As a long-established prestigious school, First High drew in top students from all over the region. Everyone was focused on who studied well and scored high—no one had the time or interest for forming cliques or bullying.
Here, no one bullied me or shut me out. I was just an ordinary student, with two or three classmates I walked around with, and I got along well enough with my roommates. Occasionally we’d gossip about this and that, and puppy love was always the hottest topic.
Compared to middle school, the pressure in high school was clearly heavier and the pace faster, but every day still felt full and satisfying to me.
When sophomore year started, we had to choose between liberal arts and sciences, and I picked the sciences, which I genuinely liked.
Mom Zhou had Zhou Haiyan and Officer Fu looking after her, and they said her condition was becoming more and more stable—she was, surprisingly, cooperating well with treatment, and the results showed. Overall, things were improving.
To keep her from feeling too bored, every time I came home on break, I’d embellish the funny things that happened at school and tell them to her to make her laugh, and I’d cling to her and hug her while we slept at night.
Seeing her low spirits shrink a little more each day, the worry in my heart gradually eased.
The atmosphere in the house came back to life too.
At first, I didn’t notice any change in myself.
Not until my tense nerves finally relaxed. Not until I grew more mature, physically and emotionally. Not until I found myself unable to look Zhou Haiyan directly in the eye.
The quiet, gradual accumulation finally broke through, arriving at a transformation that had clearly been building for a long time.
It showed in the way I kept slowing down while eating across from him, in the awkward fumbling of not knowing how to hold my chopsticks, in the way I forced myself to look composed and be the first to look away whenever our eyes met.
It showed in the way I couldn’t focus while studying beside him, in the wild, wandering thoughts running through my head, in how sharply observant I became after sneaking glances at his hand, noticing every single line across his knuckles.
It showed in the way, sitting on the sofa talking, I’d fall silent whenever our thoughts aligned, in the way my heartbeat deliberately tried to sync with his, in how my body temperature kept rising, wrapped up in the scent that surrounded him.
It showed in the way, sitting on the back of the motorcycle, my hands would hesitate before tightening around his waist, in how hard it was to answer when he asked if I’d missed him, in the way my voice would shake with nerves when we said goodbye after getting off the bike, terrified of embarrassing myself.
It showed in the frequent, inexplicable spacing out, in the secretive watching and imitating, in the sudden stammering, in the forced casualness, in the long stretches of missing him, day and night.
I felt myself losing control, bit by bit.
So I concluded that I’d come down with some strange kind of illness.
Strange enough that I could no longer be around Zhou Haiyan the way I used to.
Because of this strange illness, I started acting strangely too.
I stopped letting him wash my clothes—everything from a single undershirt to a whole jacket—and after washing them myself, I’d even hang them on the small balcony off my own room so he wouldn’t see.
On the motorcycle, I stopped wrapping my arms around his waist, gripping the sides of the seat awkwardly instead, stubbornly wearing my backpack on my chest to put distance between us, afraid it might give away the sound of my own heartbeat.
When my period cramps left me shaking with pain, I’d quietly go make my own brown sugar water in the kitchen, instead of the way I used to, curling up to him and asking him to warm my stomach with his hand.
……
One quiet, invisible act of distancing after another.
What I didn’t notice was that Zhou Haiyan’s expression grew darker and darker.
So much so that Mom Zhou began to think the two of us were having some kind of falling-out.
Friday afternoon, coming home.
Zhou Haiyan parked the bike, his face dark, and I climbed off first, backpack in hand.
Mom Zhou pulled me aside by the hand and asked in a low voice.
“Qingqing, did that brat do something to make you angry?”
Confused for a moment, I hurried to deny it. “No, no, brother and I are fine.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
Just then, Zhou Haiyan happened to walk past me, and I instinctively stepped back twice—he let out a cold, unreadable laugh.
“……”
He hadn’t said a word, and yet somehow it felt like he’d said everything.
Mom Zhou’s gaze went back and forth between him and me, clearly unconvinced.
