Chapter 59 Before leaving the hotel, Fang Minzhou...

Before leaving the hotel, Fang Minzhou went to the front desk to confirm the check-out status of room 8012.

I checked out of the hotel last night, and early this morning, there was a flight back to Beicheng.

He was angry with her like that.

Fang Minzhou returned to her dormitory and slept until the afternoon.

When she opened her eyes again, it was already late. Only Jin Ying was still in the dormitory. Seeing that she was awake, she asked Jin Ying if she hadn't slept well last night or what was wrong. "Do you want to go have dinner?"

Fang Minzhou shook her head, saying she had no appetite.

Where does it hurt?

"No, I'm just very sleepy," Fang Minzhou said. To avoid worrying Jin Ying, she added, "If you have time after you finish eating, could you please get me some bread from the convenience store?"

"no problem."

The bread was bought and placed on the table. Fang Minzhou took a few bites.

Later, Meng Yujun and Luo Jia returned. When the others asked Luo Jia about the day's progress, Fang Minzhou chimed in with a few words.

Night falls again, and the earth continues to spin.

Wang Kan didn't message Fang Minzhou all weekend, and Fang Minzhou didn't contact him either.

It's a new week again.

Fang Minzhou let herself focus all her energy on preparing for the Freshman Cup preliminary round, meticulously crafting each sentence like a form of self-torture, reading the script over and over again, from tongue-tied to tongue-free, and then tongue-tied again because of numbness. A senior member of the club praised her for being too serious, and she smiled modestly.

Once, Zhuo Rui came over to discuss something with her. As he leaned closer, Fang Minzhou felt his presence and immediately thought of Wang Kan from that night. She instinctively tried to create some distance, and the pen on the table accidentally rolled off. Zhuo Rui picked it up and handed it to her, asking gently, "What's wrong?"

“…It’s nothing.” She smiled.

Her heart, which had been weighed down by the pressure of walking on thin ice for many days, shattered in an instant, and she became angry with Wang Kan again.

Wang Kan did not suddenly appear over the weekend.

Fang Minzhou felt a little ridiculous.

Time flies so fast, and they haven't been in contact at all. The person she used to want to call every day and see every week has just disappeared from her world, as if the sweet illusion of the past was just a bubble.

It turns out that no matter how advanced transportation and communication tools are, they are not necessary conditions for maintaining close contact.

Does it mean we're breaking up?

Fang Minzhou didn't think so. She wasn't deceiving herself, but she felt the situation was too absurd, more like Wang Kan was sulking and giving her the cold shoulder. But as time went on, she couldn't help but doubt her own judgment.

During this time, Luo Jia started dating a boy from the next class. As the weather grew colder, the residents of dormitory 406 talked more and more about love, about the sweetness and pain of relationships, the good and the bad of men, like hot, sweet roasted sweet potatoes in winter.

Males are a mythical creature.

I've heard that men with money tend to go bad.

I've heard that men are completely different before and after they start dating.

All sorts of personal experiences or hearsay are quite interesting.

Everyone studies very hard, and needs a little something extra during leisure time.

Fang Minzhou's roommates noticed that her boyfriend hadn't come to see her lately, and she hadn't left the dorm to make phone calls either.

On the topic of love, the general public has accumulated many valuable insights based on their wisdom and experience. For example, long-distance relationships are destined to end in breakup, and first loves often end prematurely.

So, although Fang Minzhou's boyfriend Zhou Zhou had been the envy of everyone when he came to see her, their breakup was both unexpected and understandable. All they could do was comfort Fang Minzhou and tell her the saying: "There are plenty of fish in the sea."

Fang Minzhou showed no signs of anything amiss. Her appetite and sleep were normal; she neither gained nor lost weight. She also had a blue scarf, which stood out like a touch of porcelain against the gray backdrop of withered vegetation. When asked, she said it was a gift from her boyfriend in high school.

They had tried to subtly inquire about the matter, but Fang Minzhou always managed to exchange a few words with him. The roommates discussed privately that there was probably nothing wrong, as the third roommate was naturally a low-key person.

One night, Fang Minzhou was in an empty classroom and hadn't eaten dinner yet when she called Yuan Yue.

In January, she told her that she knew where Shen Luming had gone to repeat his senior year, and that she planned to visit him during the winter break.

After failing his college entrance exam, Shen Luming hastily broke up with Yuan Yue over the phone and then couldn't be contacted anymore. Yuan Yue felt there was a misunderstanding and that she could wait for him, so she couldn't let go. However, she asked Fang Minzhou anxiously, "Do you think I should go? Will it affect his college entrance exam?"

Fang Minzhou honestly replied, "I don't know."

After a while, Yuan Yue made up her mind: "I still plan to go."

Fang Minzhou looked out at the night view and responded.

Even an upright official finds it hard to settle family disputes. Fang Minzhou recalled that Wang Kan had jokingly mentioned that he could repeat a year of high school if necessary. At that time, she glared at him, but he always treated serious matters as jokes.

