The monthly exam results came out a week later. There were nine subjects. Coincidentally, a cold front arrived that day, and her skin immediately tightened, feeling dry. Jiang Du had always been very sensitive to changes in the weather. If the autumn mood of early fall had a sense of hesitation, then this time, it had truly turned cold all at once.

Waiting for the scores was like having a string of wind chimes hanging in one's heart; every time a teacher came, there was a series of tinkling sounds. Teachers for almost every subject would be asked, "Is this subject graded yet?"

The class rankings were posted next to the class schedule, while the grade rankings had to be seen on the public notice board.

The class monitor and Zhang Xiaoqiang were responsible for posting the lists. A commotion stirred in the classroom. Jiang Du felt her heart swell up instantly, so big that her chest couldn't contain it, ready to jump out and beat. Her heart always felt exceptionally uncomfortable whenever she was nervous.

"I'll look for you, wait a sec!" Wang Jingjing had a knack for joining in on any excitement. She squeezed to the front, desperately standing on her tiptoes, and heard someone beside her exclaim, "Zhang Xiaoqiang is first! The class monitor is second!"

"Wow, I wonder what rank our class's first place will get in the grade?"

"I already looked! Wei Qingyue is first in the grade, and you, Zhang Xiaoqiang, are ranked ninth in the grade!"

Zhang Xiaoqiang shook her head. The monthly exams at Mei Zhong were never simple. However, she felt that her test-taking process had been relatively smooth. The result was ninth place. This score could only be described as not messing up, but it was still a bit short of her own goal. After all, she had entered Mei Zhong with the second-highest score.

A top student doing poorly and an ordinary student doing poorly were two completely different things.

"You're fifteenth, I'm twenty-first," Wang Jingjing said, running back. She patted her chest. "Not bad, not good. I thought I'd be at the bottom! Hahaha!"

It was clear that Wang Jingjing was quite happy. Why? Because she didn't really like studying at all. She was nonchalant, always secretly reading romance novels and having endless daydreams. Jiang Du studied much harder than her, but she had to admit that Wang Jingjing was probably a very smart girl. Otherwise, she wouldn't be able to casually take a test and still rank in the middle of the class.

As for herself, fifteenth place, fifteenth in the class, was a bit unexpected for her. She had thought she would probably be around twentieth place. With a class size of just over forty, heaven knew how little presence students in the middle ranks had in the eyes of the teachers.

When asked by parents, the teachers' wording was always the same: 'The child is average, can basically keep up with the learning progress, but isn't outstanding. There's still room for improvement.' That group of people was faceless, and the teacher's evaluation for each was identical.

But if it was in the teens, it was slightly different. Jiang Du was very happy in her heart. Her hard work hadn't been in vain. She wasn't that mediocre, was she? Even the most introverted girl had her own small pride, especially when Wang Jingjing told her that her individual Chinese score was even higher than Zhang Xiaoqiang's.

Suppressing the smile at the corners of her mouth, Jiang Du said to Wang Jingjing, "Let's not compare ourselves to others, but to ourselves. I hope we'll improve again next time."

"Let's go, let's go see the grade rankings!" Wang Jingjing pulled her hand and ran downstairs.

Lin Haiyang followed them like a sticky bug. He was twentieth in the class this time, his total score only two points higher than Wang Jingjing's. Just two points, yet he was acting all high and mighty, showing off in front of Wang Jingjing.

In front of the notice board, there weren't as many people as expected, just a sparse scattering of figures from various classes. Without a doubt, Wei Qingyue's name appeared conspicuously in the first position. Jiang Du looked up, excitement and shyness hidden in her heart. To think there were so many occasions where she could openly stare at Wei Qingyue's name. When she realized this, she felt as if sunshine had filled her brain.

The Chinese language score was always listed first. She saw it. Her score was 141, one point higher than Wei Qingyue's 140. This was the only area where she had surpassed him. Jiang Du's mind was buzzing, and her whole body felt hot. She knew she was just too happy. She didn't have any wild fantasies of catching up to Wei Qingyue. It was just one subject, one subject where she could be his equal, and it felt as if the distance between them had been shortened a little, although it was only from her perspective.

In the summer, the cicadas outside the window would chirp incessantly, making the whole street, the whole city, feel scorching hot along with them. Jiang Du felt that scorching heat now, like a sun had landed in her heart, brilliant and scalding, chasing the cold air out of the real world.

On this day, Class Two's Chinese lesson was after Class One's, so Jiang Du's Chinese test paper was borrowed by the teacher from Class One first.

