Chapter 1

T/L: Ster

The September night in the North was very cold. Xicheng District was dimly lit, occasionally having only two or three pedestrians flocking the streets.

Tao Zhi leaned on the straight pole of the traffic light at the intersection, watching the teenager squatting by the side of the road not far from where she was as he lit his cigarette.

The boy took out the lighter from his pocket, the small flame igniting in his palm. The darkness of the night was dyed with a faint layer of warmly lit red light.

A movement that looked very natural, as if it was a habit.

Tao Zhi took out her phone and dialed the last missed call.

After two seconds, the teenager a hundred meters away lowered his head and glanced at his phone before picking it up, “Hello-“

“Have you reached yet?” Tao Zhi asked.

The boy was still biting onto the cigarette in his mouth, his voice dragged in a rather long tone, “I’m here. I have been waiting for you for quite a while now, and only you can make me wait this long.”

“You see, when you were in kindergarten, you’d dress up nicely everyday and even braided your hair. That was the time where I would wait,” he suddenly recalled the past amidst the dispersing smoke, “When we started going to school, you would sleep in and I would have to wait.”

“Even when we were born, I had to freaking wait for you to be dragged out. If it wasn’t for the tenacious vitality of this young master, I would have suffocated to death.”

The boy finally summed up with his vicissitudes of life, “Tao Zhi, you are the woman I had to wait for all my life.”

“…”

Tao Zhi rolled her eyes, walked over, before raising her hand and slapping him on the back of his head, “Are you done?”

Ji Fan let out a snort, holding the cigarette in one hand and holding his phone in the other as he turned back.

The woman that he had waited for all his life was standing behind him with drooping eyes, expressionlessly staring at him.

Ji Fan raised his head, and half of the ashes dropped from the cigarette that he clutched in his hand.

“He he,” he smirked twice, “you’re here?”

Tao Zhi hung up the phone and held it in her hand, before she squatted down as well.

Ji Fan leaned backwards and hid his hand that was holding the cigarette behind his back. However, he forgot that the person was standing behind him.

Tao Zhi lowered her head, watching the outstretched hand with the cigarette that flamboyantly showed itself in front of her face, right under her eyelids.

Then the sound of a light thud, and another piece of soot fell from the cigarette.

Tao Zhi, “…”

Tao Zhi called out to him, “Ji Fan.”

“Ah,” Ji Fan shivered, slightly panicked.

“Do you know what disease our second uncle and grandfather got in the end?” Tao Zhi said, “lung cancer.”

“…”

Ji Fan quickly withdrew his hand and put his cigarette bud against the floor tiles, before walking to the trash can and throwing it in. Then, he obediently came back and waited for the incoming lecture.

Tao Zhi glanced at him, “Didn’t you say that you’ve quit?”

“…It’s never that easy,” Ji Fan scratched his head, “Alright, I’ll quit. Don’t scold me.”

“If there was any use in scolding you, you would have achieved academic excellence long ago,” Tao Zhi rolled her eyes, her tone was unabashedly full of disgust, “I heard that you got 9 points in the Math exam for your finals? Were all the school tyrants of the Affiliated School like that?”

Ji Fan asked, “How much did you get?”

“20,” Tao Zhi said.

“…”

Ji Fan looked at her in disbelief and said nothing. He didn’t know how this person before him could look down on him so confidently with just 20 points, “The school tyrants of Affiliated High got 9 points in the test.”

Tao Zhi, “Then the school tyrant of Affiliated High obtained 20 points. After you transfer to our school, remember to think of a way to make up for the remaining eleven points.”

Ji Fan moved out with Ji Jin during his junior highschool years. At that time, he was crying and persisted in not wanting to leave. After a few years had passed, he probably could not bear to leave his friends and familiar environments that he was already accustomed to over there, yet he had to move back here again.

He didn’t want to come back, and Tao Zhi knew that, but the decision did not lie with her.

Children did not have the right to speak. Whether you approved of the plan or not had no effect on the adults’ decisions— if they demanded you go East, you would have no chances of going West.

No one spoke for a while, and the two of them squatted on the side of the road, staring at the sparse traffic at night. After a long while, Ji Fan sighed.

“When are you going back?” Tao Zhi asked first.

“Probably after a while,” Ji Fan said, “it seems like there are still some things to handle here.”

Tao Zhi propped her head with one hand as her fingertips rested on her lips. She looked at the teenager’s face that barely resembled her own and made a rare act of compassionately comforting him, “Think about the good things. Now, you will be able to attend the same school as I do.”

Ji Fan’s emotions have already calmed down a bit, but his words brought a sense of helplessness as he spoke, “Now that you say that, I’m dreading to go even more…”

“…”

Tao Zhi’s teeth were itching as she gritted them to hold back her eagerness to beat him up. After thinking about it, she then said, “Our school doesn’t need to do homework. Sometimes, when the teachers are in a good mood, they won’t check it.”

Ji Fan turned his head and looked at her inexplicably, “What homework? Are you still doing homework?”

“…”

Tao Zhi felt that her dignity as a rebellious girl was trampled under his questioning eyes.

“Of course I don’t do it,” Tao Zhi said, “why would I do my homework when I have nothing to do? I’m too lazy to even be bothered to copy.”