After taking her on a circuit of the island, Ban Sheng and Lin Weixia stood on the beach and let the evening wind blow over them for a while. The phone Ban Sheng was holding buzzed with a message, breaking through the awkward quiet.
He pulled out his phone and looked at it. A short breath of amusement left his nose:
“Li Yiran’s leaving ahead of us.”
Lin Weixia looked at him, a beat late: “Huh?”
“He went off to drink. Took Wusuan along too.” Ban Sheng tucked his phone back in his pocket.
Lin Weixia’s eyes shifted: “Then how do we get home?”
“Shuttle bus.” Ban Sheng walked straight ahead.
He knew perfectly well what Li Yiran was up to — the man had deliberately gone along with it, leaving the two of them here to give him the chance to be alone with her.
Ban Sheng led her to the shuttle bus area, only to be told it wouldn’t depart until the university music festival ended. In the distance, the sun was slowly sinking below the coastline.
The sky was growing darker and darker. A thread of anxiety wound itself around Lin Weixia’s heart.
Ban Sheng seemed to see the worry on her face. He turned and made a phone call. Whatever he said to the other end, a black car pulled up quietly before long to take them away.
Ban Sheng opened the car door for Lin Weixia to get in first, then angled his tall frame in after her, one long leg stretching in as he settled. The black tires rolled against the asphalt, and with a low roar, the car sped away into the distance.
The whole way, aside from the soft music playing in the car, no one spoke. The driver tried to make conversation with Ban Sheng, but it was obvious Ban Sheng had no inclination to talk — his replies were perfunctory at best, and he couldn’t even be bothered to lift his eyelids.
Sensing his bad mood, the driver wisely stopped trying.
Outside the window, the night scenery slid past in reverse. Lin Weixia sat quietly at his side, aware of Ban Sheng’s silence. She glanced over to find him listlessly playing a game on his phone, his long fingers moving with impressive speed across the screen, the phone sounding off with a stream of “kill” notifications. Those fine, handsome brows were pulled down toward the screen, the whole of him radiating a low and sunken energy, as though all the life had gone out of him.
After one round, Ban Sheng exited the game and shoved his phone back in his pocket. The car fell into complete silence. He leaned back in his seat, eyes closing lazily.
He no longer teased her the way he usually did, or leaned close and crowded into her space. He had gone quiet, still — unusually compliant.
And somehow, precisely because of that, she couldn’t stop thinking about him.
Lin Weixia hoped, at the very least, that Ban Sheng wouldn’t be in a bad mood because of her. He was supposed to be that unbearably arrogant, carelessly reckless version of himself — the one who looked down on everyone and answered to no one.
The car stopped on the main road, still some distance from Shuiwei Lane. Lin Weixia got out. As always, a straight, composed figure followed her out from behind.
Ban Sheng had been turned down, yet still accompanied her home without a second thought, as he always did.
Two long shadows stretched one after the other, overlapping on the ground. Lin Weixia had taken fewer than ten steps when she happened to notice a backlit advertisement sign not far off. She stopped and turned around, and found Ban Sheng lighting a cigarette.
Ban Sheng pulled a cigarette from his pocket and set it between his teeth, then cupped his hand around a lighter. The mechanism clicked with a sharp snap; an orange flame lit up a pair of pitch-dark brows and eyes. His shadow fell at precisely that angle — a few shades of worn solitude settling over him.
“Something wrong?” Ban Sheng glanced up at her, white rings of smoke drifting around him.
Lin Weixia stopped in front of him, hesitated, then asked: “Do you — want some milk tea?”
White rings of smoke floated toward the amber light of the streetlamp. A man and a woman stood in front of a dessert shop. Lin Weixia waited for quite a while before the milk tea was finally packaged and ready.
“Here.” Lin Weixia held it out to him.
Ban Sheng took it, two fingers looped through the white plastic bag, and walked her to somewhere near the door of her home. Moonlight fell across her face, giving her a softly luminous beauty. She looked up at Ban Sheng, her tone more earnest than she had ever been:
“Thank you. Today was really wonderful.”
By the time Ban Sheng arrived home, the night was deep. The housekeeper had already gone to bed, leaving a single light burning in the courtyard for him. His fingerprint landed on the door lock, and it opened with a click.
