Du Shang was asleep when he heard his phone ring. He thought it was the class monitor urging him to vote for Zhou Bichang or someone else again. Wait, he thought, hadn’t all the competitions ended? Why vote now?
Du Shang picked up his phone and quickly turned on the bedside lamp.
“Yingtao?” he asked in surprise, throwing off his blanket and glancing at the wall clock. “Why are you calling me at this hour?”
Lin Yingtao remained silent on the phone, seemingly upset. It was the middle of the night, and Lin Yingtao was staying at the south campus dorm, which worried Du Shang.
“Yingtao?” Du Shang probed, only hearing very faint breathing.
“Du Shang…” Lin Yingtao said softly.
“Where are you?” Du Shang asked.
“In the dorm,” Lin Yingtao replied.
Du Shang found it strange. Calling so late from the dorm, wouldn’t disturb others’ sleep.
Though it didn’t sound like anyone else was around.
Du Shang said, “Yingtao, do you need something?”
Lin Yingtao remained silent.
“I-I-I saw the report card today. How did you do so well on this midterm exam?” Du Shang suddenly raised his voice.
Lin Yingtao said, “Didn’t I do great? I study for so long every day!”
Hearing her laugh, Du Shang finally relaxed a bit.
“I’m telling you, you did incredibly well!” Du Shang exaggerated. “Yu Qiao only ranked around 200th! Even though he focused on basketball in his first year, he studied hard too. There are so many talented people at Experimental High! Out of over a thousand students in our grade, how did you manage to rank in the top 30?”
Lin Yingtao said, “The first-year questions were simple… I just did lots of practice problems, so I could do well.”
Du Shang said, “Cai Fangyuan wanted you to help us with homework when you’re in your second year!”
Lin Yingtao said, “I won’t do his homework!”
“Exactly!” Du Shang said, “Don’t do it for him! Just let me copy a bit.”
Du Shang grew increasingly excited on the phone. Yu Qiao pushed open the door from outside. He had woken up in the middle of the night and heard Du Shang not sleeping properly in Yu Jin’s room, fooling around instead.
Du Shang pointed at his phone and mouthed to him: Yingtao called me!
“Yingtao, how’s the south campus?” Du Shang asked, afraid the conversation might end. “Is the cafeteria food good? Compared to our Qunshan construction site cafeteria—”
“Du Shang,” Yingtao suddenly called.
“What is it?” Du Shang’s heart tightened.
“I miss Mom and Dad…” Yingtao said.
In the night, Du Shang held his Nokia 110, hearing Yingtao trying to suppress, but failing to hold back her sniffling.
Du Shang said softly, “Yingtao, oh Yingtao…”
Yu Qiao walked over and snatched Du Shang’s phone, putting it to his ear.
“Hello?” he asked urgently, his tone easily sounding fierce when anxious. “Why are you calling so late?”
Beside him, Du Shang quickly said, Yingtao’s crying, don’t be harsh with her!
Lin Yingtao sniffled at the phone, and hearing Yu Qiao’s voice, she choked out, “Why are you being so fierce? I didn’t call you.”
Before dawn, around 5 a.m., Lin Qile woke up. She sat up in bed, folded her blanket, hurriedly washed up, tied her hair, put on her school uniform, and left the dorm room with her water bottle and books while her roommates were still sound asleep.
There was a small flower bed below the dorm building. As Lin Qile walked nearby under the stars, she heard a tender, weak meow, as if waiting for her.
During the Spring Festival holiday that year, Lin Qile had gone to Beijing again with her parents. She showed her aunt, uncle, and cousin her final exam results and the certificates of merit from school.
Her aunt was overjoyed and carefully tucked the photo of Lin Yingtao wearing the blue and white uniform of Provincial Experimental High School and holding her certificate into the family portrait frame. Looking at it, she couldn’t help but hug her niece Yingtao. “Oh Yingtao,” she sighed, “how did you become so outstanding, so good, and so capable…”
Lin Yingtao went with her cousin’s family and her parents to climb the Great Wall by bus. Lin Yingtao ran the fastest, rushing ahead to be the “pathfinder” for the whole family. Lin Yingtao sat in front of the camera, wearing the princess costume from “My Fair Princess,” her childhood favorite TV show, with a heavy headpiece. She opened her big eyes wide, taking silly tourist photos.
