But Wang Fa was indeed leaving.

Lin Wanxing knew this fact.

Whether it was Wang Fa directly telling her his annual salary, or later when she received a call from the real estate agent saying the top floor tenant wanted to move out.

All these things made Lin Wanxing understand that Wang Fa was truly leaving.

Lin Wanxing held her phone, on the other end was the agent she had always entrusted with handling her rental property matters.

The agent said the top-floor tenant was very generous.

The rent and deposit would follow the contract. The tenant had originally signed for a year, with one deposit and three months’ rent upfront, but would pay the full year’s contract amount at once.

Moreover, the tenant had said there was no need to hold the apartment for him, the contract would end there, and she could freely rent the place to someone else.

“This is as generous as it gets!”

The agent said in a tone as if seeking credit.

“I understand.” Lin Wanxing listened to the report and responded flatly, then ended the call.

Putting down her phone, Lin Wanxing thought Wang Fa should be considered a generous tenant. As the landlord, she should be happy, but she couldn’t help feeling disappointed.

Because Wang Fa could have told her all this face-to-face.

Like when they were eating breakfast, during their boring evening walks, or even when they sat in the stands watching the students daydream—Wang Fa could have mentioned it at any of those times.

But he hadn’t.

She didn’t think this was because Wang Fa was “embarrassed,” but rather it was more about his attitude—an attitude that said, “This is where it ends.”

He was generous—a year’s rent was enough to wipe away the small amounts of money he had “swindled” from her before.

And he was professional, his intentions resolute—he was leaving.

For almost an entire day, Lin Wanxing stayed in her sports equipment room, thinking about Wang Fa’s situation.

It wasn’t about any romance between them, but she felt there were other issues, so she began to recall how she had met Wang Fa.

The yellowed notice on the wall, the registration book on the desk flipped through a few more pages—other than these things, even the temperature was as hot as on her first day of work.

She had met Wang Fa on her very first day on the job.

That day she went to find Chen Jianghe to collect soccer balls and encountered Chen Jianghe with a scout on the field. Wang Fa had spoken up to warn her, and she had gone down to drive away the scout for Chen Jianghe.

Lin Wanxing was quite curious—if she hadn’t appeared, would Wang Fa have walked down from those stands? Would he have “meddled” and sent away the scout who had “ill intentions” for a high school student he had never met?

With her job being leisurely, Lin Wanxing spent her work hours pondering this question.

She thought about it for most of the day, and her answer was still “yes.”

If Wang Fa wasn’t that kind of person, he could have ignored Chen Jianghe, refused to “do a small favor” when she asked during the students’ first match, and certainly wouldn’t have spent so many days accompanying them, formulating tactics, training plans, and carefully teaching the students.

He was actually very patient—although he appeared nonchalant, most of the time he was attentive and thorough. Whether teaching students how to play soccer or teaching them how to conduct themselves in life, he was beyond reproach.

All of this added up to why he was “worth that much money.”

Although none of this meant he wouldn’t leave, there were still some places where logic and emotion didn’t match up.

He had great prospects abroad, yet chose to return to China.

He paid a year’s rent but was living there for less than a month before starting at his new job.

So why did he come back—for the future of Chinese soccer?

But he had clearly said, “I don’t have dreams.”

If it wasn’t for dreams, then it was for money.

He had also said, “They’re giving too much.”

The overall logic seemed to make sense, but was Wang Fa the kind of person who could be moved by money?

Lin Wanxing thought repeatedly but couldn’t find where the problem lay.

The evening had fallen when her phone rang again, bringing Lin Wanxing back from her long contemplation.

Fu Xinshu’s voice was on the other end.

Lin Wanxing realized the students hadn’t come to the small storage room all day.

Yesterday the boys had said they would go together to “clear inventory” and then sign up for gym memberships. Now it was almost evening, so they should have finished clearing things out long ago.

According to the students’ habits, if they were still active around school, they would come to her small storage room to hang out at noon.

Sometimes they came to beg for food, or they would pull out the mats to take naps.

Today none of the students had come because Wang Fa had told them he was leaving early.

“Teacher,” Fu Xinshu’s voice on the phone sounded very calm, without any disappointment.

“Hmm, what is it?”

“We won’t be training tonight, so don’t go to the field. After work, come straight home.”

