In the midterm exams, Qiao Qingyu unexpectedly entered the top 100 in her grade for the first time, both surprising and exciting her. What made her uncomfortable was that Ming Sheng had fallen behind her again, barely hanging onto the 100th position, and ranking just after her in their class.
This was the third test since the school year began, and Ming Sheng’s grades had been like a roller coaster. That wasn’t the problem; the issue was that Qiao Qingyu seemed more concerned about his performance than he was. Remembering Ming Sheng’s pale, desperate face when he said he could never meet his parent’s expectations, she imagined Wen Qiuxin’s cold stare upon seeing Ming Sheng’s grades and felt the anguish he might be enduring. Yet she also felt she was overthinking, and began to criticize her excessive empathy.
“I just don’t like seeing our names ranked together,” she thought. “It only invites gossip.”
In reality, Ye Zilin hadn’t said anything this time, and others seemed not to have noticed.
Qiao Qingyu reminded herself that compared to Li Fanghao, any strict parent would seem lenient. Ming Sheng had been spoiled since childhood and was probably willful and self-centered with his parents. He lived so freely. With so many children in the world oppressed by their parents, he was the least deserving of sympathy.
Events proved her worries unfounded. On the last day of April, during the parent-teacher conference, Ming Sheng’s mother appeared at the school after lunch. Accompanied by the principal, vice principal, and dean of students, she moved from the administration building through the teaching building to the library. Finally stopping at a makeshift long table in the library lobby, she yielded to the principal and vice principal’s repeated invitations and penned a line of poetry.
Qiao Qingyu, leaving the reading room, heard the commotion and peered over the second-floor railing, just in time to witness Ming Yu’s graceful and confident calligraphy. “Wind flips white waves into a thousand petals, geese dot the blue sky like a line of characters.” The elegance and freedom of the moment captivated her. Only when scattered applause erupted from below did she realize she’d be late to class if she didn’t hurry back.
It was the conversation she overheard while passing this group of adults that convinced her that her concern for Ming Sheng was utterly misplaced.
“Sheng didn’t do well this time, but it won’t affect his U.S. college applications. Scores are just one factor,” Ming Yu told the principal. “His father and I have told him to relax and participate in more activities, not just focus on exams.”
“Yes, indeed. After all, his SAT score is already quite high,” the principal smiled. “Don’t worry, he’s very active and has a great attitude. As for his grades, with his ability, they’ll improve quickly.”
Qiao Qingyu felt utterly foolish. The principal was right; compared to the back-to-school exam, this poor performance seemed to have no impact on Ming Sheng. Look at what he did after the midterm results came out — confidently accepting interviews from the school newspaper and TV station, allowing others to push Su Tian towards him, and even signing up for the school arts festival, reportedly for a piano solo. When Chen Shen curiously asked why someone who had toured abroad with the city’s youth orchestra would stoop to performing at a school arts festival, he replied that he wanted to leave memories before going abroad.
HAh going abroad. Yes, in the end, emotions were just a condiment to him. Wang Mumu was both right and wrong; his heartfelt singing at the KTV didn’t mean anything. His passionate confession was, at most, just the immature impulse of a young playboy.
On the day of the parent-teacher conference, just before the last self-study period ended, Qiao Qingyu was inexplicably compelled to tidy her already neat desk drawer. She spent a few minutes quickly flipping through her books, and when she reached the last set of completed mock exam papers, a thin envelope fluttered to the floor like a snowflake.
Picking it up, the Shun Yun No. 1 High School logo on the envelope made Qiao Qingyu’s heart race, filled with a post-disaster fear — He Kai had written another letter at some point, and if Li Fanghao discovered it, the consequences would be unthinkable.
Besides Ming Sheng, who else would repeatedly interfere with He Kai’s letters? Rejected by her, he now took pleasure in tormenting her as revenge. Childish and despicable.
The bell had just rung, and Qiao Qingyu didn’t have cleaning duty on Fridays. She had to reach the school gate within ten minutes, where Li Fanghao was waiting to take her home. After freezing for several seconds with the envelope in hand, she quickly packed her bag, grasped the letter directly, and hurried downstairs.
She decided not to cross the assembly square in front of the teaching building that faced the school gate. Instead, she took the route behind the teaching building, passing the tennis and volleyball courts, circling the administration building, and exiting through the side gate. It was a longer route but would avoid Li Fanghao’s potentially watchful gaze.
Unable to be late, Qiao Qingyu walked briskly.
As soon as she left the teaching building, she began opening the envelope while walking. The letter wasn’t long, just a thin page with large blank spaces at the top and bottom. The deep blue writing in the center, excessively neat, appeared very sincere. “How are you, Qiao Qingyu,” Qiao Qingyu read silently as she hurried along. “You’re not well, are you?”
