To Ling Ling’s surprise, lots of students were cheering Lin Zishen on—not just the science-track students, but also the girls from the music class, led by Ai Guo.
It was only natural for the science-track students to cheer Lin Zishen on. He was the science track’s only competitor in the boys’ 200-meter final, after all. What bothered Ling Ling, for some reason, was the way Ai Guo and the other girls were cheering and jumping for joy.
She muttered under her breath, “Tch… Why’s this guy getting more and more popular? Everyone used to think so badly of him… And now he’s surrounded by all these pretty girls.”
That was right.
On the last day of August, when Xiao Yi introduced Lin Zishen to Ling Ling, he’d still been a lone wolf of a boy. How had he ended up with more and more people around him after just two or three months?
She didn’t know why.
Ling Ling felt a little happy, and a little unhappy.
Just then,
two first-year girls walked up beside her. They looked like devoted fans, practically lovestruck, gazing down at Lin Zishen from afar.
“Look! Look! That’s Lin Zishen, a senior from the second year!”
“Is that the Lin Zishen from the school’s Most Popular list?”
“Mm-hmm! I told you, didn’t I? He’s really handsome, and unlike those typical TV heartthrobs, he’s got real manly charm! I heard that before summer break, he got into a fight with some punks over his delinquent girlfriend—and even took a knife for her!”
“Wow, he’s got that bad-boy kind of handsome… But he probably won’t get first place today.”
“Aw, it’s okay. We can just enjoy looking at the handsome guy. It can’t be helped—there are eight boys, and four of them are athletes. If Senior Lin Zishen gets fifth, that’s good enough.”
After listening to the two first-year girls beside her, Ling Ling focused on the boy below again. She sighed and thought, So that saying really is true: little girls like bad boys.
The next second,
Ling Ling grinned and said to herself, “Good thing I’m not a little girl. I’d never like a grimy guy like that.”
Just as Ling Ling was thinking this, the starting gun fired.
All eight boys took off almost at the same time. Just as everyone had expected, the gap in their athletic ability was obvious.
At first, the four athletes held the top four spots. Lin Zishen was in fifth, a good five or six meters behind the athlete in fourth.
From above, Ling Ling had a clear view of the entire track. She’d expected this, but still felt a little disappointed. It looked like the boy wasn’t going to pull off a miracle.
But as she watched, the boy suddenly found another gear. He was no longer a lone wolf; he was like an eagle spreading its wings, gradually closing in on the athlete in fourth place.
Ling Ling froze for a moment when she saw that, then widened her eyes. The heart that had been content to watch the show suddenly began to race, and she stared intently at the boy below.
The other students started shouting too, all in unison: “Just three more!!!”
With Ling Ling’s eyes following him, Lin Zishen surged forward again, speeding up like a meteor in the night sky. In the final fifty meters, he actually passed the athlete in third place.
The students got even more excited and shouted again: “Just two more!!!”
Of course,
everyone probably already knows how the boys’ 200-meter final ended. Lin Zishen took third place, wresting a bronze medal from the athletes’ class.
Even if he didn’t reach the top, he’d still amazed everyone.
That moment, in the late autumn of November, left a mark deep in Ling Ling’s heart—one that would be hard to erase.
……
December 25.
It was Christmas, but that was all it was—a small city in the south couldn’t compare to Y City, and barely reacted to Western holidays.
Maybe the area around Times Square was the only place that felt much like Christmas.
Ling Ling was from a big city, after all. Even if she didn’t celebrate Christmas the way Westerners did, she’d still usually go out for a walk that day and soak up the festive atmosphere.
But
that year,
although Ling Ling was free that evening, she had no plans to go out shopping. The reason was simple: she had no family in Z City and not a single close friend. Shopping alone felt too pathetic, so she might as well stay in her room and play on her phone.
A few male teachers had indeed asked her to go out with them, but there was no way she’d say yes.
Their intentions were obvious.
Setting aside her looks and figure, and her wealthy background, Ling Ling was actually a pretty ordinary girl at heart. Like many women these days, she had just one or two little hobbies, no grand ambitions, and a desire for freedom and a beautiful love.
The future she wanted most was probably this: to meet someone and grow old together, and to choose one city to call home for the rest of her life.
As for her hobbies, when she thought about it, she seemed to have just one: traveling during holidays. And even if she couldn’t go on a trip, she at least wanted to leave home and wander somewhere crowded.
So,
spending Christmas cooped up at school was a pretty miserable ordeal for Ling Ling.
It was worth mentioning that Senior High School seemed to have a Christmas tradition where boys and girls gave each other candy. Ling Ling had no classes that afternoon and was on duty in the school infirmary. She didn’t run into a single person, so how could she have gotten any candy?
Besides,
the teachers couldn’t be bothered to give each other such cheap candies, worth only a yuan or two. They thought it was just kids fooling around.
Apparently, a year or two earlier, one teacher had even called for banning students from privately exchanging candy, on the grounds that it was bad for healthy interactions between boys and girls.
Fortunately,
Principal Zhu was fairly open-minded. He chose to turn a blind eye, which could more or less be taken as permission.
Around six in the evening,
Ling Ling finished her shift in the school infirmary and walked along the path between the cafeteria and the administration building. She glanced back without thinking and saw Lin Zishen passing by with a bag of candy. She already knew that he’d been doing odd jobs for the Street Dance Club lately, delivering supplies there every day.
After all,
the New Year’s Eve party was only four or five days away.
Ling Ling hadn’t meant to strike up a conversation, but Lin Zishen was standing diagonally behind her on the path. He sensed her presence, stopped at once, then turned and tried to make a clumsy getaway.
Ling Ling couldn’t take it anymore. She hurried over, grabbed the hem of the boy’s shirt, and snapped, “Lin Zishen, have you done something bad? Why do you run the moment you see a teacher?”
Lin Zishen rolled his eyes and said helplessly, “I haven’t done anything bad. It’s just that a guy’s sixth sense tells me I’d be better off staying away from you.”
“Hah!” Ling Ling was so annoyed she could barely contain herself.
Lin Zishen had no choice but to explain. “Teacher Ling Ling, you call on me four or five times in every music class. I don’t even know what I did to get on your bad side. Of course I run when I see you! What else am I supposed to do, just wait to die!?”
Ling Ling suddenly understood and couldn’t help bursting out laughing. Feeling a little guilty, she lied, “I’m strict with you because I’m trying to correct your pronunciation. You’ve got the wrong idea about me.”
“Really?”
“Of course it’s true… It’s not like I have a thing for you. Why would I go out of my way to pick on you!?”
As she spoke, Ling Ling’s gaze fell on the bag of candy in Lin Zishen’s hand. She bit her lip, feeling inexplicably annoyed, and said, “Well, I didn’t know you were so popular.”
The next second,
without giving it much thought, Lin Zishen quickly took a particularly pretty-looking lollipop from his pocket and held it out to Ling Ling. “Here. I’ll give you one too.”
“I don’t want it… Someone gave you that candy, and now you’re just passing it on to me. That’s no fun.”
“No, I prepared these candies myself… I was going to give one to… Never mind. Just take it!” As he spoke, a warm, radiant smile appeared on the boy’s face.
Ling Ling watched the boy’s smile as she let the candy rest on her tongue. Her heart rippled. Hidden by the setting sun, her cheeks turned red, and she murmured, “It’s so sweet.”
