The Scorching Sun - 85
The next time Fang Zhuo saw Yan Lie was after A University officially reopened.
The students had spent some time taking classes online, and both the university and their instructors were growing increasingly anxious. They were worried that such a learning environment would encourage everyone to slack off and leave them behind in their coursework, whether would be difficult to arrange the classes that came later.
A University took its students' education seriously. Besides, online classes really did make it easy to grow complacent. Even Fang Zhuo sometimes caught herself drifting off. Fortunately, she had a reliable study partner.
Yan Lie might have loved finding excuses to talk to her, but whenever it was time to study, he was always serious and disciplined.
Fang Zhuo studied the course materials and did her assignments with him, every so often she had the strange sensation of being back in her senior year of high school. For several nights in a row, she even dreamed she was sitting behind a school desk, taking the college entrance examination.
She couldn't make out the questions, but she was perfectly composed, writing away without the slightest hesitation.
This time, she'd not only made it past A University's cutoff, she'd gotten into B University too. Then, under Ye Yuncheng's relieved and proud gaze, she had calmly said, just as Yan Lie had once done, that she was staying at A University.
When she woke, Fang Zhuo sat on her bed with her head in her hands for quite a while.
She had to admit that, somewhere in her subconscious, she thought Yan Lie's excellent grades and decisive choice had looked incredibly cool.
Time seemed incapable of being held back by anything. Before she knew it, it had slipped away.
Before classes resumed, the instructors in each subject sent them a test and informed them that there would be another one after the semester officially began.
Ye Yuncheng left early that morning to buy supplies. Fang Zhuo packed her things herself and headed to A University to check in.
After not being back in so long, the dorm room had gathered a thick layer of dust. When Fang Zhuo stepped into the bathroom, she discovered that the recent damp weather had caused two brownish mushrooms to grow behind the broken wooden door. Mold had even begun creeping into some of the cracks. Just looking at it made her scalp prickle.
She didn't have time to unpack. She grabbed the broom from the balcony and swept the entire dormitory from one end to the other, then sprayed disinfectant into the corners of the bathroom. Only after she'd worked up a full sweat and the entire room was filled with the faint smell of cleaning solution did she finally stop.
When she looked down at the time again, it was already half past twelve. She hurriedly took a shower and rushed to the cafeteria for lunch.
At this hour, most of the food in the serving windows had already gone cold, and the crowds had mostly dispersed. Just as Fang Zhuo arrived, a fresh plate of braised eggplant in oil was being carried out, still steaming, glistening with rich sauce and looking especially appetizing.
She carried her plate around in search of a clean seat and caught sight of a middle-aged man ahead of her whose hair was beginning to thin.
He was wearing a blue-and-white striped undershirt and half-rimmed glasses. His features were thoroughly unremarkable. Clearly not paying much attention to his meal, he was staring down at his phone in deep thought, his expression unusually grave. Otherwise, there was nothing particularly distinctive about him compared with any passerby on the street. Still, something about him struck Fang Zhuo as familiar, enough that she took a second look.
That second glance caught the man's eye.
Fang Zhuo casually looked away and walked past him. Then she heard him call, "Fang Zhuo?"
Fang Zhuo took a step backward and stared at him in surprise. The man froze too, like he was already regretting calling out to her. They looked at each other for a few awkward moments. As the atmosphere around them grew increasingly uncomfortable, Fang Zhuo finally came back to herself and said, "Hello, Professor."
The man gave a slight nod. He straightened the chopsticks scattered haphazardly across his tray, then pointed to the seat opposite him. "Sit."
Fang Zhuo set down her tray and was just about to sit when she finally remembered who he was. He was the deputy dean of their school, she'd even enrolled in one of his courses this semester.
The deputy dean taught his online classes from his bedroom. To avoid glare, he often kept the curtains drawn, leaving the camera to show little more than a dark blur where his face should have been. That was why Fang Zhuo hadn't recognized him at first.
To her surprise, among so many students, the deputy dean actually remembered her.
The deputy dean opened his mouth. "You studied over the winter break, right?"
Fang Zhuo nodded, somewhat stiffly.
He continued, "Have you finished previewing my course?"
Fang Zhuo nodded again. Once he brought up studying, she quickly settled down and answered, "I've gone through most of it once and worked through some of the problems too."
The man nodded. "Mm. No wonder. There was some material on the test beyond the syllabus. You got the highest score."
Privately, he was quite pleased. He simply didn't show it.
The test hadn't actually been written by a graduate student. He'd written it himself, and he hadn't reused any of the previous year's questions.
He wasn't in a particularly good mood when he'd written it. Dissatisfied with some students' perfunctory attitude toward their studies, he'd deliberately made the test harder, hoping to let these children experience the joy of failing.
Who would've thought Fang Zhuo would score ninety-eight and only made a small mistake in the final calculation.
He vaguely remembered her. He'd once overheard his assistant discussing her family circumstances and hadn't particularly approved of the way she worked so many part-time jobs. He didn't expect her to start receiving scholarships in the second half of her freshman year and then steadily improve her grades. Apparently, she was a diligent student.
