Lian Haiping took a sip of his beer and replied with a smile, "I bought it from the landlady downstairs. It's locally made beer, not bad, right?"
"It's alright," Yu Lele said with a smile.
Lian Haiping looked on with curiosity: "Yu Lele, you have a good alcohol tolerance. How come you don't seem to have any reaction? Tong Dingding and I have been sitting here for half an hour, and she has only had two sips."
Yu Lele pouted: "I can already feel my stomach burning, but you can't see it."
Lian Haiping laughed: "All I can see is your strange outfit. Hurry up and go inside, or your classmates will mistakenly think I'm abducting innocent girls in the middle of the night and making them look disheveled."
Yu Lele rolled her eyes at him: "Why did you suddenly decide to drink?"
"When you're feeling down, alcohol can help you drown your sorrows."
"What's bothering you?" Yu Lele asked dejectedly. "I thought I was the only one feeling down."
"Why?"
"So many things piled up, it's hard to feel good." Yu Lele sighed and took another swig of wine. Sure enough, her stomach started to feel hot, and her head was a little dizzy, but also light and comfortable.
Lian Haiping tilted his head to look at Yu Lele and saw a faint blush on her face, which was reflected in the moonlight and accentuated her tired appearance, but it made his heart skip a beat.
Seeing that he didn't speak, Yu Lele turned to him and smiled, "I had a headache, but a little wine made me feel better."
Lian Haiping reached out and touched Yu Lele's forehead: "It's okay, no fever."
“I didn’t actually have a fever, it’s just that my brain was overwhelmed with too many things,” Yu Lele said.
“A fool is making trouble for himself,” Lian Haiping laughed.
Yu Lele glared at Lian Haiping: "Don't always use that word to describe me!"
Lian Haiping shook his head and took a swig of wine: "There are some things you don't need to care about at all. What others think is their business. Actually, no matter how kind and enthusiastic you are, those who are meant to dislike you still won't. People are jealous, which is understandable. You don't know, just now Tong Dingding was saying that all the students in her grade like you very much, saying that you are talented, have a good temperament, and are not pretentious. As long as someone appreciates you, that's enough."
Yu Lele propped her head up with her arm: "It's not entirely because of that."
"Why is that?"
After thinking for a moment, Yu Lele looked at Lian Haiping and said, "My boyfriend's family wants him to go abroad."
She looked up at the starry sky, her voice slightly ethereal.
Lian Haiping paused for a moment, then asked, "And you?"
"Of course I don't want it, but I also know that going abroad is a good thing for him."
"It's indeed quite difficult."
“I will not go abroad, not even to accompany my mother. Not only is my English not good, but I also can’t bear to leave my mother.”
"Does he want to go abroad?"
"He won't say. He won't say he wants to leave, nor will he say he wants to stay. But it's not a matter of whether he wants to or not. His English is very good, his major is also good, and his family is well-off. It seems a pity if he doesn't go abroad. The reason he's not leaving is probably because of me."
"Hehe, quite confident."
"It's not confidence, it's knowing him too well. Although we've only been together for a little over two years, we've known each other for eight. I can understand what he wants to do, what he wants to say, even just a glance. But that's only if he's by my side, in front of me. Now he's so far away, we can hardly see each other even during summer vacation. We see each other so little, and many things are becoming increasingly difficult to say. What can be explained clearly over a phone line? It's good enough if there are no misunderstandings." After saying so much in one breath, Yu Lele took a breath, picked up the bottle, and took another swig of wine.
Lian Haiping looked at Yu Lele and sighed, "I'm an outsider, so I can't offer any constructive advice. All I can say is, don't make things difficult for yourself, Yu Lele."
"Difficult?" Yu Lele smiled. "Isn't loving someone just asking for trouble? Actually, it's all self-inflicted. If you don't want to suffer, then don't love, but I can't do that."
Yu Lele's voice lowered, and Lian Haiping sighed, patting Yu Lele's shoulder: "Go back to sleep, those who played basketball will be back soon, you have to get up early for class tomorrow."
Yu Lele stood up silently. Lian Haiping took the empty wine bottle from Yu Lele's hand, stepped back one step to block her from behind, and followed her upstairs.
It was just a small, unintentional gesture, but it warmed Yu Lele's heart: he stepped back to shield her, afraid she might get drunk and fall down the stairs, so he stood behind her, silently protecting her without expecting anything in return. Actually, she knew many things—girls who write are often more perceptive, more sensitive, and more perceptive of subtle clues than others. But she couldn't say it. She could only consider him a friend, because she knew she wasn't alone.
Of course, she wasn't alone—she waited so patiently, waiting for a phone call, a greeting, a smiling face, for him to appear. Even if he didn't come, even if he forgot, she still told herself: she wasn't alone; with him there, she wasn't alone.
But isn't all of this just burying one's head in the sand?
9-1
The day before returning to school from Jinzhai, Xu Chen's medical team headed to the old revolutionary base area. The two barely passed each other, and their only contact became text messages and phone calls. Xu Chen had prepaid 500 yuan for his mobile phone before going to the countryside, but it was still decreasing at an alarming rate.
"What are you doing?" Yu Lele called Xu Chen at night.
“Nothing much, just like that,” he said casually. “We went from village to village to do physical examinations, and today someone even suffered heatstroke from exhaustion.”
"Didn't you bring any Huoxiang Zhengqi Water or anything? Be careful!"
“I know, I’m studying medicine, okay?” he laughed. “But you always have to remind me what to bring and what not to bring. You’re overstepping your bounds.”
"Did Ye Fei go?" Yu Lele still couldn't forget that pretty girl.
"Her? She's always been a member of the garrison, I don't think she's ever participated in this kind of activity before."