Class One had a reserved pride. Twenty of the top one hundred students in the entire grade were from their class, which was very impressive, considering there were eighteen classes in their year.

It was a pity that Wei Qingyue lost points in Chinese. He rarely memorized texts. The poems and classical Chinese he learned, he relied entirely on learning them at the time. If he remembered it, he remembered it. If he didn't, he wouldn't keep reciting it like other students. The teacher was helpless, saying that his Chinese score was the only one that wasn't number one, and that he could have easily scored higher than this Jiang Du from Class Two.

He didn't take it to heart at all.

"The highest score in Chinese for this monthly exam belongs to Jiang Du from Class Two." The teacher shook the test paper in his hand. "Look, the handwriting is graceful and pleasing to the eye. I always tell you to practice your handwriting, but some students just don't listen. How do you think the grading teachers feel when they see your chicken-scratch handwriting?"

"Drag them out and behead them," a brave soul answered from below, and everyone burst into laughter.

Wei Qingyue also smiled silently. He had practiced calligraphy, and his handwriting was very bold. The Chinese teacher undoubtedly admired his handwriting, but disapproved of the top student's aversion to memorization. Wei Qingyue could be said to have an astonishing memory; even without memorizing texts, he could still get high scores in the humanities subjects. If he did memorize, he would be perfect.

"As for the composition this time, Wei Qingyue and Jiang Du got the same score, both very high. However, personally, I prefer the writing style of student Jiang Du from Class Two." The Chinese teacher deliberately glanced at Wei Qingyue, perhaps wanting to take him down a notch, or perhaps hoping he wouldn't get arrogant, making him understand that, at least in Chinese, he was not without a rival.

Unfortunately, Wei Qingyue was a very proud person. Wei Zhendong's years of domestic abuse had caused him to develop a severe rebellious mentality. He didn't like being lectured, and only held his tongue because he understood the teacher's good intentions.

The teacher began to read Jiang Du's composition.

Wei Qingyue sat below and listened to every single word. A flicker of subtle, fragmented emotions passed through the boy's eyes. After class, he asked the teacher for Jiang Du's test paper. The teacher, thinking his competitive spirit had been roused, smiled meaningfully.

Very delicate handwriting, the paper was neat. Much like... her. Wei Qingyue suddenly recalled the few times they had met by chance: her clean face, her clean expression, her clean voice. It was just that she was very easily embarrassed.

He even remembered someone in the boys' dormitory mentioning the name Jiang Du. She undoubtedly had the kind of looks that a certain type of boy would like. Wei Qingyue had never paid much attention to whether others were pretty or not; he once felt that all girls were more or less the same.

Jiang Du was very fair, a particularly clean kind of fairness. Wei Qingyue finally remembered having once been surprised by her fairness.

He read the composition for a while and quickly returned the paper to the teacher. The teacher was still joking, "Not going to study it some more?"

This matter—or to be precise, the matter of the Class One teacher reading Jiang Du's composition aloud in public—spread back to Class Two before a single class break was over.

Jiang Du inexplicably became a heroine in everyone's eyes. This was because Class One always passive-aggressively said that Class Two dropped trash at their classroom door when they were on cleaning duty; Class One always complained that Class Two's discipline was poor and they were noisy; Class One did their morning exercises more seriously, only to be called idiots by Class Two; the people in Class One wore their school uniforms properly and couldn't stand the boys from Class Two who tied their uniforms around their waists to act cool... and so on and so forth. A pile of trivial matters led to one conclusion: Class One had a superiority complex. Bullshit, they were both regular classes, what was there to be arrogant about?

But Jiang Du had actually scored higher than Wei Qingyue in Chinese. It was truly a way to vent their frustrations. Even one point higher was still higher.

"The class next door read your composition," Wang Jingjing, like a loudspeaker, leaned over the desk and nudged Jiang Du, who was focused on her book. "You're famous! Now everyone knows Wei Qingyue didn't beat you in Chinese. The boys in their class even said you're pretty!"

Jiang Du immediately became embarrassed.

She pressed down on her book, but she couldn't press down her racing heart. "What nonsense are you talking about?"

"I'm not talking nonsense! The people from Class One said so. Wei Qingyue was unconvinced and even took your paper to look at it!" Wang Jingjing's voice was loud enough to make one's ears ring. She was like a frog after the rain, croaking nonstop.

For a sudden instant, it was as if Jiang Du's heart forgot to beat. She opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but found she had no idea what to say.