When Yuan Yue asked about her recent situation, Fang Minzhou said she was doing well. Her college had passed the preliminary round of the school's freshman cup competition, and the final round was next week. Yuan Yue happily congratulated her.

Sometimes, chatting with friends isn't about seeking advice or help, but rather about clarifying your true thoughts through the process of confiding in them.

It was as if she was actually making the call to Yuan Yue, but the moment the call connected, Fang Minzhou realized that Yuan Yue couldn't answer her question. It was like she actually wanted Yuan Yue not to go to Shen Luming, but Yuan Yue wouldn't listen to her.

January was still braver than her.

So should she also go find Wang Kan?

Sure, we can talk it out face to face, but when Fang Minzhou thought about how she had sworn she wouldn't run off to him without a word, he couldn't help but laugh at himself.

Sometimes, she seems to make promises she can't keep.

After the Freshman Cup competition, the CET-4 exam is right around the corner, and then... it's her birthday, and she also needs to start preparing for final exams. Looking at it all, she can't put it off any longer. But right now, Fang Minzhou is suddenly not in a hurry. Her thoughts change every day. At first, she was sad, then she was angry, and now she's calm. She doesn't know what will happen next week.

She thought, "New Year's Day, a three-day holiday. Even if it's not perfect, it's okay. I can treat it as a trip to Jiangcheng, or just go home on the way."

There will always be a way.

Fang Minzhou went to the cafeteria for a rice bowl with toppings. She asked for an extra portion of sauce, and the cafeteria lady gave her a small piece of leftover fried chicken cutlet. The total came to seventeen yuan.

After sitting down, Fang Minzhou started calculating again, figuring out how much it would cost to go see Wang Kan.

She had money, but airfare and hotel prices skyrocketed during the New Year's holiday, and she had recently made a large expense: because she was going to participate in a debate competition and considering how often she would wear suits in the future, she had just gone to an old tailor shop to have a rather expensive suit custom-made, on the recommendation of her senior. Thinking about this, she thought of Wang Kan again, feeling that he was going too far, and at other times she felt that she had also let him down.

However, Fang Minzhou soon had an opportunity to make money.

Meng Yujun knew a senior who twisted her ankle and asked if anyone could tutor her until the end of the semester. The dorm leader brought this up because the photos of the injury that the senior posted on social media were quite frightening. "She twisted it when she got out of bed. You guys should be careful too."

Finally, Fang Minzhou asked her dorm leader if she could send her the senior's QQ number.

Even among freshmen, there are quite a few students working part-time. Although some of these jobs could be called entrepreneurship, for students without extra capital, the hourly rate for tutoring is quite considerable because of the school's reputation.

After Fang Minzhou passed the trial class, she went to tutor a fourth-grade girl every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday evening from 7 pm to 9 pm. The girl's home was not far from the school, about six subway stops away.

The colder the weather and the earlier it gets dark, the busyness of daily life—schoolwork, tutoring, club activities, and the unfamiliar northern winter—fills every gap in Fang Minzhou's mind. Only occasionally will she think: Oh right, she's going to see Wang Kan on New Year's Day.

As the New Year drew closer, she became somewhat timid, but she forced herself not to think about it.

In the freshman debate competition, the School of Economics came in second place. The best debater was a girl from the School of Law, whose powerful and mature aura made her seem unlike a freshman. Fang Minzhou felt inferior, and then she quickly realized that she didn't seem to have much room for improvement in debating. She focused on logic and reasoning, and she was competitive, but she lacked aggression.

The latter two seem contradictory, and Fang Minzhou himself asked himself the same question.

It's not that she can't endure hardship; she's already suffered a lot for her grades. She doesn't want to exhaust herself with anything outside of studying. Her father is right; Beicheng is vast, and the world is vast too. She feels there must be something that interests her and suits her. She searches high and low, wanting the fruits of victory within easy reach.

On the day of the first snowfall in Beicheng, Fang Minzhou took photos and videos, and the first thing she did was open her chat with Wang Kan. When she was waiting for her university acceptance letter, Wang Kan had said she would come to Beicheng to visit her when it snowed.

Thankfully, it wasn't sent.

He wasn't actually a very trustworthy person, Fang Minzhou thought to herself.

She sent the snow scene to her parents and then posted it on her WeChat Moments. A day later, Wang Kan was still not among the comments or likes.

That night, Fang Minzhou decided to consider it a breakup between her and Wang Kan. She would still go to see him on New Year's Day, and if she was going to end things, she would end them cleanly.

The first snow fell intermittently.

Fang Minzhou's birthday is on a Saturday. The little girl he was tutoring had something to do at home that day, so the tutoring session was moved up a day.

Fang Min's roommates knew that she was going to Jiangcheng on New Year's Day, so it seemed reasonable that her boyfriend wouldn't come to her birthday celebration. Since the two dates were too close, they decided to celebrate together. That's the difficulty of long-distance relationships.