"Really?" Fang Zhuo gave him a stiff smile. She held it for two seconds before the corners of her mouth sank back down.
She stared at the braised eggplant in front of her, suddenly unsure of herself. Her chopsticks hovered in midair, she couldn't decide whether she should eat or not.
Fang Zhuo rarely ate with older people, especially someone like the deputy dean, a heavyweight in his field. She hesitated, wondering whether she ought to put on an eager, hungry-for-knowledge expression and ask him a few questions. Sitting across from a professor and doing nothing but eating seemed somehow embarrassing, it felt like it would make her look hopelessly unambitious.
The deputy dean was looking for something to say too. He scratched at his graying temple and belatedly noticed how uncomfortable she looked. He hurriedly said, "Go ahead and eat. You eat, and I'll just chat with you."
Fang Zhuo said, "Okay."
The deputy dean asked, "You're very serious in class. Have you thought about what you want to do in the future?"
"Actually, I'm not completely sure yet." Fang Zhuo moved her fingers, mixing the sauce from the dish into her rice. "I'll study hard and try to get into graduate school. If I can't, I'll take the civil service exam first."
The deputy dean's brow furrowed noticeably, though Fang Zhuo didn't see it. His tone dropped, his voice tightening with something close to interrogation. "Why do you want to take the civil service exam? Because it's a stable career for a woman?"
Fang Zhuo looked up, puzzled by the sudden change in his attitude, but answered in the same straightforward manner. "Not really. There's a poverty-alleviation official in my village. He also graduated from A University, and had taught me a lot. I think such work is meaningful and deserves respect."
The deputy dean's expression relaxed somewhat. "It's certainly one possible path. The country needs people doing such work to help with development. But poverty alleviation has already achieved considerable results. Talent can be put in positions where it can create even greater value."
Fang Zhuo answered honestly, "I'd quite like to keep studying too."
The deputy dean waited. When she didn't follow up with anything else, he suddenly decided that this girl was absolutely unsuited to the civil service. Even if she passed the exam, there was no way she'd get through the essay section.
She could've at least added some hollow line about how education enriched one's life, or how she enjoyed pursuing deeper research. Anything would have done.
"Don't take the civil service exam," the deputy dean said. "I don't think you'll get very far in that line of work."
Fang Zhuo: "..."
The deputy dean continued mercilessly. "A private company wouldn't suit you much better. Someone who doesn't know how to socialize is going to get blamed for things all the time in the workplace. You'll do more work, earn less, and get promoted slowly. Take expense reimbursements, for example. If you happen to run into someone who doesn't like you, they can hold up a reimbursement indefinitely."
Fang Zhuo gave him a faintly aggrieved look before lowering her head and eating.
"Your GPA looks quite good. The guidelines for recommending students for postgraduate study are going to be announced soon, so keep an eye out." The deputy dean paused. "A lot of students in A City prefer to go straight into the workforce, but I don't think there's any need to rush. There are some very profitable projects in our professors' hands too. If your expectations aren't too high, finding the right advisor won't leave you with much of a financial burden."
He suddenly remembered something. "Oh... I think I've seen some of your family's short videos before. How are things at home now?"
"Pretty good." Fang Zhuo answered. "Our income is fairly stable now. I don't really need money at the moment."
"Then if you do go to graduate school, what field are you thinking of?" the deputy dean asked. "Mathematical statistics? Risk management and actuarial science? Or pathology and biomedical health? Or perhaps something else?"
He made it sound like he didn't particularly care, but as soon as he'd finished speaking, he quickly added, "Our university isn't particularly strong in epidemiological research, actually."
A look of confusion appeared on Fang Zhuo's face.
"Don't worry. Take your time thinking about it." The professor was suddenly very considerate. "Choosing your master's advisor is something you need to take your time with. It can have a major impact on your future. Ask some senior students about their experiences. Advisors have very different styles. Some projects make a lot of money; some professors are extremely accomplished academically. Take me, for instance. Right? I've got plenty of projects, and my students tend to do quite well afterward."
Fang Zhuo did intend to pursue graduate study. She'd asked some senior students about potential advisors, and before this conversation, she'd actually had no intention of choosing him.
She'd heard that he was demanding, temperamental, and prone to losing his temper for no apparent reason. Many graduate students under him supposedly lived in a state of constant misery. But he was genuinely responsible. Unlike department heads who simply left their students to fend for themselves, he actually supervised his students, and his students tended to fiercely protect one another. As a result, quite a few top students wanted to work under him. Fang Zhuo didn't think she had much of a chance.
When she left the cafeteria, Fang Zhuo's mind was still a little hazy. Absurdly, she had the feeling that he'd been trying to recruit her. Then again, that seemed unlikely. Professors were generally rather aloof, especially someone with his credentials. She stood outside for a while, letting the wind blow over her until her head finally cleared.
By afternoon, her roommates returned one after another. They thanked Fang Zhuo sincerely for the deep cleaning and patted their chests, promising to take responsibility for next month's cleaning themselves. Then they sat down at their desks and launched into a chaotic round of last-minute studying for the quizzes that were coming up.
At dusk, Yan Lie arrived on campus too and texted Fang Zhuo, asking her to come out and see him.
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