When she was nine years old, Lin Qile read Tada Kaoru's "Mischievous Kiss" on the way to school. She thought that if she were to write a love letter to someone, there would be only one person.
She wanted to write to the person who was good to her, who cared and loved her, not someone like Naoki Irie who would make Kotoko Aihara a laughing stock.
"Why did you write him a love letter? What were you thinking about?" Qin Yeyun asked excitedly on the phone. It was clearly not her business, but she was inexplicably ashamed and angry. "Now everyone in the class is passing your letter around. How many sheets of paper did you write? Dushan grabbed one and took it back—"
Lin Qile said: "I didn't write a love letter..."
"You haven't written the love letter yet?" Qin Yeyun yelled, "I heard it all in the fourth shift. Jiang Qiaoxi and you have a daughter named 'Jiang Chunlu' at the construction site? Did you write it, Jiang Chunlu? How dare you—"
Lin Qile was confused.
Children who have just entered puberty, every pore is expressing their infinite desire for the adult world, as well as their newly sprouted, tender and fragile self-esteem and shame. Just as Qin Yeyun continued to curse at Lin Qile, Lin Qile suddenly asked: "Where is Jiang Qiaoxi?"
"What Jiang Qiaoxi?"
"I wrote a letter to him." Lin Qile said.
Qin Yeyun said angrily: "How should I know! I went to their class to look for him, but they just made a fuss and didn't tell me where Jiang Qiaoxi was!"
Mom and Dad came back from get off work. After dinner, Lin Qile sat on her little bed and hugged Bobby Elf in her arms. She repeatedly recalled what Qin Yeyun said, but still didn't quite understand. She was thinking about whether to call Dushan and ask what happened in their school.
Everything far away in the provincial capital seemed to be closely related to Lin Qile's concerns, but it was completely beyond her imagination.
Just then, the phone in the living room suddenly rang.
My mother answered the phone in the living room and said in surprise, "It's Manager Cai!"
The little bit of fantasy that appeared in Lin Qile's mind burst like a soap bubble without leaving a trace.
"Cherry? Cherry is at home... What's wrong?"
Mother Lin asked a few questions and handed the receiver to Father Lin. The call lasted more than 20 minutes. Lin Qile sat in her mosquito net, hugging her knees and not moving, when suddenly her father pushed the door open from outside.
"Cherry," Dad said softly, "Have you finished your homework?"
Dad never asked this kind of question before. Lin Qile answered: "Not yet."
Dad smiled and said, "When you finish writing, come out and eat the fruit that Mom has cut for you."
The door was closed, and nothing else seemed unusual.
Lin Qile lay in bed at night, tossing and turning, unable to sleep. She had some secrets that she only wanted to tell Jiang Qiaoxi, and couldn't tell Yu Qiao and the others. Yu Qiao would laugh at her various ideas. Only Jiang Qiaoxi was nice to her, and there should be a difference between her and Jiang Qiaoxi.
Qin Yeyun said on the phone: "Jiang Qiaoxi acts as if he doesn't know us when he sees us at school now. Do you think he still remembers you?"
The sky was dark over the mountains, and Lin Qile sat up from his bed and looked at the evergreen on the windowsill. Barbie, dressed up in a gorgeous evening gown, sat at the head of Lin Qile's bed.
Mom and Dad hadn't gotten up yet. Lin Qile came to the backyard in her nightgown. She walked to the empty, cold rabbit cage and sat down on the steps.
Lin Qile looked up at the gray sky.
Time passed and the sky began to brighten. Lin Qile combed her two ponytails and ate the breakfast made by her mother. She put on her school uniform, carried her schoolbag, and got on the bus to Qunshan Middle School, which was also the bus to Qunshan City Long-distance Bus Station. Lin Qile held the New Year's money in her hand and made up her mind.
The long-distance bus was bumpy on the road. It took nearly seven hours to get from Qunshan City to the provincial capital. Lin Qile bought a ticket by the window. She sat alone by the window with her schoolbag. She looked out at the late autumn fields. The only thing in her mind was the phone call from Qin Yeyun yesterday, and the things that happened around her every day since she had been separated from everyone for nearly a year.
She was lonely and didn't know where to go except school.
The unfamiliar term "provincial capital" always unconsciously sucked away everything beautiful around Lin Qile. From brother Chen Minghao, sister Zheng Xiaochen... to Jiang Qiaoxi, to Yu Qiao, Du Shang, Cai Fangyuan... whatever she liked, the "provincial capital" would take away.
This long-distance bus departed from Qunshan at 8 a.m., and when Lin Qile bought the ticket, she lied to the ticket seller. She said her father was at the back and had not arrived yet, and she arrived first, so she wanted to buy her own ticket and get on the bus.
At 5pm, the train arrived at the provincial capital terminal. Lin Qile followed an uncle on the same train and got off the train pretending to be a daughter. She waved goodbye to the conductor.
In the past, no matter how many times he had "adventures" in the mountains, or went deep into the mountains and jungles with his friends, Lin Qile had never come to such a remote place as the provincial capital by himself.
She was carrying a schoolbag, walking in the crowd and looking at the crowded people around her and the skyscrapers that reached the sky on all sides. Lin Qile walked to the bus stop and looked up at the map.
