Heartbeat
The senior students at Huai'an No. 3 Middle School have four days left before school starts, and the tutoring class taught by Teacher Mina will end in just one day.
Chen Xiang had arranged to play ball with Ruan Xiyan when she returned. Ruan Xiyan's return bus departed in the morning and didn't arrive until noon. Thinking that she must be tired from the long journey, Chen Xiang moved the ball game to a later time so that Ruan Xiyan could rest for a while.
At three o'clock in the afternoon, Chen Xiang arrived near Ruan Xiyan's house on time. He was typing with his head down while bouncing the ball in his arms. He easily navigated the path and looked up to see Lu Er standing in front of Ruan Xiyan's gate.
Why is the class monitor here? Still puzzled, Ruan Xiyan came out of the house and handed the cage he was carrying to Lu Er. Chen Xiang, not far away, could vaguely make out that there was a black and white cat inside.
Chen Xiang called out, "Xi Yan!"
Both people who heard the sound turned their heads. Lu Er quickly turned back and talked to Ruan Xiyan for a moment, and Ruan Xiyan's eyes lit up with laughter. After they finished talking, Lu Er carried the cage and walked towards Chen Xiang. As she passed by Chen Xiang, she glanced at him and gave a token nod in greeting.
Chen Xiang and Ruan Xiyan went to the same court on Tongnian Avenue as before. After several intense rallies, Chen Xiang finally smashed Ruan Xiyan's ball, and with a sudden leap, the ball slammed into the center of the net.
In August, Huai'an was sweltering in the summer heat, and both of them were drenched in sweat after playing several rounds. Chen Xiang came out to change into his sports uniform, while Ruan Xiyan was still wearing the mustard yellow short-sleeved shirt she had worn that morning. Chen Xiang bent over, holding his knees, panting as he looked at Ruan Xiyan: "You've been gone for ten days, and there's no one over there to play with you? You've all gotten so bad."
Ruan Xiyan wasn't annoyed and smiled, "No."
Ruan Xiyan walked under the tree and sat down on the steps with Chen Xiang.
Chen Xiang: "You're going to training camp after school starts, right?"
"It will probably be a few more days; the teacher hasn't returned yet."
Ruan Xiyan unscrewed the bottle cap and took a sip of water. Just as she was about to swallow the second sip, Chen Xiang asked, "Is that cat Lu Er's?"
“Yes,” Ruan Xiyan screwed the bottle cap back on and wiped the moisture from the corner of his lips with the back of his hand. He took a tissue, wiped his nose a few times, and got up to walk down the steps. “The cat is injured, and she has nowhere to take care of it at home. I’ll help out.”
"Oh." Chen Xiang quickly followed up, saying in a joking tone, "I was also thinking that your relationship has progressed by leaps and bounds over the summer."
Ruan Xiyan's tone was as light as if she were joking: "That's what I think."
Chen Xiang suddenly looked at him, her expression turning somewhat stern: "You two... are together?"
Ruan Xiyan didn't speak, tossing the basketball in her hand a few times like a badminton shuttlecock. Chen Xiang waited for a while, but didn't hear anything from her. Just when he thought Ruan Xiyan wouldn't answer the question, Ruan Xiyan leaned back, and the ball went in accurately from beyond the three-point line.
"No." The ball bounced a few more meters after landing, the sound still echoing, and Ruan Xiyan smiled and said, "She doesn't like me yet."
-
Today was the last English class at the tutoring center. The bell rang as usual, and Lu Er put her books back into her textbooks. Ruan Xiyan walked up beside her, giving her a knowing smile: "Want to go home together?"
"good."
Finally, she looked up and asked, "Don't you have math class this afternoon?"
"My cousin is going home, and my mom asked me to see her off at the high-speed rail station this afternoon. It's okay if I don't go to the last math class." For Ruan Xiyan, whether she went to the last class or not was indeed not important.
Lu Er nodded and followed Ruan Xiyan out of the classroom.
Ruan Xiyan had his right hand in his coat pocket for a long time, until he left the school. He finally took his hand out, along with what he was holding: "I haven't given this to you yet."
