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Gao Yingjie misses his best friend. They’re so busy now — he, busier than most, as Captain Wang often pulls him apart for one on one practice. It’s more than the time spent on practice. He also gets additional technical drills, additional tactical exercises to review, on top of the time the team spends practicing together. Even though he knows he's unlikely to get time to play on stage this season, his next opportunity feels like its only one match away.
He doesn’t mind, not really. The weight of expectation has become a familiar companion, and doing the work makes it easier to carry. Practice, practice, practice; he’s good enough at Glory to tell how big the gap is between where he is and where he wants to be. Where he needs to be to not let Captain down.
But it used to be that it wasn’t just him in the team practice room after hours. The chair next to him used to be occupied by another boy, his brown hair falling slightly into his eyes, his fingers tapping meticulously at the keys.
Despite never going on stage for a match, Qiao Yifan had never wallowed or given up. Often, he would be the one to suggest practicing longer. Faced with that determination, Gao Yingjie could never bring himself to say no.
This of course had nothing to do with how Qiao Yifan would smile at him when he agreed, a small stretch of his petal pink lips. The smile was no less bright than any other beaming grin — and to him, perhaps a thousand times more endearing.
He misses that smile. He knows there was something his best friend was keeping from him… something that his best friend felt like he couldn’t trust him with.
If only knowing there was something he didn't know would let him know what it was.
Damn. His turbulent thoughts had transformed into tonguetwisters now.
With a sigh, he glances back at the screen, meeting the eyes of his avatar, Kind Tree. "Maybe he'll practice with me tomorrow," he says hopefully. Kind Tree does not answer. He just breathes in the looping idle animation Glory uses when no inputs are entered.
Gao Yingjie shuts off the game, removes his account card, and turns around to survey the room before he switches off the lights. His eyes catch sight of a pen resting almost behind the monitor of Qiao Yifan's seat. It must have rolled away, so Yifan wouldn't have seen it — not that it mattered, since it was just a pen, one like many others of that brand Yifan had.
(Despite how digital everything was, especially in this city, Yifan still liked to carry around pens and paper with him. He had opinions on stationary. Yingjie had possibly memorised these opinions, which is why he knew that while this was his favourite brand of gel pen, Yifan had at least two more in that exact colour.)
If he left the pen there, Yifan would definitely see it the next morning. Or he could take it and return it tomorrow. There was no rush, and it was late, though not as late as the two of them used to practice until. But…
He picks up the pen, turns out the lights, and walks to Yifan's room. He knocks twice, softly.
There's no response, so he knocks again, a bit louder, and calls out. "Yifan? It's me, Yingjie."
Silence again. He ponders the door.
The door has no answers.
He reaches out hesitantly for the doorknob. If it's locked, that means Yifan is asleep, and he'll just pass the pen back in the morning and ask if he was okay, that's a perfectly normal thing to do as friends —
The door is not locked.
The training room doors aren’t heavy, so it had opened in his surprise. He sees Yifan, slumped in front of his keyboard. On the screen, the Tiny Herb Glory Training Program is on the main menu.
So Yifan was training without him.
He looks so small there. His features have relaxed in his sleep, his mouth hanging slightly open. He’s wearing a hoodie Gao Yingjie recognised as his own from his training camp days.
Back then, he had been clearing his closet, and Yifan had offered to take it off his hands. Yifan had laughed, snatching the hoodie out of his hands before he could toss it in the trash. “This will be very valuable one day! You should sign it. It’ll be worth so much when you’re the greatest Witch in Glory.”
Back then, Gao Yingjie had also laughed, and replied with “What do you need my autograph for? You’ll be right by my side.” And Qiao Yifan had bumped his elbow against his, and his eyes had crinkled up, and he had agreed.
He can’t describe the emotion he’s feeling at that moment. It’s something heavy, like the storm clouds during monsoon season, right before the skies open and empty. It’s that feeling when summer tips into fall, where you’re not really sure when it happened but it definitely happened.
Gao Yingjie pushes the indescribable feeling to the side, tiptoeing into the room and putting the pen into the holder at the corner of the table. He closes the notebook on the desk, filled with unfamiliar scribbles of tactics, and powers down the computer.
Yifan stirs. He blinks sleepily. “Yingjie?” he asks softly, reaching out to catch Gao Yingjie’s sleeve.
“You left your pen in the training room; I came to return it,” he says awkwardly.
“Oh?” Yifan rubs at his eyes. One can see his brain coming back online. Gao Yingjie is hopelessly, helplessly endeared. “Oh! Thank you, Yingjie. You know, you could have just passed it to me tomorrow right?”
“Right.”
“I still appreciate it though.”
“Mmhmm.” Gao Yingjie scrambles for what to say. “You should go to bed… it’s late now.”
“You too,” says Yifan.
“Um… you need to let go of my sleeve first.”
“Oh!” Yifan blushes.
Gao Yingjie walks to the door. Yifan watches him go, and gives him a little wave, which gets caught in a yawn. Gao Yingjie waves back, and then flees to his room.
He dreams of two cats sleeping on gamer chairs, surrounded by giant-sized stationery. They wake up from their dreams and climb the giant mountain made up of pens, and notebooks, and erasers, but when he reaches the top he finds himself alone, and wakes strangely dissatisfied.
Yifan doesn’t train with him that night either. He doesn’t leave a pen behind again. Gao Yingjie doesn’t knock on his door.