“What feels so good?”

“Uh.” A clear, cool voice cut through him like spring water on stone, and Yexiaobai jolted back from his trance. He blinked into the real world and found a long-haired, ponytailed girl across from him, brows lightly knit.

Suzhiaoyao was lovely.

Even with his heart already pledged elsewhere, he couldn’t deny it. He had to admit it. Her lips held a sakura sheen, damp and soft; her skin was pale with a living blush, bright like new leaves after rain. Her eyes were a shade narrower than most, born with a trace of quiet allure—something the current crop of girls could imitate forever and never catch. Yet she carried a chill in her nature, a soft frost that thinned that allure, making it feel out of place for their age.

—How do you even describe a girl like this?

The thought skimmed his heart, leaving a ripple.

They were standing in the hallway outside class. Sun knifed in through the gaps, sliced by the corridor walls into sharp bands; Suzhiayao stood right on the border, sunlight on one side, shadow pooling behind her. The whole of her was bathed in light. They were barely thirty centimeters apart. Eagle-eyed, Yexiaobai could see the faint glow her skin caught, that porcelain smoothness so fine it felt breath-bruiseable, the lashes that trembled like moth wings, and eyes that seemed to hold the noon sun.

—Like someone crafted her from the best the World could offer.

But—how could anything be that perfect? It felt almost fake.

A flicker of unease darted through him, fast as a fish in dark water.

He caught himself at once, heat rising; he scolded the thought. You don’t judge people like that. Don’t think rude things.

All those thoughts took an instant, lightning through a cloud.

“Nothing.” Yexiaobai had already answered. “Su—” He hesitated on how to address her.

The girl across from him supplied, cool and clean, “Zhiyao.”

“Uh. Right. Classmate Suzhiaoyao.”

She shook her head. “No.”

He faltered. “What’s wrong?”

Her voice, still cool, repeated, “It’s Zhiyao.”

He understood. His pupils widened, surprise first, then puzzled—wasn’t Suzhiayao supposed to be the frosty, don’t-come-near type?

Stranger still was his own answer that followed. Perhaps his shock blew past its limit; he spoke with an ease that felt natural and unhesitating. “Got it. Zhiyao. You came about the play?”

Suzhiayao’s expression didn’t change. It didn’t bother her, apparently, to have a boy she’d only spoken to once use a more familiar address.

“Saturday night at your place?” she asked.

“Yes.” He nodded. “There’s the pledge assembly that day. No evening self-study.”

Watching her face, Yexiaobai quickly added, “If it’s not convenient, then—”

“It is.” She nodded once. “That’s that.”

She turned without waiting for his reply and walked into the shadow behind her.

Just like that? Just to confirm the time?

He had more to say, but the words dried up on his tongue. He shut his mouth with a wry curve that tasted like defeat.

He watched her go, her figure sliding deeper into shade; a prickle ran down his spine, like static nibbling his heart.

Now she was drenched in darkness. Her body, tall and slender, looked ready to melt into it; her ponytail swayed with her steps like a fish’s tail in an underground stream—only the light had changed, yet her presence flipped from morning’s glow to something altogether different, still bright in its own way, still magnetic.

Maybe it was Li Hang’s words echoing, but Yexiaobai couldn’t help it: the girl’s back under lantern-bright fireworks on a far-off Yuanxiao night rose from the river of memory and laid itself over the Suzhiayao before him.

In his gaze, two silhouettes kept trying to overlap, then slid apart again, again and again. Like parallel lines—similar to the eye, yet truly different, never meeting, never stacking. Or maybe—

He remembered how he’d reflexively shot back at Li Hang then.

“Compared to dazzling Zhiyao, the aura rain-Han gives off is her complete opposite,” Yexiaobai murmured. “Another Suzhiayao.”

As her shadowed figure drew away, a key question struck him. He blurted before he could stop it, louder than he meant, “Zhiyao! Do you even know where I live? Or—”

The words leapt free, and his heart dropped. He clamped his mouth shut, hand flying up—too late.

Sound tore down the corridor like a bullet, a sharp wave sprinting at the speed of air—three hundred forty meters a second.

The hallway, noisy a beat ago, fell silent so fast it hurt. You could have heard a pin beg for mercy.

Students from his class and the next all turned, eyes strange and amused, spearing him. Someone leaned halfway out a window to get a better look.

