Only Jiang Wenyi sat silently behind the crowd, sweeping his gaze toward the backpack Zhou Ai had left on the chair in the distance, his eyes remaining there for a long time without moving.
After Zhou Ai circled out from the back mountain, he went to the nearby shop. He grabbed a type of bread from the shelf at random. Chen Xunfeng followed behind him. Zhou Ai paused in front of the shelves before turning back, only to find Chen Xunfeng still staring at the back of his head, as if observing him or perhaps lost in thought.
Zhou Ai tugged on Chen Xunfeng’s sleeve. Chen Xunfeng reflexively grabbed Zhou Ai’s wrist, then snapped out of it, raised his eyes, and asked in a low voice: “What’s wrong?”
Zhou Ai stepped aside to reveal the shelf in front of him. Chen Xunfeng glanced at the items in Zhou Ai’s hand and reached up to take one of the same.
Outside the shop, there were dedicated outdoor tables and chairs for tourists to rest and eat. The two returned to the place where Zhou Ai had left his bag. Chen Xunfeng sat opposite Zhou Ai. After sitting down, he suddenly turned his head to look in the direction of Class 1 behind them.
The crowd was bustling, yet he still caught sight of Hu Cheng behind them. He stared steadily for a moment before turning back.
There was a breeze at the summit, but the sunlight was warm. On the tabletop, Zhou Ai had opened the book he had been reading. He ate while slowly flipping through the pages. Chen Xunfeng sat opposite, holding his bread in one hand, propping his chin with the other, watching Zhou Ai from time to time.
“Zhou Ai.” A female voice suddenly rang out beside them, breaking the quiet of this corner. Both synchronized their heads to look over.
It was Li Meng, the monitor of Class 1. Chen Xunfeng didn’t know her; he just narrowed his eyes slightly as he looked at the other person.
Li Meng was the class monitor. She had wanted to come over gracefully to invite Zhou Ai to join their gathering, but under the scrutiny of Chen Xunfeng’s gaze beside him, she unaccountably faltered. She exhaled before speaking naturally to Zhou Ai: “The barbecue over there will be ready to eat soon. Zhou Ai, why don’t you… go over and join the other classmates? There’s plenty of food.”
Zhou Ai just swept a glance at her, shook his head indifferently, and then his focus returned to the book in his hand.
Li Meng stood to the side, looking at Zhou Ai’s profile in hesitation. She had just bought the charcoal back. No one in the class had gossiped to tell her what had happened earlier. She felt that the atmosphere in the class was quite harmonious and friendly, so she thought this was a good opportunity for Zhou Ai to break the ice with his classmates. Studying in school was always oppressive, and only the natural relaxation outside could better help the classmates accept Zhou Ai’s integration.
She pursed her lips, just about to persuade Zhou Ai one more time, when she heard the boy sitting opposite Zhou Ai speak to her suddenly.
Li Meng looked up. The gaze Chen Xunfeng fixed on her was colder than the previous scrutiny. In the moment their eyes met, she heard Chen Xunfeng’s ruthless voice: “He’s already refused. Don’t you understand?”
Chen Xunfeng’s fingers tapped impatiently on the table twice: “What are you waiting for here?”
Chen Xunfeng had a reputation; Li Meng naturally knew his style. She frowned, but still retorted stiffly: “This is our class’s business.” Meaning it had nothing to do with him, Chen Xunfeng, and he shouldn’t interfere as someone from another class.
After Chen Xunfeng twisted open the mineral water beside him and handed it to Zhou Ai, he shifted his gaze back to Li Meng. Chen Xunfeng didn’t speak quickly, so Li Meng heard every word clearly. He said: “Zhou Ai is from Class 1, but you better get this straight: he doesn’t belong to you. What the hell do you think you are?”
Li Meng had been a monitor and a top student since she was a child. She had almost never been scolded to her face like this. Chen Xunfeng was exactly as they said unscrupulous. In his eyes, it was as if there were no distinctions of gender, age, or rank. Being spoken to like this to her face, Li Meng’s highly sensitive self-esteem caused tears to well up in her eyes almost instantly. But she held them back and said one last sentence: “…I am Zhou Ai’s monitor. I should have the right and duty to manage the whole class.”
But after speaking, faced with Chen Xunfeng’s cold expression and Zhou Ai’s total indifference, she seemed unable to hold back her tears any longer and turned away swiftly and disappointedly.
