Chapter 2 Things We Must Do Upon Reunion
"Yan Zhao, why are you still daydreaming? The time for the dictation test set by the Chinese teacher is almost up, she'll be coming in soon."
When Jing Yiran first saw Ning Yanzhao enter the classroom and act calmly when faced with the dictation, she assumed that Ning Yanzhao was confident. However, when she glanced at Ning Yanzhao's workbook and saw that there were only a few words on it, she quickly reminded her.
After all, the Chinese teacher is very strict. If you can't recite it from memory, you have to go to the office to recite it in person. Ning Yanzhao had complained bitterly after being called to the office once before. Now, Jing Yiran found that Ning Yanzhao didn't learn her lesson at all. She was so disappointed in her.
"Okay, I'll write it right away." Ning Yanzhao was speechless with frustration. She wanted to memorize it properly, but she was willing but unable to do so. She had really forgotten almost everything.
More than that, Ning Yanzhao was concerned about why she suddenly appeared nine years ago, and why she happened to be on the overpass, seeing An Nianyu waiting for the bus back to school.
When the music suddenly started playing in her headphones, Ning Yanzhao seemed to realize something and quickly walked down the steps of the overpass, wanting to confirm An Nianyu's existence with her own eyes.
But when Ning Yanzhao ran down the overpass, she saw An Nianyu just getting on a bus and leaving; she missed him.
Later, during evening self-study sessions, Ning Yanzhao would sneak to the classroom door of Class 1 several times after class, but she didn't see An Nianyu sitting inside. There was nothing on his desk, making it seem as if he hadn't come to evening self-study in the first place.
The school mandates that all students attend evening self-study sessions, except for a few students who can apply due to unforeseen circumstances such as health issues.
But Ning Yanzhao clearly remembered that An Nianyu used to come to evening self-study sessions, and when she saw him last night, he was perfectly fine. What happened? Could it be that something happened and he asked for leave?
Oh well, never mind all that for now. The more I need to do something, the more distracting thoughts I have in my mind that prevent me from doing the right thing. But Ning Yanzhao really couldn't remember the last few lines of "The Road to Shu is Hard". After handing in her dictation homework with a heavy heart, she rested on the table.
It seemed like only a few minutes had passed before the first math class started seamlessly.
High school breaks are only ten minutes long, and No. 1 High School rings the preparatory bell two minutes in advance, so the actual break is only eight minutes.
Ning Yanzhao thought about many things last night and fell asleep very late. The temporary rest in the morning did not help much. She was exhausted after finishing the dictation. She could even have a dream during the few minutes of break between classes. It's true that morning reading class is very sleep-inducing no matter when.
Ning Yanzhao spent the entire morning in a daze, completely lost in the various functions of mathematics. However, just as she was drifting off into a daze, her Chinese teacher's shout during the morning exercise session snapped her back to reality: "Ning Yanzhao, come to my office."
Because it rained a little today, the long break between classes turned into free time. Students have always loved this kind of situation and wish it would rain every day during their running or exercise time, with the rest of the time being sunny.
But in reality, this situation rarely occurs, so today is all the more precious. Everyone rushed to the convenience store to buy snacks, but unfortunately, she was the only one who had to go to the office to do dictation. It was really tough for her.
"Yan Zhao, I told you to write properly just now, now you're in trouble." Although Jing Yiran's tone sounded regretful, she was actually quite gloating. Ning Yan Zhao usually handled her studies with ease, so it was rare to see her like this, and Jing Yiran naturally had to "appreciate" it.
"Ugh, I'm angry."
"No, please don't be angry. I really didn't mean to."
"Hmph, I don't believe it. Just wait until I get back and see how I deal with you." Ning Yanzhao made a final stand.
So, Ning Yanzhao went to the office to find the Chinese teacher. Sure enough, the Chinese teacher's first question was: "What happened to your Chinese dictation this time?" For a teacher, the most obvious sign of a student's decline is the mistakes in various quizzes. Even though she had taught so many students, she was still quite disappointed. Dictation questions were usually easy points in the college entrance examination.
