(1)
The scars on the desk were visible clearly.
The summer morning sunlight was already exceptionally bright. Pale yellow light slanted across the table, illuminating every scratch and carving on the desk.
An Jing rested her chin on her hand. She had never looked so closely at the marks left on the desk before.
Most of them were not left by this year’s students. Many were from the previous year, or even several years before that.
Most of the carvings were nothing but “xxx was here,” but a few expressed the feelings of the moment—hope, catharsis, or longing.
Under An Jing’s touch, the emotions of each person seemed to become three-dimensional all at once.
She even felt she could see a long story behind every line of text:
“Math is so freaking hard!”
“The Qing Kingdom shed so much blood, why do we still have to learn English?”
“Fei, I really like you!”
“I’m sorry.”
“Graduation tomorrow.”
“Memorial on the first day of school.”
Some carvings even interacted with each other, even though the people who left them would never see the responses of those who came later.
“Had a nightmare today, had one yesterday, had one the day before, and the day before that. Oh heavens, when will it turn into a wet dream?”
“Just fuck the ghost in the dream and it’ll become a wet dream.”
“There’s a beautiful girl in every dream.”
“I came back to retake the exams…”
Deep and shallow, one after another. Some were carved into the desktop, others written on the sides with markers… Different people, different words.
Everyone was the protagonist of their own story. Their campus lives were similar, but with countless subtle differences. Each person’s joys and sorrows were condensed into a short message.
This made An Jing feel a little restless—she wanted to leave a message too.
“Hmm… ‘I don’t want to be a girl’? That’s not good. How about ‘I like Zhu Ying the most’… Ah, that’s so cheesy. What should I write?”
“Hey… Xiao Jing, did you sleep well last night?” Zhu Ying tilted her head and leaned on An Jing’s shoulder, using her increasingly long hair to gently tickle the tip of the latter’s nose. “You look pretty energetic…”
“I slept at ten last night and woke up at five today. I guess I slept pretty well.” An Jing rummaged through her backpack for the compass she had bought in first year of middle school but never used, then took out a pencil to sketch a draft on the desk.
“What are you doing?”
“Uh, I saw all these words carved by others on the desk…”
“Ew~ vandalizing public property.”
“Everyone else left something…” An Jing muttered. “And it doesn’t affect using it…”
“Then what words does Xiao Jing want to carve?”
“Still thinking. I’m hesitating.”
“Why not just write ‘An Jing loves Zhu Ying the most’?”
“That’s so tacky.”
“That way everyone after us will know!”
“…I don’t want to. I want to leave something meaningful.”
“So what are the words?”
“Uh…”
“Why won’t you say? So mysterious?”
“Cough!” An Jing covered the pencil draft with her hand. “Don’t look!”
“I’m gonna look, I’m gonna look!”
“If you want to carve, use your own desk…” An Jing pouted. “But I bet eight times out of ten you’ll write something like ‘the person I love most in the world is An Jing’.”
“Wow—when did Xiao Jing get so narcissistic!”
“Hmph, you can’t even…”
“I wouldn’t write something so childish! At least add a heart in the middle!”
An Jing’s mouth twitched. “What’s the big difference, hey.”
“So what is Xiao Jing going to write?”
“Phew.” An Jing had already finished writing the line, so she helplessly spread her hands. “Go ahead, look.”
“‘No nightmare can ever separate us.’ What does that mean?”
“It means… uh… hmm… aren’t you supposed to be smart!”
“Hehe, I just wanted to see Xiao Jing blush~” Zhu Ying gave a sly smile. “That’s very… literary of you. Then I’ll have to think of something more poetic too.”
“Like?”
“What do you think of ‘I like the atmosphere of silence’?”
“…If you dare, don’t add ‘like’ in there.”
“Using ‘like’ to express liking… a bit hard.” Zhu Ying rubbed the back of her head against An Jing’s nose, making the latter sneeze twice. “Got it!”
“What?”
Zhu Ying tilted her head and pressed her crown hard against An Jing’s cheek. “‘Come, sweet silence,’ how about that?”
“…So cheesy…”
“Then that’s settled!”
“Ew—”
So early in the morning, the two of them busied themselves carving letters into the desk with the compass. After finishing, they went over it with a pen several times so it wouldn’t fade away with time.
“I’m done! I used a red pen—isn’t it super obvious?”
“I used blue…”
“Xiao Jing really does like blue.”
“It’s not that I like blue, I just don’t have a white pen.”
“Just use correction fluid!”
“It stinks. I’m afraid the smell won’t go away.” An Jing shook her head and looked at Zhu Ying, whose face was bathed in sunlight. “Those dark circles under your eyes are really noticeable.”
“Huh…? Are they?” Zhu Ying mumbled and blew away the wood shavings on the desk. “I’ve been having nightmares for several days in a row.”
“Ah? Nightmares lately? You never told me.”
“I didn’t think it would last this many days.”