"Why?"
"I don't know about that, but I heard she'll be visiting her former mother-in-law during the summer vacation."
"What?"
“My ex-mother-in-law, the one Lu Yuanyang is talking about, is the mother of the boy she used to like.”
"Why?"
“Childhood sweethearts, they were truly childhood sweethearts. It’s said that their families even arranged their marriage before they were even born. It’s just a pity,” he said with a regretful tone, “but at least that’s some consolation.”
"But if that's the case, wouldn't the boy's mother be even more heartbroken if she saw her?"
"Really? I heard she's been lovable since she was little, so she's got another mother now."
Heard it? Heard it from whom? Ye Fei herself?
Yu Lele wanted to ask, but couldn't bring herself to. It wasn't that she was petty, but rather that she was always too sensitive; she could detect subtle emotions, yet she wasn't sure. She didn't ask because she didn't want to put Xu Chen in a difficult position, but it was also hard for her not to care.
"Xu Chen."
"Hmm?"
"In the future, well, I mean after graduation, will you come back?" I finally asked.
After a brief silence, he finally said, "I don't know."
I don't know—he never lies, and he never chooses either a yes or no answer, but simply says, "I don't know."
Yu Lele's heart skipped a beat.
"Then, shall I come to your place?" he asked tentatively, cautiously.
"That's a matter for the future, let's take it one step at a time," he said casually.
However, Yu Lele vaguely felt that something had shattered in her heart. The fragments stirred up thick dust, making her want to cough, and as she coughed, it felt like she was about to cough up tears.
He made no promises, said "I'll wait for you," or "Please wait for me." He simply said, "Let's take it one step at a time."
Holding the microphone, Yu Lele bit her lip, secretly wanting to ask: Is our relationship also something we're just taking one step at a time? Is our future also something uncertain and unpromised?
But I couldn't bring myself to ask.
In your heart, I've never been the kind of girl who would argue or make trouble for you. I wouldn't seize on anything you say, I wouldn't cause you any trouble, and I certainly wouldn't make you change for me. But you don't know that my heart is like a tangled ball of yarn, with threads of sadness that seem endless to pull on, and if you tug hard, you'll find that one knot after another has been tied.
In mid-August, the results of the CET-4 exam were released. Tie Xin called Yu Lele: "Lele, did you pass the CET-4?"
Yu Lele was very frustrated: "You passed?"
Tie Xin muttered unhappily, "I'm 2 points short."
Yu Lele laughed: "I'm 3 points short."
Tie Xin lamented on the other end of the phone line, "Yang Luning and Xu Yin both passed, why are we the only two so unlucky?"
Yu Lele asked, "Who else has passed?"
Tie Xin sighed deeply: "Half of the people have passed. It's an honor that the two of us are left to rely on each other in the remaining half."
Yu Lele gasped, "Everyone's this amazing?!"
Tie Xin was puzzled: "Yu Lele, you're so good at your major courses, why is your English so bad?"
Yu Lele sighed, her tone helpless: "My English teacher always made me stand as punishment, and I have a phobia of English. I didn't build a solid foundation, so I just gave up and gave up."
Tie Xin sighed sympathetically, "When we become teachers in the future, we must never physically punish students."
Yu Lele smiled, listening to Tie Xin's complaints, but her mind wandered involuntarily.
I still remember: Ms. Li Jing, my English teacher in junior high, was young and beautiful, but she never smiled. She often chose 14-year-old Yu Lele to rewrite sentences in front of everyone at the blackboard. If she forgot to write the plural "s" or added "ed" to the verb, the English teacher's face would immediately harden. Every time this happened, without her saying anything, Yu Lele knew she was going to stand in the corner as punishment.
Five English classes a week, and Yu Lele was called on three times, and made to stand as punishment three times. At first, I felt very ashamed, but gradually I became numb. English slowly turned into a nightmare for me, and I could never get over it again.
So, when other classmates, especially his juniors, find out that he failed the CET-4, will they find it ridiculous?
Thinking of this, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and unconsciously gripped the telephone cord tightly in her hand.
"You're just judging others by your own petty standards," Lian Haiping said sarcastically, leaning against the railing of the pier as the beach was teeming with tourists in August. "Everyone's minding their own business, who cares about what's going on in other people's lives? Do you think you're an Olympic mascot, the center of attention?"
Yu Lele glared at him: "Master, you scored 93 on the CET-6, so it's easy for you to talk when you're not the one suffering from it, right?"
“Wrong!” Lian Haiping held up two fingers and waved them: “That’s what you call strength!”
Then, after thinking for a moment, I said, "However, if you are determined to make great strides toward the CET-4 under my guidance, I can consider treating you to something as a send-off meal."
Seeing his deliberately serious expression, Yu Lele rolled her eyes at him skeptically: "Really?"
“Really,” Lian Haiping said resolutely, “What do you want to eat? Just pick anything from the roadside stalls near our school gate, anything under 5 yuan!”
Yu Lele couldn't help but laugh: "I want mala tang, chef!"
Lian Haiping stroked his chin, looking distressed. "I'm a proletarian too, my disciple. You really kill without a knife."
Yu Lele shoved him hard: "If you don't go to hell, who will? I even bought you breakfast."
"You used my meal card to buy breakfast too!" Lian Haiping felt utterly wronged, but still agreed: "Then I'll treat you to spicy hot pot for lunch today, on the condition that you memorize 50 words tonight before you can go to sleep. I'll call you to check!"
Yu Lele's eyes widened: "50?"
Lian Haiping reached out and tapped Yu Lele on the head: "How do you think someone got 93 points?"
Yu Lele immediately buried her head and pretended to be a turtle. Lian Haiping saw this and just laughed.