Meng Shang worked as Jiang Ruoqi's tutor for the entire winter break. Even though a senior's winter break is basically just a spring break, and after the Spring Festival it's the most critical time for sprinting toward the college entrance exam. Their classrooms were two floors apart, but at this point it felt like they were on opposite ends of the world. Not only did they not have time for dedicated chats or meetings, they didn't even have the chance to bump into each other.
On the 100-day rally day, Jiang Ruoqi rarely participated actively in school activities. When Meng Shang stood beside his mother making his pledge, she was right behind him. Perhaps his focused gaze was especially intense. Sensing something, Meng Shang turned around and saw Jiang Ruoqi pretending not to know him, cheerfully handing him a bottle of AD calcium and wishing him a bright future.
In June, the college entrance exam came. Meng Shang performed normally. After estimating his scores—confident that he could get into Xinhai University's Medical School—he started tutoring Jiang Ruoqi in physics and math as a part-time job, claiming it was to prepare for the academic proficiency exam. The intensity of the tutoring was so high that Jiang Ruoqi sometimes thought Meng Shang really wanted her to switch from liberal arts to science. But physics was her lifelong nemesis; she couldn't even tell which theorem to use for which hand, and most of the time she dozed off listening to Meng Shang's pleasant voice. Sometimes half-awake, scribbling nonsense on the paper, she would think: if they replaced their nearly retired, bald physics teacher with Meng Shang, the overall failure rate might be even higher—because with a voice like that, it was way too easy to fall asleep.
That summer, Meng Shang was admitted to Xinhai University as he had hoped. But on the day he received the acceptance letter, he wasn't very excited. He heard that his parents were both busy with work, just as busy as Jiang Yun. He had lived with his grandmother throughout high school. With no one to share the news with, he made an appointment with Jiang Ruoqi at the library as usual. But who would have thought that a third party would show up? Meng Shang's childhood friend Su Yansheng had been quietly observing Meng Shang for a long time. When the two were buying water at a convenience store, he caught them red-handed. Su Yansheng and Meng Shang were polar opposites in personality—lively, impulsive, and quite gossipy, unlike Meng Shang's reserved and subtle nature. He kept hovering around them like a 500-watt light bulb, asking Jiang Ruoqi how they had met, then turning to Meng Shang with a cheeky grin, demanding to know exactly what his relationship with Jiang Ruoqi was. Jiang Ruoqi smiled silently and looked at Meng Shang, while Meng Shang avoided the topic, disgustedly pushing the sweaty head away.
And so their secret "meeting" turned into a three-person party. Although Su Yansheng was useless, only eating and causing trouble, it was the most relaxed and joyful holiday Jiang Ruoqi had experienced in years. It was a period she would often miss when she was exhausted and weary in Gangcheng, a memory that sustained her through her bitter days.
The year before Meng Shang left for Xinhai University, the three of them gathered together, sitting on the concrete edge of a flower bed in the park. Everyone felt some melancholy. Meng Shang was going to Xinhai, Su Yansheng was admitted to a university in Shenzhen, and Jiang Ruoqi was preparing to apply to universities in Hong Kong. Three people, three cities—this diluted the teenagers' anticipation for their new lives with the sorrow of parting. After all, at their age, they had never experienced separation. They didn't know if they would make new friends in the future, but they had to completely part from their old ones.
Jiang Ruoqi remembered that day, the sunset hung extremely slowly. Summer evening cicadas chirped loudly. A perfectly round sun hung at the edge of the sky, emitting a soft, not-morning-like light, casting a sky full of rosy clouds. She sat beside Meng Shang, knees together, elbows on her knees, propping up her chin as she zoned out. Meng Shang looked at her, then at Su Yansheng, who was uncharacteristically silent. For a moment, he too couldn't find words.
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