Fu Xinshu’s “home” referred to the rooftop where she and Wang Fa lived.

“Okay,” Lin Wanxing answered.

“We want to have a barbecue today. We still have some money left from what we earned before. Coach is leaving, so we want to have a barbecue on the rooftop. Is that okay?” Fu Xinshu asked.

Lin Wanxing was pleased that the students would seek her opinion before making decisions.

And now they sounded neither noisy nor agitated, their emotions calm—Wang Fa must have spoken seriously with them about some things.

Although she wasn’t sure what Wang Fa had said. But some words could only be shared between a coach and his players.

Lin Wanxing held her phone in silence for a long while, until Fu Xinshu urged her.

“Ah, I understand. I’ll head back soon,” Lin Wanxing said.

Fu Xinshu asked, “What about the barbecue?”

“Of course, it’s no problem,” Lin Wanxing said with a smile. As if to reflect the farewell, today’s weather was exceptionally fine, and by evening, brilliant red clouds filled half the sky.

Lin Wanxing climbed to the rooftop and saw the vast expanse of crimson clouds.

The students had set up a grill with vegetables and charcoal scattered around.

They were all busy with their tasks—some threading meat onto skewers, others washing dishes. They occasionally exchanged a few words, not particularly excited but not unhappy either.

Seeing her, the students waved in greeting, smiling.

Lin Wanxing noticed that the boys had mud on their legs and dirty clothes, their faces red from exposure to the sun—they must have trained with Wang Fa as usual today.

So she scanned the rooftop, but Wang Fa wasn’t there.

The students nodded toward his apartment, indicating their coach was inside.

Lin Wanxing glanced at Wang Fa’s door but didn’t go over. She had been anxious this morning, but now she felt more at peace.

“Did you go sign up for gym memberships?” Lin Wanxing washed her hands and joined the boys in skewering food.

“Yes, we even negotiated the price. They gave us a new discount of 7,500,” Qin Ao said lazily. “And we also negotiated that if we want to continue working out later, like if we want to switch to annual memberships, we just need to pay the difference.”

This was a discount price even though she hadn’t been able to negotiate.

The student’s tone was proud—a few days of struggling had helped him grow a lot.

Lin Wanxing nodded and pushed a bamboo skewer through a prawn. But the prawn was too slippery, and she wasn’t careful, piercing right through its back.

She frightened herself.

“Teacher, go call the coach to do the skewering,” Chen Jianghe said disapprovingly.

Lin Wanxing was just thinking of an excuse when she heard Qi Liang say, “Don’t put our Teacher Lin in a difficult position. Our Teacher Lin doesn’t dare.”

“What do you mean I don’t dare?” Lin Wanxing was speechless.

“Aren’t you avoiding our coach?”

Qi Liang’s lips curled slightly upward, his eyes narrow and fox-like.

This was a provocation, but Lin Wanxing was indeed provoked.

She simply wiped her hands and walked to Wang Fa’s door, knocking.

With a “creak,” the door opened.

Looking inside, the room was very clean, just as clean as she had glimpsed through the window that morning.

Wang Fa wore clean, soft home clothes, his hair was wet—he must have just taken a shower and was drying his head with a towel.

His gaze was bright and gentle as he stood in the doorframe, slightly bowing his head. The air carried a faint scent of mint body wash as if everything was normal.

If not for the large open suitcase in the room, Lin Wanxing might have mistaken this for an ordinary evening.

The students had just earned some money and were clamoring for a barbecue. So the coach had also agreed to end training early as a reward for the students’ days of hard training.

She had come home after work, washed her hands, and joined in skewering food.

Because she failed at skewering prawns, she was disapproved of by the students and had to call for the coach.

If this were an ordinary evening, the next scene would be predictable—

Wang Fa would join the work, while the students bickered as they prepared the food. They would argue about who burned the chicken wings or who ate two extra pieces of meat. Sparks would fly from the burning charcoal, everything lively and bustling.

Lin Wanxing could already imagine such a scene.

But the existence of the term “farewell dinner” gave an ordinary evening gathering a different meaning.

“What is it?” Wang Fa asked.

Lin Wanxing withdrew her gaze from the luggage and looked up at Wang Fa. “When are you leaving?”

“Later,” Wang Fa said.

“Later today?” Lin Wanxing was startled, reflexively asking a question whose answer she already knew.

