Chapter 103
◎Start with a good meal◎
After being interrogated for most of the night, Zhan Xinyue recounted a few key moments in her story with Shi Ziqian. She didn't say much about Wu Chuni, not wanting to reveal too much about Shi Ziqian's personal life, so she fabricated a story that Wu Chuni was actually Shi Ziqian's cousin.
She had initially doubted that her highly intelligent roommates would believe such a flimsy excuse, but to her surprise, their attention was completely elsewhere; they were simply staring intently at her.
"So you mean you and the handsome guy on our confession wall are old classmates, and he's actually still single?"
"And it seems you two still have feelings for each other, and now there's a possibility of rekindling the flame?"
"Stop, stop, stop." Zhan Xinyue quickly interrupted the group's rambling. "I didn't say that. We just feel that we can get to know each other again and see how things go."
After being pestered for a long time, Zhan Xinyue finally got her way, but then she couldn't sleep.
She drew the bed curtains and lay in the darkness with her eyes open for a long time before finally taking out her phone and opening the WeChat chat page.
At the very top of the list lay a quiet cartoon black and white rabbit avatar, its nickname consisting of only the letter "S". It had been over two years before she finally exchanged contact information with Shi Ziqian.
After entering university, people rarely use QQ anymore, so the two added each other on WeChat in the evening.
She clicked on Shi Ziqian's profile picture, intending to change his nickname, but after a while she didn't know what to write, so she simply exited and went into his Moments.
Shi Ziqian's WeChat Moments is empty; he hasn't posted anything.
Her gaze fell on the background image of his WeChat Moments: a pitch-black night sky with a bright crescent moon shining in the distance.
Shi Ziqian drove her home that evening, and the two chatted a lot on the way. She even took the initiative to tell him about her experiences after transferring schools.
She recounted how, in her first exam, she ranked over 200th in the grade, slowly but surely climbing the ranks until she finally broke into the top ranks. Even her homeroom teacher was astonished, saying they hadn't expected her to be such a promising student. She explained that several top-tier classes offered her places, but she declined, instead achieving her first-ever first-place ranking in the grade in a regular class, and then achieving her highest score ever in the college entrance exam…
During that time, she was only focused on getting to her goal. Now, as she talks about it, she is surprised to realize that she has also walked a path that sounds quite remarkable, and a sense of pride wells up in her heart.
But when she looked at Shi Ziqian beside her, she felt a little embarrassed. These words might sound like boasting to others, even though that wasn't her intention.
Shi Ziqian walked beside her, and after listening, he remained silent for a long time, his eyes looking at her with an unreadable expression.
"You must have suffered a lot," Shi Ziqian said in a low voice.
Zhan Xinyue was taken aback by his words.
She had expected him to praise her or congratulate her, but instead, she heard this.
Is it bitter? This was the first time she had ever thought about this question.
Perhaps because that year or so was so uneventful, it didn't leave a deep impression on her mind. Looking back now, all she can remember are the dark stacks of books in the classroom and the endless test papers; everything else is already very blurry.
For a full year and a half, she lived a life almost like an ascetic, with no social interaction or entertainment, fighting against her less-than-outstanding talent to the best of her ability, giving her all at all times, and doing everything she could to push herself to her limits.
The gaze that Shi Ziqian gave her was both gentle and strange, reminding her of the times when Pang Yun sat beside her in her senior year of high school, watching her bury herself in her studies until late at night, looking hesitant to speak, his heart aching and unable to bear it.
Under his gaze, she nodded firmly for the first time, smiling as she said, "Yes, it was so tough. But thankfully it's all over now, and from now on, it will all be good days."
Shi Ziqian looked at her for a long time, then nodded solemnly: "From now on, all the days will be good."
Even though they had been separated for several hours, Zhan Xinyue could still recall the way he looked at her in the darkness.
Actually, there was a lot more she wanted to say. She really wanted to ask him what he had encountered over the past year, to ask about his condition, to ask about his insomnia... But after pressing her fingers on the keyboard for a long time, she glanced at the time and decided to give up.
After all, there's plenty of time in the future.
Just as she was thinking this, she suddenly noticed that the other person's nickname had disappeared, replaced by a few words:
Typing...
My heart skipped a beat: Shi Ziqian is still awake too?
She was slightly surprised by the strange tacit understanding between the two. She didn't move, but just stared at the line of words, waiting for Shi Ziqian's message.
She guessed that Shi Ziqian might be like her, with many unsaid things he wanted to say.
The "typing" message appeared and disappeared several times before finally a message arrived, containing only a few simple words.
Goodnight, new moon.
Zhan Xinyue laughed silently in the darkness, and after a moment replied:
Goodnight, Shi Ziqian.
I have a professional class the next morning, so even if I went to bed late the night before, I still have to get up on time in the morning.
