Deskmate

In Qin An's memory, the unspoken attraction between him and Ye Zhulan had lasted until some time after the college entrance exams. The two of them were often alone together, and whenever they happened to meet, they could see a heart-stirring joy in each other's eyes, yet neither had ever confessed their feelings...

Qin An had always wondered whether he could not forget Ye Zhulan precisely because they had never truly broken through that final barrier...

Now he had done it, and he clearly realized that this was neither a dream nor a memory, but real life...

When Qin An entered the Class 69 classroom, these people should all have been unfamiliar new classmates to him. Yet as he studied them carefully, superimposing their faces on the shrewd, careworn, dispirited, serious, or imposing faces they would have many years later, he still remembered most of their names...

"Qin An, sit over there..." His father, Qin Huai, was the foreign language teacher as well as the homeroom teacher. The seat he pointed to was right under his nose...

Qin An glanced at his still-young father, not yet forty and in the prime of his life. His father had begun teaching at a very young age, working his way from a community-funded teaching post to a state-funded one, and from a teachers' college diploma to a bachelor's degree. The effort his father had put in was an unforgettable part of Qin An's boyhood memories. He remembered many nights when, even during power cuts, his father had read books by a kerosene lamp, seemingly all on subjects like Marxist philosophy. Back then, his father had even planned to take the entrance exams for graduate school...

As that image overlapped with the white-haired, aged, imposing principal of a private secondary school, the sight of his father now brought Qin An a pang of sadness. He silently lowered his head and walked to his seat...

Qin An put down his schoolbag and suddenly turned his head. A pair of cool eyes beside him immediately turned away as though nothing had happened...

That was Sun Sun, Qin An's deskmate throughout his final year of junior high. Sun Sun was the top-performing girl in Class 69, and also ranked first in the entire grade...

In that relatively simple era, at the conservative county junior high, there was no such thing as a "school belle." But everyone knew that the prettiest girl at the county junior high was Sun Sun, a girl who would grow into an alluring beauty...

Unlike with Ye Zhulan, Qin An's contact with Sun Sun had been sporadic. When Sun Sun became a famous singer, her final concert was sponsored by the company Qin An worked for. Then Sun Sun entered the film and television industry. Once she truly stepped inside that world, it proved even filthier than she had imagined. With the help of her older female cousin, who had always served as her manager, a master director hailed as the most likely to win an Oscar obtained her body while an aphrodisiac tormented her into a haze of desire, and recorded a video...

The video was posted online, and Sun Sun chose suicide, ending a life that had bloomed as brilliantly as summer flowers only to rot swiftly away, burying that body coveted by countless men, in which beauty and intelligence coexisted...

Sun Sun's only mistake was that she valued family more than anyone and trusted her relatives, yet failed to see that after entering certain circles, many people had long since allowed desire to corrupt their character...

Qin An saw the video and learned of Sun Sun's suicide. By then, he already had a wife and child. He pounded the wall with his fists like a madman, then sat silently in front of his computer, tears streaming uncontrollably...

"Sun Sun, you're still alive. That's wonderful..."

Qin An turned to look at Sun Sun's almost supernaturally beautiful profile and slightly pointed chin. This woman, who would narrow her eyes when she smiled, looking adorable with a mischievous grin like a little fox that had done something naughty, was now cold to the point of being unapproachable, her lips slightly pursed in displeasure, proud and disdainful...

From junior high onward, boys and girls no longer shared desks, but Sun Sun and Qin An were the sole exception. Qin Huai thought that with a perfect girl like Sun Sun as his deskmate, Qin An would at least stop running off to make mischief with Ye Zhulan whenever he had nothing to do. Besides, teachers all believed that good students could help poor students improve. Qin Huai had put considerable thought into this arrangement before finally persuading Sun Sun to agree...

Sun Sun had not wanted to stand out so conspicuously, to be singled out as the only girl with a male deskmate, but she could not withstand Qin Huai's persuasion. She could only think that if a father had to worry this much about his son, setting aside his dignity to discuss it with a little girl like her, then this male deskmate was clearly no good...

Although she knew perfectly well that Qin An was looking at her, Sun Sun still had no intention of acknowledging him...

At thirteen, Sun Sun had already begun to develop. Her petite figure was gradually becoming slender and willowy, her slightly budding chest covered by a camisole, her supple waist truly like a delicate willow swaying in the breeze, naturally captivating...

She already understood a little about matters between boys and girls. Under Qin An's persistent stare, her ears finally began to redden, and she turned to glare fiercely at him...

Qin An smiled. Sun Sun was still the same Sun Sun. The charm of that glare had not changed in all those years...

"You..." Sun Sun turned away indignantly. What was wrong with this Qin An? She glared at him, and he still smiled. Could anyone really be this thick-skinned? It seemed Teacher Qin really could do nothing with him...

Since Teacher Qin can't handle you, if you keep grinning at me like that, I'll discipline you in his place... Sun Sun suddenly felt that she could understand Teacher Qin's predicament...

"Ah!"

A piece of chalk came flying over. Qin Huai glared angrily at Qin An. This troublesome son of his had been making such a racket with Ye Zhulan in Class 68 that rumors were already circulating among the teachers that Qin Huai's son was showing signs of an early romance. Now, by the look of it, he had set his sights on Sun Sun...

Fortunately, Sun Sun was an utterly well-behaved student who excelled in both character and academics. She could not possibly be as fond of fooling around as Ye Zhulan, and only then did Qin Huai feel reassured...

Stifled chuckles rose around the classroom. The county junior high was not large, and most people knew that Qin An was Qin Huai's son. Many found it rather novel to see a father disciplining his son right there in the classroom...

Qin An rubbed his head, brushed away the chalk dust, picked up the half-stick of chalk, and respectfully placed it on the teacher's desk before returning to his seat...

"Please open..."

Qin Huai said nothing more. After all, this was only Qin An's first day after transferring classes, and he did not expect him to change immediately. Still, this was the first time Qin Huai had seen a student respectfully pick up a piece of chalk after being hit with it by a teacher. This seemingly respectful gesture suggested he did not take the teacher's authority all that seriously...

It was like a principal standing onstage at a meeting, berating a class for its terrible placement-test results, while the homeroom teacher being scolded applauded loudly below, beaming, then shouted, "Well said! Keep scolding!"

You little rascal, just you wait! Qin Huai thought...