Parent-Teacher Meeting
7:15 AM.
Xu Ying stood under the sycamore tree outside the school gate, her fingers unconsciously twisting the strap of her schoolbag. The morning sunlight shone through the gaps in the leaves onto her face, highlighting the fine downy hairs and making her skin appear almost translucent.
She got up half an hour early today to change into the light blue dress her mother had ironed—a new dress she bought last week. It had a delicate white lace trim around the neckline, and the hem fell just an inch above her knees, neither too short to look frivolous nor too long to look old-fashioned. Her mother had repeatedly reminded her last night, "You should dress appropriately for the parent-teacher meeting to leave a good impression on the teacher."
But Xu Ying knew in her heart that she was never nervous about the teacher.
Students were gradually entering the school gate. Several girls glanced at her a few times as they passed by, and whispers drifted into her ears:
"Isn't that Xu Ying? She's dressed so formally today..."
"I heard that Zongheng's father is coming; he's supposedly an entrepreneur from Nangang."
Xu Ying's fingertips felt slightly cold. She took a deep breath and quickened her pace towards the teaching building, but unexpectedly bumped into a wall of people at the corner—
A faint scent of tobacco mixed with the aroma of mints wafted towards her. Xu Ying looked up and met Zong Heng's eyes, which held a half-smile.
He was wearing his school uniform today, which was unusual for him, but his tie was hanging loosely, and the top two buttons of his shirt were undone, revealing a bit of his collarbone.
"So early?" Zong Heng put one hand in his pocket, and with the other hand he twirled a half-smoked cigarette between his fingers. "You didn't dress up specially for meeting the parents, did you?"
Xu Ying's ears burned, and she subconsciously touched her neatly combed ponytail: "What nonsense are you talking about? I'm on duty..."
Zong Heng suddenly leaned closer, his breath brushing against her ear: "Lying." He reached out and ruffled her bangs, deliberately messing them up. "Why are you so tense? My dad isn't a tiger."
Xu Ying slapped his hand away, but he grabbed her wrist. Footsteps came from the end of the corridor, and she hurriedly broke free, her cheeks burning: "Stop it, the homeroom teacher is coming soon..."
Zong Heng chuckled softly, about to say something, when his phone suddenly vibrated in his pocket. He took it out and glanced at it; the word "Father" on the screen instantly froze his smile.
Xu Ying noticed that his jawline suddenly tightened, his thumb hovered over the hang-up button for two seconds, and finally pressed it down hard.
"You..." She was about to speak when Zong Heng turned and walked towards the railing, took out a lighter and lit the cigarette. His profile looked particularly cold and stern in the smoke, and his furrowed brows reminded Xu Ying of a wolf locked in a cage.
When Xu Ying walked into the classroom carrying a stack of parent-teacher meeting materials, Li Wen was drawing a welcome poster on the blackboard. Seeing her enter, Li Wen's eyes lit up: "Xu Ying! Come help me see how to draw this border—"
She put down her documents and walked over, absentmindedly pointing out design details for the bulletin board, her eyes constantly glancing out the window. Zong Heng was still standing in the corridor, his phone pressed to his ear, his shoulders stiff.
"Why are you so distracted today?" Li Wen tapped her hand lightly with a piece of chalk, then suddenly lowered her voice, "Could it be because Zong Heng's dad is coming? I heard..."
The back door of the classroom was suddenly pushed open, and the homeroom teacher, Ms. Wang, walked in carrying a stack of forms. Li Wen immediately fell silent. Xu Ying took the opportunity to take the chalk from her hand: "I'll draw it. You go and help Ms. Wang organize the seating chart."
She stood on tiptoe, drawing vine patterns on the blackboard, and overheard the conversation between Teacher Wang and the math teacher behind her:
"Is Zongheng's father confirmed to be coming?"
"I just got a call saying to be there promptly at nine o'clock. The principal will personally greet you, so be careful later..."
The chalk snapped off at Xu Ying's fingertips with a "snap." She looked down at the white powder in her palm and suddenly remembered the financial magazine she had seen by chance in the library last week—the middle-aged man on the cover had a cold and stern look, and the title read, "Zong Yue, the head of the Zong Group: The Iron-Fisted Ruler of a Business Empire."
Familiar footsteps sounded outside the window. Zong Heng strode into the classroom, grabbed the half-used chalk from Xu Ying's hand, and wrote the four characters "Welcome Parents" in a flamboyant style on the blackboard.
"Don't be nervous." His voice was low, only she could hear it, "I'm here."
Xu Ying looked up at him and saw that he had his usual roguish smile on his lips, but his eyes were dark and gloomy, something she had never seen before.
