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He Youyuan turned his head to look at Li Kuiyi. He found her with her face tilted slightly upward toward him, her gaze clear and luminous, holding equal measures of expectation and nervousness — as though she both hoped he would understand and feared that he might not.
He stopped walking. His gaze rested on her face for a moment. He raised an eyebrow slightly, as though both surprised and intrigued, his tone carrying a note of inquiry: “Li Kuiyi — when you make a decision… do you always think through this many things first?”
“What do you mean by that?” Li Kuiyi’s expression dimmed slightly in an instant, as though somewhat disappointed.
He Youyuan still didn’t answer that directly, only said: “Do you know why I gave you flowers?”
Because you like me, Li Kuiyi thought inwardly.
But she couldn’t say it aloud. She could only shake her head and follow his lead: “Why?”
“I don’t actually know why. I just wanted to give them to you. Especially during the New Year — when you said you were thinking of me, I lost control of myself. Right then I thought: when she comes back, I have to give her flowers.”
He paused, then added: “That probably sounds pretty illogical. But that’s just how I am. Most of the time I don’t know why I do something. I just want to do it, so I do.”
Yes — you are someone who engages with the world through direct sensation, Li Kuiyi agreed silently, feeling that everything he’d said was perfectly consistent with how she understood him.
Differences only become visible when there is something to compare against. It was at this moment that Li Kuiyi recognized: compared with He Youyuan’s direct, instinctive way of experiencing things, she herself was more inclined to analyze and arrive at a judgment first, and only once she had formed a complete chain of reasoning would she act on it.
Take the act of “responding to He Youyuan’s feelings” — on the surface it had looked like a sudden impulse on her part, but in reality she had methodically and thoroughly convinced herself: she believed that experiencing the most genuine joys and sorrows of the present moment was life’s most profound meaning.
Reaching that conclusion had cost her considerable effort. She had worked to feel, with deliberate intensity, the moments that made her happy — touching her own youthful body, and realizing from it that the present was the best she had, the only thing she truly possessed, the one thing that allowed her to feel herself living fully, richly, vividly.
And so she had given He Youyuan a bouquet of flowers.
Once she had thought through this clearly, Li Kuiyi couldn’t help but smile to herself. She found He Youyuan truly remarkable — he thought nothing at all, completely unaware, yet wasn’t what he was doing also a form of embracing the present moment?
He hadn’t even realized he was embracing the present moment. His instincts were simply driving him to do it.
They were completely different kinds of people, the two of them — and yet somehow they arrived at the same place by different paths.
“What are you smiling at?” He Youyuan saw her quiet smile and smiled a little in return, his voice rising lightly: “Are you thinking I’m being selfish? Well, you’re not exactly in a position to judge me — you think too much, you talk yourself into all sorts of reasons, and then what? You end up doing exactly what you were going to do anyway. Looked at that way, I’m the one with real ease and simplicity.”
Li Kuiyi gave him a deliberately exasperated glare: “Thinking things through is still better than thinking nothing at all. You’re not being easy and simple — you’re just… empty-headed.”
“Hey — was that a personal attack?” He looked at her, his grin full of insufferable smugness.
“Hmph.”
Li Kuiyi tossed her head, grabbed the straps of her backpack, and marched off with great indignation.
He Youyuan hopped onto his mountain bike and caught up with her in an instant, then reached out and poked her arm: “Come on, get on — I’ll let you experience what it’s like to really fly.”
On a bicycle? What was there to fly about?
Li Kuiyi gave a slight curl of her lip — but still jumped up onto his back seat, gripping the sides of his jacket at the waist.
He really did ride fast. He sliced through the boundless night wind, sweeping past tall, straight roadside trees, the city’s neon lights melting into leaping, darting points of brightness in her eyes. At a traffic light, he braked hard and suddenly, and her face pitched forward without warning into his back — a firm, solid sensation. His scent rushed over her all at once, and the strong, steady rhythm of his heartbeat vibrated against her ear, one beat at a time.
It felt, in an instant, as though she had entered his private realm. She felt him vividly, with startling force — alive, and right there beside her.
Li Kuiyi went still.