“Nightmares are easy to fix. If I can find a way to enter your dream, I can turn the nightmare into a sweet one.”
“But Xiao Jing said you can’t freely control the dream-entry ability yet?”
“So I have to find a way.” An Jing scratched her cheek awkwardly. “What kind of nightmare is it? Too much pressure? But that can’t be it—you’ve already been admitted early. Where’s the pressure coming from?”
“I don’t know. Every dream I have, I see this long, long corridor with tons and tons of doors on both sides.” Zhu Ying thumped her head down onto An Jing’s lap, her whole body tilting sideways. “There’s no monster or anything, but I can never find my way out. Every door I open leads to another corridor with more doors. Never getting out… that feeling is really… terrifying.”
“Is that so…”
“If only I could sleep with Xiao Jing every day! Then I definitely wouldn’t have nightmares!” Zhu Ying’s speech suddenly sped up.
“Hey hey, that’s the only thing you really wanted to say!”
“Ehehe~”
“Ugh… if it really keeps happening, you can sleep over at my place. If it’ll help you sleep soundly…”
“Pfft, we’ll have to wait until Friday. Explaining sleeping over at someone else’s house on other days is too much trouble with my parents, unless they’re not home.”
“That’s true. Can’t do it too often. By the way, is it the same dream every night?”
“Yeah, exactly the same dream.”
“Maybe you can try to solve it in the dream yourself? Like find the right door or something.”
“No, I can’t at all. Every door I open is just another corridor with more doors. On and on, never getting out.”
“Then what if you lie down and go back to sleep right there in the dream?”
“Pfft, sleeping in a dream? Only Xiao Jing would come up with that. But—no way! In the dream, I don’t realize I’m dreaming. I only realize it was a dream when I wake up. When I can’t find the way in the dream, I get more and more anxious and scared.”
“Hmm… is someone chasing you in the dream?”
“How would I know? I just feel uncomfortable and want to find a safe place.”
“So how do you wake up?”
“The alarm clock wakes me up. ‘Ring-ring-ring,’ and it’s like I’m falling, then I wake up.”
“Or set more alarms in the night?”
“Then I wouldn’t get any sleep at all!”
“True… If I could use my dream-entry-and-exit superpower, I’d try to run and help you.” An Jing spread her hands helplessly. “If I can’t use it, there’s nothing I can do.”
“Doesn’t matter! As long as Xiao Jing stays close to me at school, I’ll be covered in Xiao Jing’s scent when I go home, and I won’t have nightmares!”
“Take a shower and it’s all gone.”
“Then I won’t shower!”
“Hey, watch your hygiene!”
“Xiao Jing~~!” Zhu Ying closed her eyes and struck a coquettish pose, spreading her arms. “Hug~!”
“Are you a kitten or a puppy…”
“Are you gonna hug me or not!”
“Hug, hug, hug…”
Just as they were embracing, the half-open classroom door suddenly swung open. But when An Jing and Zhu Ying both looked toward the door, it was slowly closing again.
“Who’s there?”
“Well… I feel like my timing might be off.” Zhou Chao’s teasing laughter came from outside the door. “You two, keep going, keep going!”
“Ew, the ‘fox-spirit’ showed up while we were doing good deeds.” Zhu Ying dragged out her words.
“What good deeds…”
“Hugging and kissing are the best good deeds!”
“Hey, Zhou Chao, wait, don’t run! Come in, come in!” An Jing hurriedly called. Her instincts were screaming that if Zhou Chao really left, she would be devoured by Zhu Ying in the next second.
“What? Bro doesn’t like interrupting other people’s fun.” Zhou Chao pushed the door back open with a helpless expression.
“You turn into a girl every weekend, then back again a few days later. Do you… do you spend every weekend doing… that?”
“Of course. It’s the weekend, gotta let loose, right?”
“So what do you do when you turn into a girl? If you’re still in bed, on the bed…”
An Jing asked with a red face.
“Keep going.”
“Huh—?”
“Then I pull out a bunch of tools. I’m still on top anyway, so it’s about the same.”
“…Does it really feel good?”
“Double-ended, you know.”
“Holy crap!!”
“Xiao Jing—”
“I can’t believe I asked!” Zhou Chao shrugged. “Don’t blame me, you’re the one who insisted on asking.”
“Ehehe—Xiao Jing? Xiao Jing, Xiao Jing~~!”
“Help!!” Goosebumps rose all over An Jing’s body. “Zhou Chao, let’s go downstairs and buy a drink!”
“Bro just bought one upstairs.”
An Jing rushed to Zhou Chao’s side, kicked up her leg, and sent the half-empty cola bottle in his hand flying into the hallway, where it rolled away with a gurgle. “Now go buy a new one! Run!”
“Damn it, fox-spirit, don’t steal my Xiao Jing away!”
“Don’t chase me! It’s your Xiao Jing who’s following me!!”
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