My Straight Girlfriend with Skin Hunger Syndrome - Chapter 2
Chapter 2
The starting gun fired, officially beginning the race.
Yi Shanshan’s radiant figure surged forward like a spirited young colt, her form elegant and her steps light as a feather.
The deafening roar of cheers swelled around the track, rising and falling in waves along with the athletes’ movements.
Even Ying Yuan, usually so calm and composed, found herself caught up in the electrifying atmosphere, her blood starting to boil.
Her eyes were fixed on Lina, their college’s sole representative in the women’s long-distance event. She watched her intently, silently urging her on from the depths of her heart.
Apart from a few foreign athletes with obvious professional training, the other participants were evenly matched. As they ran, they bunched together, and after one lap, their stamina waned, causing everyone to slow their pace.
Many spectators moved onto the grassy infield to follow their respective athletes. The crowd around Yi Shanshan was particularly dense, with some even holding up cameras to film exclusive “running POV” footage of her.
Ying Yuan followed suit, positioning herself near Lina. As Lina gasped for breath, Ying Yuan softly reminded her, “Maintain your rhythm. Breathe through your nose.”
Lina glanced sideways at Ying Yuan, a hint of surprise peeking through her ragged breathing.
“Don’t lose focus,” Ying Yuan said. “Keep your eyes straight ahead. If you have any strength left, prepare for a final sprint in the last fifty meters.”
Lina’s legs felt like noodles. She mumbled, “I don’t have any strength left…”
“It doesn’t matter if you don’t place,” Ying Yuan replied. “Just enjoy the joy of running.”
Lina chuckled at that. She wanted to ask, Do I look like I’m enjoying this? But as she laughed, she actually did look genuinely happy.
The paradoxical humor made her laughter unstoppable. She clutched her stomach, her legs churning clumsily through the final stretch.
One by one, runners surged across the finish line. When Yi Shanshan strode across, she threw her arms wide, her smile radiant as starlight.
In an instant, a crowd swarmed her, faces glowing with enthusiasm, filled with the exuberant sentiment that “even without victory, they had already won.”
The school cameras squeezed in, making Yi Shanshan the center of attention once again.
Lina took two deep breaths, finally pushing herself across the finish line. She stopped, bending over to catch her breath, her heart pounding wildly. Ying Yuan stood before her, holding out a water bottle but otherwise frozen in place.
The thunderous cheers were deafening, yet none of them were for her.
Lina glanced toward Yi Shanshan, panting, “It’s infuriating how some people are just born better.”
Ying Yuan replied softly, “Don’t compare yourself to others.”
Lina looked at Ying Yuan. The classmate before her was tall and slender, with delicate features. Her hair was tied back in a casual ponytail, and she wore a gray tracksuit that would allow her to blend seamlessly into any crowd. Her expression was calm, her eyes gentle. Her words were straightforward and polite, nothing more, nothing less.
A good person, but utterly unremarkable.
Like an NPC in a novel.
Lina blinked. “Don’t you feel like even though we live in the same dimension as someone like Yi Shanshan, it’s like we’re in two completely different worlds?”
“Theoretically, we’re not,” Ying Yuan said, glancing at the crowd swarming around Yi Shanshan, recalling her own pre-race plans.
“Do you feel discouraged?” Ying Yuan asked Lina.
“Huh?” Lina responded.
Ying Yuan spread her arms wide. “If you’re feeling down, you can hug me. It might offer some comfort.”
She paused, then added, “The warmth of the collective.”
Lina chuckled again, then suddenly shifted her gaze away, embarrassed. “Saying it out loud just makes it awkward. I’m fine now. Let’s go outside.”
“Okay,” Ying Yuan replied.
She withdrew her outstretched arms and followed Lina slowly toward the exit. The crowd surrounding Yi Shanshan suddenly parted, and someone holding a bright yellow bouquet of sunflowers approached Yi Shanshan. Yi Shanshan accepted the flowers and raised them to acknowledge the cheering crowd.
The audience roared with applause. Yi Shanshan performed a curtsy like a princess lifting her skirt, smiling and nodding graciously in every direction.
In the midst of the jubilant chaos, her gaze briefly swept over Ying Yuan, leaving no trace behind.
Ying Yuan returned to her class’s seating area, where the air buzzed with chatter about Yi Shanshan.
Lina sat in the row ahead, her dark head bowed. She paid no attention to the competition results being announced over the loudspeaker and didn’t engage much with the other students around her. Soon, she pulled out her phone and put on her Bluetooth earbuds.
Just as the final events of the day concluded and everyone was packing up to leave the stadium, Lina suddenly turned to Ying Yuan and asked, “Want to grab dinner together?”
“Now?” Ying Yuan replied. “I usually go back to shower first, then head out for dinner and study at the library.”
Lina was genuinely surprised. “Studying during the sports meet? What’s the point?”
“I don’t have anything else to do at night,” Ying Yuan shrugged.
