They stayed up late on New Year’s Eve, and Xin Hexue’s room was lively all night, only settling down in the early hours.
Early in the morning on the first day of the New Year, the snow from last night had melted, leaving no trace on the ground outside the building. The air was cool; breathing it in felt like frost forming in the lungs.
Sunlight fell onto the potted plants in the corridors, making them lush and green, then continued into homes as strips of light after getting filtered by curtains.
Zhuang Tongguang got up to wash up, practicing English while heating the leftover dumplings from last night. The pot was bubbling and steaming.
It was still early; everyone else in the family hadn’t woken up yet.
He took apples and lychees from the corner of his room where the New Year goods were stored, arranged them on a fruit plate, and quietly pushed open his younger brother’s door.
It was a peaceful morning. Playing cards were scattered on the bed, and the three were sleeping in disarray, limbs tangled.
The heating was on. Xin Hexue had fallen asleep last night still wearing a white high-neck wool sweater. His cheek against the wall was clean, with a hint of pink. His head was resting on Lin Oufei’s arm, and in his sleep, he kicked Lu Yang beside him with his foot.
Lu Yang mumbled something and turned over, still in deep sleep. Only then did Zhuang Tongguang see that his face was covered with sticky notes.
No wonder Xin Hexue and Lin Oufei’s faces were clean, turns out all the “tortoise” labels had gone to Lu Yang.
Zhuang Tongguang stopped his Walkman and placed the fruit plate on the bedside.
This was just due to local customs. Apples represented peace, and lychees represented luck. Actually, usually everyone just used oranges and lychees, but someone in the family didn’t like eating oranges, so Zhuang Tongguang used apples as a substitute.
It was for peace of mind.
He hoped his younger brother could grow up safe and healthy.
He closed the curtains, lowered his gaze, and looked at Xin Hexue on the bed, his expression indescribably gentle and tolerant.
Sometimes he also thought, if only time could stop, and no one would grow up, then Xin Hexue would still be the little tail following behind him, arguing to go to school together.
But unfortunately, time waits for no one, slipping away in a blink of an eye.
The campus’s sycamore trees that had shed their leaves last year had changed into a coat of tender green by spring. Zhuang Tongguang was preparing for the college entrance exam. Since the first semester of senior high, he had applied to stay at school and usually didn’t ride bikes home after school with Xin Hexue and the others.
Coincidentally, Xin Hexue and the others were assigned to the same class after they entered high school.
Lu Yang was hoping that someday the high school homeroom teacher would issue a one-on-one assistance policy between top students and strugglers, like their elementary school homeroom teacher did. That way, he could pull a little trick and sit at the same desk with Xin Hexue again.
For him, accurately controlling his score to be last place was a piece of cake, it was something he didn’t even need to think about.
School ended at 5:30 PM. Lu Yang didn’t have to attend the last class, as he had training on the track field until a little after 6 PM. So, if Xin Hexue and Lin Oufei had nothing else to do, they would usually stay in the classroom doing homework for half an hour, waiting for Lu Yang’s training to end before going back together.
Anyway, they would only get home around 6:30, almost dinner time. After dinner, taking a bath, and reviewing their lessons, they would go to bed at 10 PM. Wake up at 6 AM the next day, and it would be a new day.
Although high school had a somewhat more intense study rhythm, Xin Hexue still maintained his regular schedule of going to bed at 10 PM.
After all, his physical condition could only handle staying up late briefly once or twice. If his schedule was irregular and he slept late, it would put a strain on his heart.
It had been a while since school ended. Most of the students had left, and the classroom was spacious and empty.
Xin Hexue remained seated in his seat near the back door. The sound of his pen on paper remained constant and his gaze was fixed on the problems in the exercise book in front of him.
His sitting posture was looser than during class. His waist and back were slender, and the evening light coming from the west outlined a slender profile supporting the blue-and-white school uniform.
It was only just after the mid-term exams, but the rising temperature this month was enough for them to change out of the heavy winter school uniforms. They could now wear short sleeved shirts inside and just a spring/autumn jacket outside.
Lin Oufei from the other corner of the classroom silently got up, packing his textbooks and schoolbag. The faint noises didn’t interrupt Xin Hexue’s train of thought. It wasn’t until Lin Oufei stood behind him for a while that Xin Hexue suddenly realized his presence.
“What’s wrong? Are you leaving early today?”
His pen paused as he looked up and asked Lin Oufei.
Lin Oufei felt around in his school uniform pocket, finally stuffing a piece of chocolate into his hand. “En, my mom asked me to buy something in the city. I’m not going back with you today.”
Xin Hexue took it. “Okay.”
Lin Oufei looked at the blackboard from the corner of his eyes and frowned. “What’s the history homework?”