Her aunt’s workplace had given out two swimming experience tickets for the Mid-Autumn Festival. It was for some five-star hotel, just two tickets in total. Her aunt couldn’t bear to use them herself and only took them out after nearly half a year. In the dead of winter, Lin Qile and her cousin, wearing down jackets over their swimsuits, took the bus across Beijing to swim at that high-end hotel called Lanzhuang.
“Yingtao!” her cousin exclaimed excitedly. It was February in Beijing, so cold that their noses were red and running, “We’re people who’ve been to a five-star hotel now!”
In the alley, a small vendor was selling pirated DVDs by the roadside. Lin Qile, returning from swimming, looked at his stall for quite a while. They had all kinds of discs here. Lin Qile even thought about calling her dad to ask if he wanted to buy anything.
“Little girl, what do you want to buy?” the vendor asked, looking at her. “Taiwanese idol dramas are perfect for kids your age!”
“What do you have?” Lin Qile asked.
The vendor, with a cigarette in his mouth, replied in a mumbled Beijing accent: “Meteor Garden, this Prince Turns into Frog, and also—”
Lin Qile took money from her pocket, counted it herself, and said, “I want this one!”
The vendor glanced at the few bills in Lin Qile’s hand: “It’s Ain’t It Romantic? That’s thirty! Thirty!… Alright, alright, take it.”
When they returned from Beijing, there were less than ten days until school started. Xin Tingting came to Lin Qile’s house to study every day—for an excellent student like Lin Qile, Xin’s mother now couldn’t wait for her daughter to spend more time with her, to get closer, and to strive to rank in the top hundred of the grade.
With the bedroom door closed, the two girls threw down their schoolbags, and sat in front of the computer screen, eating freshly steamed sweet jujube buns while eagerly watching Jiang Zhishu—no, Taiwanese student Jiang Zhishu—and Yuan Xiangqin’s puppy love.
“Qile.”
“Hm?” Lin Qile responded.
“Have you ever been in puppy love?”
Lin Qile was stunned. She shook her head.
Xin Tingting turned to look at her.
“Not?” Xin Tingting asked.
Lin Qile said puzzled, “Why would I lie to you?”
Sixteen is an age of “awakening,” when flower buds stretch out, pistils begin to bloom, round cocoons break open, and butterfly wings, particularly gorgeous, tremble as they emerge. Lin Qile took her mother’s makeup from the table and placed it in front of Xin Tingting. She opened each bottle, letting Xin Tingting try them all. The two girls were especially excited. Xin Tingting told Lin Qile that long ago, she had heard at the Laishui construction site: that the son of Manager Jiang from headquarters was in puppy love with the daughter of Engineer Lin Haifen at the Qunshan site and was brought back to the provincial capital by his parents. “I thought it was true!” Xin Tingting laughed embarrassedly.
Lin Qile looked at her and smiled without speaking. Xin Tingting carefully applied lipstick in front of the mirror, then asked her, “Is this how you put on lipstick?”
Lin Qile couldn’t help but laugh: Xin Tingting could remember even adults’ names and looked like a little adult herself, but she had never even tried on her mother’s lipstick at home. “Let me put it on for you,” Lin Qile reached out.
After school started, because of her excellent final exam results last semester, Lin Qile was appointed by the homeroom teacher as the class’s study representative.
When other classmates were giggling and wandering downstairs, Lin Qile was upstairs studying hard. When other classmates gathered in groups of three or five to chat excitedly about TV shows, Lin Qile wore headphones to listen to English, even memorizing vocabulary while eating.
Zhou Jielun’s album was already on its sixth release, but Lin Qile still only loved to sing those few songs from “Fantasy.” On a weekend in early April, Lin Dianggong drove his Santana to pick up Yingtao and Xin Tingting to go home.
A cheerful song was playing in the car, with the male singer singing: Sawadika!
“Dad, did you buy Zhou Jielun’s new tape?” Lin Qile asked curiously.
“Yes,” Lin Dianggong laughed from the front, “Yingtao is sixteen today!”
Xin Tingting exclaimed in surprise: “Qile, it’s your birthday?”
Lin Qile belatedly realized it was April 9th.
Lin Dianggong said while driving: “Yu Qiao and Du Shang ordered a big cake for you, but I think Cai Fangyuan paid for it. Yingtao, you should thank the kids later…”
Xin Tingting whispered to Lin Qile: “Your dad seems to always treat you like a child, still saying ‘kids’!”
