Chapter 59 Melting Snow and Ice "I feel like it can melt now."...
A resounding victory in the mock exam.
Jiang Yueming finally managed to surpass the predicted score in a large-scale mock exam for the first time in the months leading up to the high school entrance exam, although he only barely met the actual cutoff score. However, based on previous years' predictions, the cutoff scores for mock exams are usually set higher, so whether this year's predictions are accurate will only be known a few months later. Nevertheless, Jiang Yueming was very happy.
As long as there's hope, as long as there's something to look forward to, that's fine. Something is better than nothing. Even after a slap, you have to give a sweet treat. Jiang Yueming has been slapped so many times by these half-dead grades; he doesn't enjoy being slapped, he gets no benefit from it, so he deserves a little something sweet.
"See that?" Jiang Yueming waved the report card in front of Li Leshan, beaming with pride. "Twelfth in the class, just barely making the cut. I told you, I studied hard, didn't I?"
He could finally prove his innocence. He needed to let Li Leshan know that he hadn't neglected his studies; he'd been thinking about it every single day. This time, he didn't need to jump into the Yellow River, the Yangtze River, or the Li River; a single report card would be enough to clear his name.
Li Leshan did very well on this exam, performing at his usual level. He exceeded the predicted score by several tens of points, and was not affected in the slightest by not having reviewed for the past few days. Jiang Yueming was extremely envious. With this level of performance and this consistency, his score on the actual high school entrance exam will surely be outstanding.
He took the report card and scanned it carefully, finally revealing the brightest smile he had shown in days. Even on the day his grandmother woke up, the corners of his mouth only turned up slightly.
"You're amazing." Li Leshan said in sign language, and he truly felt that way.
"I'm nowhere near as good as you..." Jiang Yueming felt a little embarrassed by such praise from a true academic star, though she was secretly overjoyed.
This was the first time Jiang Yueming had ever been so happy to see his report card. In the past, report cards had been his archenemy, the kind he would never cross paths with. His dream of attending Shishi High School was no longer just a dream. He no longer needed to mention it in humility; he could tell others that it was a real goal, no longer an empty, unrealistic one.
The shopping mall near the school is currently under renovation, and the clanging and banging noise is constant. Students look forward to their lunch break to take a nap, as their already intense studies are already unbearable. A couple of days ago, students complained that the classroom at the very end of the corridor was suffering terribly from the noise, crying out in despair. One girl stormed downstairs and stood on the metal fence of the playground, shouting her protest. Even school leaders couldn't stop her.
The effect was truly remarkable; the renovation noise stopped the next day at noon. Jiang Yueming and his family also benefited from the girl's help.
Han Jiang will still need a lot of support to catch up this time. Middle school knowledge is fundamentally different from elementary school knowledge in terms of difficulty and content coverage. This time, it's no longer a matter of cramming for a few months to catch up. He is still a very, very long way from the Shishi High School's cutoff score.
Han Jiang was sitting in a corner of the playground, while Xu Qing was practicing running, still at the 800-meter mark. With the physical education exam approaching, she needed to work even harder. She wouldn't let Han Jiang run with her, so the boy could only sheepishly stay in a corner memorizing English words. Of the twenty-six letters of the alphabet, Han Jiang had now reached "J".
"Wow, you're really something, your ancestors must be emitting auspicious smoke." Jiang Yueming joked, sitting down with him. Li Leshan was standing at the finish line waiting for Xu Qing, timing her and providing encouragement, doing the work of two people.
"Is Li Leshan's grandma alright? Xu Qing even said she'd find some time to go see her together sometime," Han Jiang said.
"It's nothing serious," Jiang Yueming said. "If you're going, buy plenty of fruit, nutritious things like milk, eggs, and steamed egg custard..."
"Buying supplies?" Han Jiang asked in surprise, having listened to the young man rambling on for quite some time. It wasn't that he didn't want to buy anything; a trip there would bankrupt him. But even if he went bankrupt, he would still buy, because he was essentially penniless. After all, he was a genuine "proletarian." Besides, Li Leshan was also his friend, his buddy, so it wouldn't be right not to buy him something. In Jianzhong's social interactions, there was no reason to visit a friend's relative in the hospital empty-handed.
Jiang Yueming narrowed his eyes and looked at the playground. There were quite a few people practicing at this time. Besides those practicing physical education, there were also many people who were rushing to take the physical education exam. Although Xu Qing was wearing the same pink school uniform as everyone else and had her hair tied in a neat ponytail, she still stood out in the crowd.
"How did your exam go for Shishi High School?" Jiang Yueming asked. He knew that Han Jiang had followed Xu Qing, and he had no right to say anything about it, because he, like Han Jiang, had followed Li Leshan.
"Not really." Han Jiang was very self-aware. With only four or five months left until the high school entrance exam, he was still 40 or 50 points away from the cutoff score. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't get past it. He couldn't figure out how to do it. "If Xu Qing goes to Shishi High School, I'll try to go with her. I asked my mom to inquire. Shishi High School has a Sino-Korean international class. You don't need to pass the cutoff score, but you have to pay tens of thousands of yuan."
