After the cold winter comes the warm spring. The seeds underground, having endured the ice and snow and the cold wind, finally sprout from the soil when the spring breeze returns to the earth.
The ninth graders have celebrated their last New Year in junior high and are now embarking on a new and significant semester.
This semester, even the most mischievous students have settled down. The teachers have been going over the knowledge points they have learned over the past three years again and again. Everything is proceeding in a tense but orderly manner.
The forsythia fades, and the gardenia appears.
June is a very special month for all students. They step into the final examination hall to test the results of three years of learning and are about to embark on a new journey.
The weather was sunny and hot, typical of a southern summer, during the two days of the high school entrance exam.
The old fan overhead creaked and groaned as they wrote their last essay, listened to English listening exercises on the radio, and finished drawing their last circuit diagram... and finally, their busy three years came to an end.
After finishing his last exam, Su Xun left the exam hall and took the bus home alone. This year, the exam halls and seats were uniformly assigned throughout the city, so students from the same school were not necessarily taking the exam at the same school.
This time, she took the exam at No. 4 Middle School, and she wasn't with her usual classmates, which made her feel much more relaxed. Sometimes, she felt more at ease when she was alone during such tense moments.
It wasn't even noon when the exam ended, but the heat in the air was already intense. As Su Xun walked under the shade of the trees, a thin layer of sweat inevitably appeared on his forehead.
She casually bought an ice cream from a convenience store on the roadside. It was strawberry flavored, and her mouth was filled with a cool sensation mixed with the rich sweetness of strawberries.
She finally felt relieved. She had done the tests very well these past two days, and they were almost all familiar question types. Except for the last bonus question in math, which she had no idea how to answer, she wrote down everything she could. She estimated that the result would not be bad.
A sense of ease washed over me, and even my steps felt lighter.
There's something else I've been looking forward to for over half a year, and it'll be resolved in the next few days.
If you really think about it carefully, it's not just half a year; she's been looking forward to it for many years. Recalling all the little things she and Pei Ke shared, that sense of unreality has never disappeared.
At first, I secretly liked him, not daring to say it or show any signs in front of him, but I still missed a lot of details and he found out.
Later, when I vaguely guessed that the other person also had special feelings for me, my first thought was not sweetness, but a faint bitterness. That period was really painful.
However, just when she was prepared to be rejected that night, the boy looked at her earnestly under the moonlight and told her that he liked her too.
Now was the day they had agreed upon, and she quickened her pace home, eager to rush back, grab her phone, and contact him to tell him how impatient she was to see him.
She told him that they would go to high school and college together, and that she wanted to be with him forever.
The cicadas were still chirping in the old residential area, quite noisy in the summer, but she couldn't hear anything; her mind was filled with images of the two of them in the future.
She suddenly stopped and shook her head as if mocking herself. She was only fifteen years old, yet in just a few minutes she had already sketched out their entire lives in her mind. How shameless!
Walking into the familiar building, the narrow corridor looked quite old. The green paint on the handrails had been touched by countless people, and much of the paint had peeled off, with reddish-brown rust staining them.
The hallway is usually gloomy, even on a sunny day like today. There's a chill in the air as soon as you step in.
She had just come from the blazing sun, and the stark contrast between the heat and the cold made her shiver uncontrollably. She quickly went upstairs.
He skillfully took the key out of his pocket and turned the doorknob.
She pushed open the door and called out, "Mom, I've finished my exam."
The scene before her was both familiar and strange. She stood frozen at the shoe rack by the door, staring blankly inside. The ground beneath her feet was a mess, littered with shards of broken glass.
Looking further inside, the sofa had been slashed with a sharp object, and the foam inside had popped out and scattered around. The tables and chairs had all been overturned on the floor, and the whole room was in a state of desolation.
It was extremely quiet.
She was stunned for a moment, wondering what was going on.
An overwhelming fear gripped her heart. She hurried inside, trembling as she searched for someone.
There was no one in the living room, no one in the kitchen, and no one in the bathroom or bedrooms.
She dared not think too much, and mechanically searched every corner of the house, calling out her family's names continuously.
Finally, I saw two figures huddled together in the corner of the balcony. The mother was curled up in the corner, leaning against the wall without moving, her face buried in her arms. The younger brother was beside his mother, looking anxious and fearful.
She suddenly hesitated to come forward, afraid of seeing a scene she didn't want to see.
She had no idea what had happened in the past two days. She was perfectly fine when she left home yesterday morning. Her mother saw her and her younger brother off, repeatedly reminding them not to forget their things for the exam and not to be nervous, as everything seemed normal.
But why did it turn out like this when I got home? The house was a complete mess, as if it had been ransacked. How could this kind of scene, which you only see in TV dramas, happen in my own home?
It felt like an eternity before she finally managed to move, and choked out, "Mom, I'm back."
There was no movement from the other side. A few minutes later, the person finally raised their head. It was a pale and tired face with messy hair, a few strands of hair hanging down and sticking to their face with sweat. Their eyes were red and swollen, and their lips were dry and peeling.
Seeing her mother, who usually kept herself neat and tidy, looking so dejected, Su Xun, who had been holding back her tears for so long, finally couldn't hold back any longer and her feet sank into the ground.
His eyes seemed to have taken a long time to focus again as he looked at her, recognizing her. His lips moved a few times, his voice hoarse from not speaking for so long: "Your father... something happened to him."
Although his tone was completely flat, it revealed boundless despair and a sliver of hatred that had long since been exhausted.
Su Xun had no idea what had happened to her father that led to such a devastating disaster for her family, causing her usually strong mother to seem to have aged ten years in just two days, leaving her in utter despair.
Her mind was in turmoil, as if something beautiful had suddenly collapsed.
Everything was normal and beautiful before she opened that door. The sun was shining brightly but not unpleasantly, and the leaves in the trees in the neighborhood had turned a lot greener, creating a lush green scene. She was thinking that as soon as she got home, she would tell her family that she had done well on the exam and that she would call to fulfill the promise she made to them six months ago.
How did things change? Everything is different now.
Tears streamed down her face silently. She stepped forward, knelt down, and hugged her distraught mother, as if speechless.
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