Chapter 37: Many onlookers hoped that Cheng Mingdu would appear immediately at this moment...
Ye Yuying neither burned nor tore up the letter.
She tried to do it, tearing the paper in half, but then regretted putting it down.
She stood up from behind her desk. The rain had stopped. She lowered her eyes and examined the writing on the white paper with a cold gaze, yet she miraculously felt a sense of inner peace.
It was as if, the moment she put pen to paper, her inner demons were conveyed through the tip of her pen and sealed in a two-dimensional space, temporarily undisturbed for the rest of the night.
So she decided to keep it.
The next morning, she carefully folded the papers, put them in an envelope, and stuffed it haphazardly into her schoolbag without even sealing it.
She was a little scared that the cleaning lady would enter her room while she was at school and then, quite by chance, discover the letter.
Although the probability was practically zero, she couldn't take the risk, probably because the person in the letter was in this house.
Ye Yuying would rather the letter be discovered outside, in the worst-case scenario, than in her own room.
There were still his belongings in the attic. Sometimes, in the dead of night, she would feel guilty, as if those inanimate objects had awakened under the magic of the moonlight and were staring intently at her from the dark corners.
She had never felt so guilty in her life. Even when she was a child, she had never felt this guilty when she tried to steal a dollar to buy snacks at the school gate. But in the end, she couldn't bear the inner turmoil. She wandered around the school with that dollar in her pocket for an entire afternoon, and then put it back untouched.
She just wanted to peel this feeling off herself, like cutting off a piece of necrotic flesh, to prevent herself from becoming terminally ill. Whether she was thrown into a ditch or fell into someone else's hands, it would be a kind of relief.
As the morning sun climbed onto the windowsill, she carried her schoolbag downstairs. Her heart was pounding faster than ever before she was late, and she walked more quietly, though no one could hear her.
On her way to the side door, she would pass that familiar door, and her steps would slow down for a few seconds.
In the past, she would openly and curiously look upstairs without any distractions, and if she was lucky, she would see a tall figure shimmering in the morning light behind the curtains at some point.
In most cases, it is invisible because Cheng Mingdu's schedule is different from everyone else's. Often, he doesn't even have time to adjust to the time difference before it's time to leave.
The sun had not yet fully risen, and the grayish-white light shone into the retro corridor, fading her shadow to a pale white, like worn-out jeans.
Too many unexpected things happened this morning. Because of her complicated thoughts, she didn't pay attention to the time. When she got to the bus stop, the bus she was on had just left. She ran after it for a while, but couldn't catch up.
The next bus was an hour away. Ye Yuying seemed to wake up a lot from the fact that she was late, and vaguely felt that she had been in a daze just a second before.
She wanted the name in her heart to wither away quickly; she wanted to live a normal life.
Since being late was already a given, Ye Yuying stopped struggling, resigned herself to her fate, returned to the station, and sat down, deciding to wait for an hour.
Anyway, she wouldn't mind adding another one to her list of seven deadly sins at school.
Sometimes being a "problem student" is good; it makes all your mistakes seem less noticeable because no one has any hope for you.
While I was idly waiting for the bus, a car drove up from a distance and stopped slowly in front of my platform.
The car window rolled down, revealing those familiar eyes, like distant mountains shrouded in morning mist.
The voice seemed veiled by a cold mist, "Why are you sitting here?"
She had never seen Cheng Mingdu at this time before. She looked up reflexively, only to be startled by his gaze, and quickly looked away.
"I missed the last bus..." She tried her best to keep her voice from sounding aggrieved, but the reason her cheeks started to burn wasn't actually because she had met him.
Instead, he happened to witness this mistake during the very only time he was late.
In Cheng Mingdu's world, there is probably no such word as "late".
The person inside the bus glanced at the bus timetable and realized that the next bus wouldn't arrive for almost an hour. So he unlocked the door and said succinctly, "Get on, I'll take you to school. If you're an hour late, you'll have to skip the first class."
When Ye Yuying looked up, the confusion in her eyes was like ashes covering her vision.
That was the first time Ye Yuying seemed to realize the seriousness of skipping a class from Cheng Mingdu's words—
He really is a good student.
She slowly got up, intending to walk to the passenger seat, but at the last moment she opened the back door instead.
The moment she opened the car door, she caught a whiff of his cool fragrance in the air. Her throat felt a little dry, and she coughed a few times to explain, "My backpack is too bulging, so it's better if I sit in the back."
