Chapter Forty-Six: The Feigned Innocent

Song Mingcheng walked in, carrying his books with a steady air, and immediately caught sight of her half-dead appearance. He kindly patted her back and said with genuine worry, “You’d better quit. It’s not worth sacrificing yourself for that bit of salary.”

Dong Yanyan was so annoyed she almost rolled her eyes, but after thinking it over, she admitted he had a point and nodded silently in agreement.

“I can’t let myself get so worked up. I need to calm down. Starting tomorrow, I’ll extend my work hours by an hour, but I won’t rush around so desperately. It doesn’t matter if I attend morning study or not. If the teacher notices I’m absent, just tell them I went to the restroom. Oh, and tomorrow’s Saturday again, right? Where’s your dorm heading for fun?” she asked, feigning nonchalance.

Song Mingcheng’s face remained expressionless as he crisply replied, “Not telling you.”

“My deskmate, if you’re going to act cool, at least do it properly. This really hurts my self-esteem,” Dong Yanyan complained, sprawled on the desk, listlessly flipping through her book. Before long, she drifted off to sleep. When Song Mingcheng woke her, half the first class had already passed. She discreetly wiped the drool from the corner of her mouth and looked up. Miss Tian was nodding at her, signaling her to stand.

Song Mingcheng covertly pointed to a passage in the English textbook, mouthing the word, “Read!”

Dong Yanyan understood at once. She picked up the book and read the passage fluently—it was about energy conversion or something along those lines. Luckily, she had previewed it the night before, marking every unfamiliar word with phonetic symbols, so she could read aloud even if she didn’t know the meaning.

Miss Tian was very satisfied, nodded approvingly, and said, “Good,” letting her sit down.

After all that, Dong Yanyan felt more alert. She glanced at her notes and nearly burst out laughing! Apparently, she’d started the class with real diligence, jotting down several lines in uneven, wobbly handwriting, like cryptic doodles.

After class, she curiously discussed this with Song Mingcheng: Did she really write those notes herself? She’d been sleeping so deeply she hadn’t even heard the bell—how could she have taken out her notebook? Was she sleepwalking?

Song Mingcheng sprawled on the desk, pretending to sleep, then waved his left hand and accurately swept the notebook toward himself, eyes closed, groping for a pen and scribbling aimlessly.

“That’s exactly how it’s done!” he declared succinctly, then swiftly tidied the props and sat upright as if nothing had happened.

Dong Yanyan looked at this fake innocent, laughing until she nearly choked.

*

There were no classes in the afternoon. After lunch, Dong Yanyan and Gu Xiaohan wandered through a nearby shopping center. The first floor was a farmer’s market, selling hardware, appliances, and daily goods. The second floor was a general store, packed with clothes, accessories, popular cassette tapes, books, and stationery of the era. Over four years, most of her daily necessities had been bought here, giving Dong Yanyan a special affection for the place. Even after buying a house in Lvyuan District, she often returned, despite its increasing shabbiness.

The stationery section on the second floor was vast. Back then, scented letter paper was all the rage, each sheet adorned with beautiful designs and text, twenty or so in a booklet, each with a unique pattern. Dong Yanyan spent ages choosing one and paid, satisfied. Gu Xiaohan thought it was pretty and bought two identical booklets.

“Why buy the same ones? Seems wasteful to me,” Dong Yanyan remarked. In her view, owning two identical things at the same time was wasteful; even seeing identical twins made her think it was a waste. Probably a result of her frugal upbringing.

“One for Tiantian, one for me—so all three of us can use the same kind! Isn’t that nice?” Gu Xiaohan laughed, hugging her arm.

Dong Yanyan had no comment: as the saying goes, three people can never get along equally; two will always be closer.

Back in the dorm, Dong Yanyan summarized the class’s friendship patterns. Many quickly found their best friends: among the boys, Zhang Lei and Liu Qiang were inseparable, as were Lin Feng and Yang Xiaohai. Among the girls, Yang Lili and Yang Ruining were like one person; in her own dorm, Leng Yue and Liu Ying, Gu Xiaohan and Tiantian, all formed pairs. Looking at herself, she got along well with everyone but wasn’t particularly close to anyone. The only one she could possibly pair up with...

She glanced silently at her lower bunk—only that cold, sly, natural airhead remained. She’d recently moved to Dong Yanyan’s lower bunk, likely to show closeness. Back then, girls ate small portions, so most pairs would share two dishes. Xinran was happy to eat with Dong Yanyan every day, but their tastes were utterly different, yet they managed to eat together for two years. A detached girl is hard to be close friends with; being her confidante was even tougher! Dong Yanyan always recalled those days with bittersweet tears. She hadn’t died of impatience from Xinran’s slow ways or suffocated from her emotional dullness, and yet, more than ten years after graduation, they ended up as best friends—what a tangled fate!

Xinran sat on the lower bunk reading, and glanced up slowly, inadvertently meeting Dong Yanyan’s soft, affectionate gaze. Startled, she asked, “Yanyan, why are you staring at me?”

Dong Yanyan couldn’t help but smile—she was always so absent-minded, no wonder she seemed odd to others.

“I’m getting off the bed and didn’t want to step on you!” She laughed it off, clumsily climbed down, then took the new letter paper from her desk and headed to the second-floor classroom.

*

With no afternoon classes, this was the time for students to doodle and scribble. Du Xinmeng practiced sketching with chalk; Zhang Lei sat in the front row, posing like The Thinker for her to draw.

Dong Yanyan took out her letter paper to write. It had been ages since she’d written such bright and melancholy confidant-style prose; it cost her quite a few brain cells, but she couldn’t help it—her crush loved this style!

Soon, Yang Xiaohai entered. Du Xinmeng’s sketch was nearly finished. Yang Xiaohai leaned over to study it for half a minute, then picked up a piece of chalk and wrote three words beside it: Master Yue!

“That’s a pretty grand name,” Du Xinmeng laughed.

Dong Yanyan glanced at the blackboard, smiled without comment. She’d thought the name was cool too, but after reading The Smiling, Proud Wanderer, she realized Yang Xiaohai was just a weirdo.

“Yang Xiaohai, why are you making trouble? You’re not Lin Pingzhi!” Zhang Lei protested, jumped onto the podium, grabbed the eraser and swiftly wiped out the three characters, then hurled the eraser at Yang Xiaohai, who dodged too late and got a face full of chalk dust.