“Students competing in the 1500-meter, please assemble at the track.”
“Students competing in the 1500-meter, please assemble at the track.”
“…”
The next morning, the very first event was the 1500-meter, the referee’s voice crackling out over the loudspeaker on repeat.
Xu Ye pulled on his running shoes, signed in with the referee, and was led to his assigned lane to warm up.
His classmates had spontaneously organized a little cheering squad to root for him, which, ironically, made him nervous. He’d walked in with zero pressure, fully in the it’s-the-taking-part-that-counts mindset. But now, with this many classmates watching, coming in dead last would sting his pride a little.
He warmed up quietly. The runners in the other lanes finished getting ready too.
At the crack of the starter’s pistol, all nine runners in the 1500-meter took off at once. Back when Xu Ye was working his summer job, he’d often run to and from work, and since starting university he came out to the track to run now and then too — 1500 meters wasn’t much of a problem for him.
But in a running race, what matters is speed.
Xu Ye had assumed he’d have no shot at the top places, but after the first lap, seeing that everyone’s pace looked about the same, he figured that if he saved up some energy, he might actually place.
From the second lap, he picked up his pace a little, and by the time he’d finished it, he’d already moved into third.
After two laps, the pace of the runners behind visibly slackened, and the gaps between competitors stretched wider and wider. By the end of the third lap, the top three had settled into one cluster, at least fifteen meters clear of everyone behind.
Only three-quarters of a lap left. The finish line had been strung with the red ribbon.
The spectators broke into a chorus of cheers, each rooting for their own runner. Xu Ye saw the top two suddenly kick into another gear, so he gritted his teeth and threw everything into catching them.
With a hundred meters to go, he was shoulder to shoulder with second place, and only about two meters behind first.
Yang Fei was dumbstruck. “Wait — how is Xu Ye, that lucky bastard, running this fast?”
Zhang Xinzhou was equally baffled. “I didn’t see it coming either.”
Watching Xu Ye close in on first, Yang Fei’s jaw dropped. “He’s not actually going to win, is he?”
By now the entire field’s attention had locked onto the front two.
Thirty meters. Twenty. Ten…
With five meters left, Xu Ye was only half a body-length behind first, and when they broke the tape at the finish, the two of them touched the red ribbon almost simultaneously.
“Who won?”
“No idea. Looked like they crossed at the same time.”
“Guess we wait on the referee’s call.”
“…”
Xu Ye finished, braced his hands on his knees, and gulped down big breaths of air. He’d stopped caring what place he came in — the race was over, and all he wanted now was a good long rest.
But a crowd had gathered around the referee, everyone wanting the final result.
At a higher-level competition there’d be electronic timing, accurate to the millisecond at the finish. But a college sports meet had no such equipment, so after thinking it over, the referee simply made a fair ruling: “I’d like to call the two of you co-first-place. Number 3, any objections?”
Number 3 was the student who’d crossed alongside Xu Ye. He shook his head. “No objections.”
The referee turned. “Number 6, any objections?”
Xu Ye waved a hand, still catching his breath. “None.”
“Good, that settles it. You two can go rest.”
The race was over. Everyone else quickly dispersed.
Xu Ye, meanwhile, got swarmed by a crowd of classmates — the guys piling on the flattery, the girls each somehow more complimentary than the last. Yang Fei was practically dying of envy.
How is this lucky bastard the center of attention no matter where he goes?
…
Jiangzhou No. 11 Middle School.
In the early evening, as the dismissal bell rang, a great crowd of students poured out of the classrooms and headed toward the gate in twos and threes.
Wang Yuxin walked to the gate with two classmates, and since their routes home didn’t overlap, she waved them off and walked home alone. The residential compound where she lived was only a dozen or so minutes from school, close enough that she walked to and from every day. Wang Yuxin’s parents — one a doctor, one a head nurse — often couldn’t get home in the evenings, which had made her independent from an early age.
Back home, she put her heavy backpack away in her room, arranged her homework piece by piece on the desk, and only then took her phone out of the drawer. The moment she logged into WeChat, a message came in from her mom, Zhang Lan.
Zhang Lan: “Yuxin, Mom’s going to be home late. Go find a fast-food place near the compound for dinner on your own.”
Wang Yuxin replied quickly: “Okay, got it.”
She carried her phone back to the living room couch, opened the contact saved as “Xu Ye-gege,” and sent a message straight over.
“Xu Ye-gege, have you eaten?”
She had plenty of QQ contacts, but they were mostly classmates she saw constantly at school, so they rarely chatted over breaks. And since she ranked near the top of her class — one of the star students — she wasn’t especially close with the average or lower-performing kids and barely kept in touch with them. Which meant that, aside from her parents, the person she messaged most over school holidays was Xu Ye.
Xu Ye was in the middle of eating in the cafeteria when he felt his phone buzz. He pulled it out for a look.
Seeing it was from Wang Yuxin, he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
As everyone knows: when a little sister messages her big brother asking “Bro, have you eaten?” — that basically translates to “Bro, I’ve got no money for food.”
When a little sister messages her big brother saying “Bro, I’m thirsty” — that basically translates to “Bro, buy me bubble tea, quick.”
Wang Yuxin’s old opener used to be: “Xu Ye-gege, are you there?” And Xu Ye’s reply every single time was: “I’m not.”
Now Wang Yuxin had wised up — she’d stopped asking whether he was there at all.
Xu Ye thought about it, then just sent her a fifty-yuan red packet.
And immediately messaged: “Eating now.”
Wang Yuxin: “Xu Ye-gege, what are you eating?”
Wang Yuxin: “Why’d you send me a red packet?”
Xu Ye: “Braised pork ribs, spicy diced chicken, broccoli.”
Xu Ye: “It’s break time — here’s some pocket money.”
Wang Yuxin: “Why so generous all of a sudden? Did you find money on the ground again?”
Xu Ye: “Nope. Your big brother struck it rich.”
Wang Yuxin: “I’ve got money of my own. You should send Qingqing-jiejie a red packet instead. Remember to add a couple yuan — 52 means ‘I love,’ 520 means ‘I love you,’ and 1314 means ‘forever and ever.'” [TL: numeric homophones — 520 (wǔ-èr-líng) sounds like 我爱你 “I love you,” 1314 (yī-sān-yī-sì) sounds like 一生一世 “one life, one lifetime”; 52 is a shorter “I love.” Sending red packets in these amounts is a common affectionate gesture — established earlier in Ch. 79.]
Xu Ye: “Mind your own business, don’t go worrying about mine.”
Xu Ye: “And also… stop calling her Qingqing-jiejie from now on.”
Wang Yuxin: “Then what do I call her?”
Xu Ye: “Just call her sister-in-law.”
Wang Yuxin: “Wouldn’t Qingqing-jiejie be mad?”
Xu Ye: “No. Even if she’s mad, she’ll just pinch me — she won’t do anything to you.”
Wang Yuxin: “That’s true.”
Wang Yuxin was a little chatterbox, and once she got going there was no stopping her. Xu Ye had nothing else on, so the two of them went back and forth for the better part of an hour.
Finally, with the sky nearly dark, Wang Yuxin said, “Xu Ye-gege, I have to go eat now.”
Xu Ye laughed helplessly. “Go on then.”
When they were little, back at their grandmother’s house, every time Xu Ye came home with some snack he’d bought, this little girl would grab hold of his pant leg and bounce up and down, urgently crying, “My tummy’s thundering! My tummy’s thundering!”
What she’d actually meant was I’m hungry, I want some too.
Thinking of those old days, Xu Ye found himself smiling like an idiot.
(End of Chapter 123)