September 1st was the official start date for No. 8 Middle School. The first-year students who had finished military training changed out of their cheap training uniforms and put on stiff, formal school uniforms, standing together with their upperclassmen on the sports field listening to speeches from the school leadership.

The entire grade wore uniforms of the same color. At first glance, all you could see was dazzling white and elegant blue, mixed together like a calm, unrippled sea.

The sports field was divided by the flag-raising platform. To the right stood the second-year humanities students and first-year freshmen in order, and to the left were the second-year science students and third-year graduating classes.

Ruan Mian stood in the middle of the female student formation for second-year science class one.

In September, the summer heat in Pingcheng hadn’t dissipated yet. The nine or ten o’clock sun made people drowsy. She was closing her eyes, feeling the temperature of the sunlight through her eyelids, when a weight suddenly landed on her shoulder without warning, and she was pushed forward with a stumble.

Meng Xinglan, who was using her shoulder as a pillow, leaned forward along with her, but her head never lifted. Her voice carried drowsiness. “How long are they going to keep talking? I really want to go back and sleep…”

“Should be soon.” Ruan Mian said.

Meng Xinglan straightened up with groans and grunts, looking rather impatient. Ruan Mian felt her pocket and found a White Rabbit candy in her pants pocket.

“Want some candy?” She turned her head to offer the candy, and in those few seconds, quickly glanced at the end of the class’s male student formation.

Chen Yi had his head turned talking to Jiang Rang about something, his smile somewhat dazzling.

Meng Xinglan didn’t notice Ruan Mian’s small gesture. She reached out to take the candy, unwrapped it and put it in her mouth. Before she finished chewing, she heard the dean of studies Wu Yan on the platform say that the opening ceremony had concluded. She couldn’t help but raise her arm and stretch lazily, her voice drawn out very long. “Finally it’s over.”

They said to exit by class order, but in the end it still became chaotic. The crowd walked outward in four directions—east, west, south, and north.

Meng Xinglan linked arms with Ruan Mian and headed toward the east gate nearest to them. “What’s next class?”

“I think it’s chemistry class, I didn’t pay much attention.” The closer they got to the exit, the slower the crowd moved. In the sweltering weather, Ruan Mian raised her hand to wipe away the sweat beading on the tip of her nose.

The crowd moved forward slowly. After exiting the sports field, Meng Xinglan pulled Ruan Mian to the small convenience store in the school. “What do you want to eat? My treat.”

Ruan Mian was very polite and only took a bottle of water.

Meng Xinglan: “…”

There were many people in the store. When checking out, Ruan Mian went outside first to wait for Meng Xinglan. Soothing, old songs echoed around the campus.

One song was almost finished when Meng Xinglan finally came out from the convenience store, carrying a black plastic bag in her right hand and two ice cream bars in her left.

She walked over and handed one to Ruan Mian. “Here, Chen Yi’s treat.”

“Hm?” Ruan Mian’s hand had just touched the ice cream wrapper. Her fingertips felt ice cold, but her heartbeat thundered like drums. “What?”

“I ran into him inside just now.” Meng Xinglan was halfway through her sentence when Chen Yi and the others walked out of the convenience store.

Ruan Mian instinctively tightened her grip, almost crushing the ice cream in her hand.

Chen Yi didn’t look in their direction. His arm draped over Jiang Rang’s shoulder, he walked down a few steps.

Instead, it was the male student wearing thin-framed glasses at the back who stopped and glanced their way, his voice gentle as jade. “Meng Xinglan, aren’t you leaving?”

“In a bit. You guys go ahead.” Meng Xinglan had just taken a bite of ice cream. Her teeth trembled from the cold, and her voice became muffled as well.

Liang Yiran didn’t say more, instructing: “Have lunch with us at noon.”

“Got it.”

The four of them went down the steps one after another. Only after they had walked far away and out of sight did Ruan Mian break free from that discomfort of imbalanced heartbeat. “Let’s go, we should head back too.”

On the way back to the classroom, Meng Xinglan explained to Ruan Mian: “The one wearing glasses just now is Liang Yiran from humanities class one. He and I are neighbors—we’ve known each other for many years.”

“Childhood sweethearts?” Ruan Mian asked.

