Time Passed Us By - Chapter 4

Song Jianan was distracted by the rapidly spinning electric fan in the classroom. Her pen’s mathematical symbols turned into naughty music notes, shaking restlessly. She felt dizzy and a very annoying song rang in her ears, which she couldn’t get rid of.

Suddenly, in the silent classroom, everyone’s thoughts were interrupted by “Report!”. The voice was hushed and low, but it surprisingly wiped out the strange music in Song Jianan’s ear. There was an inexplicable sadness, but it made people feel at ease. She looked up and saw the boy in front of her stood up. He asked, “Teacher, can I borrow a small ruler?”

The invigilate came over from behind, picked up the small ruler on Song Jianan’s desk, and handed it to him. Song Jianan was startled. She then lowered her head to write and draw on her scratch paper, but her mind was on the person in front of him.

After a while, the ruler was returned through its original path. The sound of plastic and wood touching each other brought Song Janan back to her senses, and his pair of slender fingers were retracted. All that she could see was the back.

She held the small ruler, took a deep breath, and began to solve the problem seriously.

The last two big questions were the teacher’s trump card. Song Jianan lay helplessly on the table, full of resentment. It would be fine if he used such difficult questions to test Einstein, but would it really give him a sense of accomplishment when he uses them to test us?

Forget it, even if she didn’t do it, she would still get the basic points. It seemed like the summer review plan had helped out. She decided to check the test carefully from beginning to end. She looked up accidentally and saw Su Li holding his head and staring out the window in a daze.

The sky in early autumn was very blue, the kind of bright and deep blue. Large flakes of clouds were piled together thickly, changing and flowing swiftly in the sky, just like the endless cotton candy children ate, every bit of sweetness was a little joy.

It turned out that he was looking at this. Song Jianan laughed softly and withdrew her gaze from the beautiful scenery, but inadvertently saw that a large part of Su Li’s math test paper was exposed, and the last big question was presented in front of her eyes, clear as day.

She was startled and quickly lowered her head, fearing that the invigilator sitting at the back would come up and knock on her desk. But she couldn’t help wanting to see how the auxiliary line was drawn. Based on her first impression of his paper, she tried writing and drawing on scratch paper and actually found out a general idea.

Su Li still had the same look, with his chin slightly raised and staring out the window silently, as if no one else was around.

He was always the first to leave the class, carrying his schoolbag without saying a word. Even if someone came up to him and wanted to discuss answers with him, he would just respond calmly, “I’m not sure,” “It might be like this, why don’t you try asking someone else,” or “We already took the test so let’s forget about it and prepare well for the next one. If your mood is affected, your performance will be affected.”

Song Jianan looked at him and suddenly felt very sad from the bottom of her heart. She began to hate her inferiority and timidity. Su Li was sitting in front of her, but she didn’t have the courage to ask him questions about the test: “What did you choose for the sixth multiple-choice question?”

She could only secretly watch him from behind, the way he held the pen, his dazed look, and the contented look on his face when he closed his eyes.

The three-day placement exam completely wilted these children who had been playing all around during summer vacation. The whole class was lifeless. The head teacher and subject teachers took turns to educate them earnestly, and the pressure of the college entrance examination ensued.

Song Jinan was worried about her rapid progress in math. The math teacher praised her in front of the class, and many people looked at her with surprise and a little suspicion. Only Duan Jiachen smiled and took credit, “It’s all because of the hard work I fed her over the summer.”

Zhang Jingkang who was on the side smiled a little forcedly, “Duan Jiachen, why don’t you give me extra lessons? Song Jianan is very good at liberal arts. Now her rank would be if not first then second. What should poor and lower-middle peasants like us do?”

Duan Juchen made a face, but laughed, “You didn’t tell me. Besides, Song Jianan also helps me with my English. We call this reciprocity.”

Zhang Jingkang pouted her lips, “Oh, childhood sweethearts are just different. By the way, y’all didn’t have an engagement when y’all were young, right?”

Both of them were stunned. The people around them immediately burst into laughter. Song Jianan’s face turned red and tugged Zhang Jingkang’s hand, her voice slightly raised, “Zhang Jingkang, what are you talking about? Duan Jiachen and I are just friends.”

Duan Juchen also looked embarrassed, “Don’t talk nonsense. Zhang Jingkang, if you need extra math lessons, come to me, don’t make trouble for no reason.”

At this time, the head teacher walked in, and the sharp-eyed people shouted, “Oh, the head teacher is here. Be careful, I heard that the teacher wants to discuss with our parents recently.”

All of a sudden, everyone ran back to their seats. Duan Jiachen smiled helplessly at Song Jianan, and she smiled back.

Such a high math score was not her actual level. Many of the questions were taken from the summer math study plan, and the last big question was completely answered from that “glimpse”.

As fate would have it, she actually ranked second in the class. She shook her head helplessly, and now she could no longer cheat away.

Song Jianan was alone in the office, counting the Chinese test scores. The air conditioner made her drowsy. In order to avoid falling asleep, she stood up and walked around from time to time. The teacher’s office was a standard cubicle, like a small secret room. She looked around and saw a stack of test papers on the desk of the Chinese teacher of Class 8. She was curious and slowly flipped through them, feeling inexplicably expectant.

