Chapter 10: Class 5, Grade 10

“Classmates, first of all, welcome to Shuandun High School. Let me introduce myself. You already know my name—Yu Na. I just graduated this year from Buyang Teachers’ College and I’ll be your homeroom teacher, as well as your Chinese teacher. In this first year of high school, I hope we can all get along happily and work hard together.”

As soon as Yu Na finished speaking, a voice from the back of the classroom interrupted with a loud cheer, “Alright!”

Zhang Tan turned to look. The boy who had spoken was short but handsome for his age.

This was Zhu Ran.

He was once the life of Class Five in the first year, captain of the soccer team, and one of the school’s most well-known students. Later, he became an athletic student, taking first place in the school’s four-hundred-meter race. Though he could be forceful and a bit domineering—somewhere between a model student and a schoolyard rascal—he was always protective of his classmates, earning their respect.

What Zhang Tan remembered most was that the two times he had gotten into trouble at school, Zhu Ran had stepped in and sorted things out for him.

But clearly, Zhu Ran’s boisterousness didn’t win Yu Na’s approval. On the contrary, she frowned slightly, “No talking, please.”

She then began to explain what students should pay attention to in high school, regarding studies and daily life.

At first, her speech was a little hesitant, but as she continued, her words grew more fluent.

Zhang Tan wasn’t interested in these topics. Instead, his eyes wandered over his classmates—those he remembered, those he didn’t, and those unforgettable.

There was a girl with short hair just to her ears, sitting in the third row. She wore a short-sleeved plaid shirt, her slender arms exposed, her skin as creamy as butter. Around the collar of her shirt, her neck showed, smooth as mutton-fat jade.

Zhang Tan could see her in profile, a few delicate strands of hair tucked behind her ear, her cheeks still round with a touch of baby fat—adorable.

He found himself staring, lost in thought.

...

“College entrance exams are coming up. Which university do you plan to apply to?”

Liu Jing, with her short hair brushing her ears, sat beneath the crooked tree at the edge of the abandoned sports field. Her hands cupped her cheeks as she gazed at the afternoon sky, watching the sparse white clouds shift and change shape.

Three meters away, under another tree—a broken trunk with only half its branches left—sat a young man with a crew cut, his eyes lost and confused, but he forced a casual tone. “Where could I go? I’ll probably just find a vocational college. But honestly, I don’t want to do that. I want to go out and work. I want to go to Shanghai—Shanghai has Xu Wenqiang!”

“I want to go to Shanghai, too.” Liu Jing looked at him seriously. “But we should keep studying. University is important for us. I probably can’t get into a university either, but I want to get into a vocational college. You should go too. After we graduate, then we can decide where to go.”

“No!”

The young man jumped up, walked over to Liu Jing, and, imitating Xu Wenqiang’s depth, said, “Where I go doesn’t matter. What matters is that I walk my own path!”

Liu Jing looked at him in surprise, a sudden burst of confidence radiating from him.

...

Though he wasn’t handsome, nor tall, and had a slightly provincial air, the young man carried an unshakable self-assurance. “I’m going to Shanghai. I’ve thought it through—I’ll find a job, nothing fancy, just enough for a place to stay. I want to write novels. I want to be a writer.”

His words fell with conviction.

“Then I’ll support you,” Liu Jing said with a smile, nodding. “You’re talented at writing.”

“Heh.” Hit by her smile, the confident young man was instantly shy, scratching the back of his head. “I’m alright, I guess.”

Liu Jing teased, “When you become a famous author someday, don’t forget your old classmates.”

“Of course not. If you come, I’ll roll out the red carpet.”

“I certainly will.”

“Mm.”

A sweet feeling lingered in their hearts.

Neither spoke. It was as if some unspoken understanding hovered between them, something subtle and precious, to be savored in silence.

After a while, the two rose and walked along the path back toward their classroom.