Perhaps because they discovered that the thick-skinned Lin Qile had no reaction to rumors about “Qunshan,” “countryside,” “love letters,” “coming to the provincial capital to chase Jiang Qiaoxi,” and so on, the classmates teased for a while and then gradually stopped mentioning it.
It might also be that they didn’t dare bring it up to her face anymore because of her position as a study representative.
In early June, Class Monitor Feng Letian, perhaps mustering up courage, finally started talking to Lin Qile again.
“Classmate Lin!” As soon as lunch break started and students from upstairs and downstairs rushed towards the cafeteria, Feng Letian chased after Lin Qile.
This semester, Feng Letian signed up for the school’s Olympic Math competition class. There were two rotation exams each month, and students who failed three consecutive times would be eliminated. The strict assessment system was at odds with Experimental High School’s relaxed and free campus atmosphere.
“I ranked near the bottom again…” Class Monitor Feng, holding his lunchbox, stood next to Lin Qile in the cafeteria queue. “If I don’t get eliminated in the next test, I might also go to the main campus for the second year. Then I can come to study with you!”
Lin Qile looked up and asked, “Is Olympic Math really that difficult?”
Feng Letian smiled bitterly, scratching his head: “It’s not difficult for geniuses… but for ordinary people like us…”
As the queue moved forward, Feng Letian occasionally helped block Lin Qile, as some students were careless with their trays and often bumped into others, splashing food juices.
“You… you should know Jiang Qiaoxi, right?” Feng Letian said softly.
Lin Qile thought Class Monitor Feng was a good person. On the south campus, few people were so friendly and enthusiastic towards her. She nodded.
“We were in the same middle school, and attended the competition class together,” Feng Letian said. “In middle school, our teachers often said Jiang Qiaoxi’s level was good enough to directly participate in high school competitions.”
“He should participate in the preliminaries in his first year, then the league competition in his second year, directly win an international gold medal, and get admitted to Tsinghua or Peking University.”
Feng Letian put his packed meal on the dining table. Following his parents’ instructions, he always ate properly with his bowl and chopsticks.
Lin Qile sat down across from him with her tray, ignoring the teasing noises around them. Lin Qile said stiffly, “Wow, he’s amazing.”
Feng Letian cautiously probed, “Lin, you and Jiang Qiaoxi…”
Lin Qile replied, “We were classmates for two years in elementary school, but we haven’t known each other since.”
Feng Letian paused, surprised. “Oh…”
In late June, as Lin Qile was diligently preparing for her final exams, news appeared on the school’s bulletin board.
The results of the 2006 National High School Mathematics Competition’s provincial preliminary round were announced. Over a hundred students from the Provincial Experimental High School had passed the selection and officially entered the final round. Among them, eleven students, including Jiang Qiaoxi from Class 21 in the first year and Wang Shuran from Class 5 in the second year, received first-class provincial awards and special recognition.
In mid-July, several families from the Electric Construction Company’s “Old Qunshan Base” gathered at a restaurant near the headquarters’ residential area. They reserved a private room. It was a fortunate coincidence that Manager Cai Yue had just finished his construction project and was briefly reassigned to the provincial capital, while Manager Jiang Zheng had been officially promoted to the group’s second-in-command. There was much to celebrate.
Manager Cai stood up and was the first to raise his glass. “Today, our four old friends’ families have gathered here! We’re holding a welcome party for our former little financial genius from Qunshan, Lin Yingtao! Yingtao will be living at headquarters next semester, so you kids should stick together. Also, this Yuqiao here has been elected as, what was it, VIP at school!”
“MVP!” Cai Fangyuan corrected from beside him, embarrassed by his father. “It’s not an mp3…”
“Du Shang should also be commended,” Manager Cai continued, accustomed to handling big affairs and not bothered by small details. He went on to name each person. “He found a wallet with 20,000 yuan in front of our headquarters’ bank! He returned it without taking anything! He’s the first child from our Qunshan project to make it into the newspaper. Everyone knows he’s from our Electric Construction Company!”
Lin Qile, sitting next to Du Shang, joined Yuqiao in enthusiastically applauding.
Du Shang felt a bit embarrassed and asked, “Yingtao, where’s your kitten?”
Only then did Lin Qile realize the cat had escaped from her arms. She hurriedly lifted the tablecloth to search underneath.