“Yes.”

“Are you taking the high-speed train? Then we need to hurry with dinner. I remember the last train to Yongchuan is at ten o’clock.” This was her first reaction, rambling on for a bit before realizing that when Wang Fa said he was leaving later, he meant packing his luggage and leaving them.

The air grew somewhat stifling.

Perhaps seeing her expression change, Wang Fa reassured her, “No need to catch a train, someone’s coming to pick me up.”

That made sense—Hongjing to Yongchuan wasn’t far, and it was perfectly normal for the club to send a car to pick him up.

“That’s still so rushed,” Lin Wanxing could only say helplessly.

“It is a bit,” Wang Fa said.

After that, they didn’t speak anymore, deviating slightly from the scenario she had imagined earlier.

But overall, the students’ moods were still quite good.

After she called Wang Fa, the coach washed his hands and joined the students in their skewering efforts.

The joy of barbecuing, besides grilling, cooking, and eating lots of meat, was the time spent bustling around together.

One moment they couldn’t find the black pepper they bought, the next they had added too much marinade to the chicken wings… When it came time to light the charcoal, the students discovered they couldn’t get the fire started.

They huddled together searching online for half the day, only to find out that lighting charcoal not only required stacking the charcoal in a special shape but also needed alcohol or other flammable materials, like dry leaves or cotton, or newspaper.

There was a newspaper but no alcohol at home, so to be safe, Lin Wanxing was dispatched downstairs to borrow things from the neighbors.

She knocked on the fourth-floor resident’s door and explained her purpose.

Downstairs was an auntie who ran a small goods business.

“Oh my, how can a home not have alcohol!” the auntie was surprised.

“Forgot to bring it when we moved in,” Lin Wanxing said.

“You should always keep alcohol on hand.” The auntie directly handed her a large bottle. “Here, take it all.”

“How much does it cost? I’ll pay you,” Lin Wanxing said, reaching for her phone to pay.

“How much can a bottle of alcohol cost?” The auntie paused, then said, “Little Lin, I heard you’re moving out?”

Lin Wanxing was taken aback. “Who told you that?”

“Little Li, of course. I mentioned earlier that I have relatives coming to Hongjing who want to rent a place, and he told me the top floor is now vacant and available for discussion.” The auntie paused, asking somewhat mysteriously, “Are you and Little Wang moving out so soon?”

Little Li was the agent Lin Wanxing had entrusted with renting her property.

Little Wang… must refer to Wang Fa.

Lin Wanxing looked at the auntie and calmly replied, “No, he’s moving out, I’m still living there.”

“Did you break up?”

The hallway light was dim. Because of the heat, the auntie’s face was a bit red, her eyes gleaming.

“No, we rented two separate apartments. He and I, we’re…”

Lin Wanxing wanted to say more but stopped.

She tried to clarify her relationship with Wang Fa, but when it came to finding an appropriate term, she suddenly got stuck.

Were they “colleagues”? Not exactly.

Were they “friends”? They weren’t quite familiar enough to live in the same building.

A more accurate description would be people who happened to meet, in the process of getting to know each other.

That was about right.

Lin Wanxing stopped explaining, thanked the auntie again, and carried the alcohol back upstairs.

Pushing open the rooftop door again, the clouds in the sky had burned to their extreme, grand and brilliant.

Because the scene was so spectacular, the students had all taken out their phones and were photographing the sky. Seeing her return, they turned their cameras toward her.

“Teacher, smile!” the boys waved and called out.

“Is there a beauty filter?” Lin Wanxing handed the alcohol to Fu Xinshu and moved closer.

In just this brief moment, the red clouds in the sky had darkened, like charcoal thoroughly burned red in an oven.

Someone turned the camera toward Wang Fa.

The young man was sitting in his usual lounge chair, legs crossed, gazing toward the distant field. The red glow of dusk had already darkened, as if about to enter the long night.

Lin Wanxing thought for a moment, then called out, “What are you looking at?”

Her voice scattered in the wind, and Wang Fa suddenly turned his head.

In that instant, his hair was still damp, his gaze calm.

In the distance lay the vast grass of the soccer field and the darkening sky.

And Wang Fa seemed about to dissolve into the last afterglow of the sunset.

Lin Wanxing will forever remember that gaze.

Deep, obscure, like embers about to extinguish.