Translator: Flying Lines
“Wait, did I hear it right?”
After a beautiful night’s sleep on Chen An’s bed, Ivanov returned to his former vigorous self. As he enjoyed the breakfast brought by Chen Yang and Lu Feng, he made noises of surprise.
When Chen Yang and Lu Feng went out to buy breakfast with darkened faces, Chen An related the gist of what happened to him. Seeing his surprise, Chen An stamped with force on the hairy bear’s feet under the table: so Ivanov had not been paying attention to him at all!
“Baby, my bad. Please forgive me.” Clasping his hands in a praying gesture, Ivanov was near to getting down on his knees.
Chen An did not really take it to heart. But Ivanov was still on his blacklist, and Chen An easily got annoyed by the sight of him, and thus wanted to kick him whenever he got the chance.
Last night, Chen An was close to kicking Ivanov out. Yet the hairy bear went on sleeping even on the floor. In the end, Chen An found himself unable to harden up, so he dragged him back onto the bed.
He had not seen the guy for some time. Deep down in his heart, he actually missed him a bit.
“This guy doesn’t seem reliable, An. Are you really asking him to join in?” Chen Yang had found Lu Feng alone to be hard to deal with. Now with Ivanov, he was contemplating the possibility of sticking his fork right into the man’s heart. So could this man please get lost as soon as possible?
“Hehehe! Little friend, first of all, I need to made a correction in your form of address. You should call my baby ‘uncle’, not his name. That’s for one.”
Ivanov continued his speech to Chen Yang, gesticulating as he said: “secondly, if you were not his nephew, I would beat you up right now.”
“It remains to be seen who beats who.” As if to provoke Ivanov on purpose, Chen Yang wiped his mouth with a tissue, and planted a soft kiss on the man sitting beside him. Then he said with a sweet smile, “An, I’ll go and contact the gym in the area.”
“Wait.” wiping the corner of Chen Yang’s mouth affectionately with a finger, Chen An scolded, “how old are you, a baby? Okay, go now. And get me a cup of latte afterwards.”
“Hmm.” Chen Yang beamed, giving Chen An a wink. Then he asked in a small voice, “An, are you not going to give me a good-bye kiss?”
Ivanov stared in wide-eyed shock at uncle and nephew. Pointing at the two, he protested: “Hey, hey, hey. What are you two doing? Do you see the sun shining outside? If you really kiss, I’m gonna call the police.”
Chen An, however, went on as if he had not seen Ivanov’s histrionics, and planted a kiss on the corner of Chen Yang’s mouth. Like a kid who got a candy but wanted more, Chen Yang was reluctant to let go. So Chen An patted him on the back and said, “Okay now, get going. Extra milk with the latte!”
“Sports drinks.” Lu Feng stated, with no expression on his face.
Ivanov remained pointing at Chen Yang and Chen An. Finally, he said: “Vodka, please.”
“Can’t you live without alcohol?” Chen An gave the hairy bear a dark look. Well, Vodka in the morning: Russians.
“So you’re concerned about my health, darling! I’m touched. But baby, if really care about me, you should probably not get off with other people in front of me. And with your own nephew! Damn! I did not know you have a taste for in——”
Before he could finish the last word, however, Chen An stuffed a piece of scone in his mouth. Lu Feng watched and did not speak. Yet his eyes were bright with interest: clearly he also wanted to know.
“Not really my nephew.” Chen An stated calmly.
“What?” Ivanov nearly jumped up from his chair. With a face full of remorse, he uttered in resentment: “He’s not really your nephew? My God! If I had known, I would not have left you with him. I would have…”
Chen An gave Ivanov an evil look, which shut him up immediately. With a fake smile, Chen An asked: “you would have what?”
“Asked him to a few drinks and gotten to know my future rivals in love better, hahaha!”. With a smile plastered on his face, Ivanov poked forcefully at the meat on his plate with the knife, and said, “darling, I have to ask. What are you planning to do, building a basketball team? Should I be worried about your health?”
Chen An ignored Ivanov’s innuendo and drank his soybean milk slowly. “You’re right. I’m building a basketball team. Are you joining in?”