Fortunately, Cheng Mingdu wasn't driving a sports car today, otherwise she would have had to sit in the passenger seat.
Cheng Mingdu seemed to see through the many suspicious things about her today, but he didn't ask any questions. He raised his heavy eyes from the rearview mirror, glanced at her, reminded her to fasten her seatbelt, and restarted the car.
The car was so quiet that you could almost only hear the ticking of the turn signals and the clatter of the wheels after the wind and rain had washed over the streets.
Ye Yuying sat in the back seat, one hand unconsciously gripping her schoolbag tightly, while the other hand groped for the location of the letter—in the only compartment of the schoolbag, together with her transportation card and access card.
She could feel the letter's presence; the stiffness of the paper shone through the fabric of her schoolbag, like a time bomb heated by the warmth of her hands. Meanwhile, a fire that hadn't cooled was burning inside her chest, making even her nostrils feel hot with every breath.
Even though she pretended nothing was wrong, the fire continued to burn slowly, scorching the cartilage in her chest cavity.
In the front row, Cheng Mingdu stared straight ahead, occasionally glancing down at the speedometer. His posture remained as upright and dignified as ever, giving him the air of a calm and detached outsider.
Ye Yuying suddenly felt that if such a person saw that letter, his self-possessed face would surely soften.
He would think she's crazy.
He was so disdainful that he didn't even bother to reprimand her, distancing himself from her without a word, like a torch being submerged in the Arctic Ocean, silently destroying all flames.
Thinking of this, her fingertips began to feel cold.
"Why did you miss the train today?" Cheng Mingdu suddenly asked, his voice gentle and indifferent, not so much out of concern, but more like a formality.
"I've already slept," she replied briefly, with an element of lying, but not much.
"Didn't you sleep well last night?" he continued to ask.
"Um."
This "hmm" seemed to encapsulate all the chaos and turmoil of the night into a single syllable; she dared not say more.
Silence fell again inside the car.
The city gradually cleared up after the rain, and the sunlight tore through the clouds, casting a cool light on the horizon.
Halfway through the drive, Cheng Mingdu asked, "You seem a little different today. Is something wrong at school...?"
Ye Yuying realized he thought she had caused trouble again, so she froze for a moment and blurted out, "...I didn't cause any trouble."
Her hasty words in defending himself must have struck a nerve; she seemed to catch a faint upward curve of his lips in the rearview mirror.
“I didn’t say you caused trouble,” Cheng Mingdu replied calmly.
Ye Yuying bit her lip and didn't reply. His tone was unusually gentle, but she felt extremely nervous in the space filled with his presence.
She secretly glanced at the light in Cheng Mingdu's eyes through the rearview mirror, trying to see if he suspected anything.
For some reason, at that moment she suddenly felt as if she were walking on a high-wire, and if she moved her body, the letter would slip out from the lining of her bag—fall down, be exposed, and cause disaster.
She found her excessive nervousness somewhat ridiculous; ultimately, it was just her guilty conscience.
She dared not move, and could only stare intently at the street scenes rushing past the car window.
Cheng Mingdu stopped at the next red light, and the carriage came to a standstill.
He asked, "Have you been feeling stressed about your studies lately?"
The voice wasn't loud, but it was a warm, gentle concern that easily touched people's hearts.
Ye Yuying's throat trembled slightly, but she remained silent.
But then she felt that this seemed even more suspicious, so she replied in a low voice, "A little, but it's okay."
The car was parked at the school gate.
"We've arrived," Cheng Mingdu said, turning his head to look at her, but could only see her back as she hurriedly got out of the car, a ponytail on the back of her head.
"Thank you for bringing me here."
"Going now won't make you late." His tone was still calm, but it was still a kind reminder.
Ye Yuying had already jumped off the bus and rushed into the school gate in a hurry without looking back, carrying her schoolbag.
Cheng Mingdu sat in the driver's seat, his fingertips tapping the steering wheel, his gaze seemingly fixed on her, yet also drifting away.
It seems like she's really afraid of being late.
Why didn't you call me "brother" today? You used to call me that so naturally.
She seemed to have a lot on her mind, but at thirteen, it was the most awkward and rebellious age, which was normal.
He didn't start the car, just sat there for a while, the morning light outside the window, the silence inside the car. It wasn't until a student slowly walked past the car that he seemed to be gently jolted awake, started the car and drove away.
*
The moment Ye Yuying stepped into the classroom, the bell rang. Before her heart could even catch its breath, the homeroom teacher had already entered the classroom.
