The Scorching Sun - 9

 Fang Zhuo paid no mind to Yan Lie's oddness. The boy always had some weird source of amusement going on. She just opened the lunch box, curious to see what was inside.

She’d already eaten lunch and downed a big glass of water earlier, so she wasn’t hungry. Fortunately, Ye Yuncheng hadn't packed her any rice.

The first container held a few small crispy fish, some red-braised spare ribs, a portion of shredded potato, and two little spring rolls. She could probably finish it.

Zhao Jiayou wandered over with a sign-up sheet and tapped it against Yan Lie’s desk. “Relay lineup’s not set yet. Lie Lie, which leg do you want?”

Yan Lie pulled his gaze away from the lunchboxes. "Whatever works."

Zhao Jiayou bent to note it down. "Then I'll take the first leg. You anchor the fourth."

Fang Zhuo pulled her disposable chopsticks apart and cut in. "Can I sign up too?"

“Oh?” Zhao Jiayou looked pleasantly surprised. Fang Zhuo volunteering for a group activity was a first, and worth encouraging. “Sure! What do you want? We’ve still got open slots for the fun events.”

Fang Zhuo’s response dropped like a bomb: "Sign me up for the 3000 meters."

The whole classroom went quiet. Shen Musi whipped around with a look of sheer horror, staring at her with deep concern, afraid she'd suffered some kind of mental breakdown.

Zhao Jiayou clutched his pen, dumbfounded. "...Our school doesn't have a women's 3000-meter. Girls only have 1500."

Fang Zhuo, genuinely disappointed, said, "Then the 1500 it is."

Zhao Jiayou didn’t respond. He just slid his gaze over to Yan Lie, a silent inquiry on his face.

Fang Zhuo was baffled. "Why are you looking at him? I'm the one signing up."

Even Yan Lie was too stunned not to ask, "Are you... sure? 1500. That's almost four full laps around our big track."

That slight frame of hers. Wouldn't she just collapse halfway through?

Fang Zhuo found their skepticism completely unfounded. "I can do it," she repeated. "Just put my name down."

Since no girls wanted to run the 1500 anyway, Zhao Jiayou, seeing her insistence, went ahead and wrote her name in. Anyway, their class never competed for rankings at the sports meet. If it came to that, she could always just not run.

Zhao Jiayou finished his tally and trotted off to find the homeroom teacher to submit the forms. Fang Zhuo opened the second container and found a cake inside.

A thick layer of cream coated the top, and from the weighty feel of it, the middle was packed generously with fruit, solidly built.

In this weather, the cake would spoil if it sat until evening. Fang Zhuo was starting to get a headache over what to do with it when her deskmate suddenly nudged her elbow.

Since when did he use such roundabout ways to get her attention?

Fang Zhuo turned to him, surprised.

Yan Lie propped his chin on one hand. Very indirectly, he asked, "Are you in a good mood today?"

Fang Zhuo: “Didn’t you just say I was blooming?”

Yan Lie let out a cheeky laugh. "Then can I ask you a question?"

A prickle of foreboding washed over Fang Zhuo. "...sure."

"Do you like cake?"

Fang Zhuo didn't actually have much of a sweet tooth. She shook her head.

Yan Lie, radiating pure innocence, asked. "Then how do you suppose the God of Wealth knew that I like cake?"

Fang Zhuo: "..."

Right.

Understood.

On it.

She promptly pushed the cake in front of Yan Lie, motioning him to help himself. He instantly shed his lazy slump, a radiant grin breaking across his face. "Thank you, God of Wealth!"

Shen Musi whipped his head around. Before he could even open his mouth, Yan Lie's large hand pushed him back. "This doesn't concern you. Do your homework."

Shen Musi heaved a helpless sigh.

A number was written in cream, alongside a few crooked little candles drawn beside it. It was very clearly a birthday cake.

Yan Lie scooped a bite from the corner and tugged at Fang Zhuo’s sleeve to share his discovery. “It’s really good.”

Fang Zhuo answered, "Okay."

“I'm cutting into the number now?”

"Go ahead."

"..."

It seemed like whatever decision Yan Lie made, he needed Fang Zhuo to be part of it. She sat there, a head full of question marks but holding her tongue, offering only a couple of token replies.

Yan Lie, on the other hand, became oddly talkative. By the time he finished, Fang Zhuo knew exactly what that cake tasted like.

As Yan Lie closed the lid and Fang Zhuo reached to take it back, he produced a lighter from nowhere. He held it up between them, and through the dancing flame, said with a smile, "Happy birthday."

