Accident
On the day the preliminary results were announced, Xu Yang was awakened by the screams of the girls in the front row.
When he rubbed his eyes and looked up, he saw the class monitor rushing into the classroom holding a red list, and chalk dust fell in the morning light.
"The results of the physics competition preliminary round are out!" The class monitor slapped the list on the podium. "Our class's finalists are—Lu Jinyu and Xu Yang!"
The classroom exploded in an instant. Before Xu Yang could fully wake up, Lu Jinyu elbowed him. His eyes lit up like falling stars: "Did you hear that? We're both in."
Xu Yang lowered his head and opened the textbook, but the tips of his ears felt slightly hot.
His fingertips slid across the experimental notes he made yesterday. The paper was a little wrinkled by the pencil strokes - that was the key points of the rematch that he had stayed up late to organize. Even the operating procedures of the sliding resistor that Lu Jinyu always made mistakes in were marked in red.
"The next period is a physics experiment." Lu Jinyu suddenly came over and said in a low voice, "It's a good opportunity to practice."
When Xu Yang looked up, he met his smiling eyes. The sunlight from outside the window slanted in, and the fragmented light danced on his eyelashes, just like what he saw on the back seat of the bicycle that day.
His Adam's apple moved, but he didn't say anything. He just pushed his lab notes aside.
The physics laboratory is on the top floor of the teaching building. When you push the door open, the smell of disinfectant mixed with pine resin hits you in the face.
Just as Xu Yang put his schoolbag on the lab table by the window, he heard an exclamation from the back row - Lu Jinyu was putting a whole box of weights on the scale, and the sound of metal collision was particularly harsh in the quiet laboratory.
"Lu Jinyu!" The physics teacher walked in with a lesson plan, his eyes sweeping over him from behind his glasses. "Did you submit the experimental error analysis I asked you to compile last time?"
Lu Jinyu hurriedly put the weights into the box, pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from his schoolbag and handed it over: "Here it is, teacher."
Xu Yang glanced at the flamboyant handwriting on the paper, and at the end there was a drawing of a puppy with its tongue sticking out, and he couldn't help but curl the corners of his mouth.
The teacher frowned and tapped the paper: "Next time, use graph paper, and - don't draw these useless things on your homework."
Lu Jinyu stuck out his tongue, and when he sat back at the lab table, he secretly made a face at Xu Yang.
This class is about practicing the volt-ampere method to measure resistance, which is exactly the type of question that may be tested in the rematch.
Xu Yang first checked the wire connection. When he pinched the crocodile clip with his fingertips, he moved very gently as if he was afraid of breaking anything.
Lu Jinyu was watching from the side and suddenly said, "You do experiments like you do embroidery."
"It's always better to be careful." Without even looking up, Xu Yang adjusted the slider of the rheostat to its maximum resistance. "Who connected the ammeter to the wrong range last time and blew three fuses?"
Lu Jinyu's ears suddenly turned red. He scratched his head and picked up the voltmeter to connect it to the two ends of the fixed-value resistor, but the wires became a tangled mess.
Xu Yang sighed, put down the work in his hands and helped him sort out the wires. His fingertips accidentally touched the back of his hand, and both of them retracted their hands as if they were burned.
"I'll do it myself." Lu Jinyu grabbed the wire and twisted it randomly a few times, but it became more and more tangled.
Xu Yang looked at his flustered appearance and suddenly remembered the cardboard box he saw in his house that day - this man who couldn't even sort out the wires, was so gentle when feeding the kitten.
"Like this." Xu Yang took the wire again, pinched the end of the wire with his fingertips and twisted it into a small circle. "According to the color, red connects to the positive pole and black connects to the negative pole, just like tying shoelaces..."
His voice was soft, with a subtle hint of patience.
Lu Jinyu stared at his fingers and suddenly said, “When you teach people, it sounds better than when you are usually fierce.”
Xu Yang paused. He looked up and saw the seriousness in Lu Jinyu's eyes, and it was like a ball of warm water flowing over his heart.
He turned his face away and handed him the arranged wires: "Connect them quickly, the teacher will be checking them soon."
When the two finally connected the circuit, the lab was already filled with the sound of the ammeter's needle rising and falling. Just as Xu Yang was about to close the switch, he realized that Lu Jinyu's voltmeter was on the wrong scale. He reached out to adjust it, but just as his fingertips touched the knob, Lu Jinyu held his hand.
"Don't move." Lu Jinyu's voice was a little deep, "Look over there."
Xu Yang followed his gaze and saw two girls in the back row whispering in front of their laboratory table. One of them was holding a cell phone with the camera clearly facing them.
He frowned, remembering that some people had been talking about them behind their backs recently - asking how a good student like Xu Yang could get mixed up with poor students, and that Lu Jinyu must have wanted to copy Xu Yang's answers.
"Ignore them." Xu Yang broke free from his hand and adjusted the voltmeter back to the correct range. "Just do your own thing."
The moment the switch closed, the ammeter's needle shifted sharply. Xu Yang quickly noted the reading and was about to disconnect it when he heard a snap and a series of sparks erupted from the wire joint. Lu Jinyu quickly unplugged the power cord, and a burning smell filled the air.
"What's going on?" The physics teacher walked over quickly, frowning at the burnt-black terminal. "Xu Yang, did you follow the correct steps?"
Just as Xu Yang was about to speak, Lu Jinyu suddenly said, "I connected the short-circuit protection resistor incorrectly. It has nothing to do with him."
The teacher's eyes fell on Lu Jinyu, and his expression became serious: "How many times have I emphasized that electrical experiments must first connect the protection circuit..."