Just as they were about to turn onto the main road, Liu Jing suddenly turned and said solemnly, “Zhang Tan, one day I will come find you.”

The gentle expression on the young man’s face melted into a radiant smile. “I’ll be waiting.”

Sunlight filtered through the leaves along the main road, flickering and swaying.

Boy and girl, innocent and pure.

...

“Whew.”

Zhang Tan rubbed his face, memories quietly flooding back. “Liu Jing, I’m back.”

Three years as classmates in high school, filled with stories impossible to forget.

That first year, Zhang Tan ended up sitting diagonally behind Liu Jing. His deskmate was Liang Wei, a boy who fancied himself a young Tony Leung and who promptly developed a crush on Liu Jing. They sat too far apart, so Liang Wei would often have Zhang Tan deliver little notes for him. Though Liu Jing never replied, Liang Wei persisted in writing.

And so, Zhang Tan foolishly played the part of the go-between.

He neither understood love nor cared much about it—more interested in goofing off. Matters between boys and girls were only ever the stuff of whispered conversations in the dorm at night; he scorned the drama in daily life.

But when you walk by the river long enough, your shoes are bound to get wet. After passing notes for Liang Wei for more than half a year, Zhang Tan ended up becoming friends with Liu Jing, often chatting about life and dreams. Sometimes, during evening study, when Zhang Tan slacked off, Liu Jing would prod him to work, just like Shen Jiayi did for Ke Jingteng in “You Are the Apple of My Eye.”

If Zhang Tan tried to sneak off to the internet café after evening study, Liu Jing would stop him.

Looking back now, he realized these were just the simple ways students showed affection. But at the time, Zhang Tan never understood. He always thought Liu Jing was just trying to stop him because her brother Liu Yong would sometimes go along, too.

Liu Jing was Liu Yong’s younger sister, two years his junior, but because Liu Yong had suffered from neurasthenia in middle school, they ended up in the same year.

Neurasthenia was a strange illness, Zhang Tan always thought—one that left the body untouched but meant you could skip school.

After the classes were split in the second year, both Zhang Tan and Liu Jing were placed in the slower-paced liberal arts class.

Liang Wei ended up there too: Class Seven.

The story never turned into a love triangle. The pressure was just as great in the slow class as in the fast one; this was an era obsessed with academic achievement, and the teachers were strict. With students busy all day, the faintest hints of romance were thoroughly stamped out by vigilant teachers, leaving no room to blossom.

Especially after, in the second year, a boy and a girl were caught in a romantic relationship—the boy was expelled, sending a chill through all the restless teenagers.

Though, as Zhang Tan later realized, the boy had actually just transferred schools at his parents’ arrangement, and the teachers exaggerated, saying he’d been expelled to scare the others.

And so, there was Liang Wei, forever seeking a chance to send notes; Liu Jing, always politely refusing; and Zhang Tan, the perennial bystander.

They passed the second year in peace, and the first semester of the third year as well.

But as the final semester closed in and the pressure of the college entrance exam mounted, with the end of high school looming, the feelings buried within their hearts became impossible to suppress. Zhang Tan and Liu Jing grew closer and closer—though nothing ever crossed the line, nor was anything explicitly stated, there was a tacit understanding between them.

Zhang Tan knew he liked Liu Jing, and Liu Jing, too, had always shown interest in him.

One ordinary midday, they made a promise—a promise they never kept. Zhang Tan said he would go to Shanghai; Liu Jing said she would find him there. In the end, Zhang Tan didn’t go. He compromised and attended a three-year vocational college instead. Liu Jing went to a different college. Time wore on, and they barely kept in touch.

Eventually, Zhang Tan lost all news of Liu Jing.

“Who are you looking at?” Cao Yuchuan tapped Zhang Tan on the shoulder. Tall, he had chosen to sit in the back with Zhang Tan.

Zhang Tan snapped back to the present and answered quietly, “The... blackboard.”