Fang Zhuo blew out his flame in one breath. She was about to explain when a low, storm-warning growl came from behind her: "Yan Lie!"

Yan Lie scrambled to pocket the lighter, but it was too late. The homeroom teacher hauled him up by his collar and demanded, "You smoke?"

"I don't!" Yan Lie said with absolute sincerity.

"Then why are you carrying a lighter?"

The teacher marched him to the back of the classroom and ordered Shen Musi to search him.

Shen Musi turned out every pocket on him. All he found were a few bills and some loose coins.

"This guy's got nothing but money on him!" Shen Musi declared mournfully. "He hides his vices too well!"

Yan Lie laughed despite himself. "Oh, screw you!"

With no evidence, their homeroom teacher had to let him go. She confiscated the lighter on her way out, swept a low-pressure gaze around the classroom, and returned to her office.

Not long after, she came back, set a book on Fang Zhuo’s desk, and hurried off again.

It was, unmistakably, a used study guide.

Puzzled, Fang Zhuo flipped through it. Inside, she found key lecture notes, classic example problems, complete with step-by-step solutions.

Fang Zhuo had only transferred in her second year. The teaching quality at her old school couldn’t compare to A High, and there were massive gaps in her fundamentals and problem-solving techniques.

A-High’s classes moved fast, the workload was crushing, and the teachers couldn’t slow down just for her. Fang Zhuo didn't have the time to go back and rebuild her foundations from scratch.

In science, she typically relied on brute-force calculation to compensate for technical weakness. Luckily, her mind worked fast. Even without the most elegant methods, her problem-solving speed didn’t lag behind the other students.

The notes in this guide, however, laid out every exam point in clear, exhaustive detail, even referencing material from middle school.

Yan Lie recognized the name on the cover. "This guy was from the class ahead of us," he explained. "Famous dark horse. In one year, he jumped from four-hundred-something in the rankings to the top fifty. What do you call that again? A prodigal son who turned his life around?"

Then he added, "But his grades weren't necessarily better than mine. If there's anything you don't get, just ask me."

Fang Zhuo was deeply grateful. Though her science grades were decent, she'd been stuck at a plateau for a long time.

She had no idea how the teacher had dug this up. To any other student it might’ve been useless, but for her, it was a lantern in a dark room.

 

“If there’s something I don’t get, I’ll ask,” Fang Zhuo said. “Thanks.”

· · ·

Fang Zhuo washed the lunch boxes clean and set them in a well-ventilated spot to dry.

Though the pink-and-white color scheme didn't exactly match her usual aesthetic, she found herself rather fond of these two containers. The next day, she took them with her when she went to get food.

She always went to the cafeteria on the later side and ordered only a dish. The staff all knew her by now.

When she appeared, the auntie manning the window automatically reached for a tray and heaped a massive mound of rice onto it.

"Use these," Fang Zhuo said, holding out her lunchboxes. "I'm taking it to go today."

The auntie teased, "Got new lunchboxes, did you?"

Fang Zhuo smiled faintly. "Yeah."

So, small things like this could be a little happiness too.

The auntie deliberately scooped extra vegetables into her container. "We’ve got chicken soup today. Want me to ladle you some?” 

Fang Zhuo nodded. "Thank you."

The cafeteria was mostly empty now, staff already started clearing tables.

Fang Zhuo picked a clean spot. She'd barely sat down when a shadow settled into the seat across from her.

Her first thought was that Bai Lufei was haunting her again. She focused her eyes and found it was Yan Lie. The frown that had started to crease her brow smoothed out slightly. "What are you doing?" she asked, suspicious.

Yan Lie glanced at her lunchbox. There was nothing on top of the rice but a simple stir-fried cabbage in thin, clear broth.

He set his large bowl down and declared, with righteous conviction, "Eating from my own bowl while coveting another's pot. Yesterday you shared your cake with me. Today I'm sharing my lunch with you."

Fang Zhuo was about to say that wasn't necessary, but Yan Lie moved fast. He scraped a good half of her rice straight into his own bowl, then transferred half his chow mein to her side.

Since they'd come late, her food was already a little cold. But Yan Lie's noodles had been freshly stir-fried and were still trailing wisps of hot steam. He'd added extra meat and egg. It looked incredibly appetizing.

Fang Zhuo opened her mouth to speak, but Yan Lie preempted her. "You have to eat meat to grow. You're so thin a stiff breeze could blow you away, and you want to run the 1500? What, you planning to be a kite?"

He used his chopsticks to push the noodles aside and bent to take a few quick bites of the rice. The rice was a little cold, he didn't register the flavor at first. When the savory taste finally hit him, he paused, surprised. "Your rice is actually really good!"

