Liao Xinyan stood on a chair, using a wine bottle as a microphone, completing this confession with the bearing of one marching to martyrdom.

Jing Qichi had just put a piece of boiled fish in his mouth, and now choked on it solidly, suddenly breaking into violent coughing. Huan’er reflexively grabbed a tissue and pushed it to his face as he continued coughing uncontrollably, his face reddening under the entire class’s gaze.

The boys jeered, “Hold it together, the class monitor is confessing!”

Liao Xinyan had drunk quite a bit, flushed red from face to neck, now swaying unsteadily on the chair with two girls standing on either side to prevent her from falling.

And the person in question continued, whether muddle-headed or clear-minded was hard to tell, “You all heard it, I like him.”

The private room erupted again in wild howls.

Her confession’s target finally stopped coughing, turning around slowly, and for a moment even the air fell silent.

The impatient ones began urging, “Jing Qichi, don’t play dumb, give a straight answer.”

“If you two get together, you’ll be our class’s first couple!”

“Say it, yes or no.”

Everyone laughed again.

Jing Qichi laughed too, and using the cover of this laughter, said to Liao Xinyan, “Monitor, you’ve just seen too few men.”

A tactful, clever rejection that preserved face.

The atmosphere froze for an instant.

But immediately, a socially aware boy came to smooth things over, “Me too, I’ve seen too few women.”

“You’ve seen too few? Don’t you have mountains of magazines at home?”

“Bullshit.”

“No wonder you’re going to teachers’ college, you have ulterior motives!”

“I got in on pure ability!”

The commotion once again enveloped the space. Liao Xinyan was pulled down from the chair by the girls beside her and left the room covering her face.

Du Man secretly told Huan’er at this point, “I think the monitor only chose Beijing after seeing Jing Qichi’s application form, who knew he’d changed his choice.”

Just then, Jing Qichi kicked Huan’er’s chair, “Are we going?”

“Now?”

“How can she come back if I’m here.”

Du Man hugged Huan’er, “Go on. Let’s keep in touch.”

Even until they left the restaurant, Huan’er didn’t know if leaving was right or wrong. Objectively speaking, she had a good relationship with Liao Xinyan; leaving like this seemed like joining the enemy camp, disloyal and unfaithful.

The lights were just coming on, the streets bustling, summer nights never lonely. The two rode their bikes side by side, neither fast nor slow.

Huan’er spoke up, “Have you been hanging out with Song Cong these days? Haven’t heard anything from him.”

“Mm.” The boy answered, “We’ve been working on something together.”

“What is it?”

“I’ll tell you in a while, it’s not ready yet.”

Huan’er nodded, then asked, “What else? What have you been doing?”

“Playing football and video games.”

“Doesn’t your knee hurt?”

“It’s fine.”

Beyond this, there seemed nothing else to say. Couldn’t talk about rejecting Liao Xinyan, couldn’t talk about changing application choices, even less about the school—each topic concerned that line between them, not knowing if they could step back once crossed.

And Jing Qichi seemed to have no intention of speaking about it.

Chen Huan’er returned to Sishui to resume her peaceful and leisurely holiday life. Mornings were spent tending to flowers and plants in the courtyard with her grandparents, afternoons invariably at the boxing gym practicing, evenings reading, visiting neighbors, watching TV, and then waking to a new day. Living in the human realm but without the clamor of carriages and horses—one didn’t need to recite Tao Yuanming to gradually understand the deep meaning in the poetry; being free as idle clouds and wild cranes was also a kind of aspiration.

The elderly were superstitious and loved gathering. Grandmother, hearing of a wise man in some village who could read people and their fate, especially took her for a divination. The white-bearded old man squinted as he looked her over and said there was gold in books, this girl’s scholarly path would extend far and she would be a learned person. Moreover, great difficulties had passed and all would go smoothly; her marriage destiny was set from childhood, and her full forehead, high nose, and round head were features of one who would bring prosperity to her husband. Grandmother happily paid the “labor fee,” but Huan’er scoffed, “You told him I got into university as soon as you walked in, of course, he’d say I’m scholarly. And what is marriage destiny? All the neighborhood kids played together since childhood, who doesn’t have a childhood sweetheart? The wise man sure knows how to deduce.”

The old lady scolded her, “Everyone within ten villages says his predictions are accurate, don’t talk nonsense, you must believe in fate.”

“By that logic, I should just do nothing and wait for gold to fall from the sky.”

“He said it, didn’t he? You passed through great difficulty in childhood.” Grandmother believed firmly, “You just have good fortune.”

How absurd—just as she was planning a life of leisure, she was predicted to have an endless sea of learning; finally growing strong wings to face the world’s storms, yet forecast to have clouds overhead rather than all-clear skies.

Even the main characters in dramas have to go through some setbacks.

“Hey, isn’t that Cheng boy you used to chase after also studying at a university in the south?” The old lady mused, “Oh my, he must have graduated by now.”

Where did this Cheng boy come from? The old lady would try to claim any boy as a potential grandson-in-law.

Huan’er shouted, “I’m not close with anyone named Cheng!”

She received a call from Qi Qi on a scorching hot day. When the name flashed on the screen, Huan’er hesitated for a moment. It had been too long—long enough for seasons to turn, long enough that she had almost forgotten how close they once were, long enough that if anyone mentioned Qi Qi in the future, she would at most say “I know her.” With such feelings, she pressed to answer. After exchanging meaningless pleasantries, she heard the lovey-dovey dialogue from a TV in the background, and Qi Qi said this Mu Nianci looked a lot like her. Huan’er listened to the sound as she turned off the air conditioner, the unnatural cold wind making her scalp tingle. Qi Qi then said, I’m going to Beijing, it probably won’t be easy to meet up in the future.