As expected, everyone who was supposed to come was present. Ning Yanzhao, who hadn't studied properly and recited the text, naturally admitted her mistake with a guilty conscience, "Teacher, I'm sorry, I will definitely recite it properly next time."
"Seeing how diligent you usually are, I'll let it slide this time. I won't make you do the dictation alone in the office. But you still didn't memorize it well. Next time you must be able to recite it from memory. This isn't the level you should be at. Go back to the classroom."
"Okay, thank you, teacher." Ning Yanzhao didn't expect her Chinese teacher to "make an exception," thank goodness.
When Ning Yanzhao left the Chinese teacher's office with her Chinese dictation notebook, she felt like she had been in a daze all morning.
Whether it's a dream or Ning Yanzhao has traveled back nine years, she doesn't know yet. She also doesn't know the meaning of her returning to the past. Is it just to study hard and get into a better school?
Furthermore, compared to when she was a student nine years ago, Ning Yanzhao now feels that she has overlooked many things that are elusive yet important. However, she is still confused until she comes out of the office and sees someone leaning against the corridor railing, at which point she remembers who it is.
That important thing, which she had almost forgotten for nearly nine years.
In the two years of high school, besides knowing that An Nianyu will drop out of school and leave for unknown reasons a year from now, several other important things have happened at No. 1 High School.
The first thing was that a month later, a girl named Xu Yongqing in Ning Yanzhao's class ran away from home over the weekend because of a "cell phone" incident. Because of the "information gap" between the school and her home, it took a lot of time for everyone to realize that she was missing. When Xu Yongqing was finally found, she had been in a car accident and died on the spot.
There's a reason why this incident is called the "cell phone" incident: the school not only takes a very serious approach to early romantic relationships among students, but also manages the cell phone issue for boarding students very strictly.
Ning Yanzhao still remembers what happened back then. According to the campus announcement, Xu Yongqing was caught by the dormitory supervisor for bringing a mobile phone into the dormitory and the phone was confiscated.
On the one hand, it doesn't seem like a big deal for ordinary students, since it does violate school rules to some extent. As long as they admit their mistake, their parents can still get their phones back from the dormitory supervisor after graduation. However, the other side of the problem lies with Xu Yongqing's parents.
It turns out that Xu Yongqing's parents are very strict with her, so they didn't buy her a cell phone. According to her parents, when Xu Yongqing was staying at the dormitory, she would contact them using the public phone on the first floor of the dormitory.
Midweek that week, Xu Yongqing's parents also came to the class and made a scene, "warning" the students not to lead their daughter astray. Although everyone was speechless at Xu Yongqing's parents, Xu Yongqing herself was not implicated.
This incident also exposed that Xu Yongqing may have secretly used her allowance to buy a mobile phone, because the phone was of "unknown origin" to her parents.
So when Xu Yongqing returned to school after her parents took her home during the week, according to several of her roommates, they all saw that after she took off her school uniform jacket, her body was covered in bruises.
Everyone was concerned, wondering if Xu Yongqing had been beaten by her parents at home because they found out she had secretly bought a cell phone to play with in her dormitory and was caught by the school.
However, Xu Yongqing remained silent in the face of her roommates' concern. Since the person involved refused to talk about it, no one felt it was appropriate to ask any further questions.
Things seemed to have calmed down again, until a week later, Xu Yongqing's parents came to their door again during the weekend evening self-study session.
It turned out that during that week, Xu Yongqing returned to school early on Saturday while her parents were at work. She told her parents in a note that she needed to make the most of her time at school to review her lessons, so she wouldn't be going back.
However, according to Xu Yongqing's roommate who also stayed at school, Xu Yongqing did not stay at school this week, which means that Xu Yongqing "ran away from home" or went missing this weekend. Xu Yongqing's parents only realized that the information was not symmetrical when they were preparing to "settle accounts" with Xu Yongqing again on the weekend.
Upon realizing what had happened, Xu Yongqing's parents and homeroom teacher immediately reported the incident to the police. However, they were surprised to receive a call from the police shortly afterward, informing them that Xu Yongqing had been in a car accident on a street and had died on the spot.