“I must have frightened you, which is why you didn’t reply to my letter at the end of last semester. Forget that letter, pretend I said nothing. After you finish your college entrance exam, I’ll formally say everything again, and then you can give me your answer, okay?”
She had reached the tennis court. Qiao Qingyu slowed her pace slightly, steadying her breath.
“I saw the news about your family in the paper,” she resumed reading the second paragraph, her feet picking up speed again. “Although many people think you shouldn’t have done that, I believe you’re an undeniable hero, completely overturning my previous impression of you. Only someone with such a heart could write such spirited characters. I admire this side of you very, very much.”
Past the tennis court and entering the back garden of the administration building, Qiao Qingyu began reading the final paragraph.
“Senior year is already grueling, and without you here, school feels even more like a prison. Fortunately, I remember your smiling face. I hope your classmates at No. 2 High understand and treat you gently. I hope you can smile more; your smile is especially moving.”
The last two characters were “He Kai.” Qiao Qingyu stopped, finding herself standing in the long corridor leading from the back garden to the bicycle shed, with a dreamlike expanse of light purple overhead — the lush wisteria in full, brilliant bloom.
She put away the letter, collected herself, and continued her rapid pace, stepping on fallen wisteria petals.
“Hey!”
Ming Sheng’s voice made her stop again.
He seemed to appear out of nowhere, alone, hands in his pockets, sauntering to her side. Qiao Qingyu didn’t look at him, taking a couple of small steps forward. He took a large step back, blocking her path.
“Aren’t you bored?” Qiao Qingyu glared at him angrily, waving the letter in her hand. “Why did you intercept my letter again?”
Ming Sheng shrugged lazily: “I didn’t.”
“You deliberately hid it where I couldn’t see,” Qiao Qingyu took a deep breath, furious. “If I hadn’t checked my desk, my mom would have found it tonight at the parent-teacher conference! Are you trying to ruin me?”
“I put it on your desk as soon as I got it. You’re just oblivious.”
Sophistry. Qiao Qingyu turned away, about to leave, but Ming Sheng blocked her again.
“March 6, 2009, I found this letter while reading the newspaper and put it on your desk that day, tucked into the practice test booklet in the center of your desk, on the page after where you had left off,” Ming Sheng recited as if from memory. “I thought you’d surely find it, but when you came back from the library, the bell had already rung. You just closed the booklet and shoved it into the drawer. I was anxious for you.”
The class subscription newspapers that Guan Lan brought daily were indeed often first browsed by Ming Sheng, so what he said was probably true.
“You remember it so clearly.”
“Of course. You love the library,” Ming Sheng smiled shamelessly. “I even remember that day was 12 degrees Celsius, with a light breeze, and you were wearing a moon-white turtleneck sweater under your uniform.”
“How can he use such flowery words?”
“It’s the same one you wore when you came to my house…”
“I know.” Qiao Qingyu glared at him.
Ming Sheng just smiled at her, his expression gradually becoming serious.
“Last Saturday, I went to Shun Yun No. 1 High,” he began casually. “Your alma mater is quite strict, with the whole school studying even on Saturdays.”
Qiao Qingyu instantly became alert: “Why did you go there?”
“To see He Kai.”
“What?”
“Don’t worry, I went alone,” Ming Sheng’s eyes held a bitter smile. “I didn’t do anything, just apologized to him in person.”
Qiao Qingyu responded with a slow “Oh,” and then lowered her gaze.
“Back to the day that letter arrived,” Ming Sheng shrugged, his tone becoming airy again, “Did you know you smiled at the podium that day?”
Seeing Qiao Qingyu’s confused expression, he continued, his voice gaining weight and sounding less frivolous: “Old Sun had you write a sentence from your essay on the blackboard and praised your writing and handwriting in front of everyone.”
With his reminder, Qiao Qingyu remembered. However, since Sun Yinglong hadn’t chosen her for the city’s essay competition later, she hadn’t dwelled on the praise.
“The fierce wind disperses, rain grows vertically, the city as solemn as a dream.”
Ming Sheng recited the sentence she had written on the blackboard, synchronizing with Qiao Qingyu’s silent recollection. He fell silent, seemingly waiting for her reaction, his gaze intense.
“Teacher Sun praised several people that day,” Qiao Qingyu’s eyelashes fluttered involuntarily before she quickly regained composure. “Gao Chi, Deng Meixi, Jiang Nian, Wang Haoran, and…”
“I only remember yours.”
Unable to bear it any longer, Qiao Qingyu moved, almost knocking Ming Sheng over as she fled the emotionally charged wisteria tunnel.
