The truth in the snow
The snow in December fell thickly, covering the roof of the teaching building completely, like a giant cream cake. I stood in the corridor on the third floor, holding my newly bound physics competition paper, looking down at the snow-covered playground. Zheng Yiming said he was going to the academic affairs office to submit materials and asked me to wait here for him so we could go pick up the review materials we ordered last week.
A gust of wind seeped in through the cracks in the window, carrying a biting chill. I pulled my scarf tighter around myself, my gaze unconsciously sweeping across the stairwell to the second floor, but then suddenly stopped.
Zheng Yiming was standing there.
He didn't go to the registrar's office; instead, he was talking to a girl with his back to me. The girl was wearing an apricot-colored down jacket and had her hair in a high ponytail. Her profile was so familiar that my heart skipped a beat—it was Zhou Manqi.
My former best friend.
In our first year of high school, she would link her arm with mine and say, "I'll always be on your side," while secretly slipping the note I wrote to Zheng Yiming to Li Zichen, watching him read it aloud in public for his amusement. When Li Zichen spread rumors about me, she would hypocritically comfort me, but then turn around and tell others, "Shen Zhixia was never innocent." Even when Zheng Yiming and I had our first falling out, she would go to Zheng Yiming and say, "Zhixia is just too sensitive, you should be more tolerant of her," but then she would tell me, "Zheng Yiming doesn't care about you at all."
Later, she transferred to a school in a neighboring city, and I thought I would never cross paths with her again. Unexpectedly, she came back.
What startled me even more was Zheng Yiming's action—he turned his head to listen to Zhou Manqi speak, a faint smile playing on his lips, a relaxed demeanor I hadn't seen in a long time. Zhou Manqi raised her hand, seemingly to brush the snow off his shoulder, but he didn't flinch. Instead, he lowered his head slightly, letting her fingertips fall on his down jacket.
That scene was like an icicle, piercing my eyes so hard I couldn't open them.
My fingers gripped the paper so tightly they turned white, the edges of the paper digging painfully into my palm. No wonder he kept saying he had "something to do" these past two weeks, no wonder he kept postponing the deadline for submitting the materials, no wonder there was always an inexplicable evasiveness in his eyes when he looked at me—it wasn't just my imagination.
The wind in the corridor suddenly turned exceptionally cold, making me shiver. I wanted to rush down and confront him, but my feet seemed nailed to the spot, unable to move. My mind was buzzing like countless bees, shattering my self-righteous "understanding" and "peace."
He wasn't getting close; he was acting.
He wasn't hesitating; he was weighing his options.
His so-called "moving forward together" never included me in his only future plans.
"Zhi Xia? What are you doing standing here?"
Zheng Yiming's voice suddenly rang out behind me, tinged with a barely perceptible panic. I turned around and looked at him. There was indeed no snow on his shoulders, but there was a faint apricot-colored stain on the shoulder seam of his down jacket—it had come from Zhou Manyi's down jacket.
"Didn't you go to the registrar's office?" My voice was soft, but it carried an icy edge.
"Oh... I ran into Zhou Manqi at the stairwell. She asked me about the competition, so we chatted for a bit." He explained naturally, but his eyes seemed a little unfocused. "She just transferred back and was assigned to our class. We'll be classmates from now on."
"Classmate?" I laughed, my throat tightening with laughter. "Just a classmate?"
His expression changed slightly: "Zhi Xia, what do you mean?"
"It's nothing." I handed him the paper I was holding. "Go get your own materials. I'm not feeling well, I'm going home now."
"Zhi Xia!" He reached out to pull me, but I dodged him.
I turned and headed towards the stairwell, my steps quick as if I were fleeing. As I passed the second floor, Zhou Manqi was leaning against the railing, playing on her phone. When she saw me, she looked up, a meaningful smile playing on her lips, as if she were showing off some trophy.
I didn't look at her, but went straight downstairs and rushed into the swirling snow. Snowflakes landed on my face, melting into icy water that mixed with my tears and streamed down my cheeks.
When I got home, I locked myself in my room. On my desk was the ginkgo bookmark Zheng Yiming had given me; the words "The light is always there, and so are you" on the back now seemed like a huge joke. I grabbed the bookmark and threw it forcefully into the corner, making a crisp sound.
The phone kept ringing; it was Zheng Yiming calling, along with his messages: "Zhi Xia, let me explain," "Zhou Manqi and I really have nothing going on," "You're overthinking it."
Are you overthinking it?
As I looked at those messages, I suddenly remembered that in my first year of high school, Zhou Manyi did the same thing, holding my arm while stabbing me in the back. And Zheng Yiming, he knew all of this, knew what Zhou Manyi had done to me, yet he could still stand with her without a care in the world, smiling as he accepted her affection.
This is not negligence, it is betrayal.
It is a deliberate act of harm.
That evening, Lin Xi and Meng Meng came to see me, bringing my favorite strawberry cake. Seeing my swollen eyes, Lin Xi immediately exploded: "Did that brat Zheng Yiming bully you? I told you he'd been acting strange lately; people keep seeing him going to the cafeteria with Zhou Manqi!"
“Zhou Manqi is still talking badly about you behind your back,” Meng Meng said angrily. “She said that you were able to get first place only because Zheng Yiming helped you, and that you are not good enough for him at all.”
It turns out everyone knew, but I was the only one who was kept in the dark like a fool, still being moved by his ambiguous tenderness.
"Why did he do this?" I hugged my knees, my voice hoarse like a broken gong. "He knew what Zhou Manqi had done to me, he knew I hate betrayal the most..."