With a sharp series of clicks, the living room lights came on one by one, as bright as daylight. What greeted his eyes was Li Yiran, draped across his sofa without a single bone in his body to keep him upright.
On the coffee table sat an uncorked bottle of red wine.
Clearly raided from his wine cellar. Ban Sheng set the milk tea on the table, sat on the sofa, and fixed Li Yiran with a gaze like the edge of a blade:
“You don’t have wine at home?”
Li Yiran glanced at the cup of iced milk tea on the table. The ice had long since melted, condensation collecting on the outside of the white plastic cup, wet streaks running down its sides. He let out a low whistle:
“Ban, after all that effort, all you got was a cup of milk tea. Tsk.”
“She’s genuinely different from the girls who throw themselves at you.”
Ban Sheng couldn’t be bothered to respond. He rubbed the back of his neck and leaned back into the sofa to rest. Then Li Yiran’s phone buzzed. He glanced at it, stood up, and moved to leave.
Li Yiran had his phone in one hand. With the other, he quietly and casually reached for the cup of milk tea and made to walk off with it. Ban Sheng opened his eyes at precisely the right moment — his gaze cut across the room to him:
“Put it down.”
Li Yiran pointed at the cup and said lightly: “If I remember correctly, you’ve always had trouble sleeping — you never touch coffee or milk tea. And looking at you, you don’t seem interested in drinking it either. Want me to take it off your hands?”
“I feel like it,” Ban Sheng replied.
Li Yiran’s face said everything — it said: I give up. He put the milk tea down and left.
Once he was gone, Ban Sheng picked up the cup and drew two sips through the straw. The ice had melted entirely; it was at least twice as sweet as it would have been freshly made and iced. Even so, he swallowed it.
Still pretty sweet. Ban Sheng stared at the cup in his hand and stopped himself from thinking too hard. The kind of thing you used to coax little girls — and here it was being used on him.
Lin Weixia had gone to the seaside, and barely a weekend later, the aftermath of the sunburn had made itself known. The exposed skin on her face, arms, and back had turned red and was stinging with a burning, searing pain.
She had completely forgotten to use the sunscreen spray Wusuan had passed to her that day. Lin Weixia was regretting it deeply. That evening after school, she went out to the courtyard and snapped off a piece of aloe vera from the plant in the yard, then brought it to her room.
Lin Weixia was in her room cutting open a stalk of green aloe vera and applying the gel to her arm, when the phone sitting on her desk started buzzing with message after message. She picked it up — it was from Cheng Wusuan.
Wusuan: [Weixia, I’m sending you a few videos from the music festival. Some I filmed myself, and some the crew captured with a drone aerial shot.]
Lin Weixia typed a reply: [Great, thank you, Wusuan.]
Lin Weixia sat in her chair in a white cami dress, applying aloe vera while she absentmindedly tapped through the videos. The drone footage of the music festival was more comprehensive and far clearer than anything hand-held — it had swept across the face of nearly every attendee in attendance.
Her gaze wandered — then stopped cold. To be sure she hadn’t imagined it, Lin Weixia rewound the video and watched that section again.
In the video, Lin Weixia stood below the stage, watching Ban Sheng perform. And slightly behind her, off to one side, was a girl in a grey short-sleeved shirt. Among the crowd, this girl looked ill at ease and withdrawn, her gaze nevertheless fixed unwaveringly on Ban Sheng.
When Ban Sheng finished his song and left the stage, this girl disappeared from the frame too.
Unless she was mistaken, that girl was — Fang Jiabei.
The girl in the class that people called a freak. The invisible girl who drifted through school alone, completely isolated.
The next day, Monday, the classroom was as lively as ever. When Lin Weixia arrived at school, she glanced instinctively toward the left — and found Ban Sheng’s seat empty.
Lin Weixia assumed he was late or had taken the day off, but all the way through until school ended, Ban Sheng never appeared.
Classmates filed out in their groups. Lin Weixia had already told Liu Sijia earlier that she wouldn’t be going to the cafeteria with her for lunch and had brought her own onigiri to school.
Liu Sijia had given a small shrug, and was then swept along by a group of girls going to eat off campus.
The classroom gradually emptied, until only Lin Weixia was left. She capped her pen, picked up her blue lunchbox, and headed out.
On the steps by the school lab, Lin Weixia spotted Fang Jiabei sitting there alone, quietly eating her lunch in silence. Lin Weixia’s voice was gentle:
“Do you mind if I join you?”