The first sentence was: "One student made tremendous progress in this quiz."
Ye Yuying habitually daydreams when the teacher says things unrelated to the textbook content, because these comments are irrelevant to her, and daydreaming can be a way to take a break.
"Ye Yuying, don't just stand there, come up and get your test paper."
At the teacher's prompting, the whole class became surprisingly quiet, and the gazes directed at Ye Yuying were mostly one of disbelief, with some students expressing doubt about her.
Everyone knew what it meant to be the first person to receive the exam paper.
She came in first place with the highest score.
Ye Yuying snapped out of her daze, paused for two seconds, and realized that the homeroom teacher was indeed calling her name. She quickly got up to get her test paper, her movements becoming serious involuntarily.
Could it be that this time the teacher is handing out the test papers starting with the student who came in last place...?
But her math grades are already above average, so it shouldn't be that bad.
"Ye Yuying went from last place to first place in just one month, making her the student with the greatest improvement in the class."
Reluctant applause rang out in the classroom.
"I hope everyone will learn from her and not limit themselves." After the homeroom teacher finished speaking, he raised his hand to signal her to return to her seat, his tone revealing rare praise.
Ye Yuying walked back to her seat with the test paper bearing the conspicuous score, her fingers gripping the edge of the paper tightly. Her palms were slightly sweaty; being first place felt a million times more nerve-wracking than being last.
She really did it.
But as she sat down, her hand trembled slightly, and she subconsciously reached out to touch it; the letter was still in her bag.
A letter in one hand and a math exam paper with the highest score in the other coexist in her world—one bright, one dark.
In the classroom, someone whispered, "How could she possibly be number one?"
"Could it be plagiarized?"
"This is so fake..."
"How could someone improve so much? Could they have copied it?"
"But how do you copy math..."
She heard it, but didn't turn around. She knew that she had written this exam paper stroke by stroke, without cheating or guessing; it was all the answers she had painstakingly worked through late into the night, immersing herself in a sea of questions.
If there's anything driving her, it's probably that lately, in order to clear her inner demons, she's been forced to stay up late reading and doing practice problems like crazy...
*
When school was over, Ge Jie's gaze fell on her.
Without goodwill or haste, it's like a snake lying in wait in the bushes, coldly watching its prey approach unknowingly.
She walked up to Ye Yuying, squinted, and glanced at the hidden compartment of her backpack before asking righteously, "Ye Yuying, you've touched your backpack countless times during class. You don't have anything you're hiding there, do you?"
Ge Jie's eyes were like a wolf smelling the blood beneath her hidden wounds.
Ye Yuying instinctively stopped.
She didn't expect Ge Jie to notice such a subtle action, and she certainly didn't expect the other party to speak up in front of everyone in the classroom.
She had indeed touched the inner compartment of the backpack countless times; what was hidden there... was definitely something she couldn't tell anyone.
Her back stiffened for a moment, but the next second, she forcefully flattened the expression on her face.
"Is it any of your business?" Her tone was very light, even carrying a hint of weariness and indifference, as if she had only heard a pointless, sarcastic remark.
Ge Jie raised an eyebrow and smiled: "If you dare to say you didn't hide anything, why don't we empty your backpack in front of everyone and take a look?"
As soon as these words were spoken, several classmates who loved to stir up trouble immediately started jeering:
"Yeah! Maybe she really did hide a cheat sheet!"
"First place? That's hilarious! Maybe they had some kind of 'expert' guiding them!"
"Did you steal the standard answers from the teacher's office?"
Ye Yuying stood still, her gaze sweeping over them as if they were a group of completely unimportant background noises.
She didn't speak, but instead pulled the test paper from her bag, laid it out neatly on the table, and said, word by word:
"If you're so capable, try copying it and show me. We'll get the same score, so I'll give you a blank paper to copy from."
Her tone was not angry, but every word was sharp, which silenced the entire room.
Ge Jie, however, was not afraid of her direct rebuttal. Her smile turned colder: "Why are you so agitated? I didn't say you plagiarized. You're acting like... you really do have a guilty conscience."
“Yes, you didn’t say that,” Ye Yuying nodded and said calmly, “You’re just making insinuations, stirring up trouble, and spreading rumors.”
"If it's so aboveboard, why not open it and take a look?"
She used reverse psychology from the side, and everyone echoed her. Ye Yuying looked up at the people in front of her, and for a moment, the characters in Lu Xun's writings came to mind.