There was an Olympiad math training activity at school today, so he missed the first-period history class in the afternoon. The history class representative had apparently forgotten to write the homework on the blackboard with chalk.
“Exercise book page 67.” Xin Hexue checked a sticky note and added, “And corrections for the mid-term exam paper.”
“Got it.”
Lin Oufei waved his hand and swung his schoolbag onto his back.
Before leaving, he stopped at the back door, turned around, and asked seriously, “Xin Hexue, for the class division next semester, are you choosing arts or sciences?”
Lin Oufei had an uneven academic performance; sciences were his strong suit, but besides English, his performance in arts subjects was as outstanding in comparison. His Chinese essay in the mid-term exam was off-topic, but this probably had its roots back in third grade when he didn’t write essays in exams. If it weren’t for his math, physics, and chemistry scores being perfect or almost perfect marks, he would have fallen out of the top five in his grade.
Xin Hexue’s performance in various subjects was well-balanced, leading the second place by a margin of over twenty points. So Lin Oufei wasn’t sure whether Xin Hexue would choose arts or sciences.
Lin Oufei had seen the results posted on the bulletin board outside the office. If ranked by science subjects alone, he could be second. But if ranked by arts subjects, he would barely scrape into the top thirty.
The final exams of this semester were an important milestone. When they returned next semester, the teachers would give students subject stream recommendations based on their exam rankings.
It’s estimated that they would have to fill out the subject intention form after the semester started.
If possible, Lin Oufei still wanted to be in the same class as Xin Hexue by senior year.
He felt safer in places where he could see Xin Hexue.
“I haven’t decided yet,” Xin Hexue pondered, unconsciously spinning his pen, his fair knuckles nimble. “I’ll tell you after I’ve made up my mind, okay?”
Lin Oufei hummed in agreement and left the classroom.
……
The clock hands pointed to 6:30. Lu Yang rushed up the stairs two or three steps at a time, his figure agile. “Xin Hexue, let’s go home!”
He wasn’t even wearing his school uniform jacket, just the short sleeves and shorts of the summer sports uniform. The wind whistled through his sleeves as he ran, his wheat-colored skin glowing with a healthy sheen under the light.
Lu Yang trained for long-distance running during his middle school entrance exam. The high school P.E. teacher saw that his explosive power was good, and had him focus on sprinting now. It was precisely this ability that allowed Xin Hexue to do homework for a while at noon and then leisurely walk to the cafeteria, where Lu Yang had already gotten three portions of food and was sitting waiting for them.
“Hey, where’s Lin Oufei?”
Lu Yang picked up his water bottle, tilted his head back, and gulped noisily, his eyes scanning the classroom.
Xin Hexue said that Lin Oufei had something to do today and left early.
He shoved the “fool’s notes” he compiled from the last math class to Lu Yang, remembering to stick on the sticky note listing the homework for each subject to prevent this “smart guy” from “forgetting” things.
Xin Hexue reminded him, “Finish your homework before going to sleep tonight. Don’t come to school tomorrow morning to finish it again. If you don’t hand in your homework, I’ll write your name down.”
“I didn’t do it on purpose.”
Lu Yang attempted to justify his failure to hand in homework yesterday, but when he met Xin Hexue’s eyes, he deflated and confessed, “Actually, it’s because I’ve been changing medication recently.”
The two walked out of the classroom together. While going down the stairs, Lu Yang said, “Because the medicine my hospital originally prescribed is considered a central nervous system stimulant. Even taking it as directed could cause me to fail a doping test. And applying for a Therapeutic Use Exemption for the competition is really troublesome, so the coach told me to ask the hospital to switch to a different one.”
“The one I’m switching to now is…” Lu Yang recalled the name of the drug, “…called Strattera or something. I don’t feel it works very well. The doctor said this medicine takes effect slowly and told me to take it for a month and a half first.”
They walked towards the bicycle shed, passing under a stretch of shade trees; the shed was located at the school’s east gate.
When they arrived, they saw a familiar classmate standing nearby looking helpless. He recognized her even before getting close. “Miao Ling? Why haven’t you gone home yet?”
The girl’s long hair was tied up in a high ponytail, with a side-swept fringe, her features delicate. She frowned, looking very angry. “Some two-faced traitor pulled out the valve stem of my bicycle!”
Her shoulders slumped. “At this hour, it is still uncertain whether I can catch the last bus…”
Xin Hexue stepped forward to check. It was indeed unrideable. “Why don’t you borrow my bike to go home today?”
Miao Ling’s eyes lit up, but then she asked sheepishly, “Then what about you?”
“I can ride on the back of Lu Yang’s bike,” Xin Hexue said, tilting his head to indicate. “Lu Yang?”
Lu Yang responded listlessly.
Miao Ling beamed and thanked them.