I flushed red, not knowing how to explain that we truly weren’t fighting—that this was entirely my own doing.
To my surprise, she just waved a hand, unbothered. “Fine, I won’t ask. You two will be back to normal in a day or two anyway.”
He Qing Hai Yan – Chapter 28
Mom Zhou was a fortune-teller.
After dinner, she took her medication on schedule and went upstairs to rest.
Zhou Haiyan was in the studio sketching, and I sat beside him as usual, planning to study.
But ten minutes passed and my test paper was still blank—my attention kept drifting toward the person beside me, my heart racing.
Resigned, I picked up the papers, ready to go finish them in my room.
“It’s only nine-thirty. Going to bed already?”
I shook my head. “No, going to my room to do homework.”
His expression stayed flat, the pen spinning quickly between his fingers.
“Can’t do it here?
“Or am I in your way?”
He tilted his head slightly, his dark lashes casting a faint shadow, his features sharp and striking.
His gaze settled on me lazily, weighing something.
My fingers curled at my side; I could feel my face growing hot again, that warmth quietly threatening to intensify.
He said, “Sit down. Let’s talk.”
I set the papers down and sat back in my seat.
He got straight to the point. “You’ve been off lately.”
Caught out, my expression went momentarily unnatural.
He thought for a moment, recalling. “Did I do something wrong? I’ll apologize if I did.”
“No, no.”
“Then someone bullying you at school?”
“No, not that either.”
He studied me for a long moment without a word.
Then, suddenly, he asked, “Are you having puppy love?”
Everything inside me lurched violently.
It struck like a bolt of lightning, scorching me inside and out all at once, my heartbeat skipping a beat.
Countless fragments rewound through my mind at once, and all the confusion I’d been carrying, unable to explain, suddenly resolved itself in a flash of clarity.
Like a lost sailor finally finding his bearing, a wanderer finding his way out of the rainforest, a drifter finally finding somewhere to belong.
The clouds parted to reveal the mountains; the snow melted and the bamboo straightened its back.
Everything suddenly had a reasonable explanation.
It wasn’t the wind moving, it wasn’t the banner moving—it was my own heart moving.
Even though everything inside me was now in total chaos, turned entirely upside down, outwardly I only appeared a bit quieter than usual.
Because a war fought through secret longing was, by its nature, destined to be fought alone.
Seeing me stay silent, Zhou Haiyan jumped to conclusions, assuming my silence was an admission.
He took a deep breath, his expression gradually stiffening. “Tang Heqing, you’re only a sophomore, who gave you permission for puppy love?
“Is it that kid who walked next to you after school today? Or the one who said hi to you at the school gate two Mondays ago? Or the one who held an umbrella for you in the rain three Fridays back?”
I stared at him, stunned by how thoroughly he had it all catalogued.
He fumed on. “Don’t tell me it’s the one who slipped a love letter into your desk at the last parent-teacher meeting?”
I suddenly laughed.
“None of them.
“There’s no puppy love.”
Only a secret crush.
Our eyes met, his gaze direct and unrestrained, sharp as if trying to sift the truth out of my words.
I met his eyes head-on, calmly.
For a long while. Long enough that the air around us grew heavy with silence.
His gaze finally softened, and he warned, “No puppy love allowed.”
I asked, “If seventeen counts as puppy love, then what about eighteen?”
He said, without hesitation, “That counts too.”
Me: “What about twenty? If I fall in love at twenty?”
Him: “Twenty counts too.”
Me: “What about your age right now?”
Him: “……”
I pressed further, closing in. “So if you fell in love right now, would that count as puppy love too?”
His eyes flickered, and he forced out a string of coughs, waving me off.
“What are you still doing up this late? Go to your room and rest.”
“……”
The one telling me to sleep was you. The one refusing to let me sleep earlier was also you.
Faster to change his mind than to flip a page.
A man’s heart—deeper than the ocean floor, and just as impossible to read.