Just now she had noticed the difference between her and He Youyuan’s ways of thinking — no value judgment in it, a difference was simply a difference. But was it only their ways of thinking? No — there were probably many other ways in which they were unlike each other. The truth was, no one in the world was entirely the same as her. Even if two people shared a similar appearance and voice, a person’s thoughts, experiences, and the paths they had traveled had already made her into a unique “her.”
These things that set her apart from others — invisible, intangible — were exclusively hers. Her private realm.
Compared to the great world outside, her private realm was terribly small, and everything about her was of little consequence. But to herself, her realm was filled with green shade, clear mountains and bright water, thick growing grass and trees, brimming with life.
Like a small private garden —
Representing a patch of green in a life, a window, a fragment in miniature — the most essential, most vivid proof of a person’s existence.
Everyone had a garden like that.
And building an intimate relationship was like issuing a pass to that garden. With pass in hand, another person could enter this private space — walk the winding paths of old blue brick, taste the fruit on the trees, sometimes sweet and sometimes sour, explore unknown treasures, or simply sit on a small hillside, quietly resting for a while, the body at ease and the spirit free to wander.
Of course, inviting someone into your garden was not without risk. Not every person was capable of appreciating this hidden, deep-rooted landscape. They might leave at any moment, and might even show disdain.
Then why, she wondered, did everyone still continue so eagerly and tirelessly to invite others into their small private gardens?
Just as these thoughts were forming, the traffic light switched from red to green. The traffic around them began to flow, but He Youyuan didn’t move. He glanced back at her, his voice casual yet pointed: “Getting bolder, aren’t you.”
Li Kuiyi startled out of her reverie and realized she was still leaning against his back.
She immediately sat upright, her face flushed, and mumbled apologetically: “Sorry, I forgot.”
This explanation was probably not very convincing. Li Kuiyi heard He Youyuan let out a long, drawn-out laugh — but he didn’t choose to tease her about it, and instead, with unhurried ease, began pedaling the mountain bike forward.
He didn’t ride as fast as before. He lazily hummed a tune under his breath, and Li Kuiyi recognized it — “Want to Be Free.”
He was the same as ever, taking a song of loneliness and humming it until it sounded bright and bold.
/I can’t bear to
/give up this moment for the uncertainty of tomorrow
When he reached this line, he seemed to think of something too, and suddenly sang it out clearly, his voice low and unhurried, as though it were a quiet, steadfast vow.
If nothing can be held onto forever — then this present moment is all the more extraordinary.
At the entrance of her apartment building, Li Kuiyi stepped down from He Youyuan’s back seat and stood facing him. She drew in a deep breath, raised her eyes, and said: “I don’t know if the decision I’ve made is right or wrong. But since I’ve made it, I don’t want to regret it — so I’m going to do my best to turn it into the right decision.”
When she finished, she pulled the folded piece of paper from her pocket, pressed it into He Youyuan’s hand, turned around, and ran upstairs.
Oh! A love letter!
He Youyuan was thrilled. He unfolded the paper on the spot and held up his phone, using its flashlight to read by.
His smile froze. He scratched his head.
He still couldn’t make sense of it —
Who in the world writes a formal list of terms and conditions for the person they like?
Twenty-one of them, no less.
Li Kuiyi, you’re something else. By some measures, you alone could hold your own against seven of Liu Bang.
He Youyuan went through all twenty-one terms one by one, let out a quiet laugh, folded the paper back up, and put it in his own pocket. That weekend, Zhang Chuang came over to his place to play video games, and there on his desk, inside a small frame, Zhang Chuang found the piece of paper — matted and framed with care.
Zhang Chuang picked it up and read it once, twice. A string of question marks suddenly appeared above his head.
He remained dazed for a moment before managing to fish one question out of the confusion in his mind: “What exactly is your relationship with her right now?”
“I don’t know,” He Youyuan said, eyes still on his study problems, not even looking up.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Zhang Chuang was instantly exasperated. “She won’t even give you an official title, and you go and frame this scrap of paper? Why?”
He Youyuan finally deigned to look up and snatched the frame back: “What do you mean, scrap of paper? It’s a handwritten letter. Have you no sense of romance?”
“You call this romance?” Zhang Chuang looked utterly speechless.
“What would you know? Also — if you want to play the PS4 go play, stop bothering me. I need to finish these pages of problems.”