Xu Ying lowered her head to organize the parent sign-in sheet, her fingertips gently tapping the paper with a ballpoint pen. More than twenty parents were already seated in the classroom, mostly ordinary working-class people, dressed in casual shirts or sweaters, chatting quietly in small groups. The homeroom teacher, Ms. Li, stood by the podium, holding a report card, glancing occasionally at the door, as if waiting for someone.
Suddenly, footsteps echoed down the corridor—not the casual, relaxed rhythm of ordinary parents, but the crisp sound of leather shoes on the floor tiles, each step seemingly calculated, steady, precise, and impossible to ignore.
The buzzing in the classroom gradually subsided.
Xu Ying looked up and saw a tall man standing at the door.
He wore a sharply tailored black suit with a dark silver tie, and a platinum cufflink that gleamed coldly under the light. His face bore a striking resemblance to Zong Heng, but his features were more hardened, with sharp eyes beneath his brow bone that seemed capable of piercing through a person's disguise.
—Zong Heng's father.
The entire classroom fell silent instantly.
Xu Ying unconsciously clenched the edge of the sign-in sheet, the paper wrinkling slightly beneath her fingertips. She had seen Zong Heng's phone screen saver before—a blurry family photo, in which the man in the photo was dressed in a suit and had a cold, stern face, perfectly overlapping with the person in front of her.
The homeroom teacher, Ms. Li, almost reflexively stood up straight, quickly walked over, and put on an overly enthusiastic smile: "Mr. Zong! You've arrived, this way please—"
The father's gaze swept across the classroom, lingering on Xu Ying for a second.
That glance was like some kind of assessment, cold, precise, and devoid of any emotion.
Xu Ying's breath hitched slightly.
The grandfather strode into the classroom, followed by a young man wearing gold-rimmed glasses—probably a secretary or assistant—holding a tablet computer and respectfully trailing half a step behind.
The other parents in the classroom unconsciously made way for them.
Xu Ying's mother was sitting in the third row, chatting quietly with the parents next to her. When she saw this, she stopped and looked curiously towards the door.
Today she wore a light gray knitted cardigan, and her hair was neatly tied up, a typical image of a gentle mother.
The presence of the patriarch seemed to suddenly lower the temperature of the entire classroom by ten degrees.
He walked to the back row, and his secretary pulled out a chair for him. When he sat down, he didn't even touch the back of the chair; his posture was as upright as if he were attending an international conference.
Xu Ying noticed that the watch on his wrist was a Patek Philippe, with a subtle dark blue luster on the dial under the light—she had seen the same model in a magazine before, and its price was equivalent to half a year's revenue of her family's convenience store.
—They are from another world.
Her fingertips curled up unconsciously.
In the back row of the classroom, Zong Heng was leaning lazily against the window, twirling a pen in his hand, his gaze casually sweeping over the scene of the parent-teacher meeting.
But the moment his father walked in, his fingers tightened suddenly, and the pen snapped in two with a "crack".
Ink splattered on his tiger's mouth, like a hideous wound.
Xu Ying turned to look at him and found that his eyes had completely changed—no longer the usual casual, slightly roguish expression, but a sharp, almost hostile coldness.
The father's gaze also fell on his son.
The father and son looked at each other across the distance, and the air seemed to freeze for a moment.
Then, Zong Heng twitched the corners of his mouth, revealing a cold smile, and deliberately leaned his chair back, the back of the chair slamming against the table behind him with a "bang".
The piercing sound silenced the entire classroom once again.
The father's gaze darkened slightly.
The homeroom teacher, Ms. Li, clearly sensed that something was amiss. She quickly cleared her throat and began to introduce the class situation according to procedure.
Xu Ying lowered her head and continued organizing the documents, but she couldn't concentrate at all.
She could feel her father's gaze falling on her from time to time—a gaze that was neither curious nor friendly, but rather a condescending scrutiny, as if he were assessing the value of a commodity.
She instinctively straightened her back.
Halfway through the parent-teacher meeting, the homeroom teacher asked a representative of the outstanding students to speak. When Xu Ying's name was called and she walked onto the podium, she could feel everyone's eyes on her—including her father's.
Her fingers trembled slightly, but her voice was steady: "...Class 7 of Senior Three has made significant progress in overall academic performance this semester, especially in mathematics and English..."
From below the stage, Zong Heng suddenly chuckled and deliberately spoke in a volume that everyone could hear: "Well done, you academic genius."
Xu Ying's ears turned red instantly.
But the father's gaze turned completely cold.
After the parent-teacher meeting ended, the parents left one after another. Xu Ying's mother was surrounded by several parents who enthusiastically asked, "How did you raise such an outstanding child?"
Xu Ying was tidying up the materials on the podium when she suddenly heard a deep, cold male voice behind her:
"Zong Heng, come out."
