The fourteen-day military training period finally came to an end, and campus life settled into a regular routine.
Li Xingchuan had already been informally selected by the university’s Arts Department, so he merely went through the motions of attending an interview. In addition to that, he joined the basketball team. Somehow, university life became inexplicably busy. It wasn’t as though he had anything particularly important to do, yet he found himself running all over the place every day, dragging his exhausted body back to the dormitory by nightfall.
Apart from departmental activities, he was almost always accompanied by Ji Wangcheng. The two went everywhere together.
Ji Wangcheng wasn’t much of a talker, so whenever the two of them were together, nearly half their time was spent in silence. Yet somehow, that silence never felt awkward in the slightest.
The Computer Science Department mostly held large lectures, with relatively few smaller classes. Naturally, this meant that relationships within the class tended to remain fairly superficial.
Li Xingchuan, on the other hand, seemed to have a natural talent for making friends. He quickly became familiar with nearly everyone in his class, and even the handful of female students enjoyed joking around with him. Ji Wangcheng’s attitude was the complete opposite. He remained entirely detached from the group, keeping himself apart from everyone else.
Whenever he wasn’t speaking, his entire demeanor seemed especially cold and distant, as though even the sharp contours of his face had been carved out of ice.
The ordinary light of the fluorescent lamps fell across his skin, settling like a thin layer of frost and giving it a pale, wintry sheen.
With an aura like that, it was difficult for anyone to feel inclined to approach him of their own accord.
However, Ji Wangcheng’s exceptionally handsome appearance practically guaranteed that he would receive more than his fair share of attention.
There were plenty of girls who were curious about him but too intimidated to approach him. One of them, Pan Jiayi, sat in front of the two boys during one of their smaller classes.
Taking advantage of the brief moment when Ji Wangcheng left his seat after class, she secretly turned to Li Xingchuan to fish for gossip.
Pan Jiayi asked, “Does Ji Wangcheng have a girlfriend?”
“As far as I know, no,” Li Xingchuan replied.
“What type of girl does he like?”
“I have no idea. Why don’t you just ask him directly?”
“How could I possibly bring myself to ask him that? Could you ask him for me?”
Li Xingchuan imitated her tone perfectly and repeated, “How could I possibly bring myself to ask him that!”
Pan Jiayi suspected that he genuinely didn’t know the answer, so she changed the subject. “Oh, then how did the two of you meet? Were you neighbors from the time you were little? Did you always go to the same school?”
At last, this was a question Li Xingchuan could answer. He was just about to speak when Ji Wangcheng returned.
The girl, who had been asking one question after another just moments earlier, immediately fell silent. She turned back around and put on the appearance of an exceptionally demure, studious young woman.
Under Ji Wangcheng’s slightly puzzled gaze, Li Xingchuan suppressed a laugh and lightly poked the back of his hand with the end of his ballpoint pen.
“—Do you still remember the first time we met?”
That year, Li Xingchuan was in the first grade of elementary school.
The marriage between Li Shuhui and Zheng Yuan had become little more than a formality. The two were living separately, and Zheng Yuan, the son-in-law who had married into the Li family, had moved out. Naturally, Li Xingchuan stayed with his mother.
Li Shuhui was inadequate both as a wife and as a mother.
She had grown up surrounded by adoration and indulgence, but that had done nothing to soften her heart. Instead, she had developed the temperamental, nitpicking disposition of a spoiled princess. Even the smallest inconvenience could set her off.
Whenever something displeased her, she would find an excuse to beat and scold her son. Her mental state was no different from that of the deranged women in television dramas from a certain country who constantly spat out the curse “ssi-bal.”
In Li Shuhui’s eyes, Li Xingchuan was the offspring of “that bastard surnamed Zheng.” He carried inferior blood and could do nothing right. As far as she was concerned, it was only natural that he should be subjected to his mother’s “discipline.”
By then, she had already begun obsessively studying the mysteries of metaphysics and the occult. The ancient wisdom of the I Ching, passed down through generations, had done nothing to improve her twisted state of mind. Instead, it had given her even more inspiration for inventing all sorts of excuses to undermine and torment Li Xingchuan.
The spring and autumn outings organized by the school were among the days children looked forward to most.
They were free of charge, yet Li Xingchuan had never once been allowed to go.
Every time an outing was scheduled, Li Shuhui would call his homeroom teacher the day before and apologetically explain that her “son wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be able to attend the outing.”
Even this small, easily accessible happiness, something every other child could enjoy without a second thought, was something she refused to let Li Xingchuan have.
When he returned to school afterward and heard his classmates talking excitedly about what had happened the previous day, all he could do was listen in bewilderment, relying on their descriptions to imagine the amusing things they had experienced together.
On the evening of the spring outing, Li Xingchuan happened to run into some of his classmates at the street corner as they were returning from the amusement park.
“Shanshan, are you feeling better?”
His classmates were kind people. Remembering that he was a “sickly patient,” one of them had even brought him a little gift.