Zhang Chuang watched him put his head back down and bury himself in his work again, and sucked in a sharp breath. He asked carefully: “Did the top student make you do this?”
“Yes.”
“And you just… do whatever she says?”
He Youyuan tapped the frame with his pen, pointing to the first item on the list of terms and conditions —
“Studying hard is the top priority. If my grades show any decline, or if yours drop by more than five places in the ranking, we immediately end the current arrangement. Work hard — let’s go to Beijing together after the college entrance examination!”
Zhang Chuang offered his sincere admiration: “Threat and reward, all in one. Impressive.”
That’s what you call threats and rewards? He Youyuan silently scoffed. Only someone who’d been in a relationship for so long and still understood nothing about love could see it that way. This was clearly a promise about the future.
Zhang Chuang no longer felt like playing games. How was anyone supposed to play after this? They’d agreed to be bad students together — and now this dog of a person had gone and improved himself in silence, betraying his comrade. People who betrayed their fellow students really deserved to swallow ten thousand pins.
“I’m leaving,” Zhang Chuang said, waving his hand and gritting his teeth as he walked out of He Youyuan’s home. But when he reached the ground floor, he spotted a familiar-looking mountain bike locked up with a U-lock — it looked a great deal like He Youyuan’s.
He Youyuan’s mountain bike was a graduation gift from his family on the day his middle school exams ended, worth over thirty thousand. The design was stunning. Zhang Chuang would bet anything that no boy their age could resist a bike like that.
But why, on the back of this impossibly cool mountain bike, had an ugly rear passenger seat appeared?
Even though the bike wasn’t his, Zhang Chuang felt his heart clench with a brief, sharp ache. He Youyuan, you absolute disaster of a romantic — if you want to be lovesick, go be lovesick on your own. Why did you have to ruin your mountain bike?
In Zhang Chuang’s eyes, He Youyuan was clearly beyond saving. But in the eyes of the teachers, this child was becoming more and more pleasing by the day. Even if he was still full of small faults, his good looks, his growing diligence, and his increasingly prominent grades made the teachers prone to pulling him aside for praise at every opportunity. The history teacher — an elderly woman — had apparently picked up some internet slang from somewhere and said of him that he clearly had the face to coast on his looks, yet insisted on relying on talent instead.
At the first monthly examination of the second semester of second year, He Youyuan’s ranking climbed again — though only by one place. Everyone understood: once you entered the upper tier, further progress was no easy thing.
After the examination, the students were eager to let off some steam, and channeled all their energy into P.E. class. This semester, there was only one P.E. lesson per week, and sometimes even that was taken over by other teachers — a fact that stirred considerable resentment. When they ran into the P.E. teacher, they couldn’t help complaining in a coaxing, half-joking way: “Mr. Lin, you need to be tougher! Don’t let the homeroom teacher take our classes!”
Mr. Lin was easygoing and assured them earnestly that “next time, for sure.”
In the second half of the P.E. lesson, everyone had free time.
He Youyuan held a basketball and scanned the field for Li Kuiyi. He found her sitting under a tree with a few other girls. The April sunlight wasn’t particularly harsh — if anything it was rather mild and cool — and he couldn’t quite figure out what the girls were sheltering from.
He wanted to invite her to watch him play, but he couldn’t call out to her in front of so many people. After all, the second item of her terms and conditions stated that at school there were to be no intimate gestures of any kind; unless there was a tutoring reason, they were to avoid contact as much as possible.
While He Youyuan stood there in indecision, the P.E. teacher came striding over and, with an easy lift of the chin, said: “Playing ball? Count me in.”
“Sure.” He Youyuan tossed the basketball up and caught it, agreeing readily.
But before heading to the court, he glanced back one more time at the girls.
Come on, Li Kuiyi — have a little initiative, would you?
By the time word had reached Li Kuiyi’s group that He Youyuan was playing basketball with the P.E. teacher, the match on the court had already reached its peak. The girls rushed over in a crowd to watch; Li Kuiyi followed along. Zhao Jiawei nudged class monitor Meng Ran with her elbow: “What’s the format?”
Meng Ran explained: “Simply put — He Youyuan shoots, and the teacher blocks. The teacher said He Youyuan gets three attempts, and if he makes even one, He Youyuan wins. He Youyuan just took his first shot — the teacher blocked it.”