Lu Jinyu lowered his head to listen to the lecture, his fingers unconsciously scratching the edge of the laboratory table. Xu Yang looked at his hair, which had been tanned light brown by the sun, and suddenly said, "Teacher, I didn't check it carefully. We are both responsible."
Lu Jinyu suddenly looked up at him, his eyes full of surprise. The teacher sighed and pointed to the toolbox in the corner: "You two go get the spare equipment and do it again, this time more carefully."
On the way to get the equipment, Lu Jinyu suddenly grabbed Xu Yang's arm and asked, "Why did you speak for me just now?"
"It's originally a matter between two people." Xu Yang broke free from his hand and picked up the new wire and resistor. "We are allies, aren't we?"
Lu Jinyu looked at his back and suddenly chuckled.
The sunlight poured in from the corridor window, stretching Xu Yang's shadow very long, and even the wire in his hand was rimmed with gold.
When doing the experiment again, both of them were extremely careful. Lu Jinyu was responsible for reading the numbers, and his voice was very low: "Voltage 3.2 volts, current 0.5 amps..." Xu Yang recorded it in his notebook, and the sound of the pen tip sliding across the paper was like a spring silkworm chewing mulberry leaves.
"I figured it out. 6.4 ohms." Xu Yang showed him the result. "It's about the same as the nominal value of the fixed resistor."
Lu Jinyu looked at the neat handwriting on the paper, suddenly picked up a pen and drew a small smiley face next to it.
Just as Xu Yang was about to glare at him, he saw the physics teacher coming over and quickly covered the notebook with his hands.
"Well done." The teacher looked at their data and nodded. "The experimental questions in the semi-finals will be more difficult than this, but your cooperation is very good. Keep it up."
After the teacher left, the two looked at each other and couldn't help laughing. The sycamore tree outside the window was rustling in the wind, and the sunlight fell on the laboratory table through the gaps between the leaves, making the little smiling face particularly clear.
After school, Lu Jinyu waited for Xu Yang downstairs, pushing his bicycle. He pulled something out of his schoolbag and threw it to Xu Yang, who reached out to catch it and discovered it was a candy wrapped in the shape of a star.
"I'm here to apologize." Lu Jinyu scratched his head. "I almost messed up the lab class this morning."
Xu Yang peeled off the candy wrapper, and the sweet aroma of grapes spread across his tongue. He remembered the smiling face on the lab bench and suddenly said, "Tomorrow morning, I want to have a tuna sandwich from the convenience store."
Lu Jinyu was stunned for a moment, then laughed: "No problem, enough."
The setting sun overlapped their shadows. As the bicycle passed through the flower bed full of roses, Xu Yang folded the candy wrapper into small squares and put them in his pocket.
He looked at Lu Jinyu's back and suddenly felt that the definition of "alliance" seemed to be more than just a competition.
When passing by the stray cat's nest at the entrance of the community, Lu Jinyu suddenly stopped the car.
He took out a bag of cat food from his schoolbag and poured it into a paper plate. He squatted down and watched the three kittens fighting for the food, gently touching the thinnest one with his fingertips.
Xu Yang stood by and watched, and found that the cuffs of his school uniform were stained with some rosin from the experiment class, mixed with the fishy smell of cat food, but it didn't smell bad at all.
"I'll take them to the veterinary hospital next week." Lu Jinyu stood up and dusted off his hands. "I asked the people at the rescue station, and they said they can get vaccinated."
Xu Yang nodded, and suddenly remembered what his mother said that day. He couldn't help but ask, "Do you... really want to study veterinary medicine?"
Lu Jinyu kicked the stones under his feet and said in a muffled voice, "I don't know. My mother would definitely not agree." He paused, turned to look at Xu Yang, the light in his eyes dimming. "What about you? Did your parents already plan for you to take the entrance exams for Peking University or Tsinghua University?"
Xu Yang thought of the brochures for prestigious schools that always piled on the table at home, and his mother's constant advice that "only by passing the exams can you have a future," and suddenly his throat tightened. He lowered his head and kicked at the pebbles on the side of the road. "Not necessarily."
The evening breeze blew over, bringing a bit of coolness. Lu Jinyu suddenly smiled and reached out to ruffle his hair: "Never mind them, let's win the competition first."
Xu Yang's hair was messed up, but he didn't avoid it like usual. He looked at Lu Jinyu's profile dyed golden by the sunset, and suddenly felt that the glucose in his mouth seemed sweeter.
When he got home, the living room was unusually quiet. Xu Yang put down his schoolbag and found an unfamiliar envelope on the coffee table. It was labeled "Xu Yang."
He opened it and saw that it was a letter of intent for early admission from a key high school in the city. The additional condition was that he had to participate in their school's recommended student training and give up the physics competition.
The envelope slipped from his hand with a slight sound. Xu Yang looked at the sky gradually getting darker outside the window, and suddenly remembered Lu Jinyu squatting in front of the cat's bed, and the little smiling face on the laboratory table.
He bent down to pick up the envelope, slowly walked to the desk, and stuffed it into the deepest part of the drawer. Then he took out the tutorial book for the physics rematch and opened the page with the bookmark - it was a puppy drawn by Lu Jinyu, sticking out its tongue, as if smiling at him.
When the desk lamp came on, Xu Yang took out his phone and sent a message to Lu Jinyu: "Meet at the school gate at 7 o'clock tomorrow morning. Those who arrive early will have a sandwich."
A reply arrived quickly, a grinning emoji. Xu Yang stared at the screen, suddenly feeling that all those so-called "plans" and "ways out" weren't as important as the noisy ally beside him.
The moonlight from outside the window crept onto the pages of the book, making the puppy's graffiti particularly clear.
Xu Yang took out a pen and drew a kitten next to it, with its tail curled into a small question mark.
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