Fourteen years ago, Lincheng.

That summer, Xu Xingchun entered the middle school division of a key school. His home was dark and damp, with an old, dimmed light bulb burning year-round. His strange and eccentric mother began taking medication day and night but still couldn’t sleep, tormented by illness, unable to obtain even a trace of peace, weighing less than fifty pounds.

Dishes and bowls shattered amidst cursing voices. Strangers visited frequently, their visits becoming more and more frequent.

At school he was an outstanding boy—delicate features, taciturn and intelligent. When class ended, his peers would rush to the basketball court shouting loudly, but he didn’t participate in recreational activities, didn’t watch television, and didn’t play with phones.

Accustomed to being alone, without any emotional fulfillment, without friends. Introverted personality, day after day, living through this long lonely, oppressive, boring life.

His soul was locked at the bottom of a pitch-black deep sea, in utter darkness. On the surface he still tried hard to maintain a normal appearance, naturally lacking awareness of his personality defects, neither enthusiastic nor seemingly indifferent toward others.

Many people underestimated Xu Xingchun.

In the suffocating midsummer, behind the school hill was an abandoned construction site. Wind of several dozen degrees rolled through, bringing dry air.

The honor student famous throughout the school, the flag-raiser who routinely raised the flag every Monday. He looked very delicate, pale and thin. His school uniform hung half-open as he casually lit a cigarette, holding it in his mouth, puffing clouds of smoke.

The smoke swept through his lungs. He opened his mouth, slowly exhaling it from his throat.

Sitting at this height, he could see a lake in the distance. He stared at it in a daze.

Withdrawn and dull, he sat quietly on a low half-wall. The stuffy afternoon wind was also still. There were scattered shuffling footsteps. Xu Xingchun slowly raised his eyes.

His line of sight moved from low to high.

A goose-yellow short skirt, snow-white arms, her whole body plated with a ring of light and shadow. There was overly scorching sunlight, distorted and blurred air, and then he could finally see the face of the person approaching.

A camellia flower about to wither was held between her lips. The silver chain at her ankle jingled as she approached him in a rash manner. She also saw him. He didn’t have time to withdraw his gaze.

A moment.

She picked up a stone and tossed it at the stone wall beneath his feet, looking up, “Hey, you look so cool smoking. Which class are you from?”

He bent his thin waist, elbows propped on his knees, lowered eyelashes thick and straight. Unhurried, he used his fingertips to extinguish the burning half-cigarette. Xu Xingchun silently made eye contact with her.

The distance wasn’t far. She leaned sideways against the wall, casually discarding a flower. Her thin white knee-high socks got dirty.

Unlike female students of this age, she had no shyness, no superfluous words. With watery eyes, proud and self-satisfied, she gazed back at him.

Her lips pulled at the slightly protruding dimples on both sides—she had naturally smiling lips. Suddenly her smile bloomed brilliantly. Looking elsewhere, she used her index finger to block her own rose-like dewy lips, as if telling a secret, “Shh, someone’s coming. I have to go.”

She said, “Actually I’m a demon. Don’t tell anyone you’ve seen me.”

A stray cat passed by. Her voice carried a nasal quality as she let out a happy shriek and chased after it.

Watching that gradually distant figure, Xu Xingchun was lost in thought.

They had no connection whatsoever. She had stumbled upon his shameful secret. They didn’t know each other.

Later he quit smoking, but never saw her again. He continued his mechanical, monotonous, formulaic life. Facing textbooks, practice books, materials. Meticulously repeating calculation formulas.

The second time he saw her, the sun was still viciously intense. He packed up his books, shouldered his backpack, and walked out of the classroom.

Between classes the foot traffic was dense. She walked past the classroom door with her black hair loose, fine and smooth as silk. Ignoring school regulations, she wore an embroidered white camisole, her tender snow-white spine exposed in the air without any inhibition. A beautiful chiffon short skirt adorned with fine lace trim.

She carried a large umbrella by herself. Willful and casual, alienated from everyone around her, existing conspicuously.

Passing by each other, Xu Xingchun’s heart felt like fine dense insects were crawling across it. He turned and walked into the crowd, following behind her, from the stairwell, through the corridor, walking under the lush parasol trees, all the way to the school gate.

Later he learned that she wasn’t his hallucination, nor was she a demon. All the school’s teachers and students knew of her. Legends about her were everywhere. Even in the discussions among boys during breaks, she appeared with high frequency.

This was how Xu Xingchun learned in bits and pieces—that girl who had caught him smoking at the abandoned construction site that day, her name was Fu Xueli.

Never looking at anyone properly, from a well-off family, mediocre academic performance, with a circle that seemed very lively. They wandered around campus, indifferent to others, cruel and dangerous.

In his dreams Xu Xingchun saw Fu Xueli again. She sat beside him, her jade-like slender legs swaying in the wind, exposing a section of her thin waist. Her toes kicked, making the back of his spine itch.

For the first time he thought something looked beautiful. Too focused and mesmerized, he didn’t even dare let himself continue looking. The details were clear. He really wanted to reach out and touch, then bite inch by inch.

Touch the protruding butterfly bones on her back, touch her flat smooth neck, wondering if it was as pure and fragile as it looked.

Actually at first sight, when she leaned against the wall looking up with a flower in her mouth, it had already made Xu Xingchun react.

Her hand, seemingly there yet not there, cool and smooth and soft, climbed up his back. Enveloping him. He rolled up the hem of her skirt. The young girl’s smooth thighs, like warm gentle waves, without any obstruction.

Xu Xingchun casually turned on the bathroom light. He looked at himself in the mirror, arm pressed against the tile surface, fingers gradually clenching tight. He covered his face with a towel, closed his eyes, gasping as he pleasured himself.

After his shower, barefoot, he returned to his room and sat at his desk.

That camellia flower she had casually discarded—he had picked it up, placed it in a corner of his drawer, where it gradually withered in his diary. For the first time, Xu Xingchun felt something real.

Unrestrained reality.

At school there were rumors that she recently got a boyfriend.

She would kiss others.

She would smile at others.

She would tell others they looked cool smoking.

He knew she wasn’t a demon.

She wasn’t his salvation.

In nights as dark and silent as an abyss, he repeatedly raised a chair and smashed it against the wall.