She didn’t know where Qi Qi had tested into—after leaving the liberal arts class, she had no close classmates there anymore, and Huan’er hadn’t paid attention to anything happening in that building, but she thought Qi Qi must have done well.

“I heard about Liao Xinyan’s confession,” Qi Qi continued on her own, “just found out.”

Huan’er remained silent.

If one had to trace it back, it seemed their gradual estrangement began with Liao Xinyan’s intrusion. But that couldn’t constitute a logically complete reason, which was why Chen Huan’er still didn’t understand—her confusion had faded with time but hadn’t disappeared.

Qi Qi said, “Because of me, there was a huge misunderstanding between us. I sincerely apologize to you.”

“Misunderstanding?”

“Yes, misunderstanding.”

The TV started playing its theme song, and the room’s temperature began to rise.

Qi Qi’s last words before hanging up were, “Give me some time, I need to think about how to tell you.”

Misunderstandings can be resolved, mistakes can be forgiven, and apologies can be accepted, but the cracks that grew from them, the time lost, the feelings of defeat—how could these be compensated?

It was only because things had once been too good that letting go was difficult, and going back was even harder.

The day she returned to the staff quarters, Song Cong and Jing Qichi came together, mysteriously sitting her down at the computer, starting it up, opening the browser, typing in a URL, and with one press of enter, an unfamiliar page appeared before her eyes.

The top left showed the title—Notes Alliance.

“What’s this?” Huan’er was completely confused.

“What we’ve been working on.” Jing Qichi said as he took out an envelope, “Your share.”

Inside was a hundred-yuan note.

Song Cong explained, “We made a website, Qichi’s idea, to publicly sell graduating students’ notes. The traffic isn’t high now, but the conversion rate is pretty good.”

No wonder. The images were all photos of notes, with “product” descriptions beside them, noting the original owner’s previous school and admitted college, middle school entrance exam type, or college entrance exam type—these two had found a way to make quick money.

Huan’er held the hundred-yuan note, “Mine sold?”

She hadn’t known anything about this.

“Aunt Li Na said they were going to sell them as waste paper anyway, so we picked out the notebooks with notes, wrong questions, and printed excerpts from your pile of books.” Song Cong observed her expression, “Are you angry? We wanted to surprise you…”

“So…” Huan’er frowned, “All of mine only sold for a hundred?”

“About right,” Jing Qichi rubbed his nose, “Old Song only sold for five hundred.”

He was trying not to laugh.

Song Cong had been sparing with paper these years, his notes for all subjects stacked together weren’t as thick as her single subject’s error collection. Crushed in studies throughout school, and now dealt a solid blow even at graduation.

Huan’er turned her head and sulkily looked at the webpage. Of course, it wasn’t as fancy as portal websites, but it excelled in functionality. The image specifications were uniform, the text content was clear and prominent, and the color design had a sense of simplicity. Words like Tianzhong Olympic Class recommended admission and various prestigious schools appeared one after another, greatly satisfying and stimulating the target audience’s expectations. Casting a wide net to catch many fish—these two had been busy all summer without making a sound.

“Most of what you see here was done by Qichi.” Song Cong took the mouse to demonstrate, “Here, clicking this contact button sends messages to our admin email, you can make offers directly or ask questions. The only thing missing is online payment functionality, time was too tight, couldn’t make it too complicated.”

Huan’er asked him, “Where did all these resources come from?”

“I got help from Director Fu and our experimental center’s academic director.” Song Cong pointed at the screen, “Not just these student notes, the customer base all came through them too. They posted in the teachers’ groups, teachers forwarded to parent groups, and gradually more people started asking.”

Males lead internal affairs, males lead external affairs, and brothers lending a hand makes work promising.

Huan’er thought secretly, no wonder they didn’t include me, there wasn’t a place to fit in another person.

She glanced at Jing Qichi, “What about this business going forward?”

Song Cong suddenly smiled, “Him? He has big ambitions.”

“If it doesn’t work out, it becomes Tianhe’s local study materials exchange and trading platform, expanding from middle and high school entrance exams to other types of tests,” Jing Qichi spoke matter-of-factly, showing no signs of joking or boasting, “If it works well, it becomes a nationwide knowledge exchange community, from studying to all aspects of life, can be divided by province and city regions, or by type and motivation, that’s a general idea.”

“See what I mean?” Song Cong gave Huan’er a meaningful look.

“Indeed.” Huan’er looked at Jing Qichi, nodding heavily.

At that time, she hadn’t yet realized that in this year before the fully intelligent era arrived, Jing Qichi had already shown internet thinking that surpassed not only his peers but most people.

“Bought your ticket?” Jing Qichi suddenly asked.

“Not yet.”

“I’ll buy together with you.” He finished speaking and took the laptop, sitting directly on her bed, after searching for a while he asked again, “Do you want to leave in the morning or arrive in the morning?”

“Leave in the morning.”

“Okay.”

Very normal, his questions, expressions, and reactions were all normal, but something wasn’t quite right. Since Jing’s father’s incident, Jing Qichi had indeed changed greatly, talked less, no longer playfully teased about everything, and according to his mother sometimes even came home to find instant noodles he had cooked. Parents all said he had become sensible and mature, was it because of this that things felt wrong?

But Chen Huan’er had long adapted to this version of him, it wasn’t this that was off.

It was as if there was a layer between them, she and Jing Qichi weren’t as close anymore.

The strange thing was she was also certain that at some untouchable deeper level, nothing had changed between them.