Cheng Che had just turned into the players' tunnel when Qin Lie caught up.
He hurried over to Cheng Che's side in long strides and gave him a thumbs-up, a half smile on his face. "Kid, you sure know how to show off."
Cheng Che had still been keeping a straight face, but at those words, his ears instantly flushed red. "I wasn't. I was tired."
"Tired?"
Qin Lie looked him up and down, his meaning perfectly clear:
You finished a whole match with just a thin sheen of sweat on your forehead, without even breathing hard, and you're telling me you were tired?
"I really was." Cheng Che turned his face away.
"Sure, tired." Qin Lie chuckled, a laugh more embarrassing than no laugh at all.
He had seen straight through that little bit of boyish scheming in Cheng Che's heart.
It was Cheng Che's first time winning a match on such a big stage, too. With so many people watching and reporters chasing him with microphones, saying nothing would have made him seem too awkward;
saying too much, though, might have exposed his nerves.
In the end, he had squeezed out, "See you in the main draw," and even he thought he looked cool replaying it in his head.
Who knew Old Qin would see through him in a second?
The two entered the locker room one after the other, the atmosphere peculiar.
Cheng Che sat down in front of his locker and took out his phone, pretending to check his messages. Qin Lie said nothing either, leisurely packing his things beside him and humming a song from who knew what decade.
Cheng Che really did not want to deal with him.
As soon as he opened his phone, messages poured in thick and fast.
He was about to scroll through them from top to bottom when the pig-head avatar pinned at the top suddenly jumped.
He tapped it.
It was a photo.
In it, he stood on the service line, his body arched backward and his racket raised high.
Sunlight slanted down from above, gilding his entire figure in a bright, clean white.
The background was a blur of stands and people. The edges were a little crooked, and the composition was nothing special, but it had captured that instant with perfect precision.
As though something was about to fly out of the frame.
Beneath the photo was a line of text:
[I stand in the stands, watching the scenery.]
As Cheng Che read it, the corners of his mouth slowly curved upward.
"Fragment."
Someone watched the scenery from the stands, while the person watching the scenery watched him on the court.
This older girl actually had such an artsy side, playing poetry games with him.
Another young guy might have started racking his brains by now, trying to squeeze out an even more literary reply.
But not Cheng Che.
He thought for a moment, then simply typed.
[Cheng Che: Are you free today? Let me buy you a meal.]
He sent it.
Before a reply came, a call arrived.
He glanced at the screen. It was Jiang Xue.
"Cheche! Mom saw your match! Oh my God! How is my son so amazing? That shot, whatever it was, just whooshed right over, and the boy on the other side was stunned!" Jiang Xue's voice was high and shrill, with Cheng Jianguo shouting beside her, "Put it on speaker! Let me hear him too!"
Cheng Che listened with a smile as his parents took turns talking, and only managed to hang up after quite a struggle.
Immediately afterward, Guo Xin's call came charging in.
"Holy shit! Cheng Che! That last ace! I spent ten fucking minutes bragging about it in the group! Our class chat went nuts! Even Su Qingyue showed up! Do you have any idea how hot you are right now? Your super topic gained thirty thousand followers! Thirty thousand!"
"All right, all right, stop howling." Cheng Che held the phone farther away.
"I'm happy for you! Hurry up and reply to Lin Xiao. She keeps asking in the group when you're coming back. And that guy Zhao Lei-I saw him in there too, not saying a word. Watching probably gave him depression, hahaha!"
After Guo Xin hung up, his grandfather Cheng Qingshan called.
The old man was not very good with smartphones, and it took him ages to get one sentence out clearly:
"Cheche, Grandpa saw you on television. That ball you hit was so fast! Faster than your grandpa carrying loads on a shoulder pole back in the day!"
Cheng Che could not hold back his laughter. "Grandpa, how can you compare those?"
"Why can't I? They're both about speed!"
By the time Cheng Che finally finished dealing with all the calls, nearly half an hour had passed.
He let out a long breath and slumped in the locker-room chair, still holding his phone, its screen lit.
Half an hour earlier, in a van outside Hang City Sports Center, Yan Ruanning had unlocked her phone, opened her chat with Cheng Che, and seen the message: "Are you free today? Let me buy you a meal."
Biting her lip, she typed.
[Sure.]
She sent it.
Then she rested her phone on her knees and looked out the window, her fingers unconsciously twisting the hem of her skirt.
One minute. Two minutes. Five minutes.
The phone did not light up.
She glanced down. Still dark.
Ten minutes.
Yan Ruanning picked up her phone, switched on the screen again, confirmed there were no new messages, and put it down.
Fifteen minutes.
Xiao Zhou looked back from the driver's seat. "Sister Ning Ruan, are we heading back to the filming location now? The director's still waiting."
Yan Ruanning said nothing, lowering her head to glance at her phone.
Twenty minutes.
She pouted slightly, turned her phone over, and set it facedown on her lap.
"Let's go back," she said.