“Oh, so he still has two chances.” The girls nodded and immediately fixed their eyes on the two players on the court.
He Youyuan drove forward with the ball, darting left and right while the teacher moved to cut him off. Both had broken a light sweat across their foreheads, and neither could gain the upper hand. The teacher was not as tall as He Youyuan, but she was nimble and quick, with excellent jumping ability. He Youyuan found an opening in the defense, leapt, and hurled the ball upward — but the teacher was lightning-fast and blocked it again.
“Ohhhh—” The boys began jeering at He Youyuan; the girls jumped up and down with excitement, shouting: “Teacher Lin is amazing!”
Even those girls who were quietly hoping He Youyuan would win didn’t dare cheer for him openly. The calls of encouragement were overwhelmingly one-sided.
Li Kuiyi also shouted “go for it!” — without naming anyone.
He Youyuan ran his fingers through his hair, combing it back, and breathed out slowly. Then suddenly he flashed left, pivoted with clean, fluid form, and casually tossed the ball toward the hoop. There was a loud “bang” as it struck the backboard, and the sunlight falling down around them seemed to shiver with the impact. No one understood why he’d made such a casual, almost careless throw — everyone assumed he had lost, and even the teacher dropped her guard. But the ball that had struck the backboard bounced straight back. He Youyuan leapt up to meet it and slammed it hard into the hoop.
It went in.
The whole sequence was fluid and effortless. Even Li Kuiyi, who understood nothing about basketball, felt the heat and excitement of the moment. The crowd of spectators erupted in a sudden collective cry of astonishment; cries of “that was amazing” and “how did he do that” rang out from all directions.
He Youyuan knew he’d made a beautiful shot. With a barely-there smile at the corners of his mouth, he bumped fists with the teacher, stepped off the court, and walked straight toward Li Kuiyi.
Li Kuiyi froze.
His dark hair was damp at the edges; his chest rose and fell slightly with each breath. He walked toward her one step at a time, unable to stop himself from looking at her — eyes bright and clear, radiating open pride.
Just as Li Kuiyi was wondering what to do, he swept past her, bent down, and picked up a water bottle from the ground. He twisted it open and drank in long, deep gulps.
He did that on purpose, didn’t he.
Li Kuiyi pulled her brows together and shot him a glare that could barely be detected.
He Youyuan caught the look and assumed that since he’d just finished exercising and might have body odor, she was wrinkling her nose over that. He couldn’t help tugging his collar up for a self-conscious sniff. There was a bit of a sweaty smell — but quite faint. Was her nose really that sensitive?
After P.E. came lunch. He Youyuan skipped the cafeteria and went home to shower.
Li Kuiyi and Zhou Fanghua ate in the cafeteria.
Zhou Fanghua, noticing Li Kuiyi was wearing only her short-sleeved school uniform, face still faintly flushed, asked with a smile: “Are you feeling warm? You’ve taken off your jacket.”
“I had it on originally, but our class just had P.E., and after two laps I felt too hot, so I took it off.”
Zhou Fanghua was surprised: “Your class still has P.E.? Ours has been almost entirely taken over by physics, math, and English.”
“We have it, but not much anymore.” Li Kuiyi smiled. “So today during P.E., some of our classmates were telling our teacher in this coaxing, half-joking way — ‘Mr. Lin, please be a bit firmer — don’t let people take our classes.'”
Zhou Fanghua looked even more surprised, as though she couldn’t quite believe it: “Coaxing a male teacher?”
“No, no.” Li Kuiyi shook her head. “Our P.E. teacher is a woman. But she’s very — dashing and decisive, with a kind of sharp, clean energy to her…”
As she spoke, she had a vague sense that something wasn’t quite right, though she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what.
“Everyone likes her a lot… it’s a way of showing affection, really, so they call her ‘Mr. Lin.'” Li Kuiyi forced the second half of the sentence out.
Zhou Fanghua nodded with understanding: “I see.”
Nothing wrong with that, right? Li Kuiyi told herself.
Everyone in the class had been calling her “Mr. Lin” for over a year. The teacher herself had never found it strange. Li Kuiyi had just told Zhou Fanghua, and Zhou Fanghua didn’t find it strange either. So why did she feel the need to find it strange?