The main reason is that Fang Minzhou doesn't say anything, so they can only guess at nothing. But anyway, it's a good opportunity for them to celebrate her birthday.

On Friday, on the subway back to school after finishing her tutoring session, Fang Minzhou received a red envelope from a parent.

Tutors are paid weekly, and no matter how quickly the money comes in, it still feels like a hard-earned reward.

Unlike summer vacation, when she had nothing to do all day and the children came to her house for tutoring, things are completely different now. She has evening classes every Wednesday, and Mondays are full of classes. Before that, there were competitions and exams, and now it's cold and snowy, with a long walk even after getting off the subway. The little girl is quite smart and obedient, and the parents are very polite, but sometimes she reminds Fang Minzhou of her own childhood.

She didn't tell her parents about her part-time job. On the night of her first tutoring session, she missed a video call from her mother. When she called back later, she said she was busy, and her parents didn't suspect anything.

If I tell them, they'll definitely be angry. They might think she's not focusing on her studies, or they might think she's been mistreated while studying away from home.

Fang Minzhou started out just to make money, and with that money, she lost her melancholy. She didn't approve of Wang Kan's nonchalant attitude towards money, but his indifference made Fang Minzhou wonder if she was being too nosy. Some of her spending might seem extravagant to others, but now Fang Minzhou no longer thought she was wrong.

Stepping out of the subway, the snow was falling quite heavily. Fang Minzhou put on her down jacket's hood and walked against the wind towards her dormitory. There were few pedestrians along the way, and the dim streetlights seemed frozen solid. She didn't ride her bike because she felt it would be even colder, and the slippery ground made it easy to fall; she had fallen once before and now preferred to walk.

"Fang Minzhou?"

The hat and the sound of the wind obscured part of Fang Minzhou's hearing, but she vaguely heard someone calling her. She looked in the direction of the sound and saw Lin Sinian.

"How come you..." She tugged at her mask. The last time they met was shortly after the start of the semester, when senior students from Zhangcheng No. 1 Middle School organized a get-together, which was a kind of hometown reunion.

"I just got back from a dinner party. What about you?"

Fang Minzhou didn't hide it from T, saying that she had just finished tutoring.

Lin Ssu-nien was somewhat surprised, but didn't ask any further questions.

He was also going back to his dorm, and the two of them were going the same way, although Lin Sinian's dorm was in a more distant area. They chatted casually about Beicheng and their recent situations. Lin Sinian knew that Fang Minzhou had joined the debate club, and he had even gone to watch the finals, saying that she had performed very well, which made Fang Minzhou feel quite embarrassed.

She thought she must have been a quiet girl in high school.

She didn't know about Lin Sinian's extracurricular life; he was studying mechanical engineering. Lin Sinian said he just studied every day, and there wasn't much to say. This was the first time Fang Minzhou had heard a hint of complaint in his voice.

The two of them hadn't talked much before, and she thought that studying was an effortless thing for Lin Sinian.

“But it’s still quite interesting,” Lin Sinian said.

Since it was a major she was interested in, Fang Minzhou's heart, like the snowflakes in front of her, drifted down and she couldn't say she liked her major that much.

When they filled out their college applications, the information was already relatively transparent. She was the type to follow popular trends, while many other students would choose based on their interests and hobbies. The most shocking thing, of course, was that Sun Tong went to study medicine in Gangcheng.

If she also came to Beicheng, they would be in the same university. Back in high school, Fang Minzhou never imagined she could go to the same university as Sun Tong, and indeed, that never happened.

There are many unpredictable things about Sun Tong.

Fang Minzhou's mention of Sun Tong was a bit abrupt, because she had never mentioned Sun Tong to anyone before. However, it wasn't too strange at the moment, since no matter how long it had been since graduation, the top student in the class was always mentioned.

"It's too cold in the north of the city. I heard that you can wear short sleeves in the port city even in winter," she said.

Lin Sinian smiled and said, "Yes."

As they walked up to her dormitory building, Lin Sinian suddenly said to her, "Happy birthday."

Fang Minzhou was stunned. "How did you know?"

“One evening during my senior year of high school, I asked for leave from self-study at the last minute,” Lin Sinian said. “When I went downstairs, I saw Wang Kan secretly moving things, and later I heard about the commotion.”

Fang Minzhou remained silent for a while, then raised the corners of her mouth and said, "Thank you for not reporting him back then."

Lin Sinian smiled and shook his head.

He even hit you afterward, what an ingratitude! Fang Minzhou thought to herself.

"Is he coming to see you for your birthday tomorrow? Or...?" Lin Sinian asked curiously.

“I’m going to Jiangcheng to see him on New Year’s Day,” Fang Minzhou said. She felt a little hypocritical, as if she and Wang Kan had a very good relationship.

"Bless you both," Lin Sinian said. "I'll be going now, bye-bye."

"Bye-Bye."

Turning around, I saw a person standing quietly not far away, out of the reach of the streetlights.

Wang Kan stood there, not knowing how long he had been standing there.