Fang Jiabei looked up. Her eyes were dull and expressionless as she looked at her, then she gave a small nod. Lin Weixia went over and sat on the step beside her, opened her lunchbox to find five tuna onigiri inside.
“Would you like one?” Lin Weixia held out a piece of onigiri with her chopsticks.
Fang Jiabei took it, and said in a small voice: “Thank you.”
Lin Weixia rested her lunchbox on her knees. She peeled back the thin plastic film, slowly chewing her tuna onigiri, which made her voice come out a little slow:
“Were you at the music festival this weekend?”
“Yes.” Fang Jiabei’s voice was still barely there, like someone running on the last half-breath of air.
As though she had anticipated Lin Weixia would ask the next question, Fang Jiabei lowered her head over her food and said: “Please don’t ask me why.”
Lin Weixia nodded. She sat quietly beside her and finished her onigiri. When she was done, she packed up the rubbish into a bag and was getting ready to leave, when a voice called out from behind her.
Lin Weixia turned. Fang Jiabei’s voice was louder than usual. This was the first time she had met someone’s eyes directly, and her tone was cold: “I hope you’ll stay away from him.”
Fang Jiabei hadn’t said who “him” was. Lin Weixia didn’t ask. A shaft of light rested on the steps between them. It was impossible to tell who had hidden their secret first, or who had first seen through the other’s.
After the lunch break, the classroom atmosphere was unusually charged. Everyone was crowding together, not knowing what they were discussing, and filing out one by one. Lin Weixia sat sideways and glanced around the room, puzzlement in her eyes: “Why is everyone so excited?”
Fang Mo linked her arm through Lin Weixia’s and walked along with the others, leaning her head close: “There’s one elective class every semester. Last semester you hadn’t transferred over yet when we chose, and apparently this semester they delayed opening the selection system for some reason, and only just made it public.”
“What are you thinking of picking?” Lin Weixia asked her.
“Ha — what choice do we actually have.” Fang Mo’s expression was one of resigned acceptance.
Seeing Lin Weixia’s look of confusion, Fang Mo gestured with her chin toward the front, where the sound of a few Shengao students in their uniforms laughing and chatting drifted back — words like “tennis” and “gymnastics” floating through. Fang Mo began to explain:
“Electives are first-come, first-served for A-tier students. They always pick the easy, fun, aesthetically pleasing indoor sports. Whatever’s left — the outdoor ones that are hot and exhausting and that no one else wants — those are ours.”
“Your ranking moved up again after the last exams! Aren’t you just two points away from the cutoff? If you do well in the next major exam, Weixia, you’ll be an A-tier student — and then you’ll get to enjoy the same privileges and benefits as them.” Fang Mo said.
Lin Weixia smiled faintly, her voice soft, almost as if speaking to herself: “But that’s not what I’m here for.”
“What?” Fang Mo asked.
“Nothing.” Lin Weixia gave her a nudge. “Let’s go. Time to pick our class.”
All the students in the year had gathered in the Houd Building today to select their courses. Once the A-tier students had made their choices, they filed out one after another with books tucked under their arms, chins lifted, smiles on their lips.
The F-tier students logged into the system. Even though they had seen this coming, the collective sigh that went through the room when the page loaded to reveal only the remaining courses was universal.
Lin Weixia gripped the mouse, scanned the page, and turned to Fang Mo: “Hey, there’s one indoor elective left — swimming. If you don’t want to be out in the sun, what about that?”
Fang Mo shook her head immediately. She was afraid Lin Weixia might click it. It came out before she could stop herself: “No! It’s bad luck. Something happened before — we’re better off leaving it alone.”
The air went still, broken only by the sound of mouse clicks. Lin Weixia’s amber eyes moved. She blinked: “What happened before?”
Fang Mo instantly regretted saying anything. Under Lin Weixia’s gaze, her eyes began to shift away. What she said next was vague: “I’m not sure exactly — apparently someone had an incident at the swimming pool. Anyway, that place is terrifying. Even walking past it, I get chills…”
“Tell me slowly,” Lin Weixia said, her voice soft and measured, with a quieting quality to it.
Fang Mo was chewing on the end of her pen, instinctively dropping her head lower, her voice shrinking smaller and smaller: “I’m sorry — I don’t want to bring trouble on myself.”