If there was any positive outcome from being intercepted by Ming Sheng, it was that before seeing Li Fanghao that day, the troubled Qiao Qingyu unhesitatingly discarded the letter she was holding. Later, when she tried to recall the letter’s contents, her thoughts were incomplete, constantly interrupted by Ming Sheng’s words, making it impossible to focus. Ming Sheng, who had once jumped directly from a tree to intervene between her and He Kai, was undoubtedly a forceful intruder. Even in her mind, he was as domineering as in reality. He had clearly expressed through his actions and words that he wanted to stand in front, making sure she saw him, not He Kai.
Qiao Qingyu decided to write back to He Kai, telling him she hadn’t received his previous letter to prevent misunderstandings and anxiety. Unable to write at home and finding the classroom too chaotic, she spread out paper in the library reading room after the May Day holiday. As she pondered how to begin, she suddenly felt grateful for not having read that letter, leaving her unburdened and without apology, her relationship with He Kai remaining as pure and straightforward as before.
However, she reminded herself, this didn’t mean Ming Sheng was right to discard the letter. There was no need to feel inexplicably grateful to him.
In her reply to He Kai, she casually described her life in Huan Zhou. “Thank you for affirming my actions,” she wrote, “although now I’m not as certain that what I did was just. Every coin has two sides, and the fact is I’ve caused irreparable harm to my family.”
At the end of the letter, she politely requested He Kai not to write again.
“You must have already seen my family’s pain… After my sister’s tragic experience, my mother went to the other extreme, constantly watching me and checking everything. Anything related to boys appearing around me would shatter her psychological defenses. Although my life now isn’t free, it’s stable and peaceful, and I’m content. With the college entrance exam approaching, everything else must give way. Don’t let writing back to me distract you from your studies. I wish you great success in the exam!”
After finishing, she read it through, satisfied with her politeness and courtesy. Inevitably, her thoughts turned to Ming Sheng. She had denied saying hurtful things to him in front of Wang Mumu, but deep down, she knew how wounding her words in the tree had been. She wondered if his increased activity this semester was related to her harsh treatment of him.
Look, she thought, the arrogant, domineering, stubborn me that you look down upon is quite popular.
But why engage in such speculation? Qiao Qingyu questioned herself as she walked back to the teaching building. Why assume everything Ming Sheng did was related to her?
Today, she returned to the classroom right after finishing the letter, with fifteen minutes left before class—relatively early. At the stairway corner, she heard an argument from the corridor above, seemingly between Su Tian, Deng Meixi, and Guan Lan.
“Combining poetry recitation with piano solo into one program, even Teacher Miao agreed. Who are you to say no?” Deng Meixi’s voice carried the same tone as when she had questioned Qiao Qingyu about preventing Ming Sheng from playing basketball.
“That’s right. Deng Meixi’s recitation won first prize in the city and was on TV. Who else could pair with Asheng’s piano solo?” Guan Lan chimed in.
“I said it’s overtime. Your poetry recitation was added later. Why should yours stay while our aerobics routine gets cut?” Su Tian protested defiantly. “First come, first served, understand, senior?”
“Listen to the teacher’s overall arrangement. If you think it’s unfair, talk to the teacher yourself!” Deng Meixi’s voice grew louder.
“You make it sound like the teacher forced you to perform with Asheng. You voluntarily reported the program to the teacher, all that Youth Day and civic virtue talk to please her, that’s why she replaced ours!” Su Tian accused.
War was about to break out. Qiao Qingyu hugged the wall as she passed them, wishing she could disappear in the crossfire, and quickly ducked into the classroom.
She wondered if they would still argue so undignifiedly if Ming Sheng were present. Her guess proved correct; not long after, Ming Sheng returned and dismissed Su Tian with a few words.
Deng Meixi had won, Qiao Qingyu thought, feeling both the excitement of a spectator and the pain of disappointment. After the English recitation and karaoke, this was the third time Ming Sheng had actively chosen Deng Meixi.
Before afternoon P.E. class, Qiao Qingyu first ran to the small shop near the administration building to buy stamps, then hurried to the school gate, intending to drop the letter for He Kai into the mailbox across the street. The security guard asked for her pass, which she couldn’t produce. Despite her pleas, he wouldn’t let her out. The bell rang, forcing her to tuck the letter into her uniform pocket and run to the sports field for P.E. class. After class, she tried again with the guard but was rebuffed once more.
Feeling dejected, she turned to see Ming Sheng, Chen Shen, and others swaggering across the assembly square, each drenched in sweat and holding a can of cola. As they passed by, Ming Sheng glanced at her casually while tilting his head back to drink, exuding an air of victory, as if mocking her predicament.
Qiao Qingyu turned again, darting past the guard before he could react. She sprinted across the street amid his shouts, solemnly inserting her letter into the mailbox.
Upon her return, she found Ming Sheng and his friends waiting by the school gate, as if specifically for her. As she passed them, her gaze swept over Ming Sheng’s stern face, catching his evident frustration. To her surprise, a sense of triumph ignited in her heart.