Then he squinted at Ivanov and gave him a wry smile: “I absolutely respect your decision. I won’t make you do anything, little Ivan.”
The corner of Ivanov’s mouth twitched. He stared with disbelief at Lu Feng: “Hey, madman. You don’t have anything to say to that?”
Lu Feng did not spare Ivanov a glance. He kept at his breakfast: “I do what An wants.”
Chen An placed a hand on Lu Feng’s shoulder, and lifting his chin, he gloated at Ivanov: “come off it, little Ivan. You can’t get between us. We are very much in love with each other.”
Lu Feng turned and placed a kiss on the hand resting on his shoulder, which made Ivanov put down his knife and fork, and threw his hands in the air.
“Of course I want to join.” But he really minded the fact that he hadn’t got a kiss this morning. So Ivanov curled his lips and complained, “darling, I want a good morning kiss, too.”
Chen An, however, got up along with Lu Feng, and pointing at the dinner table, said: “clean it up.”
“Why are you so mean to me?”
“How about I get you a hotel room? Then you won’t have to suffer our presence tonight.”
“Cleaning up now!”
…
…
Chen An, Chen Yang and Lu Feng.
The three of them stood and watched as Ivanov, dressed in sportswear, made ten shots, and missed ten times.
“An, can this really work?” Lu Feng couldn’t help but ask.
Though they’d known that basketball was not a hobby of Ivanov’s, could he be this bad? Was he really not a spy sent by Zhao Ziliang?
“Bang——”
Again, the ball hit the hoop and rebounded. Now it was 11 miss.
Chen An slowly let out a sigh. He couldn’t bear to watch Ivanov’s performance any more, and turned to Wang Li and the nerd, who just got on the scene. He asked, “why are you two here? You are supposed to be looking after the tall boy.”
“He drove us out. According to him, if we beat the basketball class, he’s avenged. And the only function we serve if we stay is to irritate him.”
Wang Li went on, and said she totally agreed with the tall boy on that point. Chen An had medical care personnel looking after the tall boy, so he had no used for Wang Li and the nerd except to talk to. Thus they would prefer to be here and be useful.
Chen An nodded with a smile. He noticed that the nerd watched the hairy bear play attentively, so he asked: “what do you think?”
The nerd pushed up his glasses a bit, and said: “this foreign friend is absolutely horrible at shooting. But he’s a wonderful dribbler.”
Chen An nodded. Well, he wouldn’t expect Ivanov to score. He only needed to dribble and pass the ball. After all, Ivanov had advantage in height, build and strength.
“Uncle Chen, are you really asking Mr. Ivan to join?” Wang Li still remembered Chen An’s concern about ‘having outside help’ if they asked Ivanov to join.
Outside help? One that could not shoot?
Chen An put on a small smile. When was he a person who cared what others said?
“Get him to the university tomorrow, for the necessary procedures.” Stroking his chin, he added: “I remember Ivanov already has a PhD. Not a student then. He can be my teaching assistant.”
Wang Li held her tongue; did a PE class need a PhD as a teaching assistant?
Besides, was their team a little bit overly…stupendous? Were they sure they were going to a basketball match, not to conquer the world?
“Uncle Chen, we need one more player.” Wang Li did not think this would pose a problem for Chen An though. She simply wanted to know.
“Oh, I called Ding Sheng last night. He’s on holiday recently. So it’s not a bad idea to be a visiting scholar. He’s half Chinese. It will do him good to come back more often.” Chen An said casually.
It was not really surprising, still…
Wang Li looked at Lu Feng, Chen Yang, and then Ivanov, who was still attempting to make his first successful shot. She wanted to ask: Uncle Chen, you sure you were going to a basketball match?
“Ow, damn! I refuse to accept failure!” Ivanov cursed, pointing at the basket, “if you block my shot one more time, I will send you up with a rocket tomorrow!”
Chen An said nothing, but he found his phone and took down the scene with it. Well, he liked this one much better than the horrible cartoon last night.
He was starting to like this basketball match.