Yexiaobai froze where he stood. Under that machine-gun spray of stares, he felt like his head was under a line of muzzles.

Far off, Suzhiayao’s figure paused near the stairs. Her voice drifted back, cool as ice cubes knocking, “I’ll find you Saturday night.” And then she slipped around the corner and was gone.

Cool as ever, yet under that thin sheet of water, a ripple of laughter seemed to slide.

The corridor’s noise rushed back a heartbeat later, but her words dropped like a torpedo into a lake, blasting froth and chatter in all directions.

…

…

“Yeah. It was me. I said it. No, no—seriously, that’s not it! Ahhh! How do I even explain? It’s really nothing! We’re just talking about the play! I didn’t confess! —What rejection—there wasn’t any! —Don’t comfort me for no reason!”

After who knew how many explanations, Yexiaobai’s mouth felt like dry paper. He collapsed on his desk, spent.

Thud!

Skull met textbook with a smack. It stung, sure, but the real ache was the dumb mess he’d made.

The corridor thing had kicked off a nightmare. All noon, all afternoon, right up to the break before evening self-study, he’d been roasted under looks, people burning holes to see the boy who’d allegedly confessed to Suzhiayao—the girl known across the school as “hard to deal with”—like he had three heads and six arms, like a daredevil carved from brass.

“Hey!”

He pulled his book up over his head, shutting the world out. He couldn’t even blame them; even he couldn’t believe he’d done something that dumb.

“Sigh like that and your hair’s gonna fall out,” came Mu Xiaowei’s gleeful voice from behind him.

“Let it fall,” he snapped, more tired than mad. What was odd was that he’d expected Mu Xiaowei to be the angriest—he’d kept a big secret, right? He’d braced for her little-tiger claws when he got back to his seat. Instead, she sat there, looked at him, hid her mouth behind a book, and giggled.

Thinking it through, the only answer was that Mu Xiaowei’s schadenfreude had steamrolled whatever displeasure she’d had.

She kept laughing behind him, openly delighted. Every so often, her pen poked his back, a little jab to make sure he’d never forget today’s blunder.

Finally, Yexiaobai couldn’t take it. He turned to face her. “Is it really that funny? You’ve been laughing all day!”

“C—cough, cough—” Half her face hid behind the book, but her eyes smiled like twin crescent moons. “It’s not that funny, exactly. It’s just—”

“Just—?”

“Seeing the Yexiaobai I know—feels good.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means the idiot Yexiaobai.” She lowered the book. The smile on her lips stayed, but it was a soft one. “The past two days feel packed with things, weird things. Even I feel weird, like none of it’s real—seeing the idiot Yexiaobai I’m used to. Mm. That feels good.”

As she said it, her eyes, bright as a clear moon, held his reflection. A small stream ran in that gaze, clean and serious, a focus she herself didn’t seem to notice. Yexiaobai did.

He paused, a low tremor tapping his heart. For a moment, Mu Xiaowei’s quiet smile outshone Suzhiayao’s morning light, brighter, nearer.

“Random. I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

He dropped his eyes. Seeing himself in her pupils made him oddly shy; he tried to wall up the feeling with words.

The wall leaked. The feeling spilled, splashing onto Mu Xiaowei.

“What? You’re the idiot, Yexiaobai! What’re you being shy about?”

Flustered, she yanked her book back up, hiding her face as color rose. Her gaze darted, little birds startled, and she pretended to grumble, “Y—you’re making me embarrassed too.”

Red from the sinking sun spilled over Mu Xiaowei’s desk, warm and lazy. The air floated in a slow afternoon drift.

They fell quiet together. Their eyes knocked like two timid deer, then flitted apart. A subtle warmth grew between them, layer by layer, climbing toward a crest.

Like a branch pushing a fresh bud—if nothing interrupted it, a flower would open here. Whether that flower proved sweet or strange, it would be a step worth cheering for two childhood friends long stuck in place.

But everything fears those four words: “if nothing interrupted.”

Fate never listens to anyone, does it?

“Sorry to cut in.”

A lazy voice slid into the moment.

They both jumped, heads snapping up. Like kids caught doing something they didn’t even do, they forced laughter and started chit-chatting about nothing at all.

“Mingming!” Yexiaobai stood, about to move aside for her to sit.

She shook her head. “Mr. Xu is looking for you.”

“Huh?”

“She’s got a little girl with her.”