It was a tiny fish, so small that it was barely the size of the tip of his little finger. He didn’t know what species it was, only that it would never grow very big.
The little fish was enclosed in a sealed, spherical container filled with water and air. A chain was attached to the ball, allowing it to be clipped onto a schoolbag’s zipper with a slight squeeze. Hanging a little fish from one’s bag was considered incredibly cool, and the accessory was quite popular among children.
Li Xingchuan couldn’t bear to take his eyes off the little orange-red fish. He held it up toward the setting sun, looking at it again and again, his heart bubbling with excitement.
But he knew that if his mother discovered it, the little fish wouldn’t survive.
As far as Li Shuhui was concerned, her son’s privacy was practically nonexistent. And with her constantly keeping an eye on him, finding somewhere to hide the fish would be difficult.
He wanted to give the little fish to someone else.
Tomorrow, he would explain everything to his classmate and apologize properly, hoping his friend would understand.
Holding the little fish carefully in his hands, Li Xingchuan walked for quite a while before finally stopping outside a house.
On the small platform beside the fence sat a cut-open plastic bottle filled with water. At the bottom were several colorful SpongeBob SquarePants toys that had been soaked until they were soft and swollen. They had probably been left there by some child passing by.
Looking farther inside the house, he spotted a little boy standing beside an enormous floor-to-ceiling window.
The boy had exceptionally pale skin and a pointed chin. He was dressed in pajamas and stood there quietly, perfectly still. When he glanced over, there wasn’t a trace of emotion in his eyes. He looked at Li Xingchuan as casually as someone might look up and notice a leaf.
With the little courtyard and the window separating them, he seemed terribly, terribly far away.
Li Xingchuan stood there in a daze for a moment.
He didn’t know this boy, but both elementary schools in the neighborhood were holding their spring outings that day. Since the other boy was at home wearing pajamas, he was probably genuinely ill and had been unable to go, too.
A sense of shared misfortune welled up in Li Xingchuan’s heart.
He struggled to open the packaging, then carefully poured the little fish into the half-full plastic bottle.
“I’m giving this to you.” He smiled at the boy.
The other child didn’t respond. Even the straight line of his lips remained unchanged.
The fading light of dusk clung to his amber-colored eyes, casting a faint golden haze over them. He looked like an exquisitely crafted doll, beautiful in appearance but utterly devoid of life.
Li Xingchuan moved the bottle closer to the doorway, making sure the homeowner would see it as soon as they opened the door. Then he looked up at the house number and set off for home.
The following afternoon, after school, he deliberately took a detour past the same house. He wanted to see whether the little fish had been accepted.
Unfortunately, it hadn’t. The transparent plastic bottle was still sitting outside the door.
Its position had changed, though. Someone had raised the bottom of the bottle slightly, so it was no longer resting directly on the ground. It didn’t look as though the gift had been rejected outright.
Li Xingchuan felt confused. He couldn’t quite make up his mind about what it meant, so he peered through the fence again, searching for the boy’s figure.
This time, the boy was standing on the second-floor balcony, looking down at him from above.
“Can I come and see it?” Li Xingchuan tried to negotiate with him again.
Once more, he failed.
The boy seemed as though he simply didn’t know how to speak.
Li Xingchuan was a rather thick-skinned child, a little slow to pick up on things and remarkably good at finding ways to entertain himself even in miserable circumstances. Perhaps that was precisely why Li Shuhui’s treatment hadn’t driven him into depression or madness.
No answer meant no refusal, as far as he was concerned. So he came back the following day.
For an entire week, he took a detour after school every day, stopping by the boy’s house to check on the little fish before hurrying home as quickly as possible.
The fish was doing quite well. It seemed that the more insignificant a life was, the more stubbornly it fought to survive.
A few days later, the SpongeBob toys at the bottom of the bottle disappeared. In their place were small, colorful pebbles, and the water had become clear again. Apparently, someone had changed it.
Yet the boy inside the house still hadn’t said a single word to Li Xingchuan.
Every time, he watched Li Xingchuan from a distance. Even after seeing him several times, he showed no intention of getting any closer. He was like a proud, cautious cat, observing the world from a safe distance and refusing to let anyone approach.
Li Xingchuan had come to regard him as a friend in spirit. This friend was a little cold, but at least he had helped look after the little fish.
Then, one day, a heavy rainstorm arrived.
It had started at two in the afternoon, without the slightest warning, and there was no telling when it would stop.
Li Xingchuan hadn’t brought an umbrella. At the time, he was still living alone with Li Shuhui, so naturally, there was no one who would come to pick him up, either.
He was worried about his little fish. He didn’t want to ask his homeroom teacher or the parents of his classmates to help him get home, but the rain outside showed no sign of letting up.
Just as he was caught between a rock and a hard place, his deskmate dug out a packet containing a disposable raincoat. It had been bought in preparation for a trip to the amusement park, where they had planned to ride the thrilling water rapids attraction. Unfortunately, the elementary school package tickets didn’t include that ride, so the raincoat had never been used and had remained forgotten inside the desk ever since.