Early in the morning, the group of us left the dormitory together.
Zhan Xinyue was the last one to go to bed among them. She was still feeling sleepy and walked ahead of everyone else as she went downstairs, pushing open the dormitory door first.
The coolness of the late autumn morning rushed in the moment the door opened, dispelling her drowsiness.
Zhan Xinyue had become much more awake and pushed the door open completely.
Then, she saw Shi Ziqian.
Shi Ziqian stood not far from the dormitory building, dressed in all black, his figure tall and slender. He was looking down at the roadside, his jacket zipper pulled up high, obscuring most of his beautifully shaped chin.
Zhan Xinyue stared at that figure, holding onto the door and not moving for a moment.
This scene felt unexpectedly familiar to her. She seemed to recall a similar morning when Shi Ziqian, dressed in black, stood quietly waiting for her.
A moment later, she suddenly remembered that Shi Ziqian had indeed picked her up like this once. That day, the two of them had arranged to go to the aquarium together, and Shi Ziqian had been waiting for her at the entrance of the residential area early in the morning.
"What are you standing at the door for, like a door god?" Several roommates dragged their feet as they approached, and seeing that she hadn't moved, they began to chatter as they came closer.
Hearing the noise, Shi Ziqian looked up—
Two years have passed, and that memory seems so distant. But when she saw his dark eyes, the frame of time suddenly became blurred.
The boy in front of me seemed to be exactly the same as before, and even that long separation seemed to have never existed.
Shi Ziqian looked at her for a while, then glanced at the several heads peeking out from behind her like a human pyramid, and lowered his head to type on his phone.
Shortly after, Zhan Xinyue's phone vibrated, and a WeChat message popped up.
"When you say 'eat together,' does that include breakfast?"
Zhan Xinyue glanced at it twice, then quickly typed a few words into her phone and replied:
"Including."
Then, amidst the undisguised laughter of the people behind her, she walked towards Shi Ziqian.
She stopped in front of him and looked at him: "Good morning, when did you arrive?"
"Good morning, Zhan Xinyue." Shi Ziqian, with his black hair and black eyes, gazed at her with clear, bright eyes. "Not long after."
This familiar, almost déjà vu conversation stirred up some old memories for her once again.
Fortunately, Beijing's autumn is dry, and the mornings are crisp and clear, without a trace of fog. This reassured her that this wasn't a repetition of the past, but a genuine reunion.
The dorm mates walked past us, laughing and joking. It was as if their eyes were always on us; even though they were already far away, they kept turning back to look at us.
Zhan Xinyue sighed helplessly. She saw Shi Ziqian straighten up slightly and nod to the group. The group, who had been making a lot of noise, quieted down when Shi Ziqian greeted them politely and walked straight ahead, pretending to be serious.
"Don't mind them, they're very gossipy." Zhan Xinyue pursed her lips. "Shall we go get breakfast now? Our cafeteria here has tofu pudding, want to try it?"
Shi Ziqian: "Okay."
There are many cafeterias in the school, so it's not very crowded. Standing at the familiar tofu pudding stall, Zhan Xinyue said to the auntie, "Auntie, two servings of tofu pudding."
He glanced at Shi Ziqian again and added, "One serving without chili."
She still remembers the discovery she made when she ate tofu pudding with Shi Ziqian that year: he couldn't handle spicy food very well.
Shi Ziqian was slightly taken aback, his gaze falling on her face, but he said nothing.
The tofu pudding was ready quickly, and the two found a table and sat facing each other.
Zhan Xinyue's hair had grown quite a bit. As she bent down to scoop up some tofu pudding, stray hairs fell down around her ears, which she brushed aside with her hand.
Shi Ziqian, who was sitting opposite her, was quietly scooping tofu pudding with his head down. When he looked up at her, he opened his palm and saw that there was a hair tie with a delicate moon-shaped decoration on it.
"How did you get this?" Zhan Xinyue asked.
"I bought it last night," Shi Ziqian said.
Zhan Xinyue said "Oh," took it, and tied her hair up.
There was no need to ask anything in the first place; it was simply that she still remembered all the details of the past. And he, too, hadn't forgotten.
The two remained silent, quietly eating their food. At one point, Zhan Xinyue quickly glanced at Shi Ziqian across from her.
When she was very young, her parents told Zhan Xinyue that eating is the most important thing for anyone.
When I'm tired or sad, as long as I can still eat, I can always regain my energy.
As long as the sick and the elderly can still eat well, they will not lose their vitality.
Therefore, Zhan Xinyue always believed that as long as one can still sit down and have a proper meal, life will never reach a dead end.
She wasn't sure how far the two of them could go in the future, nor was she sure if the phone call she made to her mother yesterday was just a momentary impulse.
But one thing she was certain of was that she wanted to be there for him through the tough times.
It starts with eating a good meal.
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