Jiang Nuan sat by the hospital bed, swinging her legs, biting an apple. The crisp sound echoed gently in the quiet ward.
“Hey… Xiao Nuan! You look great! Not at all like the rumors outside!”
A girl around sixteen or seventeen, wearing a duffle coat that revealed her blue school uniform pants underneath, stood at the door of the ward, holding a plastic bag.
“Doudou!” Jiang Nuan’s eyes lit up, extending her arms. Cheng Doudou also squinted and smiled, running in for a hug, but Jiang Nuan grabbed the plastic bag from her hand and started rummaging through the snacks inside.
“You heartless thing! Little Missy carried this all the way for you, not even a thank you! Our friendship boat has sunk!” Cheng Doudou jumped onto the bed, sitting beside Jiang Nuan.
“Our friendship boat isn’t made of toilet paper, relax!”
The plastic bag was full of snacks like Lays, shrimp crackers, and dried tofu, making Jiang Nuan’s eyes shine and her mouth water. She quickly tore open a bag of snacks and started munching.
“Hey! My dear Nuan, take it easy! You look like a starving ghost!”
“Forget about that! Tell me, what are they saying about me outside?” Jiang Nuan mumbled, opening a bottle of Coke, feeling refreshed.
Snacks and Coke are the best in life!
“They’re saying you fell into an icy pond in winter, had a fever over 40 degrees for days, and lost your mind! You were babbling nonsense! Later, you even stopped talking! When we came to see you once, the doctor didn’t let us in. We could only press our heads against the glass door, thinking you were fine, just like sleeping…” Cheng Doudou whispered, “The light outside the window shone on your face. Guess what it looked like?”
Jiang Nuan had a bad feeling about what Cheng Doudou was going to say.
“Like what?”
She couldn’t imagine the scene.
“A final glimmer! My dear!”
Jiang Nuan almost spat the snack crumbs on Cheng Doudou’s face.
“More like divine illumination!”
Just then, a sweet young girl’s voice came from the corridor: “Hello, Auntie!”
“Oh! Can Can, you came to see Xiao Nuan!”
It was Jiang Nuan’s other friend, Rao Can.
Jiang Nuan immediately understood that Rao Can’s loud greeting was a warning that the empress dowager had arrived and to quickly hide anything inappropriate.
Cheng Doudou jumped down, collected the plastic bag, and pushed it under the bed.
Jiang Nuan pulled out a wet wipe, quickly cleaning her fingers.
“Your mouth! Jiang Nuan, there are still crumbs at the corner of your mouth!” Cheng Doudou grabbed the wet wipe from Jiang Nuan, wiped her mouth forcefully, and stuffed it into her pocket.
At this moment, Rao Can entered with Jiang Nuan’s mother, Luo Chen, on her arm.
Rao Can was tall and well-built among the girls in their second year, always looking good without makeup. She could make even the most ordinary school uniform look like a high-end sports brand.
Rao Can’s eyes slightly tilted upward, giving her a unique charm when she glanced sideways. Many boys in their class liked her. Jiang Nuan and Cheng Doudou nicknamed her “妖精” (Enchantress).
This nickname, when called by Jiang Nuan and Doudou, had no derogatory meaning. They would often drawl it out affectionately.
“Oh, Doudou is here too. So, the three of you are all here. You girls chat away, I won’t be a third wheel.” Jiang Nuan’s mother, Luo Chen, smiled and walked to the door.
Just as Jiang Nuan and Cheng Doudou were about to breathe a sigh of relief, Luo Chen stopped and said, “Eat less of those snacks like Lays and chips. Your pneumonia just got better.”
Doudou was stunned and whispered, “We were seamless! How did Auntie know you just ate Lays?”
Rao Can rolled her eyes at them: “As soon as I came in, the air was full of the smell of Lays!”
With that, Rao Can raised her chin with a queenly air. Doudou crouched down, pulled out the snacks from under the bed, and tossed a bag of shrimp crackers to Rao Can.
“Xiao Nuan, you don’t know that when the doctor issued your critical condition notice, Doudou cried her eyes swollen! Why weren’t you walking carefully on the ice in winter and fell into the pond?” Rao Can rubbed Jiang Nuan’s head, “Tell me, if our Xiao Nuan left us, who would carry our reference books? Who would fetch water for us? If bad boys came to trouble us, who would stand up for us?”
Jiang Nuan touched her nose and smiled, “I couldn’t bear to leave you guys.”
“Most importantly… Can Can and I have no sense of direction. With so many spots in Nanshan Cemetery, how would we find your grave to bring you snacks? Good thing you didn’t die.” Doudou teased, but her head was down, and Jiang Nuan knew her eyes were red.
“I wouldn’t give up so easily! Now I have the enchanting Rao Can on my left and the pure and lovely Cheng Doudou on my right. Such blessings, how could I let anyone else have them?”
Jiang Nuan raised her shoulders, hugging her two good friends tightly.
“And what about Lu Ran? Hasn’t he come to see you? You’ve chased him for so long, and now he saved you heroically, carrying you to the ambulance. No follow-up?”
Rao Can tilted her face, smiling, and even Cheng Doudou looked ready for a story.
Jiang Nuan was dumbfounded, looking like she had eaten a fly.
“What? I chased Lu Ran? That high-and-mighty, arrogant, and smug Lu Ran?” Jiang Nuan’s eyes widened in complete shock, “You two must be trying to trick me because you know I can’t remember the past six months clearly!”
Rao Can and Cheng Doudou exchanged glances.
“No way… everyone in our entire 2nd-year Class 3, actually the whole grade, knew you liked Lu Ran, unless they were blind,” Cheng Doudou said, patting her forehead. “Wow! So high fever can really cause memory loss!”