Li Xingchuan’s eyes lit up. He had named his little fish Lulu, and he said with heartfelt gratitude, “I’ll thank you on Lulu’s behalf!”
The disposable raincoat had only cost a few yuan. It didn’t even have a brim over the hood, and the sleeves were absurdly wide. In truth, it was hardly capable of keeping the rain out.
He ran most of the way home, his sneakers splashing through the shallow layers of water on the pavement. Each time his feet struck the ground, droplets sprang up and burst against the edges of his shoes.
Along the way, the wind carried the raindrops straight into his collar and sleeves. His hair was soaked, and his skin felt cold and damp.
Li Xingchuan sneezed and shivered involuntarily.
The rain made the sky grow dark much faster than usual. At the street corner, the headlights of passing cars cut through the curtain of rain, illuminating the direction he needed to turn.
There were steps in front of the house, and the entrance was set farther back than the outer courtyard wall. Until he reached the main gate, Li Xingchuan had no way of knowing what had happened to the bottle and the little fish.
He had already come up with a plan. If the boy hadn’t brought the bottle inside, he would take it home himself, hide it in the milk box by his doorway for the night, and then return the fish before the milkman arrived the next morning.
The rain grew a little heavier, beating against the thin plastic raincoat and playing an irregular little melody of pitter-patter, pitter-patter.
At last, he arrived.
Li Xingchuan drew a slightly breathless gasp, his eyes widening in surprise.
The courtyard gate, which had always been tightly shut, was now unexpectedly half open.
For the first time, that gate had opened in front of him.
And the boy who was usually found standing on the balcony, his entire demeanor radiating an unmistakable keep your distance, was now holding a black umbrella with a wooden handle, his eyes lowered toward the little fish at his feet.
It was a child’s umbrella, with a small canopy that offered very little coverage. The boy tilted the handle slightly, positioning it so that the waterproof fabric covered the mouth of the bottle perfectly. As a result, one of his shoulders was exposed to the rain. The dampness stood out clearly against the smooth, luxurious fabric of his clothes.
He raised his eyes and looked over.
The instant their gazes met, the boy took a step backward, seemingly intending to retreat into the courtyard.
But Li Xingchuan moved faster than he could think. In just two or three quick strides, he rushed forward and thrust his hand against the edge of the gate, stopping the boy from closing it halfway through the motion.
“Thank you.” He thanked the boy sincerely. “My name is Li Xingchuan—you can call me Shanshan. What’s your name?”
The reply was almost drowned out by the sound of the rain.
“…Ji Wangcheng.”
Li Xingchuan’s eyes immediately curved into a smile.
He was in the middle of losing his baby teeth at the time, and the space where his left canine should have been was still empty. He quickly reined in his smile, though. He had never imagined that he would actually meet Ji Wangcheng, let alone exchange names with him and become friends. At least, that was what Li Xingchuan believed they would become. He had come completely unprepared for such an encounter.
He hurriedly rummaged through his pockets and finally managed to find two pieces of candy.
Two pieces of eight-treasure candy.
He pressed them into Ji Wangcheng’s hand.
“Will you come downstairs again tomorrow?”
Ji Wangcheng clutched the candies in his fist. His lips moved slightly, and beneath his cold expression, there was a faint, almost imperceptible trace of bewilderment.
After a long while, he closed his fingers around the candies and gave a small nod.
“…You lent me your umbrella, but I still got beaten because I’d been caught in the rain. My mom almost snapped the umbrella in half, too.”
Resting his chin on one hand, Li Xingchuan slowly twirled his ballpoint pen as he reminisced. “Fortunately, your umbrella was good quality. Come to think of it, was your umbrella—”
His voice gradually faded.
Throughout the several minutes Li Xingchuan spent recalling their childhood memories, Ji Wangcheng simply listened in silence. His eyes were lowered, his lips pressed into a straight line. His thick eyelashes cast faint, featherlike gray shadows across his lower eyelids, and he looked as though his mind were burdened with countless thoughts.
It was a complicated emotion, difficult to describe in words. It was like standing before the glass tank of a tropical aquarium, watching a beautiful fish. You could lose yourself in its beauty while simultaneously envying the freedom with which it embraced the vast expanse of water.
This wasn’t the first time.
Whenever Li Xingchuan brought up the amusing little incidents from their childhood, Ji Wangcheng would always wear this same expression, his back held perfectly straight.
Li Xingchuan had asked him before whether he disliked talking about their childhood. Ji Wangcheng had denied it with such effortless naturalness that there had seemed to be nothing unusual about his answer.
Li Xingchuan genuinely couldn’t figure out the reason and was beginning to feel a little puzzled. He cautiously ventured a question. “…Have you forgotten?”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
Ji Wangcheng withdrew his gaze. His Adam’s apple moved slightly as he answered, seemingly unconcerned, “I remember.”