Wang Jingjing seemed to have completely forgotten about the whole love letter incident. Her clamoring about wanting to pursue Wei Qingyue also felt like something from the last century. Like many girls, it was true that she liked Wei Qingyue. He was so special, so dazzling; it was normal for anyone to like him. Precisely because he was so unattainable, and because so many people admired him, the matter instead became something that didn't need to be avoided. And for that reason, it wasn't embarrassing even if one failed. There was only one Wei Qingyue; it was impossible for him to say yes to everyone.

The world fell silent. The class break was extremely noisy, but Jiang Du sat alone at her desk, with only one thought in her mind: 'He got my paper.'

Chinese was the third period. As expected, Jiang Du's paper was held by the teacher, who showed no intention of returning it anytime soon. She had no choice but to share with Wang Jingjing.

"Class, Jiang Du's test paper this time tells us that, in fact, scoring 140 in the Chinese Gaokao is not a dream. First of all, you can't get the multiple-choice questions wrong." The teacher began to passionately give everyone a pep talk, but Jiang Du kept her eyes fixed on her own test paper.

Which part had he touched? The warmth he left behind must have long since vanished forever, just like that pen from the library. But the regrettable thing was, she had once felt the warmth of that pen, whereas this thin test paper, how many seconds of warmth could it retain? The traces he left had already been covered by someone else, she didn't know who. Perhaps the teacher's hand, perhaps the papers of the students above and below hers...

Jiang Du turned her head. In the small flower bed not far outside the window, the flowers were beginning to wither, their colors slowly fading into something unnamable.

She copied down all the questions she got wrong on the monthly exam from every subject, creating a collection of her mistakes. Xiao Xu came into the classroom to inform everyone to prepare to pay for materials. The task was divided between two people: the boys were to give their money to the class monitor, and the girls were to give theirs to Zhang Xiaoqiang.

Everyone was used to paying for materials. This amount of money was not a big deal for most families, and Jiang Du was no exception. Her grandparents both had pensions, so supporting her was still manageable. Her biggest expense was buying books. There was a bookstore at the school gate that often sold old books. Jiang Du had discovered this store by chance and liked it a lot. Since she did well on this exam, she decided to reward herself by browsing the bookstore.

In contrast to her, Wang Jingjing's style was completely unacademic. She also read books—romance novels, entertainment magazines, shoujo manga—and also loved buying piles of colorful diaries to copy down sappy love song lyrics and cheesy, vague sentences. Therefore, when Jiang Du asked if she wanted to go to the bookstore, she refused outright.

The sky was dim, and an autumn rain began to fall with a pitter-patter. Chills came in waves. Jiang Du went to the bookstore alone, holding an umbrella.

The light in the bookstore was equally dim. The owner had long hair tied into a small bundle. Two of his fingers were yellow from holding cigarettes for years. He looked very young, but people said he was in his late thirties. His store sold some rare old books, and the covers of many had faded. The store also sold cutout CDs, which was quite fashionable, so it was often frequented by young people and attracted many students from Mei Zhong.

"You're here?" The owner had an impression of Jiang Du and greeted her.

Jiang Du nodded shyly.

He had too many books here. Above was a small attic, and even the sides of the narrow staircase were piled with books. If one looked carefully, one could find some good books from private collections. The store had a musty smell that never dissipated over the years, as if it were hiding a rainy season.

Jiang Du felt that he didn't like to tidy up. It was messy, and she would often trip over books if she wasn't careful.

After greeting her and chatting for a bit, the owner stepped onto the creaking staircase and went up to the attic to find books for her.

She had thought she was the only one in the bookstore at the moment, since it was raining, but around the corner, there was clearly a figure.

Jiang Du wanted to go over, but saw it was a middle-aged man wearing a hat, so she couldn't see his face clearly. He showed no intention of moving out of the way. She looked for a moment, then changed her mind and stayed where she was, flipping through the newly arrived books.

Suddenly, a strange smell wafted over. She couldn't tell what it was. She looked up and saw that the man had unknowingly come to stand beside her, very close. Jiang Du found it very abrupt and subconsciously recoiled from this violation of social distance.

"Do you like uncle's big treasure?" the man suddenly asked her with a low laugh, his hand moving at his waist. Jiang Du was bewildered and glanced over subconsciously.

An incomparably ugly and hideous thing came into view.

Jiang Du was still in a state of immense confusion and bewilderment. She didn't react at all, not knowing what it was, only finding it horrifying to look at.

"Want to touch it?" the man asked her.

"Why didn't you tell me you were coming to the bookstore?" A familiar voice suddenly sounded. By the time she came to her senses, a hand was already on her shoulder, pulling her back a little. Wei Qingyue was actually in this bookstore too. His appearance was just as abrupt, and he placed himself between the girl and the man.