"Yan Songqi didn't have time to give it to you, so she asked me to pass it on."
Lu Er saw that he was holding a stack of photos. After flipping through them roughly, she saw photos from that night at summer camp, from the drama performance, from the picnic, and from the day Lu Er and Ruan Xiyan were at the amusement park.
Lu Er carefully tucked it into the inner lining of her backpack: "Thank you."
Ruan Xiyan suddenly felt that their conversation had returned to how it was when they first met. But he knew that today was different from the past.
Things will never be the same again.
The sky was slightly dim, and with a gentle breeze, the already precarious leaves on the treetops were completely unfurled.
Ruan Xiyan tilted her nose up and looked at the dark clouds overhead, as if a storm was about to break: "It looks like it's going to rain."
"I forgot my umbrella." Lu Er immediately turned back.
"I'll go, wait for me." Regardless of whether Lu Ertong agreed or not, Ruan Xiyan waved and ran towards the school. His departing figure resembled a sapling, reminding Lu Ertong of the trees rushing past when looking out of a bus window.
A month ago, Lu Er never imagined that she would have such an encounter with Ruan Xiyan. The usually composed Lu Er seemed to lose her composure whenever she met Ruan Xiyan.
Lu Er stood still, looking completely bewildered, as if her soul had been ripped out.
Ruan Xiyan grabbed an umbrella in the classroom, and then it started to rain. There was no natural shelter where Lu Er was standing, so he looked around and chose to take shelter under the eaves of the nearest milk tea shop.
The rain was light, the raindrops were fine and scattered, like someone holding a handful of pearls and then scattering them capriciously.
Because of the rain, he and Lu Er swapped souls. For the entire summer vacation, they were busy trying to correct this chaotic situation. It was almost as if every time it rained, an accident would occur.
But if it weren't for the soul swap, Ruan Xiyan thought, he probably wouldn't have had the chance to get to know Lu Er.
For him, this summer was both unfortunate and fortunate.
Thinking this, Ruan Xiyan felt much happier, and looking at the raindrops, she saw them as if they were sparkling glass beads.
Ruan Xiyan was gazing at the sky, lost in thought, when a boy who looked similar to her approached her. Ruan Xiyan glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, and the boy jumped in surprise, his face flushing with nervousness. He stammered, "Excuse me, didn't you...didn't you bring an umbrella?"
Ruan Xiyan nodded. The boy seemed shy and avoided Ruan Xiyan's gaze: "I have another umbrella, you can borrow it... Let's add each other on WeChat, you can return it to me when you have time."
So he was just trying to pick her up. Ruan Xiyan turned her gaze back, quietly looking at the rain. The boy followed her gaze. There, a person holding an umbrella could be seen walking out. The closer Lu Er got, the clearer and more upright his figure became.
Ruan Xiyan's eyelids twitched. An idea sprouted from the ground like flowing water.
"Thank you, but no need." Ruan Xiyan finally spoke up. As she left the roof, she smiled at the boy, her lips curving slightly but her dimples deep. "My boyfriend is here to pick me up."
The rain stopped before I even reached the bus stop, rendering my umbrella useless.
"What were you talking about just now?" Lu Er asked, closing her umbrella.
Ruan Xiyan smiled as she recalled the scene from earlier: "It's nothing."
The car hadn't arrived yet. Ruan Xiyan chatted casually with Lu Er: "Teacher Lu, there are only two more days until school starts, right?"
"Um."
Ruan Xiyan: "Can I still ask you questions in class?"
Lu Er glanced at him out of the corner of her eye: "You won't be in the class anymore, right?"
“There should still be a week.” Ruan Xiyan’s eyes crinkled as he pressed his advantage, “What about weekends and holidays? Like Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day. They say a teacher for a day is a mother for life, you won’t just ignore me after that, will you?”
Lu Er was about to speak when she suddenly froze, her eyebrows furrowing. Ruan Xiyan noticed her distress and turned to look at her as well: "What's wrong?"