“Lastly, my son Cai Fangyuan,” Uncle Cai continued, his shiny leather shoes visible under the tablecloth, “won a small, insignificant prize in the provincial high school computer competition. He has some talent, but he mustn’t become arrogant!”
Lin Qile, crawling under the table, whispered, “Mimi… Mimi!” She tried imitating a cat’s meow: “Meow meow!”
As Manager Cai’s speech was nearing its end, he suddenly remembered something. “Oh right, I almost forgot, there’s another big award! Manager Jiang’s son, Jiang Qiaoxi, the famous prodigy at headquarters! He won a first-class prize in the provincial Olympic Mathematics Competition! Manager Jiang, what kind of luck do you have to have such a heaven-sent genius for a son?”
Manager Jiang smiled and waved it off, but it was clear he was quite pleased.
Lin, the electrician, asked, “Where’s Qiaoxi? Why didn’t he come?”
Manager Jiang told his old neighbor, “He’s at his Olympic Math class.”
“He’s still taking classes?” Foreman Yu asked from across the table.
It had been four years, and Manager Jiang’s son had been attending these Olympic Math classes through thick and thin.
“Hasn’t he finished the exams?” he inquired.
“Uncle Yu, that was just the preliminary round,” Cai Fangyuan explained from the side. “He still has to take the final round in September.”
“There’s a final round?” Foreman Yu peeled a peanut. “You… Fangyuan, why didn’t you take the exam? Aren’t you studying it too?”
Cai Fangyuan quickly clarified, “No way! Who takes that in their first year? We usually take it in the second year, and even then, not everyone qualifies!”
“Sounds like the schedule is pretty tight,” Lin the electrician said, sitting next to Manager Jiang. “He’ll have to study throughout the entire summer vacation?”
“Let him study,” Manager Jiang said, still smiling but with furrowed brows. He clinked glasses with Cai Yue, already drinking. “Come on, brothers, let’s have a drink!”
As the adults drank at the table, the children, finally on summer break, could play freely. Lin Qile was returning to her original school, moving from the first to the second year of high school. The former “little group of four” had all chosen science tracks, and there was a chance they might end up in the same class.
Cai Fangyuan was playing with a PSP under the table, with Lin Qile sitting next to him, holding her cat and watching. Cai Fangyuan said, “You’ve never played this before, right?”
Lin Qile replied, “No, I haven’t.”
Cai Fangyuan still focused on his game, glanced at Lin Qile.
He remembered that back in elementary school in Qunshan, Lin Qile loved wearing flowery dresses and red leather shoes. She liked dressing up, changing her hair accessories daily even at a young age, always trying to show off.
Yet after growing up and coming to the provincial capital, she started wearing baggy sportswear, with her hair plain and simply tied back, not even bothering with a hairpin when going out.
“Lin Yingtao, I think you’ve become a bit of a country bumpkin at South School,” Cai Fangyuan remarked.
Lin Qile glared at him, her large eyes quite intimidating when narrowed.
Cai Fangyuan laughed, lowering his head back to his game. Suddenly, he said, “Jiang Qiaoxi said he’d come after class.”
At the table, Manager Jiang had drunk too much. Among the colleagues present, he was the oldest. If it weren’t for Jiang Mengchu’s past accident, he wouldn’t be reminiscing at the same table with these coworkers who were more than ten years his junior because of his child. “It’s not easy, none of them are easy,” Manager Jiang said, after listening to Cai Yue’s flattery all evening. “This child of mine, he may seem obedient, but in middle school,” his face was flushed from drinking, his eyes half-closed with intoxication, and he lowered his voice, “he had a puppy love affair.”
“His mother caught him writing a letter halfway through. There was a big scene at home, tearing up books. The neighbors in three or four buildings around us could hear it all,” Jiang Zheng blinked, holding his wine glass. “I don’t know what he wrote, but I just heard Liang Hongfei getting angry. To be honest, children, none of them make life easy.”
“That’s why I didn’t want him to come today,” Manager Jiang said, then raised his glass again.
After several rounds of drinks, it was already eight o’clock at night.
Foreman Yu, reeking of alcohol, said, “Yuqiao, you and Yingtao, go outside and order some noodles!”
Lin Yingtao, holding her cat, walked out with Yu Qiao. Du Shang asked from the side, “Is this a stray cat from South School? How can there be such a cute stray cat?”