Once they were riding on the road, Lu Yang glanced back and saw that Miao Ling was riding along the same route as them. He unconsciously furrowed his brows slightly and said to Xin Hexue, “I want to go eat grilled sausages outside East Gate Street.”
So they said goodbye to Miao Ling again, and Lu Yang turned his bicycle into the food street outside the east gate.
The food street was full of businesses catering to No.1 High School students. There were breakfast stalls, fried food vendors, fast-food joints, and milk tea shops. At the end of the street was a café decorated particularly stylishly. It had a beaded curtain door with wind chimes, wooden floors, and green potted plants, standing out incongruously among the surrounding greasy food stalls and vendors.
There was a bicycle parked in front of the café. The storefront had glass walls, and as Xin Hexue waited in front of the egg pancake stall, casually glancing around, he happened to see Lin Oufei.
The boy was sitting silently at a table inside, the drink in his cup untouched. He wasn’t looking outside, and his gaze remained consistently lowered, his profile cold and aloof.
Sitting opposite him was a middle-aged man with a square face, wearing glasses. He looked kind and seemed to be persuading him about something.
Xin Hexue had not seen Lin Oufei like this, all prickly and defensive, for a long time. At least not after they became friends.
When with them, although Lin Oufei didn’t show much expression, Xin Hexue could feel the smile in his eyes, not like now, covered in a thick layer of ice.
Lu Yang, holding a grilled sausage in one hand and taking the egg pancake from the vendor with the other, turned and said, “Xin Hexue?”
He followed Xin Hexue’s gaze. “Isn’t that Lin Oufei? Who’s that with him?”
……
The wind chimes at the café rang softly, the beads clattering crisply before the curtain fell back into place.
“What’s wrong with transferring back to Provincial Experimental High School? Weren’t you in their elementary school division before? Dad has arranged everything for you. Your second uncle is a department head at the school. If you transfer, you’ll be placed directly in the Olympiad class.”
“Then, in senior year, you can first participate in the provincial competition, aim for a first prize, prepare for the SAT, then join the national competition and win an award. By your final year, you can submit applications to prestigious universities abroad. Of course, it would be even better if you could enter the IMO. After all, your brother made it to the International Mathematical Olympiad, got third in the team event, and was admitted to university with a full scholarship.”
Zhou Taining had everything planned out for this younger son, his face full of pride when mentioning his eldest.
As if remembering something, Zhou Taining’s expression darkened again. “Why aren’t you saying anything? Dad is usually very busy with work, and you don’t answer my calls. I made a special trip here today. If you don’t answer me, I’ll take it as your agreement. I’ll have your mom go to your school tomorrow to handle the transfer procedures.”
Lin Oufei coldly lifted his eyelids. But before he could speak, he saw two people entering and was slightly taken aback.
“Lin Oufei, it’s this late, why aren’t you home yet?” Lu Yang pretended to be boisterous. “Ohhh, you said you were helping Auntie Lin buy things, but instead you’re sneaking off to eat good stuff behind our backs, aren’t you? Are we still brothers?”
Lu Yang slapped Lin Oufei hard on the shoulder, so hard his eyelid twitched.
Xin Hexue stepped forward with a smile, and said politely, “Hello, are you Uncle Zhou? We are Lin Oufei’s friends. This is Lu Yang, and I’m Xin Hexue.”
Zhou Taining was startled, and he shook Xin Hexue’s hand with confusion. “Oh, oh, I’ve heard Xiaoqing mention you.”
At this point, the conversation couldn’t continue.
Lin Oufei casually slung his backpack over his shoulder, took fifteen yuan from his pocket, and pressed it onto the table. “I’m not transferring. There’s nothing more to say. I’m leaving.”
“Is that any way to talk to your father?”
Zhou Taining stood up hurriedly, but seeing the three of them, sat back down, resuming his elegant facade, and took a frustrated sip of coffee.
They pushed their bicycles a long way out before Lu Yang suddenly exclaimed in shock, “That crappy coffee cost fifteen yuan?! You could buy ten egg pancakes with that, a full thirty grilled sausages! Is your dad that rich?”
Lin Oufei frowned, a vein throbbing at his temple, restraining himself. “…I didn’t drink his coffee. And, eat less junk food.”
Xin Hexue thought for a moment, then offered an egg pancake wrapped in oiled paper, the surface fried to a slight crisp, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. “Do you want some?”
Lin Oufei glanced at it. “…Yeah.”
After finishing the grilled sausage, Lu Yang tossed the bamboo skewer into a roadside trash can along the way, swung his long leg over the bicycle, and gestured for Xin Hexue to get on the back. “Let’s go home.”
The setting sun stretched their shadows long on the bustling avenue.
Lu Yang wobbled as he pedaled off, and Xin Hexue couldn’t help but warn, “Be careful.”
Lin Oufei rode alongside, saying calmly, “My back seat is empty.”