After Li Meng left, Chen Xunfeng propped his chin on the table and turned back to watch the person opposite. He was lightly spinning the cap of the mineral water in his hand, his voice very low: “Zhou Ai, I don’t like to hide things from you, so I’m still going to tell you first: I won’t let Hu Cheng go just because you stopped me today.”
Hearing Chen Xunfeng’s words, Zhou Ai’s breath paused slightly. He placed the bookmark on the page he was reading, tidied up the plastic bag remaining after finishing his food, and then looked up.
“I won’t just let this go.” Chen Xunfeng turned his head away, not looking at Zhou Ai: “That person surnamed Jiang has a filthy mouth; I can make him unable to speak. But those thugs Hu Cheng found to stalk you, to block you…” Chen Xunfeng gave a sarcastic, cold laugh, shook his head, and didn’t continue.
Zhou Ai looked at Chen Xunfeng’s fluently contoured profile, watched how the zipped-up collar perfectly caught his jaw, and watched his broad shoulders and the powerful arms he braced. Chen Xunfeng had grown up a lot, but there were many parts of him that still overlapped with his childhood self.
There was always a stubbornness, or perhaps a paranoia, about Chen Xunfeng. Once he wanted to do something, he would definitely do it. He wouldn’t listen to any admonitions; even if Zhou Ai tried to stop him, he would do it behind Zhou Ai’s back. And every time he encountered a situation where Zhou Ai didn’t support him, he would turn his head to avoid Zhou Ai’s gaze.
But his avoidance was always very short-lived because he knew that if the two of them couldn’t look each other in the eye, if his gaze wasn’t fixed on Zhou Ai, he wouldn’t know what Zhou Ai wanted to express. Because Zhou Ai couldn’t speak, and Zhou Ai couldn’t call his name aloud.
Zhou Ai packed his book into his bag. Hearing the sound, Chen Xunfeng had already turned back. He watched Zhou Ai put the bag on, his gaze pausing briefly on the side of Zhou Ai’s waist, but he didn’t ask anything more.
The order of the descent was the reverse of the ascent. Class 1 became the tail end of the mountain-descending formation. Zhou Ai and Chen Xunfeng became the last two people in the entire freshman grade procession. They walked a few steps slower than the main group, so it was easy to open up a distance from Class 1 in front.
After walking down a few slopes, they saw a boy walking up the stairs against the flow of the crowd from far away. The boy’s afro was exceptionally distinct. Zhou Ai recognized Jiang Chuan, who was climbing the stairs, from a distance.
Jiang Chuan was carrying a bag and ran over to their side, slightly out of breath. He handed the bag to Chen Xunfeng and greeted Zhou Ai first: “Hey! Top student!” Then, he rested his hands on his waist to slowly steady his breathing rhythm: “Xun-Xun, you’re in trouble. We just took our class photo, and you were missing again. Old Wu really blew his top… He said that this time when he goes back, he definitely has to have a chat with your uncle.”
Chen Xunfeng peeled open the plastic bag and showed it to Zhou Ai beside him, responding to Jiang Chuan with an indifferent tone: “Am I not on the road to being in trouble every single day?”
Chen Xunfeng held a sweet potato with its skin already burst open in his hand. Before the bag was even opened, the sweet, fragrant scent of the sweet potato had already drifted into the air.
Jiang Chuan frowned as he watched Chen Xunfeng meticulously peel the sweet potato while walking, then scrutinized the expressions on both their faces. The two of them were clearly not speaking and had no eye contact, and yet, even though Chen Xunfeng’s previous sentence had been directed at him, Jiang Chuan felt that he, standing beside them, was exceptionally redundant.
Clearly, they were both guys, clearly they both knew each other, clearly Jiang Chuan could always easily integrate into any group of his male peers, but he was completely helpless against these two. When they were together, it felt as if the surrounding air was redundant; there was some kind of magnetic field between them that wasn’t open to outsiders.
At first, he had been curious about how they got along, but after hitting a wall a few times, he encountered an awkwardness in interpersonal relations he had never experienced before, and he thoroughly gave up on being a background character beside them.
Jiang Chuan curled his lip, waved his hand, and accelerated his pace downward: “I’m going first. I’m heading down. Top student, you guys take your time. Bye-bye.”
