Chapter 148: Former Good Times

Seeing her climb up with hands and feet, Song Yang couldn't help laughing heartily. "Desk mate, you're way too agile! I was just about to give you a hand, but you scrambled right up on your own!"

"It's freezing outside, and it's nice and warm in here!" Dong Yanyan chuckled.

Someone was tapping on the window of the cab. Song Yang opened the door and smiled at Wang Fang, "Fang, get in."

"Song Yang! You actually sent a vehicle like this to pick us up? Couldn't you find something a bit better? With only this many seats, how do you expect us to fit?" Wang Fang said playfully, rolling her eyes with a smile.

"Why don't you sit on my lap? Don't worry, it definitely won't interfere with my driving," Song Yang said with a cheeky grin.

Wang Fang stamped her foot and shot him a sidelong glance. Dong Yanyan remembered that Song Yang had a crush on her back then, so she waved at Wang Fang and smiled, "Fang, come sit on my lap!"

Wang Fang walked around to her side, pulled the door open, and got in. Song Yang turned his head and told Wang Fang, "You should let Yanyan sit on your lap instead, she's much thinner than you."

Just listen to that! What an impossible guy when it came to saying the right thing. Actually, he was quite handsome. Aside from having a rather obnoxious mouth, a tendency to poke and prod, and rather poor academic grades, he was still a pretty good kid. When it came to good-looking guys, she was always very forgiving.

Wang Fang gave Song Yang a subtle, blank stare and swapped places with Dong Yanyan. Dong Yanyan sat on her lap, turned around, and giggled, "Fang, you've lost weight, while I've chubbed up."

"I think you've put on some meat too, but you used to be way too skinny, so now you're just right!" Wang Fang said with a smile.

"Is that so? Let me feel too!" Song Yang reached out his hand mischievously, and Wang Fang scolded him playfully as she slapped his hand away.

Amidst the chatter, several boys had already pulled open the rear door and squeezed themselves in. Seeing this, Li Juan grew angry, yanked the door open, and tried to haul them back down.

"Why are you boys so completely inconsiderate? How can you have the heart to leave the girls freezing in the back?" Before she even finished speaking, she was grabbed by multiple pairs of hands and pulled up by the boys. The lot of them crammed together like sardines, packing the back seat to absolute capacity.

"Is everyone up yet? If we're all here, I'm going to start driving! Jianbo, help me do a headcount!" Song Yang shouted backward.

Yu Jianbo was Song Yang's buddy. He went back and forth outside, counting repeatedly, giving a number every time. Growing impatient, Song Yang cursed out loud, "You're supposed to be the math class representative! You can't even count a few people? Starting from me, everyone, call out your numbers!"

Leave it to the sports commissioner to actually have a solution. In no time at all, the headcount was tallied.

"Whoever isn't here will just have to miss out, let's get moving!" With that, Song Yang steered the vehicle out onto the main road.

Outside the town ran a provincial secondary highway. The inn owned by Song Yang's family was situated right by the roadside, functioning much like a motel. Traffic here was heavy day and night, and his family had belonged to the very first wave of people to open lodgings along the highway, earning quite a tidy sum over the years. His parents were quintessential business people—smooth, tactful, flashing a ready smile to everyone they met, and overflowing with hospitality toward his classmates.

Ten minutes later, the truck pulled to a halt in the courtyard in front of a two-story building. The classmates disembarked one after another, strolling inside in twos and threes. Beyond the entrance lay a modest front hall where Song Yang's mother was tallying accounts behind the counter. The moment she spotted them arriving, she immediately greeted them warmly, took Wang Fang's hand to inquire about her wellbeing, and led them all into a private dining room while exchanging pleasantries.

The private room was warmed by a traditional heated brick wall, making it wonderfully cozy inside. Two round tables sat in the room, and everyone found themselves seats, slipping off their down jackets and draping them over the backs of their chairs. A waitress brought over a teapot and cups, pouring tea for everyone.

"Song Yang, warm yourselves up for a bit first, I'll go tell the chef to start stir-frying the dishes right away," Song Yang's mother said warmly with a smile.

"Auntie, go ahead and tend to your business, we're going to hang out and play for a while, there's no rush to eat," Wang Fang said.

"Then let me find you a few decks of playing cards!" Song Yang's mother said as she departed.

Li Juan, Song Yang, and some others turned on the VCD player to sing, the boys started a card game, and the girls gathered in small groups to chat. Dong Yanyan sat quietly off to the side, cracking sunflower seeds and listening to their conversation.

Back in junior high, she had been a timid child, only maintaining close ties with a few classmates, so she was already accustomed to lingering in the background and listening to others talk. She was never one for grandiose talk; in truth, with people she wasn't very familiar with, if something could be said in a single sentence, she would never stretch it to two. It wasn't until she went to vocational school—where, unlike junior high, she didn't just go straight home after classes but instead spent every waking moment living closely alongside her peers—that she gradually became more talkative, though naturally, that only applied to those she held dear.

Right now, she deeply savored this quiet moment. Looking at the youthful, innocent, and smiling faces of her former classmates, she felt thoroughly content. Everything felt like a dream—truly, she ought to be grateful for the generous gifts of the heavens.

"Come on, let's drink up, won't stop till we're drunk, my beauty to the east, the Yellow River to the west..." Song Yang and several boys were howling at the top of their lungs over there. With nothing much to do on her end, she clapped enthusiastically.

"Desk mate, come over here, let's sing together." Song Yang trotted over with a cheeky expression and pulled her along. Dong Yanyan didn't refuse; she picked up the microphone and joined their howling, "...Wait for me to cup my hands in salute to the rivers and mountains just to win your smile, as millions chant together to pass down through the ages. Look at the distant mountains smiling and the flowing waters running deep, enduring through the generations until the seas run dry and the rocks crumble!!!"

"Dong Yanyan can sing too? Give us another one!" Chen Wenfeng egged her on from the side.

"Wang Fang, why don't you guys sing?" Dong Yanyan handed the microphone over to Wang Fang and the others, found a seat, and sat down to listen to them sing. She never fought for the microphone; after all, where couldn't a person sing? There was no need to wrestle for it with so many people.

Song Yang took the seat beside her, and she shared half the sunflower seeds in her hand with him. Reflecting on it, during those three years of junior high, she truly hadn't made many friends. Back then, her introverted personality prevented her from getting too close to others, leaving her with only one or two good friends she could truly confide in. Curiously, neither of those two close girlfriends of hers had come today, leaving only Song Yang. For those three years, the two of them had seen each other nearly every single day, facing each other day in and day out. Who could have imagined that more than a decade would pass afterward without them ever crossing paths again?

Everyone's path diverges; we intersect at one crossroads only to brush shoulders and part ways at the next. Years later, what remains in memory are merely scattered fragments of starlight and a slowly blurring smiling face. Yet today, that face appeared before her eyes with such crystal clarity.

"Yanyan, honestly, among all the girls in our class, aside from you and Li Juan, I didn't make a single real friend." Song Yang said with rare earnestness.

Back then, she was too young to understand the heavy weight of those words. Hearing them, she had simply smiled blankly and let it pass without giving it much thought. But hearing them again today, she felt an overwhelming sense of melancholy.

"Me too. Sometimes I think back on all of you, remembering the days we spent together, and they really were wonderful. From thirteen to sixteen years old, you could say we grew up together." Dong Yanyan turned her head to look at him. "What are your plans for the future?"