“How did you get so good at this game? How come I never noticed combos could be chained like that? There’s nothing like that online, right?”

“I just mashed buttons and it came out.”

Su Yu answered casually. He and Chen Kai had just walked out of the internet café behind them. School had ended early today, so Chen Kai dragged him in for a couple rounds. There was a computer at home, but Chen Kai still insisted on coming to the café, saying the atmosphere was better.

“Now that’s just no fun,” Chen Kai said with a pout. “Teach me a couple moves. I still haven’t learned that one.”

“Buy me something.” Su Yu beckoned with a hand. “A cup of milk tea.”

“No money. After exams.”

The two of them walked with their arms slung over each other’s shoulders. Their schoolbags hung crookedly at their sides. The feeling was familiar. Su Yu had long since lost the mindset for gaming, yet he still came to the internet café and spent the whole afternoon playing with Chen Kai, his hand on a grimy mouse and a keyboard dusted with cigarette ash.

“Hey, Su Yu. Your home’s still here, right? During New Year break and stuff, are you coming back?”

“Hard to say. Even if I come back, I’d still be alone. At most I’d go see Mu Qing. Once she starts college, I might not come back at all.”

“Huh? Then what about me? We’re brothers, and you won’t even come back to see me?”

Chen Kai hooked an arm around Su Yu’s neck and played it up. Their shadows stretched long across the old street they had walked countless times. They kept going until the intersection, where they split up. Thinking of the milk tea shop He Muqing liked, which was nearby, Su Yu planned to buy a mango pudding to take back.

“Hey, suddenly I feel like He Muqing’s actually pretty good too. Aside from her bad temper, there’s really nothing wrong with her.”

Su Yu only gave him a faint glance. It made Chen Kai’s scalp prickle.

“If you don’t like it, then you don’t like it. Why’re you getting mad?”

“She can find someone better.”

He had already changed He Muqing’s future. He shouldn’t interfere any further. Her life would change. She could still be that proud white swan with her neck held high, and her life would follow a completely different path.

“Tsk, tsk. I don’t get you. I’m off.” Chen Kai shrugged and headed toward the bus stop on the other side.

Su Yu remembered the way to the milk tea shop clearly. Sometimes after gaming, he would stop by and bring some snacks back for He Muqing. But in truth, he had other thoughts too. Ever since being reborn, schoolwork had kept crushing his time. There were places he had never found the chance to revisit.

...

The park still looked as run-down as ever. No one had cleaned or maintained it in ages. The old exercise equipment was coated in dark red rust. The flowerbeds, which might once have had color, were now nothing but weeds. In the low gray grass, a black stray cat let out a meow and darted past, vanishing from sight.

Because the surroundings were so bad, hardly anyone came to this quiet park. After buying the mango pudding He Muqing liked from the milk tea shop, Su Yu passed by here. Taking the path through the park saved a long detour. Back when he was younger, he was timid in age but bold in nerve, so this gloomy-looking park had never scared him.

The benches along the way were covered in choking dust. Su Yu looked at them and kept walking forward. Ahead was a pavilion. He followed the steps up. The red-painted pillars had been cracked dry by wind and sand. Dense fractures spread from the surface of the pillars all the way to the dome overhead. Fine grains of sand fell from time to time, and the whole pavilion looked as if it might collapse at any moment.

The corners of the pavilion were thick with endless cobwebs, yet the stone round table in the center looked clean. Only a thin layer of dust had settled on it. It still looked out of place with the rest of the park.

She... probably hadn’t come here for a while.

Su Yu’s thoughts stirred. Revisiting every corner of this place tugged at his nerves. A faint ache spread through his chest.

He hadn’t met Xia Qiange at school. He met her one day after coming out of the internet café, carrying a mango pudding he had just bought. He had been cutting through the park as a shortcut when, through the dense leaves, he saw a girl sitting in the pavilion with her head lowered, doing exercises.

Her skin was like snow, cleaner than the pure white earphone wire at her neck. Her pale brows, fine and slender like willow leaves, drew his heart along with every slight furrow and release. That day, he stood there staring for a long time. It was no longer secret glances. He was entranced, until the girl lifted her eyes and caught him in a fleeting look.

His heart nearly stopped, then clenched hard, because he saw the bloodshot in her eyes, the faint pink at the corners, and the barely visible traces of tears that had run down her cheeks.

...

“I’m from Yangming High. Starting first year when school opens.”

“Huh? Me too.”

“You... why are you crying?”

“It’s nothing. Sand got in my eyes.”

After that, he often passed by here, just for the chance of running into her and getting to look at her a little longer.

...

His drifting thoughts were cut off by a bleak meow. Su Yu suddenly turned around and saw Xia Qiange standing in the wind. Her growing hair drifted loose, and sorrow swayed in her clear-colored eyes. Su Yu remembered the girl once saying that when she was in a bad mood, she would come here and sit for a while.

“You... still come here a lot?”

Su Yu hid his surprise with a smile. He pointed at the faint dust on the table. “I thought you wouldn’t come anymore.”

The exams were close now. At a time like this, Xia Qiange should have been at home reviewing, not here.

“It was too stuffy at home. I came out for some air.”

Xia Qiange brushed past Su Yu. She wiped the dust off the seat with a tissue and sat down. She was still wearing that ugly school uniform, but on her, it still looked good.

Most of the times Su Yu saw Xia Qiange, she was wearing her school uniform. At the age of senior year, many girls had already started secretly using their mothers’ makeup, smearing it on their faces, copying the fashionable outfits in magazines and dressing themselves up. As for the school uniform... it had long been tossed into a corner, not worth a second glance.

“The day you filled out your applications, you chose Jiangnan, right?”

Xia Qiange nodded lightly. She looked at the boy standing beneath the pavilion. He stood straight as a pine. Heavy emotions gathered in his pitch-black eyes, freezing inch by inch into ice.

“Mm. I’m going to Jiangnan.”

Silence spread like the evening sun. Su Yu paused for a moment. Even though he already knew the answer, he still couldn’t help asking, “Your family... is everything okay?”

“It’s okay. They got divorced.”

“Divorced... I’m sorry.”

Su Yu came from a single-parent family. He knew exactly who got hurt the most in a broken home.

“It’s fine. They can’t fight anymore. And I don’t have to hide here after school to do homework now.”

Xia Qiange looked indifferent, or at least stronger than Su Yu had been before. She looked at the mango pudding in Su Yu’s hand and froze for a moment.

“You like sweet desserts like that?”

“I don’t. But someone likes them, so I’m bringing some back for her.”

“I see. So all this time... it was always for her.”

“What?”

Xia Qiange’s voice was too soft. Su Yu didn’t hear clearly.

“Nothing. Aren’t you going back yet?” Xia Qiange’s voice sounded a little cold, or maybe it was just because the evening wind had picked up.

“Oh. Then I’m leaving. It’s getting late. You should head back early too.”

“Mm.”

Su Yu left the park. Only Xia Qiange remained, sitting alone among the layered leaves. Her figure looked thin... lonely.

He had forgotten some things. Back then, whenever Xia Qiange told him to go first, he had never left so simply.