After walking a few steps, he stopped and turned back to remind Chen Xunfeng: “Oh yeah, Zhao Yue has been looking for you constantly. She thought you didn’t come at first, then she probably saw the news in the group. She’s coming up now, saying she’s here to meet up with you.”
Chen Xunfeng dealt with the roasted sweet potato in his hand as he walked. Hearing this, he looked up at Jiang Chuan in front: “What is she looking for me for?”
Jiang Chuan was a little helpless. The Chen Xunfeng in front of him seemed genuinely confused.
Everyone understood Zhao Yue’s feelings clearly, except for Chen Xunfeng, the principal party involved, who seemed completely unaware. Chen Xunfeng wasn’t dull; he had thoroughly rejected any girl who had ever expressed such feelings toward him. But he simply couldn’t seem to understand Zhao Yue’s intentional behavior. Either Zhao Yue was performing too well in front of Chen Xunfeng, or Chen Xunfeng simply never cared about Zhao Yue, who appeared punctually by his side every day.
Because he didn’t care at all, he naturally wouldn’t pay her any mind, and naturally wouldn’t perceive Zhao Yue’s intentions.
Jiang Chuan shrugged, not wanting to pierce Zhao Yue’s intentions to Chen Xunfeng’s face: “She made cookies at home and shared them with all of us. You’re the only one who hasn’t eaten them.”
Chen Xunfeng and the others had already walked up to Jiang Chuan. Chen Xunfeng didn’t raise his head, his focus still on the sweet potato in his hand: “If you run into her when you go down, take her away.”
Jiang Chuan glanced at Chen Xunfeng’s expression and nodded: “Well… alright, if I run into her.”
Listening to the conversation between the two beside him, Zhou Ai’s lashes flickered. There were many girls in the school who liked Chen Xunfeng; this was an obvious fact. Thus, it was absolutely normal for Chen Xunfeng to have a campus romance with a suitable girl he liked.
Zhou Ai had never seen what other people’s love looked like, but the few contacts Chen Xunfeng had shown with Zhao Yue were clearly not intimate or close. Thus, even someone with absolutely no experience like him could see that Chen Xunfeng and Zhao Yue were not in a standard romantic relationship.
Zhou Ai was well aware of the spread of rumors, and he knew what it meant to “have your reputation destroyed by the crowd.” After all, these things had happened to him countless times already. So, when that note from the desk-mate first came, Zhou Ai had only looked at it, but that hadn’t confirmed Chen Xunfeng and Zhao Yue’s relationship for him. Moreover, at that time, he and Chen Xunfeng were still in a phase of unfamiliar friction, and these were Chen Xunfeng’s private matters that didn’t have much to do with him.
But now, combined with the few meetings with Zhao Yue and Chen Xunfeng’s behavior, Zhou Ai had probably guessed the specific situation. He lowered his eyes slightly, following their footsteps downward, but suddenly Jiang Chuan’s brilliant smiling face appeared before him. “Then I’m going first! Bye-bye, top student!” Jiang Chuan’s words snapped Zhou Ai out of his thoughts, and he even paused his footsteps on the stairs.
Chen Xunfeng beside him had already kicked Jiang Chuan’s lower leg: “Did you eat too much and have indigestion? Why are you trying to scare him?”
Jiang Chuan was already running down the mountain: “Damn! I was just saying hi and bye to the top student. Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you! I’m out!”
Jiang Chuan’s silhouette vanished rapidly into the mountain path. Zhou Ai stood in place until Chen Xunfeng beside him leaned over and turned his head to look at him, as if carefully observing his expression. He asked Zhou Ai: “Are you dazed? Did he scare you just now?”
Zhou Ai looked at Chen Xunfeng and shook his head indifferently.
Midway, the main group took a break. Staying at a distance from the group in front, Zhou Ai and the others found a flat, large rock to sit on in the back. The sweet potato in Chen Xunfeng’s hand was finally peeled. He placed it in a plastic bag and handed it to Zhou Ai: “This is quite delicious. Want to try it?”
Zhou Ai looked at Chen Xunfeng. According to what he said, after they parted ways that year, Chen Xunfeng had been taken abroad. He had never eaten things sold everywhere on the streets, so he didn’t seem to know how to eat it either. He had already peeled the sweet potato originally a large one—down to only the narrow part in the middle while walking.