“More or less.” Meng Xinglan explained in more detail: “He and Chen Yi were first-year classmates. There’s also one called Shen Yu—the male student standing at the very bottom just now. He’s in class two next to us now. Him, Liang Yiran, Jiang Rang, and Chen Yi—they were the four who got along best in their first year. Probably still are now.”

Ruan Mian hadn’t expected there was this layer of connection. For a moment, aside from surprise, she had nothing else.

Meng Xinglan shook the bag in her hand. “Want to come eat with me at noon? You’re desk mates with Chen Yi now anyway. You’ll have to get familiar with him sooner or later.”

“No thanks. Teacher Zhou wants to talk to me about the competition at noon.”

“Ah, okay then.” The back of Meng Xinglan’s hand inadvertently brushed against the ice cream Ruan Mian was holding, reminding her: “If you don’t eat it soon, it’s going to melt completely.”

Ruan Mian came back to her senses. When she unwrapped it to look, although it hadn’t melted completely, there were only a few bites left. She carefully took out the remaining part and bit into it.

Cold and sweet.

Like the cool breeze of a summer evening, leaving one wanting more.

During the time Ruan Mian and Chen Yi were desk mates, they didn’t communicate much. Ruan Mian exercised restraint, while Chen Yi simply didn’t care.

Before National Day arrived, the school organized a monthly exam. The exam rooms were arranged according to the first-year final exam results from back then.

Ruan Mian was a transfer student with no ranking at No. 8 Middle School. Zhou Hai submitted her assessment exam scores from when school started.

Friday afternoon biology class, Zhou Hai walked into the classroom carrying the class assignment sheet. “Class president, post this at the back of the classroom.”

The female student sitting in the front row stood up to receive the class assignment sheet, took some tape, and walked straight to the back of the classroom.

At the same time, Zhou Hai opened the folder beside him and said gently: “This monthly exam is your first official exam since school started. I hope everyone can perform well and not lose face for us as science class one.”

“Also, after National Day comes the school sports meet. Although we’re a key class, we also emphasize comprehensive development in morality, intellect, physique, aesthetics, and labor. So I also hope everyone will actively sign up.” Zhou Hai picked up a stack of registration forms. “Come, PE representative, take these and distribute them to the students.”

Class president Fu Guangsi had just finished posting the class assignment sheet and hadn’t yet returned to his seat when he was grabbed by PE representative Lin Chuan to help distribute the registration forms.

Ruan Mian received a registration form and scanned through it quickly, finally writing her name after the fifty-meter sprint and three-thousand-meter long-distance run.

Meng Xinglan turned around and asked: “Mian Mian, what did you sign up for?”

Ruan Mian: “Fifty meters and three thousand meters.”

Meng Xinglan: “…”

At that same moment, a sudden bout of urgent coughing came from beside Ruan Mian. She and Meng Xinglan both looked up at the same time.

They saw Chen Yi calmly raise his hand to wipe away the water droplets from his lips, screw on the bottle cap, and act as if nothing had happened.

Although Meng Xinglan had some interactions with him, their relationship wasn’t deep. Normally when Liang Yiran wasn’t around, she didn’t dare joke around with Chen Yi much.

At this moment, she also acted as if nothing had happened, silently withdrew her gaze, and picked up Ruan Mian’s registration form. After confirming it, her expression was somewhat hard to describe. “Three thousand meters, you’re really something.”

Ruan Mian laughed. “It’s okay. I’ve run even farther distances before.”

Meng Xinglan was at a loss for words. She made a fist and gave her a thumbs up.

Ruan Mian didn’t say more. From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the water droplets remaining on the corner of Chen Yi’s desk, and the smile at the corner of her lips deepened.

After class, Meng Xinglan pulled Ruan Mian to the back of the classroom to check their exam rooms.

Ruan Mian’s combined scores for four subjects ranked near the bottom in class one, and her school-wide ranking wasn’t high enough either. She was assigned to exam room forty-six, which was considered quite far back compared to key class students.

However, she didn’t pay much attention to it. After looking up Meng Xinglan’s exam room and seat number, her gaze followed upward, finally settling on the first row.

In this row, aside from the name Chen Yi being different, the remaining exam number, exam room, and seat number were all the number one.

Exam room one and exam room forty-six weren’t just a little bit different. Ruan Mian silently sighed in her heart.