The reason Ning Yanzhao cared about this was because she had seen Xu Yongqing on the bus home that Friday. She didn't notice anything unusual at the time because she and Xu Yongqing always took the same bus home, but they were not familiar with each other and never greeted each other on the bus.
Normally, Xu Yongqing would get off the bus a few stops earlier than her, but that day, when Ning Yanzhao was about to get off, she realized that Xu Yongqing was still on the bus.
At that time, Ning Yanzhao thought that Xu Yongqing might be going somewhere to buy something, so she didn't say anything. However, she didn't expect that two days later, on Sunday night, she would find out that Xu Yongqing had neither gone back to school to study nor home on Saturday, but had disappeared.
Looking at Xu Yongqing's thin figure leaning against the railing, exposed to the cold wind, Ning Yanzhao wondered if she had known where Xu Yongqing was going on the bus, would it have changed her fate of dying in a car accident?
Ning Yanzhao really doesn't have many opportunities to get close to Xu Yongqing. She noticed that Xu Yongqing rarely talks to others. Many people say that she has a strange temper. So, is there anything that Xu Yongqing has to do?
In a flash, Ning Yanzhao remembered the essay competition registration form she had seen in the Chinese teacher's office earlier—this was it.
Although Xu Yongqing usually seems uninterested in anything, the only thing that everyone knows is that she loves reading and has excellent grades in Chinese, especially in composition. Ning Yanzhao remembers that she once won the national first prize in this composition competition. Since the registration fee is paid by herself anyway, she might as well participate and join in the fun! As soon as the Chinese teacher announces the composition competition in class, she will sign up immediately.
With a new goal to strive for besides studying hard, Ning Yanzhao became more motivated. However, this did not prevent her from still feeling somewhat dazed. After all, it was the first time in nine years that Ning Yanzhao had attended a full day of high school classes, and she thought it was normal that she couldn't keep up with the knowledge all at once.
Although the courses in college are also very intensive, at least some of them are relatively easy, so you can relax a little. Unlike high school, where it is best to be proficient in all subjects and get as high a score as possible, as teachers often say, "one more point will crush thousands of others." So, after a whole day, Ning Yanzhao was exhausted, something she hadn't experienced in a long time.
Throughout the day, Ning Yanzhao struggled to cope with the familiar yet unfamiliar high school courses. She also took advantage of breaks and the time for group exercises to wander around the entrance of Class 1, but she didn't see An Nianyu anywhere. She even began to doubt whether they were actually classmates in the same school and grade.
Ning Yanzhao walked along, lost in thought, until she saw An Nianyu carrying a cardboard box at the entrance of a small alley near her home. She thought she was dreaming.
No way? How did someone who's never around all day end up at the entrance of an alley near my house? And he's carrying a cardboard box that looks like it was just found on the spot. I wonder what's inside.
"Woof!"
Was there actually a puppy inside the cardboard box?
The puppy in the box had already smelled Ning Yanzhao's scent. Now, upon hearing her voice, it immediately tried to raise its paws higher so that Ning Yanzhao could see it. At this moment, its eyes became wet as it looked at Ning Yanzhao, and it whimpered softly, looking incredibly pitiful.
"Hey, what are you doing here?"
Kaochuan is a small mongrel dog that Ning Yanzhao's family keeps. After Ning Yanzhao went to university and started working, it was taken to the countryside by Ning's mother, Wen Huiquan, who had retired early to take care of her grandparents.
Furthermore, when Ning Yanzhao returned home from evening self-study after transmigrating yesterday, Kaochuan was already asleep, so today was actually the first time in a long time that she had personally seen Kaochuan awake.
Hearing Ning Yanzhao's voice, An Nianyu, who was holding a cardboard box containing a puppy, also looked over.
An Nianyu was wearing a black winter school uniform padded jacket specially made by the school. Now he was turned to the side, and Ning Yanzhao could only see the winter night wind blowing his hair, and could not see what kind of expression he had.
At the same time, this is the first close meeting between Ning Yanzhao and An Nianyu, who have returned to their place nine years ago.
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