t remember that he had received a phone call from Yan Yan that morning.

"I can’t laugh right now, because I haven’t finished answering your question just yet.

If you ask me now, my answer would be three words—I don’t know." Yan Yan looked at Qi Yi.

"Why?" Qi Yi was a bit puzzled. Was Yan Yan saying she had started deceiving herself again?

"Because, I now feel that back in high school, when we were only seventeen or eighteen, we really didn’t understand what love is. There was somewhat a sense of ’manufacturing sorrows for poetry’s sake.’" Yan Yan gave her own explanation.

"Do you understand now?" Qi Yi’s real question was whether Yan Yan had already fallen for someone else now.

"Now, well, I kind of get it but not really, which is why the answer has become I don’t know." Yan Yan made a thoughtful expression.

Qi Yi wanted to continue the topic, but even before he could speak out, Yan Yan stopped him.

"The noodles from Monash University Student Union weren’t that great to begin with. If you don’t eat them now, they’ll soon become even harder to swallow." Yan Yan urged Qi Yi to eat the noodles.

Qi Yi complied and began to eat. Sometimes love really wasn’t something that could be clarified with just a question or two, or explained in a sentence or two.

"How is it, do the Saigon Noodle Bar’s noodles taste good?" Yan Yan asked Qi Yi.

"Just as you said, not particularly good, nor particularly bad; they’re unremarkable," Qi Yi summed up after tasting a bite.

"That’s why when I was at Monash, if I had morning classes, I would often come here for noodles," Yan Yan said with a smile.

"Because they aren’t very good?" Qi Yi found Yan Yan’s logic strange.

"No, it’s because they’re unremarkable, as you said. You know, I’ve always dreamt of being an unremarkable person ever since I was little. Frustrated that I’ve never achieved that, I could only take solace in these noodles." Yan Yan’s logic often differed from the norm.

"You can do that?" Qi Yi felt this was something only Yan Yan could say.

"Why not? The greatest feature of these noodles is that they are featureless.

So much so that every time after I’ve eaten, aside from feeling full, I can hardly remember what they tasted like.

Then, after a few days, in an attempt to remember that taste, I end up coming back for more, in an endless cycle." Yan Yan’s way of speaking always had its own unique logic.

.........

After finishing the noodles and coming out of Union House.

"Have you been to Melbourne before?" Yan Yan asked Qi Yi.

"No," Qi Yi answered.

"Oh, then that’s good," Yan Yan let out a sigh of relief.

"What is up with that odd reaction?" Qi Yi was a bit puzzled.

"Odd? What’s odd about it? If you’ve never been here, I can take you anywhere I want, describe it however I see fit, without worrying whether it’s true or not, because you wouldn’t know the real situation anyway." That was Yan Yan’s explanation.

"Why do I feel like you’re setting me up to be sold?" Qi Yi looked worried.

"That’s not a bad suggestion, I’ll seriously consider it," Yan Yan laughed and replied before she remembered another question, "When I called you this morning, you were not fully awake yet. Did you have trouble sleeping last night?"

"Um, I couldn’t adjust to the time difference all at once," Qi Yi replied.

"Is it really the time difference? Couldn’t it be that you couldn’t sleep because you were excited about meeting an old friend in a foreign land?" Yan Yan teased Qi Yi.

"Both are true, but the likelihood of the latter is greater than the former." Qi Yi wasn’t embarrassed to admit that.

"Then you must be quite tired today, having just taken such a long flight and not resting well last night.

You’ve also pretty much got a glimpse of the University of Melbourne when we came over to Union House.

The University of Melbourne is quite close to the city center CBD. So it doesn’t cover a large area, can’t really compare to your Stanford.

Moreover, the architectural styles that we have here, you seem to have at your place as well, and what we don’t have, you do, plus San Francisco is also by the ocean.

I won’t take you to tour the campus or go to Dockland to see the sea or anything." At this moment, Yan Yan actually hadn’t decided where she should take Qi Yi today.

"I’d like to visit your school’s library," Qi Yi expressed his own opinion.

"Ah? Our library isn’t anything special, it’s not even a third of the size of Stanford’s." Yan Yan was dismissive.

"I’m not looking at books, I’m looking at people." Qi Yi felt pleased that Yan Yan knew even the size of their school’s library.

"It’s been so many years, how come your hobby of going to the library to watch people dating hasn’t changed?" Yan Yan said, slightly amused, shaking her head.

"Going to the library to watch people date is your hobby, my hobby is going to the library to watch you," Qi Yi said seriously.

"You say it as if it’s true. Back in the sophomore year, you would drag me to the library every day, not resting even on weekends.

It got to the point where my mom would advise me every day not to study so hard.

But in reality, every time we went to the library, you were busy helping various classmates with their questions.

If it weren’t for the boredom, why would I watch others dating?

Your hobby isn’t going to the library to watch me, but to be watched in the library," Yan Yan teased Qi Yi with a smile.

Yan Yan had always been troubled by her naturally unpopular constitution, but someone like Qi Yi who is too popular has definitely another kind of trouble.

"You make a good point. Then I can just try out a library where no one asks me questions, and I can solely watch you," Qi Yi had too many memories of being with Yan Yan in the school library.

But Qi Yi’s mind was completely devoid of recent images of Yan Yan studying in the University of Melbourne library over the past few years.

This feeling, it was as if a part of the memory was missing.

Qi Yi said he wanted to see the library, but what he really wanted in his heart was to fill in the missing images of studying together with Yan Yan in the university library.