That day was the last Friday of September. As was No. 8 Middle School’s custom, the Friday near the end of the month had no self-study classes. After school, after Ruan Mian finished participating in the general cleaning, Meng Xinglan took her to scout out the exam room locations.

Meng Xinglan and Chen Yi were both in exam room one, which was very far from Ruan Mian’s exam room forty-six—they weren’t even in the same teaching building.

After checking out the exam rooms, the two went outside school to have dinner.

Meng Xinglan’s home wasn’t in this area, but it wasn’t far either. Taking the bus from the West Pingjiang Alley stop, it was only two stops away.

After eating dinner, Ruan Mian waited until she got on the bus before turning to walk toward the alley. When passing by Li Family Supermarket, she went in to buy two pens.

Li Zhi was at the store today. Ruan Mian hadn’t seen him for a while. During those few days before school started, she could see him at the store about five days out of a week.

After checking out, Li Zhi saw the school uniform she was wearing and initiated conversation. “You go to No. 8 Middle School too?”

“Yes, I just transferred here this semester.” Ruan Mian stood by the counter, playing with the coins she’d just received as change.

“Second year?” Li Zhi asked.

Ruan Mian nodded slightly.

Li Zhi said “Oh,” then asked: “Humanities?”

“No, I’m in science.”

Li Zhi smiled and said: “What a coincidence. I have a friend who’s also in No. 8 Middle School’s second-year science class.”

Ruan Mian guessed he was probably talking about Chen Yi. She blinked but didn’t tell the truth. “Really? That is quite a coincidence.”

Someone else came in to buy things outside. Li Zhi wrapped up the conversation. “I’ll introduce you sometime when there’s a chance.”

“Okay.” Ruan Mian picked up her things. “You’re busy, so I’ll head back first.”

“See you.”

Ruan Mian’s front foot hadn’t gone far when Chen Yi came to the store on her heels. Only when Li Zhi saw him did he suddenly remember that Ruan Mian and Chen Yi should have met before, on that night over a month ago.

Because she had taken a wrong turn, she had stumbled to the entrance of his family’s internet cafe by mistake, then mistook him for the barbecue vendor and ordered twenty lamb skewers.

Thinking of this, Li Zhi laughed to himself. He put the coins on the counter into the drawer, looked up at Chen Yi. “How come you came over?”

Chen Yi raised his eyebrows and smiled. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that? How come you’re back at this time? Did you skip class or skip school?”

“Neither.” Li Zhi corrected him. “It’s vacation.”

Chen Yi looked at him skeptically, clearly not believing it.

Li Zhi was in his third year this year. Although No. 7 Middle School wasn’t as strict as No. 8 Middle School, they wouldn’t start vacation this many days early.

“It really is vacation. That broken teaching building for third year at No. 7 Middle School collapsed again yesterday. For safety reasons, the school plans to repair it during this holiday.” Li Zhi scratched his face. “Enough about that. Have you eaten?”

“Not yet.” Chen Yi took a lollipop from the counter. “Come on, close up shop. Let’s go eat at my place.”

“Not going.”

“There’s no one home.” Chen Yi said.

Li Zhi swiftly grabbed his keys and closed the door. “That red braised pork ribs your auntie made last time seemed pretty good.”

“…”

By the time they got to the Chen house, Li Zhi changed his shoes and sprawled on the sofa with Chen Yi, one on the left and one on the right. Chen Yi’s orange tabby cat lazily nestled between the two of them.

The auntie brought over fruit and juice.

Chen Yi told her to add a dish of red braised pork ribs for dinner, then turned around to see Li Zhi making a heart shape with both hands above his head.

His brow twitched. He reached out to grab a pillow and threw it over, his tone disgusted. “Don’t gross me out.”

Li Zhi dodged with a laugh, then bent down to pick up the pillow that had fallen by his feet, patted it, and put it back in its original place. “Just talking, no need to get physical.”

Chen Yi sat back down in his original position. Thinking of the figure he’d seen at the store entrance not long ago, he casually asked: “Just now before I went to find you, the girl buying things at your store—do you know her?”

“Yeah, I know her.” Mentioning Ruan Mian, Li Zhi also remembered something. “Speaking of which, she’s also at No. 8 Middle School. Same as you—second-year science class.”

“I know.” Chen Yi glanced at him and said blandly: “She’s my desk mate.”