They finally found out, on her eighteenth birthday.
Gu Jianian had been living in fear and trepidation since before the college entrance examination, waiting for the truth to be revealed.
Even checking messages every day is a torture.
But more than a month has passed, and her life in Yunmo has been calm. Neither her Chinese teacher, her class teacher, nor her parents have sent her any message.
It was as if this secret would be buried forever along with her life in Yunmo.
Her parents' disgusted looks were like a doomsday hurricane, sucking her into the vortex of time and returning her to the last day of school before the college entrance examination.
The day she had been trying to avoid, not wanting or daring to recall.
That evening, during the first evening self-study class, Gu Jianian escaped from the suffocating classroom under the pretext of making up lessons as usual, and hid on the abandoned rooftop on the top floor of the teaching building with his schoolbag on his back.
The evening breeze that day was as bleak yet free as usual.
The huge senior high school building was brightly lit, and everyone was studying furiously to prepare for the college entrance exam. She was the only one on the rooftop.
Gu Jianian sat down with his back against the concrete wall, hiding himself in the shadow of the fence, and tremblingly lit the cigarette hidden in his sleeve.
The cigarettes were the cheapest kind bought by someone else, and the smell of the low-quality tobacco was very pungent.
But strangely, only this smell can gradually calm her down.
She let it burn in circles like this, thinking vaguely that the college entrance examination would be held in a few days.
How wonderful, unbelievably wonderful.
She finally made it to this point, she did it.
These endless days are really coming to an end.
She could finally escape from her parents, this suffocating school, and this cold city.
By then she would quit smoking and go to college far away from Beilin.
She can grow her hair long and wear pretty dresses as she wishes; find a part-time job in a bookstore and read her favorite books until late at night; make new like-minded friends, eat the ice cream she wants together, and go to the KTV and cinema that her parents never let her go to.
Then start again step by step and try to live a dignified and free life.
The cigarette butt collapsed into a scarlet dot, like a firefly flickering its wings in the dark night.
Gu Jianian's imagination was endless like this until he heard the sound of footsteps in the corridor that made his scalp tingle.
She was startled and looked back in panic, praying in her heart that it was just a student who came to get some fresh air occasionally.
But the person who walked in from the stairs was her Chinese teacher.
Among all the teachers, he was the friendliest to her.
Gu Jianian's heart skipped a beat and she quickly hid the half-burned cigarette butt in her palm. The hot sparks burned blisters on her palm.
Although she moved quickly, the Chinese teacher still saw it.
She walked over step by step, and when she smelled the smoke that had not yet dissipated on the rooftop, she took a breath and her face suddenly turned pale.
She looked at Gu Jianian's pale face and ruthlessly pried open her fingers one by one, her tone full of disbelief and utter disappointment.
"Gu Jianian, I originally thought that although your grades were poor, you were still a good kid. I didn't expect that you lied and said you were going to cram school and skipped evening self-study just to hide here and smoke? This is Lin High School, the top high school in Beilin with the strictest school rules and regulations. Do you know what the consequences will be if you are caught smoking in school? At the worst, you will be expelled, at the worst, you will be persuaded to drop out, not to mention that you skipped classes for a month!"