The classroom light was dim and yellowish, like a light bulb about to burn out, casting blurry shadows on the faces of the group. Everyone's expression seemed to be cut from the same mold, carrying shallow curiosity, feigned concern, and costless malice.
What they want to see is never the truth.
Instead, it's about showing the fall of someone worse than them, so that they can feel reassured that they aren't so bad after all.
Ye Yuying suddenly loosened her grip on her schoolbag. She even gave a slight smile, a smile like a crack in ice, but cold and devoid of warmth.
What do you want to see?
Her voice was so soft that it was almost inaudible in the noise of the classroom.
The voice carried a hint of genuine emotion—like a spark falling on cold water, slight yet capable of generating heat.
"You want to find a reason to search my bag, invade my privacy, slander and defame me, and see a country girl get beaten down and unable to get up. Even though beating me down doesn't benefit you in the slightest, you just want to watch the show and make things worse, right?"
She walked step by step to the front of the classroom, placed the high-scoring math test paper on the desk, and spread it out.
"I've put my test paper here. You can study it as you like. If you don't trust me, you can report me. It's easy to spot if I wrote the exact same answer key as the teacher on the math test."
She glanced up and looked at the classmates surrounding her.
At that moment, the classroom was no longer a classroom; it became a stage without tickets.
She was the "prisoner" who was about to be dragged out and displayed in public, while they were the spectators waiting for the show to begin.
Ye Yuying suddenly understood that Lu Xun's "onlookers" were not an exaggeration or a fiction, but rather the inertia ingrained in people's bones.
In "Medicine", when Xia Yu is beheaded, the onlookers are only interested in the excitement and are so engrossed in watching that even the vendors can take the opportunity to sell blood-stained buns for profit.
In "The True Story of Ah Q", the Zhao family and the villagers bullied Ah Q on the one hand, and on the other hand, they watched or fawned over Ah Q's execution.
In "Kong Yiji," the patrons appear to chat and laugh with Kong Yiji on the surface, but in reality, they are extremely indifferent. When Kong Yiji crawls into the tavern with his broken leg and sits on the ground asking for drinks, everyone only finds it funny; no one truly sympathizes with him, helps him, or even gloats over his misfortune.
The group of people in front of me are only teenagers, but how are they any different from those "spectators"? They don't use knives or make a move, but their eyes are cold and their silence is as firm as iron.
This group of people doesn't need evidence or judgment; they only need a commotion or a rumor to use public opinion as a rope to hang people up and expose them to the elements.
They watched with great interest, and if one day she didn't make a fool of herself or provide any amusement, they would create new jokes.
She even felt that if they could see her being slapped and beaten by Ge Jie, falling to the ground, covering her face and crying, kneeling and begging for mercy, they might not be able to help but laugh out loud, and then go home and say, "The school was really lively today."
Those gazes were like barbed wire.
Round and round they ensnared her, wanting to see her break down, to see her shed tears, to see her utterly dejected, in order to prove that their ordinariness was not failure, but simply commonplace.
Ye Yuying glanced at everyone and secretly clenched her fists.
She began to understand what Cheng Mingdu meant by what he had said to her that day.
She wanted to escape all of this. If she were an ordinary person, she would always be surrounded by numb onlookers who would engulf her like a swamp, not allowing anyone to escape this place of right and wrong.
Everyone is like a non-Newtonian fluid that keeps absorbing victims and not letting anyone escape, because everyone is going to fall together, so why should anyone be able to stay out of it?
She stood before the podium, as if standing in the center of a sheet of ice. Beneath the ice lay cold stares, skepticism, a conspiracy of malice and unease. But then she suddenly understood something—
She didn't want to blend into the ice, didn't want to be assimilated into the next spectator.
"I have no obligation to prove my innocence, and I will fight to the end."
Someone whispered in the corner, "What's with the pretense of being high and mighty?"
She didn't turn around, picked up her schoolbag, and walked out of the classroom.
The letter is still in the bag, safe and sound.
All her strength vanished the moment she stepped into the school corridor. A warm spring breeze blew, and she suddenly felt her eyes welling up with tears.
She looked around blankly in the empty campus. The sunlight fell on her shoulders, but it couldn't reach her heart. She wished that Cheng Mingdu could appear in front of her right now.
She longed to tell him—
I finally understand why you went to such lengths to keep me on campus, and why you always reminded me not to let them drag me down.