“You could relax in bed, scroll TikTok, play games, or even learn to knit like that literature major in our dorm!” Lina suggested.
Ying Yuan smiled faintly. “None of those interest me.”
Lina was completely baffled. “No wonder you don’t hang out with your roommates. This habit of showering before dinner is so weird!”
“I’ve been sweating all day under the sun,” Ying Yuan replied.
“Just shower before bed then,” Lina countered.
But she didn’t press the matter further. Gathering her things, she stood up. “Let’s walk together. I’ll head to the cafeteria, and you can go back to your dorm.”
The two girls joined the departing crowd and left the stadium together, parting ways at the fork in the road.
At this hour, most people would be grabbing lunch or at least a milk tea, so Ying Yuan found her dorm room empty when she returned.
She glanced at her phone, grabbed a change of clothes, and headed to the shower.
She showered quickly, but her phone still rang midway through. Soap lathered her body, making her fingers slick and slippery.
Steam filled the air, veiling her vision in a hazy mist. The phone’s intermittent, fluctuating ring—now high, now low, rising and falling—sounded less like an urgent summons and more like a faint, nagging itch at Ying Yuan’s heart.
She cranked up the water, letting the hot torrent cascade over her body like a waterfall.
She emerged from the shower moments later, wrapped in a towel, and strode to her bed in two steps to grab her phone.
The caller ID showed no name, only a flashing star symbol.
It was the call she’d been expecting. Ying Yuan let out a long sigh.
She answered the call. Yi Shanshan’s voice burst forth like a bird poised for flight: “Ying Yuan! Where are you?”
“Dorm,” Ying Yuan replied.
Yi Shanshan: “Come quick! Meet me on the third floor of the faculty cafeteria.”
“I…” Ying Yuan curled her fingers around the bath towel. “I’m taking a shower.”
“Aww… You answered my call even while showering?” Yi Shanshan drawled, her voice dripping with cloying sweetness. “You’re the best, babe~”
Ying Yuan: “……”
She genuinely disliked Yi Shanshan’s unwarranted terms of endearment, which made her suddenly feel obligated—as if she now had a responsibility to fulfill Yi Shanshan’s demands, to go wherever she was asked.
Ying Yuan’s brief silence didn’t dampen Yi Shanshan’s enthusiasm. She seemed to have moved to a quieter spot and continued in the same cloying tone, “What stage of your shower are you at?”
Ying Yuan lowered her gaze to her body. What stage, indeed? She’d just lathered up with body wash, hadn’t even had time to scrub properly, but had hurriedly rinsed off to answer the phone.
Not that she’d rinsed thoroughly—there were still bubbles clinging to the hollow of her neck and her legs. Her skin remained damp, beads of water, from who-knew-where, rolling down to pool at her feet, forming a small, tranquil puddle.
Ying Yuan swallowed hard, unable to give a straight answer. She knew Yi Shanshan would twist such information into some wildly exaggerated narrative.
So she replied vaguely, “Almost done.”
“That’s fantastic!” Yi Shanshan said. “You won’t keep me waiting too long, then.”
Fantastic? Ying Yuan thought. Everything that comes out of your mouth sounds like it’s all sunshine and rainbows.
Yi Shanshan: “Hurry over, okay? I really want it~”
She lowered her voice deliberately when she said “want it,” as if revealing a secret.
Perhaps because the phone was pressed so close to her ear, the sound seemed to bypass any barrier and burrow straight into Ying Yuan’s eardrum, sending a tiny electric jolt spiraling down her spine.
Ying Yuan wanted to end the call, but Yi Shanshan was still rambling on.
“There wouldn’t have been so much to do, but the Student Union suddenly got it into their heads to invite us to dinner. I hate dealing with those people—they talk in circles, and they’re all full of hidden agendas.”
“And they even expect us to toast everyone, pulling out all those greasy banquet tricks. If it weren’t for all the extra interactions during the recent sports meet, I wouldn’t have come at all…
“That’s why I really miss you, waaaah… I want to hug your arm and nuzzle against it…”
“I’ll come over,” Ying Yuan interrupted her.
“Aww! That’s amazing!” Yi Shanshan’s voice instantly brightened, her dejection vanishing, replaced by pure, radiant anticipation and joy. “I’ll be waiting for you! Hurry, hurry!”
With that, she eagerly hung up, as if saving even a second would make Ying Yuan arrive sooner.
Clutching her phone, Ying Yuan stood rooted to the spot, her ears still burning. She started toward the bathroom, her grip on the towel loosening, revealing a large expanse of bare skin.
Ying Yuan rinsed off one last time. As the water cascaded over her body, Yi Shanshan’s words replayed in her mind, word by word.
She said she really misses me, Ying Yuan swallowed hard.
She said I’m so nice, Ying Yuan took a deep breath.
She said arm, nuzzle. Ying Yuan lowered her gaze and unconsciously rinsed her arm twice more.