How does it compare to the library in your mind
His expression was still as lazy and indifferent as when we first met, and even the curve at one corner of his mouth seemed cynical.
In her memory, he was a man of few words, and rarely said anything serious or solemn. However, his light and joking words left a mark in her heart, word by word, and were as valuable as gold.
Gu Jianian blinked away the tears in his eyes, smiled and nodded at Chi Yan: "It's better than I thought, a million times better."
It was so good that she was only worried that she might not be able to reach it.
Next, Chi Yan took her to visit all six floors of the library for the entire morning.
From literature to art, from basic science collections to the latest scientific journals.
Every field and every profession is filled with heavy texts and books.
He didn't ask her any more questions, nor did he talk to her, as if he wanted to leave all this time for her to feel things on her own.
Gu Jianian looked at it quietly, touched it with his fingertips, and breathed in the smell of wood pulp and ink emanating from the books and papers, without saying a word.
But some thoughts that have been chaotic since adolescence have gradually been split into clear cracks.
She felt as if the seven-year-old Gu Jianian had been resurrected.
The child whose eyes were filled with desire and innocence opened her eyes again from the depths of her corrupt soul.
For the first time, she felt her heartbeat revived by something that could be called a dream, and her breathing became rapid due to desire.
For the first time, I was thinking proactively.
The meaning of reading.
The significance of the exam.
The meaning of hard work.
"If you don't do well in the exam, you will have to live in the basement and eat instant noodles, and you won't be able to support yourself."
"You have to study hard and get into a good high school and a good university, so that you can find a stable job and live the rest of your life in peace."
“Only by reading good books can you survive.”
not like this.
Thoughts were like the morning sun that dispelled the darkness, and Gu Jianian suddenly remembered Chi Yan's words.
“Living is not our purpose; how we want to live our life is the purpose.”
She didn't study just to survive, nor did she study because of their expectations and constraints.
She wanted to be able to use her own campus card to swipe through this gate one day, sit here upright like them, read the books she wanted to read, and learn the knowledge she wanted to learn.
She wants to be able to pursue a career that she supports and do what she loves freely every day for the rest of her life.
Reading should never be such a passive and painful thing.
*
By the time they came out of the library, it was already noon.
The clock tower struck twelve o'clock, clear and pleasant to the ears, exactly twelve times.
After classes, students filed out of the teaching buildings of various majors, some on foot or on bicycles, and headed in groups to the cafeteria at the other end of the huge campus.
The quiet campus began to boil.
Chi Yan walked down the steps of the library, turned around, and saw the little girl following him with a tense face.
There is emotion, struggle and thought in the eyes, like a turbulent undercurrent.
He slowly stretched out his hand and waved it in front of her eyes, jokingly saying, "Let's go, I'm starving. And you said I'm a vampire, I don't think you're any worse."