“Maybe he didn’t take any of that seriously at all,” Lin Xi sighed, patting my back. “Or maybe he never really understood how much pain you were in.”
Yes, he doesn't understand.
He doesn't understand what it feels like to be betrayed by the person you trust most, he doesn't understand the pain of biting your blanket and crying in the dead of night, he doesn't understand how much effort I spent to get out of those shadows. He only thinks it's "something from the past," that "I'm too sensitive," but he doesn't know that some hurts can never be forgotten.
The next day at school, I deliberately avoided the route I usually took with Zheng Yiming. When I entered the classroom, Zhou Manyi was sitting in the empty seat next to Zheng Yiming, holding a physics workbook in her hand, smiling innocently: "Yiming, can you explain this problem to me again? I still don't understand."
Zheng Yiming lowered his head and patiently drew a force diagram for her, his profile appearing exceptionally gentle in the sunlight.
That scene stung my eyes like needles. I walked to my seat expressionlessly, put down my bag, and took out my textbooks, as if they were just two insignificant potted plants in the corner of the classroom.
Zheng Yiming looked up, his gaze falling on me with a complex emotion. I didn't look at him, opened my physics book, and traced the formula for "conservation of momentum" with my fingertips, but I couldn't concentrate on reading a single word.
We didn't say a word all day.
He came to find me during break, and I pretended to be discussing a problem with Lin Xi; he put hot milk in my desk drawer, and I returned it without touching it; when school ended, he blocked the door, and I walked around him and left with Meng Meng.
During Wednesday's physics competition tutoring session, the teacher had us form groups for discussion. Zheng Yiming walked up to me and said in a low voice, "Zhixia, let's talk."
"There's nothing to talk about." I packed my things, stood up, and said, "I've already been assigned to a different group."
"Shen Zhixia!" He grabbed my wrist with terrifying force, his eyes churning with emotion, as if about to overflow. "Do you have to do this? Zhou Manqi and I really are just..."
"Just what?" I interrupted him, raised my head, looked directly into his eyes, and said in a voice as calm as still water, "Just laughing and talking with her at the stairwell while I was waiting for you? Just letting her touch you without flinching? Just treating her like an 'ordinary classmate' after she's betrayed me countless times?"
His face gradually paled, his lips moved, but he couldn't utter a single word of explanation.
“Zheng Yiming,” I gently pulled my hand away from his and said, word by word, “What disgusts me most about you is not being with her, but that you chose her even though you knew what she had done to me. This isn’t making friends; it’s telling me that my pain, my past, everything I care about, is utterly insignificant in your eyes.”
After saying that, I turned and left without looking back.
The wind in the corridor was still cold, but the ice in my heart seemed to have frozen completely at that moment, and would never melt again because of his actions.
During the afternoon class meeting, the homeroom teacher announced something: "Zhou Manyi just transferred back and hasn't been assigned a seat yet. Zheng Yiming suggested that she sit next to him. Does anyone have any objections?"
No one spoke. Zheng Yiming sat in his seat, staring at me intently, as if waiting for something.
I raised my hand and said clearly, "I have a problem with this."
All eyes in the class were on me. I stood up, looked at the homeroom teacher, and also at Zheng Yiming, and said, word by word, "Zhou Manyi once maliciously spread rumors about me, causing me great harm. I cannot accept being in the same study group as her, and I do not want her to sit so close to me."
Zheng Yiming abruptly raised his head, his eyes filled with shock and disbelief. Zhou Manyi's face turned pale instantly, her lips trembling, but she couldn't utter a single word in rebuttal.
The homeroom teacher paused for a moment, then nodded: "Okay, then let's rearrange the seats again."
As I sat down, I felt a burning gaze on my back; it was Zheng Yiming. I didn't turn around, but opened my notebook and wrote on the first page: "Never wrong yourself for someone who isn't worth it."
As school let out, the snow started falling again. Lin Xi, Meng Meng, and I walked out of the school building side by side when Zheng Yiming suddenly caught up from behind and blocked our way.
"Zhi Xia, do you have to be so ruthless?" His voice was filled with suppressed anger. "Couldn't you... leave me some room for maneuver?"
“Give me a chance?” I looked at him and suddenly laughed. “When you stood with Zhou Manyi, did you leave me any room for maneuver? When you accepted her intimacy, did you think about my feelings? Zheng Yiming, you're the one who drove yourself into a dead end first.”
He looked at me, his eyes filled with pain and struggle, like a wild beast trapped in the snow. "My relationship with her... isn't what you think."
"What it is doesn't matter anymore." I walked past him and continued forward. "From now on, you are you, and I am me. We owe each other nothing."
Snowflakes landed on his shoulders, quickly accumulating into a thin layer. He stood there, not chasing after them, like a statue abandoned in the snow.
I didn't turn around.
Some roads, once you choose the wrong direction, you can never turn back. Some people, once they betray you, are never worth forgiving.
The snow fell heavier and heavier, quickly covering the footprints behind me. I held Linxi and Mengmeng's hands and walked forward step by step. Our footprints crunched in the snow, as if we were saying a final goodbye to our past selves.
True letting go isn't about forgiving, it's about not caring.
I don't care who he's with, I don't care if he regrets it, I don't care about the past feelings of attraction and hurt.
Just like this land covered in white snow, no matter how many traces it has left, it will eventually return to peace, and then when spring comes, new hope will grow.
And in my hopes, Zheng Yiming will never be there again.
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