Fang Zhuo: "..."

Her chicken-soup-soaked rice…. 

***

After eating, they cleared their dishes and walked back to the classroom together.

Yan Lie walked beside her and finally found the opening to ask, "Why didn't you stay at your uncle's place last week?"

Fang Zhuo didn't really know how to answer that without sounding completely foolish. She could only pretend she hadn't heard him, silently turning her head away.

Yan Lie rested a hand lightly on her shoulder, a helpless laugh escaping him. "Your pretending-not-to-hear act isn't very convincing, you know."

One after the other, they walked into the classroom.

Yan Lie was pulling out his chair to sit when he noticed a delicately wrapped cake box sitting at the corner of his desk. A sticky note was also tucked under his textbook, its edge peeking out discreetly.

Fang Zhuo caught a vague glimpse of it. Before she could make out what was written, Yan Lie had already torn the note off. She coolly withdrew her gaze, grabbed her cleaning supplies, and went to the sink to wash her lunchboxes.

By the time she came back, Yan Lie's desk was cleared. He was standing by the windowsill chatting with someone, his expression perfectly natural, as if nothing had happened.

First period that afternoon was math. The teacher was a middle-aged man whose hairline was well on its way toward the Mediterranean.

He strode in just after lunch break ended, a stack of test papers tucked beneath his arm. After handing them to the students in the front row to pass back, he clicked the mouse and pulled up the lesson slides.

A few minutes into class, his eyes finally landed on the small gift beside the podium. Grinning, he picked up the cake box. “Who gave me this? Why are you giving me cake out of nowhere? If someone’s done something wrong, raise your hand and confess now. Don’t pull this kind of ceremonial stuff. You’re making me nervous!”

The students looked up, still not fully awake from their post-nap stupor, all looking uniformly drowsy. 

The math teacher turned the box around and peeled a heart-shaped paper off the back. He read it aloud, chuckling as he went. "'To the most esteemed teacher, from the all the students of Senior 3, Class 1’… This handwriting, it's Lie Lie, isn't it? There's not even a proper salutation. Is this really for me?"

Yan Lie clapped. "Thanks for your hard work, teacher!"

A pack of boys joined in the applause and hooting.

"This is really for me?” The math teacher deeply suspected a trap. "You lot are being awfully nice all of a sudden."

"It's because you're so sweet!" Yan Lie said.

The room burst out laughing. The math teacher laughed along despite himself.

After mulling it over, he asked, pointedly, "Am I the only one, or did the other teachers get them too?"

"You're the only one," Yan Lie said. "I only had one box."

"Alright, then." The teacher set the cake down with exaggerated care, rubbing his hands together. "Since you're all being so good to me, I ought to return the favor, right? For the Mid-Autumn break, I'll assign you a little less homework."

"YES!"

The whole class snapped fully awake, eyes wide, shouting with delight.

"Take out the test papers I just handed out," the math teacher said. "The last fill-in-the-blank problem? Skip it. And the third sub-question on that final long problem? Skip that too."

The students examined the paper more closely, only to discover it was an exam from another province with different test points. The two problems he'd crossed off weren't even in their review scope.

Realizing they'd been duped, a wave of jeering boos instantly filled the room.

"Class is in session!” The man at the podium put on a stern face and huffed dismissively. "You're in you senior year and still want to slack off! Trying to bribe me? You guys are cute, I'll give you that. But your ideas? Not so cute!"

"Oooh—"

The students clutched their heads, a complicated sigh rising up from them, half-contented, half-cringing. Somehow, their clamorous indignation was entirely smoothed over.

Wei Xi raised a hand. “Sir, stop, please, we’ll do the work! Just promise us you’ll cut back on the internet memes, okay?”

Fang Zhuo folded her paper and wrote her name across the front in bold strokes. All the while, she could faintly feel the gaze from beside her lingering on her, subtle yet impossible to ignore. As she finished the final stroke, she finally turned her head, lifted a brow, and asked, “Why do you keep sneaking glances at me?”

She'd assumed he'd be at least a little embarrassed. Instead, Yan Lie just uncrossed his arms, his expression held that disarming candor of his. With straightforward sincerity, he smiled and said, “Because you look really pretty when you smile.”

Fang Zhuo spent two full seconds trying to formulate a response. This person seemed to have a gift to throw her language systems into disarray. Finding no coherent thread, she simply cast him a light, fleeting glance and pulled her attention back to her workbook.

That glance, however, reined in some of Yan Lie's insolence. It felt like a brief, cool rain washing over his heart. He straightened his expression, grabbed his textbook, and started listening to the lesson.

---

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