Lin Weixia was just about to say “it’s okay” when, from the row of computers behind her, a sharp, cold laugh cut through the air — layered with mockery and a particular kind of scrutiny.
She turned around. The first thing she saw was a curve of lips that was slightly unnerving. Her gaze traveled upward, and landed on a pair of gloomy, narrow eyes.
It was Fang Jiabei.
But this was not the timid Fang Jiabei she knew. This Fang Jiabei held her gaze directly, eyes cold and unwavering. After a full minute of holding each other’s stare, Fang Jiabei was the first to look away, pulling her shoulders inward as she turned back to her screen, and she was once again the same as she had always been.
That evening, Lin Weixia came home, washed up, and then fell back onto her bed in exhaustion. She lay there, eyes closed — and suddenly thought of something. She picked up the phone from beside her and found the dark-background profile picture in her contacts. She typed in the message box:
“Did something happen, you didn’t come to school today” — she typed it out, then pressed backspace one character at a time until it was gone. She retyped:
Xia: [Why didn’t you come to school today?]
Lin Weixia stared at the screen for a moment, deliberating, then sent it anyway. She immediately shut off the screen and waited a few minutes before turning it back on. The chat window had nothing in it except the message she had sent.
Her thick, dark lashes drooped. A complicated feeling welled up — like wind pushing into the room, pressing against her heart from the inside, dragging it gently but persistently downward. She got up, opened the window, and stood there for a while, breathing.
Lin Weixia couldn’t put a name to the feeling. She didn’t know that what she was feeling was called disappointment.
The following day, Ban Sheng still didn’t show up at school, and no one knew where he had gone. Lin Weixia sat at her desk memorizing vocabulary. When she looked up, she could see through the corridor window that Liu Sijia seemed to be pressing Qiu Minghua for Ban Sheng’s whereabouts, while Qiu Minghua pulled a long-suffering face and shook his head — he didn’t know either.
In the end, Liu Sijia apparently got nothing out of it, and walked away with an icy expression.
For several days running, Lin Weixia sent Ban Sheng several messages, all of which went unanswered. She had even begun to wonder whether he was simply abandoning her because she had turned him down. She had considered asking Wusuan where Ban Sheng had gone, but ultimately decided against it.
He’ll turn up eventually.
Lin Weixia came out of the shower, toweling her damp hair, water droplets dripping intermittently onto the floor. The phone lying on her bedsheet buzzed with an incoming message. She picked it up and opened WeChat.
Ban Sheng had actually replied.
The scattered messages she had sent him over the past few days were still lined up in the chat window:
Monday, 9:40 PM — Xia: [Why didn’t you come to school today?]
Tuesday, 6:35 AM — Xia: [Do you want any milk?]
Wednesday, 10:50 PM — Xia: [Did something happen to you.]
She had sent him three messages in total. And Ban Sheng had skipped over the most recent one and replied only to the second:
Ban: [Yes.]
On Friday, Lin Weixia was on cleaning duty and had gotten up early to take the bus to school. The morning air was already thickening with heat. A faint sweat had gathered on Lin Weixia’s back by the time she reached the classroom door — only to find a tall, imposing figure looming in the doorway.
It was Ban Sheng.
Ban Sheng was wearing a black T-shirt today, leaning against the doorframe, watching Lin Weixia without speaking. His complexion was unusually pale, the weariness beneath his eyes impossible to hide. She had no idea where he had been or what he had been doing.
He smiled as he looked at her, eyelids lifting.
That gaze was too familiar, too dangerous. Lin Weixia instinctively took a step back — but Ban Sheng narrowed his eyes, and in one quick motion his arm reached out, fingers hooking into the dark blue bow at her collar, drawing her in.
Lin Weixia was pulled forward without warning, coming so close she nearly collided with the tip of his nose. He seemed to have just washed his hair that morning — a faint, clean mint scent drifted from him, water drops still trailing down from his brow. Ban Sheng’s eyes carried a smile, and the black mole near the bridge of his nose — on his cheek — seemed to come alive.
Both upright and dissolute at once; a cold composure wrapped in something bewitching.
Her heart inevitably skipped — charged, racing.
Ban Sheng’s face came close to her ear, his motion dangerously ambiguous, fingers still hooked in her collar bow, and he opened his mouth, voice languid and carrying a thread of laughter:
“Where’s my milk?”