"...No." Lu Er shook her head. She wasn't sure if it was just her imagination, but she seemed to see Cui Feng standing on the street. The bus arrived, and Lu Er urged him, "Let's go back quickly."
Two other people were waiting at the platform. Ruan Xiyan was the last to board the bus. The front door was still open, and he was facing Lu Er with a cotton candy-like smile on his lips.
The rain suddenly started again.
Lu Er's vision suddenly shifted, and in an instant, what appeared before her eyes was a folding car door.
Ruan Xiyan stood there, her eyes filled with laughter, and silently said something to Lu Er.
He said, "See you when school starts."
-
When Lu Er arrived home, Cui Feng was lying on the sofa watching TV. As Lu Er passed by, she glanced at her briefly; Cui Feng's clothes were neat, and she looked relaxed, not like she had been out.
Lu Er breathed a sigh of relief. As she pushed open the door to her room, Cui Feng's hushed voice rang out: "Xiao Er, who was that boy who took you home just now?"
"A classmate."
"Oh." Cui Feng's voice was low and deep, almost as if it came from underground. "That boy seemed to know you quite well. He came to your house a few times during summer vacation. Are his grades good?"
Lu Er remained calm and said, "Generally, I occasionally tutor him, which counts as private tutoring."
She didn't turn around, but she could still feel Cui Feng's gaze on her. The room had become incredibly stuffy, and sweat beaded on Lu Er's forehead.
Unlike Lu Guoyang, Cui Feng wasn't tactful. She bluntly stated, "Discussing studies together is great, of course. I'm just worried you might get the wrong idea. He doesn't care about his poor grades, but you do, so you need to take better care of yourself. Getting involved in romance or puppy love will only hurt you. School is about to start, and senior year is the crucial period. You need to be confident."
"...Yes, I know."
The door lock clicked shut, and Lu Er wiped the sweat from her forehead. She sat down at the table, cleared her mind for a moment, and decided to preview her Chinese textbook first.
But her mind was always wandering. She'd be halfway through the first modern text reading passage when she'd suddenly snap out of it, realizing she hadn't understood it at all, and had to turn back and start over. After repeating this several times, Lu Er became increasingly frustrated. She tossed aside her Chinese mock exam book and instead reached for her English mock exam paper in her bag.
Even the test papers seemed to be working against her, falling haphazardly and fragilely into her schoolbag, making a piercing tearing sound with the slightest bit of force.
Lu Er was extremely annoyed, so she turned her schoolbag upside down and shook it up and down. The photos immediately floated out like snowflakes.
Lu Er lowered her eyes and stared at the photos all over the place. She deliberately ignored the scenes in the photos, but then she saw the Usachi figurine on the shelf. It was the one she gave to Ruan Xiyan, the Xiao Ba figurine, which he insisted on replacing with his own two.
Tucked inside her books were the test questions she had assigned to Ruan Xiyan, which she hadn't finished yet; in her drawer were the snacks Ruan Xiyan hadn't finished; her dress and her cold medicine were gifts from Ruan Xiyan... As if she had stepped on something, Lu Er lifted her foot and found it was a movie ticket stub.
It's as if a strong wind has swept through here, leaving its mark everywhere. And the name of that wind is Ruan Xiyan.
Lu Er inevitably caught the infection, his mind filled with images of Ruan Xiyan.
Lu Er had never taken her aunt's talk about puppy love to heart. From childhood to adulthood, there had been quite a few people who had feelings for her openly or secretly, and who had sent her love letters and confessed their love.
Lu Er didn't care because she knew better than anyone that if she didn't have feelings for someone, then no matter how hard that person tried to win her favor, it would be in vain.
But... it seemed to be Ruan Xiyan, and she couldn't help but feel her heart pounding.
Lu Er hugged her legs tightly, burying her head against her knees as if trying to escape, as if she had noticed something subtly changing.
This feeling made her feel like a helium balloon that had been released from its grasp, floating aimlessly in this world.
Logically speaking, this is wrong.
She shouldn't like him, nor should she have him.
She must bring the deviated trajectory back on track.
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