Xiao Zhou glanced at her again in the rearview mirror.
She had been with Yan Ruanning for three years and knew that gesture all too well.
Whenever she was upset but did not want to talk about it, Yan Ruanning turned her phone over.
As though sulking at someone invisible.
Xiao Zhou started the van and slowly drove out of the parking lot.
She had only one thought:
Two people making things needlessly complicated.
The van drove through the streets of Hang City, shadows of trees and arcaded buildings retreating outside the windows. Yan Ruanning kept her head lowered, her phone facedown on her lap. No one knew what she was thinking.
Meanwhile, in the venue's locker room, Cheng Che looked at that solitary "Sure" on his screen, then checked the time.
It had been sent twenty minutes ago.
He thought for a moment and typed.
[Sorry, I was taking a few calls. Where are you now?]
He sent it.
One minute. Two minutes.
No reply.
Qin Lie finished changing beside him, picked up his bag, and tipped his chin at him.
"Not leaving? Waiting for the reporters to corner you?"
Cheng Che looked at his phone. The chat sat silent on the screen, the last message still the one he had just sent.
Qin Lie walked over, glanced at the screen and then at his expression, and tactfully kept quiet.
Suddenly, Cheng Che moved.
Following the usual script, he should have started fretting over gains and losses by now.
Does she not want to go?
Was she just humoring me?
Did I say something wrong?
Cheng Che did not.
He simply tapped Yan Ruanning's avatar and pressed "Voice call."
Qin Lie stopped in his tracks, his eyes widening slightly.
Attaboy.
With that kind of initiative, he won't stop until he gets the girl.
The call went through.
Ring-ring-ring-
By the seventh ring, Cheng Che thought it would disconnect automatically.
Then someone suddenly picked up.
"Hello." The voice on the other end was very soft, carrying a barely perceptible hint of delighted surprise.
Cheng Che's resonant voice traveled through the receiver:
"Sister Ning Ruan, my parents, friends, and grandparents were taking turns calling me just now, so I didn't see your message. Sorry."
"It's fine." Yan Ruanning's voice was a little low, as though she were suppressing some emotion.
"Are you free now? I'd like to buy you a meal," Cheng Che said.
There was a moment of silence.
Then a voice suddenly blasted out of the receiver. "She's free, she's free! We're both free!"
Cheng Che's expression stiffened. "Xiao Zhou, you're there too."
"Only just remembered me, huh?" Xiao Zhou sneered. "You came to Hang City to play tennis and didn't even tell me. A textbook case of forgetting your friends for a pretty face. If I'd known, I shouldn't have poured you water back when we were filming the music video."
Cheng Che did not know whether to laugh or cry:
"I was planning to contact you both after the match. Don't be mad, Xiao Zhou. I'll buy you both a meal."
Beside her, Yan Ruanning muttered, "Who's a pretty face..."
Xiao Zhou's ears were sharp. She turned to look at her, saying nothing, merely raising her eyebrows.
Yan Ruanning cleared her throat, straightened her phone, and softened her tone:
"You still have two days of matches to play. Don't eat just anything right now. Let's celebrate once you make the main draw."
"Sure, after the main draw, then. My treat," Cheng Che said.
Yan Ruanning murmured an acknowledgment.
Cheng Che thought the conversation was over and was about to say, "I'll let you get back to things," when he suddenly heard a light, soft sentence from the other end:
"When the time comes, I'll... come watch again."
Those last three words were very quiet, as though carried over by the wind. But Cheng Che heard them perfectly clearly.
Holding his phone, he suddenly smiled.
His smile was outrageously brilliant, like the midday sun in high summer, lighting up the entire locker room.
Sitting beside him, Qin Lie watched this boy, who had just beaten his opponent into questioning his life on court, now smiling like a high schooler who had managed to ask a girl out after school. He could not help cursing inwardly:
Son of a bitch. She must be a beauty.
After hanging up, Cheng Che stuffed his phone into his pocket, stood up, and headed out with his rackets on his back.
Qin Lie called after him. "Where are you going?"
"Home," Cheng Che said without looking back. "I've got another match tomorrow. I need to study my opponent some more."
Watching him go, Qin Lie clicked his tongue. "Keep pretending. Go on."
In the van, Yan Ruanning hung up and pressed her phone against her chest, saying nothing for a long while.
Xiao Zhou glanced at her in the rearview mirror. "Sister Ning Ruan, your face is so red."
"It's hot." Yan Ruanning turned her face away.
"Sure, it's hot," Xiao Zhou said. "I'll turn the AC down, then. Wouldn't want you getting 'hot' enough to cook."
Yan Ruanning glared at her without a word.
She lowered her head to look at the call log on her phone screen, the corners of her mouth curling upward without her noticing.
Then she opened her calendar and counted the days.
Two days.
Two more days. Once the final qualifying round was over, the main draw would begin.
Then she would sit in the stands again.
Wearing a hat and sunglasses, somewhere no one knew about, watching him.