To put it nicely, it's a "China-Korea international class"; to put it bluntly, it's "getting in through the back door." Many people say that this kind of program is specifically designed to scam people who are naive and have too much money.
"Xu Qing...you're going too?" Jiang Yueming asked.
"No, she said I'm stupid." Han Jiang laughed, but his laughter was tinged with misery. "But I am stupid. I can't learn anything, so this is the only way I can do it."
There was no other way; this was the best Han Jiang could think of at the moment. Unless he could raise his score by fifty or sixty points in a short period of time. But if he had that ability, why would he need to go to school? He could just go straight to a high school tutoring center.
The Sino-Korean international class… Jiang Yueming silently repeated it twice in his mind. He decisively dismissed the idea; he couldn't add any more burden to his aunt, and Li Leshan would definitely not let him go.
Han Jiang joked, "Isn't it said that brothers walk together for life? How come you flew away while we were walking together?"
In his memory, weren't Jiang Yueming and he his sworn brothers? They did their homework together, got scolded together, and wrote self-criticisms together... The hardships of the past were still vivid in his mind!
Jiang Yueming laughed and said, "I don't fly very far. You can catch up with me in just a few steps."
"Han Jiang, buddy." When it came to his brother, Jiang Yueming was silent for a while, his gaze falling on Li Leshan in the distance. The young man was thin and tall, standing very straight. "I will do my best to get into Shigao High School. If I don't get in, don't just look after Xu Qing over there, help me look after Li Leshan too."
Han Jiang was clearly used to his words, but he was still a little surprised and puzzled. He knew that Li Leshan and Jiang Yueming were close, so close that they couldn't even be described as inseparable. He really cared about Li Leshan a lot.
“Yueming, not to be rude,” Han Jiang scratched his head, unsure how to begin, “you’ve been too good to Li Leshan, so good that it’s hard to know what to say.”
Of course he knew it was because Li Leshan was a good person and treated Jiang Yueming well. Jiang Yueming was able to get where he was today because Li Leshan helped him catch up little by little from behind. However, Han Jiang had been friends with Jiang Yueming for ten years and had never seen Jiang Yueming treat anyone like this.
"What, are you envious or jealous?" Jiang Yueming joked with a smile.
"What's the use of me being envious and jealous?" Han Jiang punched him. People are just different, so different. There are some things that Han Jiang can't help even if he's envious to the heavens.
"Do you remember what I said?" Han Jiang asked.
"What, what famous quote are you saying that I have to memorize? Are you Lu Xun or Marx?" Jiang Yueming propped himself up on the ground with his hands, slumped down, staring silently at Li Leshan, his gaze not wandering elsewhere.
He even felt he hadn't been good enough to Li Leshan. Jiang Yueming thought to himself that Han Jiang should understand him, because being good to someone doesn't need any reason, it doesn't need to be explained. It's spontaneous and doesn't seek anything in return.
"I would say Li Leshan is like a block of ice, no one can melt him," Han Jiang said. He had agreed with this statement for many years, and only now has his opinion changed slightly.
"I feel like I've melted into their world now."
Jiang Yueming unexpectedly fell silent, his fingers unconsciously picking at the weeds growing in the cracks of the cement floor beside him, and ultimately said nothing.
"What are you two talking about!" Xu Qing and Li Leshan walked over, and for some reason, the two people in front of them looked like they were deeply saddened and resentful.
"How many minutes did you finish?" Jiang Yueming changed the subject and asked with a smile.
"Three minutes and fifty-two seconds!" Xu Qing laughed. Her training these past few days had been remarkably effective, improving her time by a full thirty seconds. Although she was still a bit short of the perfect score of 3 minutes and 25 seconds.
Jiang Yueming stood up, casually patted his school uniform pants, and gave Xu Qing a thumbs up. "Wow, amazing. I knew our beautiful Xu would do it."
"Then we're off. We still have to do our practice problems when we get back." Jiang Yueming waved to the two of them, no longer wanting to linger. He had to do his practice problems when he got back. Li Leshan was going to analyze a mock exam paper for him. He had only barely passed the mark, not by much, so he wasn't sure he was safe.
"Go on, go on." Xu Qing waved her hand, her eyes reluctant to leave Li Leshan.
Jiang Yueming glanced back at Han Jiang and winked at him. Their ten years of brotherhood made Han Jiang immediately understand what he was asking him to do.
Han Jiang felt a little helpless. This reminded him of when he was very young, when Jiang Yueming begged him not to let slip that the two of them had skipped school to go ice skating. Those days, though so many years had passed, were still as clear as yesterday.
He raised an eyebrow and gave Jiang Yueming a "leave it to me" gesture.
Passing by the small garden—a small pond built by the No. 1 Middle School at great expense. Seeing the ice faintly visible in the pond, Jiang Yueming recalled what Han Jiang had said, including Han Jiang's words about "not being on the same path," and Jiang Yueming remembered all of them.
Melting snow and ice.
His thoughts now are the same as they were back then, unchanged after so many years. He's kind to Li Leshan not to melt his heart, nor to see how warm and radiant the heart is beneath that layer of ice.
Jiang Yueming didn't actually expect that piece of ice to melt for her.
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