She finally found the familiar name she had wished to see– Su Li, with a score that was neither good nor bad. It seemed that Chinese was not his strength, but it was much better than Duan Jiachen’s. Although his composition was indeed far-fetched and tasteless, his handwriting was very beautiful, strong yet delicate. The blue-black pen words were light in color, clear and steady, charming yet not flashy.

Who would insist on using a fountain pen during an exam in this day and age? Song Jianan couldn’t help but smile. Su Li was really a special person.

She quickly scanned the clutter on the teacher’s desk, and one printed paper on the wall caught her attention. She looked closer and found that it was the contact information of the student representatives. The first one was Su Li’s name and his home phone number.

Song Jianan’s heart moved, and she suddenly felt a little unexpected joy. She looked out the window nervously. It had been a while since school was over, and no one would pass by. She stared at the number for a long time before she managed to remember it, but she still felt uneasy, so she grabbed a pen and quickly wrote it down on her wrist. She checked it over and over again until she was willing to leave.

It felt like grabbing two or three more candies from her mother’s candy jar when she was a kid, thrilling and exciting, with feelings of shock and happiness after success. She pushed the bike out of the campus alone, the number on her wrist flickered under the streetlight, Song Jianan took a deep breath, and a smile slowly bloomed on her face.

Even if she got his number, what could she do? He didn’t know her.

But it seemed like this brought him a lot closer.

After returning home and finishing dinner, Song Jianan’s father went to his office to practice calligraphy, and Song Jianan brought a plate of freshly cut apples into her room. She opened her schoolbag, dragged out a mess of various exercise books, and spread them on the table. She read a few pages but lost interest, and her eyes moved to the phone number in the secret place she had carefully memorized.

Suddenly, the volume of the TV in the living room became very loud. Song Jianan heard that it was a weekend entertainment program broadcast by the provincial TV station. There was a star who was being punished for playing games innocently. The hosts had to make themselves funny to please the audience, but also couldn’t anger the star. Song Jianan then remembered that Su Li’s sister Su Jin was the host of this entertainment program and that she had the highest ratings in the province.

She quickly took her cup of water out. Mother Song was lying on the sofa leisurely watching TV. When she saw her come out, she asked unhappily, “What are you doing out here?”

“Oh, just drinking some water.” Her eyes swept across the TV. The beautiful host in white clothes and with a sweet smile was announcing the rules of the game. The camera gave her a close-up. At first glance, she looked like Su Li, especially the face shape, which was exactly the same.

Her heart skipped two beats and she hurriedly lowered her head and went into the kitchen. Behind her, she could hear her mother shouting, “If you want to drink some water, just let me know and I’ll pour it for you. When you’re done, go back and study hard. Don’t think you can be careless just because you did well on the test this time.”

Song Jianan slowly filled the glass with water, and when she returned to her room, she looked at the TV again, but there was no more footage of Su Jin. Under the constant urging of her mother, she reluctantly returned to her room to continue reading.

But her mind was not on the book at all. She lay on the bed, put on headphones, and listened to the light and lingering sounds of the violin, strands of silk threads entangled, and crystal clear notes, like water droplets falling through a net and rolling all over the floor. Then, a slightly sad female voice sounded, “I’m sailing on this terrible ocean, I’ve come for myself to retrieve…” Song Jianan sat up and turned on the bedside lamp, watching the dim light flow quietly in her room with the deep night, the night also rippling like water.

The longing from the bottom of her heart was aroused, entangled in strands, and as sour as first love.

Suddenly remembering the campus BBS that was mentioned a long time ago, she immediately turned on the computer without hesitation, plugged in the telephone line, and watched the digital light on the screen change. At that time, the Internet had just emerged. QQ, which now occupies almost every computer, was unknown at that time. Most of the internet trendsetters were mixed in major forums or campus BBS. However, it was this sporadic maintenance that made Song Jianan miss the young boy who was out of reach from her heart.

Opening the campus BBS, there were quite a few members and visitors. She quickly registered an ID and clicked into the Listening to Heavenly Sounds section. Sure enough, a long list of posts were all posted by Su Li. Not many people paid attention to his posts, and there were very few clicks and replies, but he still posted songs and wrote his own stories seriously.

His avatar was lit, indicating that he was online. In a moment of impulse, she clicked “Send a note” and typed a line of words on the keyboard without much hesitation: I like Sinead O’connor very much, and I also like Lisa Ono, what about you?

Sent to Su Li who was on the other side of the network.

After waiting for a long time and getting no reply, she curled the corners of her lips helplessly. This was a deliberately found topic. No one knew each other on the Internet. It was like sending it to the wrong person. Maybe Su Li would just take a look at it and delete it without asking any questions.

Falling in love with someone who you have never spoken to for no reason like her is what people call having a secret crush.

She buried her face in her arms, not daring to look at the computer screen, but mechanically refreshing the page. Unexpectedly, a gentle female voice came from the speaker: “You have new messages, please check.” She was surprised to find that it was actually him. In the reply, he wrote: Lisa Ono is okay, but I have been listening to Sinead O’Connor recently, and I like him very much. Most Irish singers are very soulful. Many of my posts have lots of songs from Irish singers. You can go and look at them. I hope you will like them.

Song Jianan stared blankly for a while, not believing her eyes. She thought about it but didn’t know what to say, so she just smiled foolishly. The dim light and the moonlight outside the window intertwined, and she suddenly felt a little warm.