She turned around abruptly and saw Zong Heng's father standing at the back door of the classroom, looking at him with icy eyes.
Zong Heng chuckled, slowly stood up, put his hands in his pockets, and walked over.
The father and son walked out of the classroom one after the other and disappeared around the corner of the corridor.
Zong Heng followed his father out of the classroom. The sunlight in the corridor cut out a boundary between light and shadow. He stood in the shadow, while his father stood in the light, his suit impeccably tailored, like a cold sculpture.
"Twelfth in the grade?" The grandfather's voice was low, but it felt like a blade scraping against your eardrum. "You should have been first."
Zong Heng chuckled, put his hands in his pockets, and leaned lazily against the wall. "None of your business."
The grandfather's gaze darkened, and he tapped his knuckles lightly twice on the windowsill, as if issuing some kind of coded warning. The secretary tactfully stepped back a few paces to ensure no one could hear their conversation.
"I heard you've been very busy lately." The father's gaze swept past him, landing on Xu Ying, who was organizing materials in the classroom. "Busy with dating?"
Zong Heng's back stiffened for a moment, then he gave a mocking smile. "What, you sent someone to follow me?"
"I need to follow him?" Father Zong sneered. "The whole school is saying that the eldest son of the Zong family is infatuated with a transfer student."
Zong Heng's knuckles clenched tightly in his pocket, his nails almost digging into his palms. He was all too familiar with his father's tone—that condescending, ant-like contempt.
“Her name is Xu Ying,” he said, emphasizing each word. “She’s not a ‘transfer student,’ nor is she ‘that person.’”
A flicker of impatience crossed the elder's eyes, as if he couldn't be bothered to waste time on this "childish insistence." He leaned forward slightly, his voice lower, yet each word pierced to the bone like an ice pick—
“Xu Ying’s family owns a small supermarket. Her father is an ordinary employee, and her mother is a nurse at a community hospital.” He paused, a mocking smile playing on his lips. “Do you think someone with such a background is worthy of the Zong family?”
Zong Heng's breathing suddenly stopped.
He suddenly reached out and grabbed his father's tie, the force so great it almost dug into his flesh. His father didn't even flinch, just stared at him coldly, as if watching a clumsy performance.
"Don't you fucking touch her." Zong Heng's voice was terrifyingly low, a violent undercurrent surging in his eyes. "Otherwise, I guarantee you'll never see me again in your life."
The grandfather gave a soft "heh," raised his hand, and pried open his fingers one by one, his movements as elegant as if he were adjusting his cufflinks.
"Threatening me for a little girl?" He slowly smoothed the wrinkles in his tie. "Zong Heng, you're more like me than you think."
Zong Heng's pupils suddenly contracted.
These words were more ruthless than any threat—they were like a mirror, forcing him to see clearly the same stubbornness and coldness flowing in his bones as his father.
At the classroom door, Xu Ying held a stack of report cards, her fingers unconsciously tightening, causing tiny creases to form on the edges of the papers.
She couldn't hear what they were saying, but the image of Zong Heng gripping his father's tie struck her like a hammer blow. She had never seen him so out of control—even when fighting, he always smiled knowingly, as if he had everything under control.
But at this moment, his back was taut like a fully drawn bow, ready to snap at any moment.
"Xu Ying?" The homeroom teacher's voice brought her back to reality. "These need to be distributed to the parents."
"Okay, okay." She nodded hastily, but as she turned around, she was met with a reflection in the window—her father's gaze pierced through the crowd and locked onto her precisely.
The look in his eyes wasn't like he was looking at a person, but rather evaluating a product.
"Does your family own a small supermarket?"
As if hallucinating, those words suddenly exploded in my ears.
Her fingers trembled, and the report card scattered all over the floor.
At the end of the corridor, the grandfather pulled a check from his suit pocket and handed it over lightly.
"Five million," he said, "to leave my son."
Zong Heng stared at the paper and suddenly smiled.
He took it, and under his father's slightly satisfied gaze—
Tear it into pieces, bit by bit.
"So cheap." He released his grip, and scraps of paper fell like snowflakes. "Is your son only worth this much?"
The patriarch's gaze finally turned completely cold.
"What do you think you're rebelling against?" he said slowly. "Without the main family, you are nothing."
"Is that so?" Zong Heng took a step back, a provocative smile playing on his lips. "Then let's see, Dad."
He turned and headed towards the classroom, but suddenly stopped at the corner—
Xu Ying stood there, her face pale.
Their eyes met, and Zong Heng's heart sank.
How much did she hear?
Xu Ying's lips moved as if she wanted to say something, but in the end she just squatted down and mechanically picked up the scattered report cards. Her fingers were trembling, and it took her three tries to hold one paper steady.