It was Cai Fangyuan who first said, “Oh, you’re here!”
Yu Qiao looked up.
At the entrance of the restaurant stood someone who wasn’t exactly a stranger, but also not very familiar anymore.
Jiang Qiaoxi seemed to have just finished class. He was wearing a dark gray T-shirt and carrying a backpack, standing there alone.
When Lin Qile saw him, the cat in her arms suddenly let out a soft “meow.”
“You…” Du Shang stammered, very surprised, “Why are you here?”
Yu Qiao asked, “Have you had dinner?”
Jiang Qiaoxi looked at his former elementary school deskmate and shook his head.
Yu Qiao patted Lin Qile’s back. “Let’s go order some food.”
The five high school students stood in front of a wall filled with fish tanks, with a colorful menu printed on it.
Lin Qile was originally next to Cai Fangyuan, focusing on the photos of sample dishes, listening to the sound of the oxygen pump in the fish tank, and holding her kitten. Suddenly, Cai Fangyuan went over to Yu Qiao to order food.
Jiang Qiaoxi then stood beside her.
Lin Qile’s breath stopped.
“You’re returning to the main school for your second year?” Jiang Qiaoxi suddenly asked.
His voice had changed, becoming unfamiliar, sounding more like an “adult” compared to when they were children.
Lin Qile couldn’t make a sound. She nodded.
“Which class are you in?” Jiang Qiaoxi pressed.
Lin Qile shook her head; she didn’t know.
Yu Qiao had finished ordering all the dishes and noodles by himself and was about to leave. Lin Qile wanted to quickly follow, but suddenly Jiang Qiaoxi called out from behind, “Lin Qile!”
Lin Qile stopped in her tracks.
The young man who had been silently waiting at the door suddenly called out loudly. Many people around them fell silent and looked at him.
Jiang Qiaoxi slowly walked back in front of Lin Qile. His snow-white skin made his dark eyes stand out even more, giving him an eternally black-and-white appearance. Lin Qile looked up at Jiang Qiaoxi’s face.
Jiang Qiaoxi also looked down at her, his brows slightly furrowed, his bangs falling and half-covering his eyes, his lips pressed together.
It seemed as if he still had something he wanted to ask, that he wasn’t finished asking.
But Lin Qile didn’t want to answer anymore. She started to walk forward, while Jiang Qiaoxi stood still with his backpack.
Lin Qile raised her head.
“I want to tell you something,” Lin Qile suddenly said.
“Go ahead,” Jiang Qiaoxi replied.
In the distance, the sound of Uncle Yu and the others toasting and laughing could be heard.
“I didn’t come to the provincial capital because of you,” Lin Qile said, looking at him.
The small kitten in her arms meowed at Jiang Qiaoxi, but he couldn’t reach out to hold it.
“And I’m not transferring to the main school because of you either,” Lin Qile added.
Jiang Qiaoxi looked down at her and said, “I know.”
Our Generation – Chapter Notes:
- “Voting for Zhou Bichang or someone else”: In 2005, Hunan TV’s “Super Girl,” a talent show under the “Happy China” series, swept across the nation, igniting a voting frenzy. Zhou Bichang, a young 20-year-old female singer, won second place nationally and debuted from there.
- “Nokia 110”: The Nokia 1110, a bar phone released by Nokia in August 2005, became incredibly popular due to its low price. It sold 250 million units, earning the title of the best-selling mobile phone in history.
- The Prince Who Turns into a Frog: A Taiwanese idol drama directed by Chen Mingzhang and Liu Junjie, starring Ming Dao and Joe Chen. It premiered in Taiwan on June 5, 2005, and broke the highest viewership record of 6.43 previously held by the Taiwanese drama Meteor Garden.
- It Started with a Kiss: A popular Taiwanese idol drama adapted from Kaoru Tada’s manga Itazura na Kiss. It aired in September 2005 on CTV and GTV.
- “Jay Chou has already released his sixth album”: In November 2005, Jay Chou released his sixth album, Chopin in November.
- “The male singer sang ‘Sawadee Ka!'”: These are lyrics from Jay Chou’s song “Maltose,” composed by Jay Chou with lyrics by Vincent Fang.
- PSP: A multifunctional handheld console developed by Sony Japan, capable of gaming, music, video playback, and internet browsing. It was released in 2004 and became available in North America in 2005.