With change in hand, she boarded a bus bound for the Experimental High School Affiliated to the provincial capital.
Maybe I will see Jiang Qiaoxi soon, as well as Yu Qiao, Du Shang, Cai Fangyuan and Qin Yeyun... Lin Qile sat by the window, looking at the unfamiliar streets of the provincial capital. This is where Jiang Qiaoxi grew up, and this is the city where Yu Qiao and others are living.
Lin Qile didn't know what time the Experimental High School in the provincial capital would end. When the bus arrived, she got off. When passing by a clothing store on the roadside, Lin Qile looked at the window glass for a while, looking at the red and white school uniform of Qunshan No. 1 High School on her body. The uniform was washed very clean. She took off the strawberry hairpin, combed her long hair with her hands, and then tied two ponytails.
Lin Qile has grown taller and thinner than when he was in elementary school. His round face now has a small chin, and his eyes look bigger.
Several students, wearing blue and white school uniforms, walked past Lin Qile, holding magazines in their hands and chatting and laughing.
"Did Jiang Qiaoxi really go to the countryside before? I heard that he went to elementary school in Hong Kong. How come he went to the countryside again—"
"It's not the countryside, it's a small city called Qunshan."
"Jiang Qiaoxi transferred here from Hong Kong in the first grade of elementary school. Felinger in Class 1 was his classmate. You can find out if you ask him!"
"Does Felinger know about that girl named Lin?"
"Of course I don't know!"
"Jiang Qiaoxi is so unlucky. He went to the countryside with his parents to study, and was pestered by a country girl—"
Lin Qile looked at her face in the window. On the chest of her red and white school uniform, the words "Qunshan City No. 1 Middle School" were printed.
Those students gradually walked away, and new students kept coming.
The nearby middle school seemed to have finished classes.
"Are Jiang Qiaoxi and Cen Xiaoman together?"
"I heard that Cen Xiaoman has liked Jiang Qiaoxi for a long time, but Jiang Qiaoxi doesn't like her."
"No way, they go home from school together every day, they look so good."
"Anyway, I see Jiang Qiaoxi ignores everyone and doesn't even smile at Cen Xiaoman."
"He won't let you see his smiling face—"
Lin Qile went against the flow of people leaving school and walked in the direction where her peers were coming from. From time to time, laughter brushed past her ears.
Countryside. Mountains. Jiang Qiaoxi. Cen Xiaoman.
Only then did Lin Qile understand a little bit why Qin Yeyun called her so excitedly yesterday.
She seemed to have done something very bad.
"When the head teacher of Class 1 learned about this, he was so anxious that he called Jiang Qiaoxi to his office this morning—"
"I heard that Cen Xiaoman was crying in the girls' bathroom during class break, and several girls surrounded her to comfort her. Could it be that Jiang Qiaoxi really has a daughter in the countryside?"
"You think too much. I just passed by the entrance of Class 1 after school and saw Cen Xiaoman still waiting for Jiang Qiaoxi to pack her schoolbag and go home—"
…
At the gate of Provincial Experimental High School.
Lin Qile walked to the gate of the school, where students were pouring out of the school. Some of them were laughing and joking, while others glanced at Lin Qile, looked at her school uniform, and then walked away indifferently. Lin Qile looked inside the campus and saw a plastic track that was almost twice as big as that of Qunshan No. 1 Middle School, and a public telephone booth at the edge of the track.
"Yu Qiao! Wait for me!"
A boy anxiously ran past Lin Qile and brushed past her.
When Lin Qile heard the voice, she was stunned at first. She turned around and saw the boy running madly. Although he was wearing an unfamiliar school uniform, Lin Qile recognized him at a glance.
However, Duchamp did not recognize Lin Qile. He did not look at anyone, and ran out of breath to the road outside the school, running towards the newsstand.
A dozen tall boys were gathered around the newsstand. Some were buying water, some were eating popsicles, and only one boy was using a pay phone.
Seeing Dushan passing by, he stretched out his hand to Dushan, and Dushan gave him a handful of change.
Lin Qile looked at him.
It’s Yu Qiao.
Maybe there were too many strangers around, and Yu Qiao and Du Shang were wearing the same school uniforms as the strangers. Lin Qile wanted to walk over, but his feet stayed where they were.
"Jiang Qiaoxi, did the head teacher say anything to you?"
A boy's voice came from the sky, right behind Lin Qile.
"There's a competition the day after tomorrow. He can't possibly cause you trouble now."
"Teacher Liu didn't cause any trouble to Jiang Qiaoxi," the girl's voice continued, soft and pleasant to the ear, "She just asked about the letter."
"What's there to ask?" said the first boy. "That woman's letter is just nonsense. What does it have to do with Jiang Qiaoxi?"
A group of people walked past Lin Qile, and Lin Qile quietly raised his head and took a look.
Many people gathered around the boy, and everyone was talking, except for that boy who was unusually quiet. He was wearing the same blue and white school uniform as the others, and he had grown taller, much taller than Lin Qile remembered, and he looked a little unrecognizable.
"Jiang Qiaoxi..." Lin Qile called out his name unconsciously.