Zong Heng strode forward and grabbed her wrist. "Xu Ying—"
"I'm fine," she said softly, even smiling at him. "The parent-teacher conference isn't over yet."
But her eyes were empty.
Zong Heng suddenly realized—
Some injuries cannot be healed by simply throwing a punch.
It started raining when school let out, the raindrops crashing down on the ground like a torn Milky Way. The trash can that Zong Heng kicked over rolled several meters away, the metallic clang drowned out by the thunder. His school uniform shirt was soaked through, clinging to his taut back, his fists clenched so tightly his knuckles turned white, and his breathing was heavy like that of a trapped beast.
Xu Ying stood three steps behind him, rain streaming down her eyelashes. She looked at his back—the usually lazy and arrogant boy, whose shoulders were now so tense they seemed about to burst. She suddenly remembered the crumpled medicine boxes in his drawer, how he had sneaked into her yard in the middle of the night just to slip her a box of fever reducers, and how he would always nonchalantly say "just a minor injury" after a fight.
"Zong Heng," she called, her voice mostly drowned out by the sound of the rain.
He didn't turn around, but just wiped his face hard, unable to tell if it was rainwater or something else.
When Xu Ying rushed over and hugged him, they both stumbled. Her arms wrapped around his waist, her face pressed against his soaked back, and she could hear his rapid heartbeat.
Zong Heng froze.
"Let go," he said hoarsely. "I'm dirty." — He had gotten muddy from kicking the trash can earlier.
Xu Ying hugged him even tighter, her school uniform sleeves slipping down to reveal her slender wrists. Her voice trembled, yet she stubbornly repeated, "It's not dirty."
The instant the thunder roared, Zong Heng abruptly turned and pulled her into his arms. His hand gripped the back of her head, the force almost causing her pain, yet his voice was hoarse and barely audible: "Xu Ying, are you fucking stupid...?"
Rain dripped down his chin onto her face, like a gentle punishment.
The streetlight at the end of the alley was broken, flickering and stretching their shadows. Xu Ying could feel Zong Heng trembling—not from cold, but from suppressed anger that hadn't yet dissipated.
“Why does he look at you like that…” Zong Heng suddenly said, his thumb brushing against her under-eye area as if to wipe away some non-existent dirt, “Why does he…”
Xu Ying knew what he was talking about. Her father's gaze was like that of someone assessing a product—contemptuous and indifferent. Her nose stung with tears, but she tilted her head back and smiled: "But you were especially handsome just now."
Zong Heng stared at her, then suddenly lowered his head and kissed her fiercely. The kiss tasted of rust, both fierce and urgent, as if confirming something. Xu Ying's hand, gripping his collar, trembled, but she stood on tiptoe to respond to him.
They were both panting when they separated. Zong Heng pressed his forehead against hers and suddenly laughed: "Xu Ying, you're finished."
"What?"
"I will never let go in this lifetime."
A blinding headlight suddenly swept across, illuminating the puddles in the alley. Xu Ying squinted and saw the familiar black Mercedes parked at the alley entrance, its window half-rolled down, her father's face hidden in shadow.
Zong Heng instinctively pulled her behind him.
The headlights went out, and the engine sound slowly faded into the distance. But the oppressive feeling still lingered overhead, like a knife that hadn't yet fallen.
“He did it on purpose,” Zong Heng sneered. “Just to tell me—'You can’t escape.'”
Xu Ying suddenly grabbed his hand: "Then we won't run away."
The rain lessened, and water droplets fell intermittently from the eaves. Her eyes shone with an astonishing light: "Zongheng, let's apply to the same university. Far away, somewhere he can't interfere."
Zong Heng's Adam's apple bobbed, and he suddenly pulled off his school uniform jacket and wrapped it around her: "Aren't you cold?"
"It's not cold."
“You’re lying.” He squeezed her cold fingers. “When we get home, I’ll make you ginger soup.”
"You can cook?"
“No,” he said matter-of-factly, “but your kitchen should have instruction manuals.”
Xu Ying laughed out loud, but tears streamed down her face. Zong Heng frantically tried to wipe them away, only to mess up her bangs. The two stood there dumbfounded in the rain, like two lost little animals who had found each other.
Their blurry shadows were reflected in the puddles at the alley entrance. Zong Heng squatted down and insisted on carrying her on his back: "The water is too deep, you'll catch a cold."
Xu Ying lay on his back and heard him whisper, "Xu Ying, remember, you are cleaner than all of them."
She buried her face in the crook of his neck and hummed in response.
In the distance, the Mercedes' taillights disappeared completely into the rain. But this time, no one looked back.
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