The next second, a new message came through:

[Chinese tutoring.]

The screen lit up again, and he lazily added:

[Essay writing.]

This was entirely true. Ban Sheng’s grades were excellent across the board, except for Chinese Language, where Liu Xiping had called him out in class for his essays being far too off-topic. She had even told him to go ask Lin Weixia after class about how she managed to write essays that scored nearly perfect marks.

Lin Weixia typed back a question, instinctively raising her defenses: [Just that?]

She waited quite a while, but the other side sent nothing more. Just as Lin Weixia was about to turn off her screen, his message came through.

Ban: [Yeah.]

Lin Weixia continued to insist on tutoring Ning Chao in English, thinking he would make at least some progress. The results, however, were both exasperating and amusing. When the English teacher walked into class, she called out student numbers and had students stand to answer questions.

“Number 36!”

Ning Chao yawned and stood up lazily. The English teacher raised an eyebrow when she saw it was him and said, “Ning Chao, I hear you’ve been getting tutoring lately. Go ahead and recite a good sentence for everyone to check on your progress.”

“Hikangkang, how are you?”

“I’m fine, thank you.”

Ning Chao blurted out those words, sending the entire class into an uproar of laughter. Even the English teacher, who had been stone-faced while drinking water, couldn’t help but choke a little.

The atmosphere in the classroom immediately relaxed. Ning Chao looked around with sleepy eyes — from middle school until now, hadn’t those two lines been the most common English he’d ever heard? Surely there was nothing wrong with them?

Ning Chao noticed Liu Sijia in the front row, who had been cold and rigidly upright for several days. Right now, she couldn’t hold back the smile breaking across her face — her red lips curved upward, and a few strands of her pinned-up hair had fallen loose around her ears, making her look radiant and beautiful.

Ning Chao stared and felt momentarily dazed.

The weekend arrived as expected. Lin Weixia woke up in the morning and made breakfast for the household, and not long after discovered that her period had come. Her menstrual cycle was always difficult. After changing her sanitary pad, she forced herself through the discomfort, cleaned the apartment, then lay down in bed to rest.

Under the covers, it wasn’t long before Lin Weixia broke out in a layer of sweat. Before much time had passed, the abdominal pain began. The longer it went on, the more it felt as though something were wringing her insides, and the pain drove her to curl her entire body inward involuntarily.

Whenever Lin Weixia’s period came, she seemed to fall completely apart. The worst time, she had forced herself through the pain and asked for leave, only to collapse in the end beside a bicycle near the school gate. Someone found her and sent her to the hospital, where she was put on an IV drip before she recovered.

She had arranged to go to Ban Sheng’s home that afternoon, but now… thinking of this, Lin Weixia’s eyelashes fluttered. She strained to take her phone from the drawer and typed a message to Ban Sheng:

[I’m sorry, my period came today and I’m not feeling well — I probably won’t be able to make it.]

After sending it, Lin Weixia didn’t bother checking for a reply and switched off her phone screen. She pulled the blanket around herself and turned over, closed her eyes, but the pain in her stomach was too much for her to fall asleep.

At eleven o’clock, the landline rang in the living room. Lin Weixia was too exhausted to move, and forced her voice out with effort:

“Gao Hang, answer the phone.”

From across the hall came the sound of Gao Hang roaring at his microphone in his room: “Unbelievable — are you playing with your feet?! You’re this bad and you’re dragging your teammates down with you?”

“You idiot, I’ll beat you so badly you’ll go home to drill textbook exercises.”

Gao Hang hammered his keyboard so hard it thundered, and his shouting filled the room. Lin Weixia sighed, pushed back the blanket, slowly climbed out of bed, and walked to the living room to answer the phone.

“Xiaxia, I’ve got something going on at noon so I won’t be back — remember to make lunch for Hang-zi, alright?” Her aunt said over the phone.

Lin Weixia pressed her hand over her abdomen and sat down on the sofa. She hesitated a moment before speaking: “Auntie, I’m not feeling very well today — could I maybe order —”

“Oh right, I paid the water and electricity bill this month. Sigh, it really is different having an extra person in the house to feed. It’s all because of your uncle…” Her aunt’s end was noisy with background sounds, and her words seemed to carry an implied meaning.

Her uncle was always out on long-haul freight runs and rarely came home. Since it was the slow season for transportation recently, he had been idle at home, helping out at her aunt’s fruit stand from time to time.

The words “order takeout” lodged in her throat. Lin Weixia swallowed them back down and forced a smile: “Alright, Auntie.”

Lin Weixia sat in front of the sofa in a daze. On the coffee table she noticed a flyer stained with oil — Gao Hang had been eating noodles that morning and found them too hot, so her aunt had grabbed the flyer to use as a placemat for him. Oil and moisture had blurred the print, but the words “Cello Club Recruitment” were just barely visible.

