Me After Meeting You

It took quite a while, but after Ian took off his shoes and entered the house, Billy finally recovered. He walked in front of Ian and closely examined him over and over again. “Is this really the Ian that I know?”

Usually, when faced with a joke like this, Ian would have ignored him. But today, he was surprisingly tolerant, and answered with a grunt.

It made Billy feel like he should leave and go clear his mind. For him to be this calm, this easy going, even after being dumped … perhaps he should consider letting this guy get dumped several more times.

But all of this was nothing compared to his attitude towards Amber.

Amber asked, “Did something come up? Why are you guys here?”

“I’m hungry.”

Amber froze for a moment and then turned around to look at the time. “Oh, it’s already 5:30. I guess we can eat now. If I have to make food, it’d take too long, but I do have some beef jerky, meatballs, and dumplings that my mom made, what do you want to eat?”

“It’s up to you.”

And so Amber rolled up her sleeves and said, “Then I’ll get you a bit of everything.” After saying this, she headed to the kitchen.

Ian was very pleased. He followed behind her and sat down at the dining table, waiting for the meal, almost as if he hadn’t seen the man lying on the sofa in the living room.

Billy merely watched him, open mouthed.

Billy also followed behind Ian as they sat down, asking, “So, what’s the situation between the two of you?”

‘Was he too old to know the newest trends anymore? He always felt that the world was moving too quickly!’

Even after they had allegedly separated, the two of them still acted so naturally towards each other; one had said that he was hungry, and the other, just like a dutiful wife, had immediately run off to cook something. But on the other hand, if they weren’t separated, then it was way too unusual for Ian to not react even after seeing a strange man sleeping at his partner’s house!

Ian’s patience with Billy was clearly limited to before he entered the doorway, because he didn’t deign to respond to him now. Instead, Ian lowered his head and started to play ‘Extreme app that he’d become obsessed with recently, a particularly childish and boring kids game about little flying cars.

What’s more, Ian’s skills were particularly horrid. Ten times out of ten, he’d crash his car against a cliff. Despite his having played it for over half a month, Ian still hadn’t gotten past a single checkpoint.

This time was no different. Billy had just sat down and was about to say something when he saw Ian’s car smash down with a big “Bang!” sign filling the screen-he had crashed into a roadblock. The crash destroyed the car entirely and instantly killed the driver, only leaving a bunch of glass shards and blood spurting out from within the car.

Billy’s eyes twitched, and he pretended that he hadn’t seen anything. He earnestly urged Ian, saying, “Don’t play this game, alright? Even if it doesn’t lower your intelligence, it’s very damaging to your image. Anyway, tell me what you plan on doing about that man. Do you want to chop him up or smash him to pieces with a hammer? I’d be very happy to lend you a hand.”

“That’s the guy we met that day near the river, isn’t it? F*ck, then he must have gotten together with her before the two of you broke up! Are you really going to let him off just like that?”

“I don’t think that you should eat anything that she cooks. With her skills as a doctor, who knows if she’ll add something else inside?”

….

He spoke until his mouth became parched and his tongue dry, but Ian impassively continued to play his game. Billy couldn’t help but grumble, “Say something, won’t you?”

Ian didn’t even raise his head as he replied, “Oh.”

What a particularly gloomy man. Billy was unable to incite a response from him, so he decided to switch to a different tactic.

“Do you know what I saw when I first came in? They were ….” He extended his hand to within Ian’s range of vision, and made a particularly vulgar hand gesture as he noisily sucked in air with his mouth. “It was nearly too unbearable to look at! I even took a picture. Do you want to see?”

Billy assumed that Ian would ignore him just like before, but right as he finished speaking, Ian’s car once again crashed viciously into an obstacle. The charred metal of the wreckage rolled off into the horizon, somersaulting through the air until it finally landed heavily on the ground.

Ian mashed furiously at a button, turning the car to scrap instantly.

Only after this did Billy realize that all of Ian’s actions in the game were violent. His back covered in a layer of cold sweat, Billy quickly became submissive, saying, “Don’t accelerate when you’re turning a curve, don’t rush it, do it slowly. Actually, there must be something wrong in the settings of this broken game. Wouldn’t it be better if the roads were straight? How stupid must the creator be to make so many curved paths, cliffs, and obstacles ….”

When Ian looked over at him, he immediately flashed a gentle smile at him. “Let me ask you something, why are you eating here?”

Ian lowered his head again and coolly replied, “I’m hungry.” His reason was just this simple.

“Oh.”

Billy was somewhat dazed, because he could smell a wonderful scent, and then he realized very lamentably that he too was hungry.

Very, very hungry!Property of Nô)(velDr(a)ma.Org.

Last night, Ian had abruptly left him in the restaurant halfway through, and then he had to leave because he had something to do. He had even slept late last night and was busy the whole day today, accidentally skipping lunch on top of that.

In the afternoon, Ansell and the rest had booked a place and insisted that he and Ian make up for their missed gathering. To meet up with everyone, he had gone to find Ian right after work, so he hadn’t eaten anything decent for the whole day.

As he kept thinking about food, he got hungrier; as he kept sniffing at the air, he got even hungrier. By this point, his stomach was almost inflamed with desire.

Billy pounded the table. “I’m hungry too!”