The freedom we understand now, the so-called freedom, is not about escaping, but about no longer living within their definitions. It's about no longer constantly explaining, clarifying, pleasing, or compromising, but about being able to live authentically, not being held hostage by their gaze, and not needing to prove one's innocence.
I long to go to a place where there is no more pain, where I can truly live my own life.
She took a deep breath and forced back her tears.
She returned to the Cheng family as quickly as possible. She had been avoiding Cheng Mingdu for many days, but at this moment, her desire to see him was so strong.
She searched the lounge and parking lot, and finally mustered up the courage to walk into the indoor court, where Cheng Mingdu's private coach was practicing tennis with him.
Cheng Mingdu, dressed in a white tracksuit, swung his racket with clean, crisp movements. The sound of his shots echoed in the spacious, quiet stadium, as rhythmic as a metronome. With each swing, his silhouette appeared exceptionally resolute, like the endless green mountains she had gazed upon countless times in her hometown.
Ye Yuying stood at the door for a while, not going to disturb her. She gripped the strap of her schoolbag tightly, her knuckles turning white from the force. She had so much to say, but it all got stuck in her throat. She held back her tears, not wanting to cry in a corner where he couldn't see her.
If you have to cry, cry in front of him.
She stood there for a while until he noticed her and realized she was in a bad mood.
Cheng Mingdu stopped swinging his racket, his brows furrowing slightly as he looked at her, his tone calm yet questioning: "Why are you here?"
She opened her mouth, but found the words stuck in her throat. Her eyes swept over the private tutor in the distance, and she hesitated.
His personal trainer tactfully stepped aside, silently putting away the ball tube and leaving them the space.
"Why are you back so early today?" He took two steps closer, and although he had just finished exercising, he handed her the electrolyte water and turned around to get another bottle for himself.
She didn't answer, but just looked at him, as if to confirm that this person was really in front of her, and not just a figment of her imagination.
“I…” Her voice was a little hoarse, “I only understood what you were telling me when I walked out of the classroom today.”
Cheng Mingdu's brow relaxed. "Which sentence?"
"What you told me in the lobby last time, about freedom..."
Remember, if you only have eyes for your own little corner of the world, then the slightest breeze or a cold laugh from someone else will control you.
You're not trying to please anyone, nor are you trying to prove whether you deserve to stay. You're fighting for your dignity and future—fighting for your freedom.
He paused for a moment, then asked, "Has something happened at school again?"
“There are many.” She looked up, “but they’re no longer important.”
"Today I finally understand what you mean by 'freedom'."
Her eyes were clear when she said that.
The somber look in Cheng Mingdu's eyes slowly faded. He didn't speak, but listened quietly.
"Freedom is not a physical escape, nor is it waiting for them to shut up or let me go on their own. Freedom is standing amidst the clamor of voices, unmoved by the winds, with a heart as still as water, knowing who I am, unmoved by the whispers, undisturbed by rumors, knowing where I came from, and unafraid of where I am going."
Cheng Mingdu looked at her and said, "The brave are fearless; though there be thousands, I will go." [Note]
She took a step forward, as if to get closer to that familiar warmth, but quickly stopped.
In that instant, Cheng Mingdu saw her hesitant steps forward, and a strange emotion slowly welled up in his eyes, but he quickly regained his usual calm.
“That’s good. You’re starting to grow into yourself,” he said.
Those few words seemed to lift her up from the weight of the storm.
Ye Yuying lowered her head and smiled, but there was a hint of bitterness in her eyes.
She nodded and said sincerely, "Thank you."
Then, just as she was about to turn and leave the gym, she heard him ask, "Want to play ball?"
Upon hearing this, Ye Yuying shook her head: "I can't."
Cheng Mingdu replied calmly, "Want to learn?"
Ye Yuying looked at him without saying a word.
Cheng Mingdu casually added, "You said you were hopeless before, but you still got first place in math."
Ye Yuying was taken aback. After a moment, she smiled sheepishly, but more than that, she was astonished.
Cheng Mingdu said he received a call from her homeroom teacher in the afternoon, saying that her risk of dropping out of school had been averted.
Ye Yuying then took the racket he handed her, held it in her hand and shook it, as if trying to get used to the weight.
Sunlight streamed into the edge of the indoor court, piercing her eyes. She raised her hand to shield them, but couldn't hide the smile that curved her lips.
-----------------------
Author's Note: [Note] Quoted from Mencius, Book 2, Part 1 (Gongsun Chou).
Is it fat enough?
50 red envelopes! [Cat emoji]
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