Lin Weixia bent down, pulled out the flyer, and threw it in the trash. The paper was buried under the garbage and disappeared entirely. She walked to the refrigerator to see what ingredients were left.

Cold air rushed out. Lin Weixia was in such pain that she had to brace herself against the refrigerator door, her lips drained of color. She looked inside — there was a piece of lean pork and some vegetables.

Just then, Gao Hang shuffled out of his room in slippers, scratching his head: “Sis, forget cooking — let’s just have instant noodles.”

Outside of gaming, Gao Hang was actually like a little adult who knew how to be considerate. Lin Weixia gave a faint smile and changed the subject: “Do you think I’d give you an excuse to eat junk food?”

Lin Weixia closed the refrigerator and walked toward the kitchen, beginning to rinse the rice to cook. She turned on the tap, letting water run into the rice container. Just as she was about to wash the rice clean, the phone on the counter beside her let out a low buzzing vibration.

The screen flashed an unfamiliar number. She tapped to answer, her voice barely above a whisper: “Hello?”

“It’s me.” A low, unhurried voice came from the other end.

“What are you doing?”

Through the receiver came the repeated clicking of a lighter. Ban Sheng’s tone was casual as he waited for her answer. Lin Weixia didn’t know if he had called to start trouble or for something else entirely. She was exhausted, her mood persistently low, the pain driving cold sweat from her skin — she had no energy to spar with him, and spoke stiffly:

“Cooking. If there’s nothing else, I’m hanging up.”

Without waiting for any reply, Lin Weixia immediately ended the call. Then she called for Gao Hang to take her phone out of the kitchen.

After Lin Weixia rinsed the rice and got the rice cooker going, drowsiness and pain washed over her together. She went back to her room, intending to rest for a while before getting up again to finish cooking.

In the haze of sleep, Lin Weixia vaguely heard Gao Hang repeating in the living room: “No — I’m at No. 7, Lane Sixteen. Come in and go straight, turn left at the third alley, then turn right and you’re here.”

“Alright, let me come down.”

Lin Weixia slept a short while before Gao Hang woke her, telling her to come out and eat. She stumbled out with a foggy head and found the table covered in beautifully arranged dishes, fragrant and inviting, with takeout containers from a place called “Yunshang Fang” stacked beside them.

“Where did all this come from?”

“No idea — your phone was ringing earlier. It was a delivery driver who couldn’t find the place, so I went down to get it.” Gao Hang’s voice was cheerful.

“And then guess what? I ran into a really good-looking guy downstairs who said he was your classmate. He told me to watch and make sure you drank all this porridge.” Gao Hang pointed to a thermal container sitting nearby, and beside it, a packet of heat patches for menstrual pain.

Lin Weixia opened the lid — inside was a bowl of five-red porridge, a remedy for menstrual discomfort, steam rising warmly to her face. She put the lid back on and walked toward the living room.

Behind her, Gao Hang kept marveling: “I heard this restaurant is members-only and not open to the public. My friends have been wanting to go for ages but could never get a reservation. I have to take a photo and show off.”

“Sis, your classmate treats you really well. You don’t have to cook now.”

Lin Weixia found her phone, went back to her room, and closed the door. She scrolled through the recent calls, found the number, and dialed back. The call connected quickly.

Neither side said anything. Only the quiet static of the line filled the air.

“Thank you — how much was it? I can —” Lin Weixia spoke first.

“Have you drunk the porridge yet?” Ban Sheng suddenly cut her off.

Lin Weixia found it strange, but answered anyway: “Not yet.”

“Go drink it,” Ban Sheng said, pausing for a beat. “And put the heat patch on too.”

“But you’re the one who ordered the food — I can’t just accept it without —” Lin Weixia insisted on settling the matter clearly.

Ban Sheng switched the phone to his other hand, flagged down a car at the roadside, and climbed in, saying:

“Save my number.”

Calling him self-serving would not be an overstatement. He gave precisely, then expected a return in kind — making her willingly save his number while ensuring he himself lost nothing at all.

Lin Weixia leaned against the door with her back, bent her knuckles, and knocked lightly on the wall. Her tone was hesitant: “How about… I help you review your essay online this afternoon?”

A rushing sound of a car speeding past came through the phone. Ban Sheng called her by her full name for the very first time, his voice low and pleasant:

“Lin Weixia.”

Her heart gave a faint tremor, as if a current had passed through it. Lin Weixia held her breath instinctively, and heard Ban Sheng let out a soft, low laugh — his tone playful and faintly commanding:

“You owe me a full day. What’s mine isn’t going anywhere.”