Zhou Ai reached out to take it, gently split it in two, and handed one portion to Chen Xunfeng.
The orange glow of the sunset gradually appeared on the horizon. Leaning against a tree with autumn-dyed yellow leaves, the golden sweet potatoes held in their hands seemed to shimmer in tandem with the yellow colors of the season.
…
The pace of study at the Sixth High was still fast. The sports meet and the autumn outing did not leave the students with any buffer time; the midterm exams were coming up in full swing.
All freshmen would re-select courses and be placed into different classes after the end of the first semester. In the classes before them, there were only a few specific combinations for course selection. The basis for sorting into classes naturally depended on the grades from each major exam in the first half of the freshman year. Among these, the midterm and final exams were especially important. The results of these two exams could, to a large extent, directly determine the student’s final placement for the second semester.
Therefore, their competition was still against the same group of people, and the intensity was even more severe than the previous two monthly exams.
On the afternoon of the day before the midterm exams, Chen Xunfeng crossed the skywalk between the two teaching buildings as usual to wait for Zhou Ai outside the Class 1 classroom.
Since returning from the autumn outing, he had come to Class 1 more frequently and naturally. Almost every day at noon and after school in the afternoon, he would appear punctually at the back door of Class 1 to find Zhou Ai. Thus, the class was now accustomed to his visits. Most of the time, they would just watch the two leave in silence.
But today, Chen Xunfeng arrived at their class during the break before the last period.
The afternoon before the exam was entirely composed of self-study sessions arranged by the teachers. The students of Class 1 only felt more pressure, so even during the break, most students remained in the classroom to continue studying. While there was constant clamor inside and outside the classrooms on other floors, Class 1 only had tiny, whispered discussions. It was at this time that Chen Xunfeng walked into Class 1 from the back door.
No one noticed him when he first walked in, until he walked to the corner row where Zhou Ai was sitting and kicked Jiang Wenyi’s chair to tell him to “move over.” Jiang Wenyi stood up from his chair reflexively, the chair legs scraping against the floor with a jarring sound. This noise caused the people in front to turn their heads, and only then did they finally realize Chen Xunfeng had come again.
Only Zhou Ai, sitting closest, was completely unaffected by this sudden sound; his pen showed no signs of stopping.
Chen Xunfeng leaned over and bowed his waist, tapping his fingers lightly on Zhou Ai’s desk. Only then did Zhou Ai finally look up. He looked up along the boy’s Adam’s apple to see Chen Xunfeng’s face.
Chen Xunfeng scanned the empty seats in the front of the classroom and asked Zhou Ai softly: “It’s the last period now. Can you leave?”
Zhou Ai rubbed his fingers while looking at Chen Xunfeng, waiting for his next sentence.
Zhou Ai had probably been focusing on studying in the classroom all afternoon. The classroom was hot, and his earlobes were flushed red by the heat.
Chen Xunfeng’s gaze swept over his earlobes and he reached out to pull open the window next to Zhou Ai: “It’s too stuffy in the classroom. If your class isn’t taking roll call, why don’t we… change places now?”
The self-study period in Class 1 was entirely dependent on self-discipline; there were no teachers monitoring. Some students in the class would go to the library themselves, and many students utilized this time before the exam to hurry and ask the various subject teachers questions.
After Chen Xunfeng finished speaking, he kept his eyes on Zhou Ai, seemingly waiting. Zhou Ai looked at Chen Xunfeng’s expression, slowly closed the exam paper spread out before him, and tilted his head to look at Chen Xunfeng.
Chen Xunfeng gave a light laugh, picked up his backpack, and asked: “Which books do you need to pack?”
The first place the two went was the playground. During the last period of class, there weren’t many people on the playground, only a few scattered individuals. The two walked side by side on the red track. Chen Xunfeng turned his head to look at Zhou Ai’s hair being gently blown by the wind: “I was outside just now, and this breeze felt very comfortable. So, I wanted to call you out for a few laps.”
The breeze of the autumn evening was soft with a hint of chill. Chen Xunfeng’s cold, crisp voice sounded even clearer in the wind: “I’ve never seen you come out for a walk since you started sitting from morning till night in the classroom.”
Chen Xunfeng reached out and touched the lumbar support brace beneath Zhou Ai’s school uniform: “Does it hurt?”