Jiang Nuan was stunned. It seemed she was the only one unaware that “Jiang Nuan liked Lu Ran.”
More than forgetting the knowledge from the first semester of their second year, the idea that she liked Lu Ran made her think not that there was something wrong with her brain, but with the world.
This was Lu Ran, the guy who could nonchalantly ride his bike through the admiring glances of girls without a second look, who could respond low-key to other boys’ provocations and retaliate high-key, who could solve problems that stumped teachers with clear logic, and who had a venomous tongue despite his perfect appearance.
“You guys know Lu Ran and I don’t get along, right?” Jiang Nuan looked at her two friends, trying to find any sign of a joke in their eyes, but there was none.
“Yeah, but that was before the first year. You really don’t remember?”
Jiang Nuan shook her head vigorously like a rattle drum.
Rao Can sighed, “Alright, Doudou, you tell her.”
“Tell her what?”
“About how our Xiao Nuan came to like Lu Ran.”
“I… I don’t know how she came to like Lu Ran! Before, she wished the school motto would fall off and hit Lu Ran on the head. Later, she somehow bought a bike to follow Lu Ran after school, asked him to help her with questions during breaks, and during morning assemblies, she complained my head was too big and blocked her view of Lu Ran raising the flag…”
Jiang Nuan stood there, stunned. Even in her wildest dreams, she never thought she would like Lu Ran.
This wasn’t just terrifying; it was horrifying.
“People even said you chose the science stream to continue chasing Lu Ran. With your terrible physics and chemistry grades, choosing the humanities would’ve been the golden road!” Cheng Doudou opened a bag of Lays, munching as if watching a top comedy show, with Jiang Nuan as the tragic heroine.
Jiang Nuan had never been into idol stars. In middle school, when everyone was crazy about Meteor Garden, she couldn’t understand it. Dao Ming Si in real life would be the kind of guy who got criticized by the principal every morning and eventually expelled.
In high school, when girls fawned over new idol stars, Jiang Nuan was reading wuxia novels under her desk, admiring tough guys like Qiao Feng and disdaining pretty boys like Duan Yu, who relied on luck and had a bunch of women around him.
After the first semester final exam, the girls around her often discussed Lu Ran instead of Korean stars. Jiang Nuan found it even harder to understand. Liking Dao Ming Si or celebrities like Nicholas Tse and Jay Chou made sense since they were far away and left room for fantasy. But Lu Ran… he was born to shatter girls’ fantasies, wasn’t he?
There was no denying Lu Ran looked good, possessing an outstanding aura in their grade and the entire affiliated high school. But his words were always lethal, never giving anyone a chance to recover. Jiang Nuan had been roasted by him many times.
For example, when Jiang Nuan first entered the affiliated high school and tried on her uniform in front of the mirror.
The damn Lu Ran said coolly, “Stop looking. You’re so tacky that the mirror’s going to crack.”
Another time, Jiang Nuan’s dad asked Lu Ran to tutor her in chemistry. Lu Ran glanced at her paper and summarized, “You only don’t know two things.”
“Really?” Jiang Nuan thought her chemistry might be salvageable.
Then Lu Ran said, “This and that.”
Arrow to the knee. Couldn’t get up again.
Or when, after the first semester mid-term, Lu Ran came to Jiang Nuan’s house for dinner with his dad. Jiang Nuan’s dad sincerely shook Lu Ran’s hand, saying, “Please help my daughter. We’ve enrolled her in so many tutoring classes, but her grades just won’t improve.”
When the dads went to the balcony to smoke, Lu Ran took Jiang Nuan’s Coke and said, “For you, kindergarten would be easier.”
How could Jiang Nuan possibly like someone like that?
Even if her brain was smashed and filled with steel and concrete, she couldn’t like Lu Ran!
“You must be joking.” Jiang Nuan looked at Cheng Doudou with resistance.
Doudou, adding salt to the wound, said, “You wrote it in your blog—‘I’m a white swan. I can’t bear to eat swan meat. Just give me a feather.’”
So cheesy it gave her goosebumps!
Jiang Nuan immediately retorted, “I don’t believe it!”
A white swan? Asking for a feather in such a humble way? This wasn’t the style of the fierce Jiang Nuan who despised all “girly” thoughts!
What use was a feather? It’s not like it was intelligence she could gather piece by piece to make a down comforter for winter!
“If you don’t believe it, check your computer at home.” Rao Can said, waiting for her to slap herself in the face.
“But more importantly… the class teacher suggested you might need to repeat the second year due to memory loss. She told your parents to consider having you start over next semester.” Cheng Doudou pouted. “But I don’t want you to repeat a grade. I want you to go to college with us.”
Yeah… that was the main point.
But she had indeed forgotten all the first-semester content.
A few days ago, she opened her winter break homework and found it familiar yet frustratingly incomprehensible, living up to Lu Ran’s words, “This and that.”
“What did the doctor say? You don’t seem to have lost your mind! You still recognize us, don’t you?”
“I did a lot of tests. The doctor said my logic and memory are fine… as for the lost memories, maybe they’ll come back, or maybe they won’t. Anyway, you two are the most important to me. As long as I remember you, it’s enough.”
“There’s another option: switch to the humanities stream. Focus on catching up in math. Handling physics and chemistry together might be too much for you.” Rao Can suggested.
“Forget Lu Ran for now. This is the real issue.” Jiang Nuan kicked her legs and flopped back on the bed, a picture of giving up.
Why did she choose the science stream?
Could it really be because of Lu Ran?
But in her short life, she was never the type to change herself for a boy, let alone something as important as choosing between humanities and science.
After a minute of struggling, Jiang Nuan pitifully asked Rao Can, “Can Can—Enchantress—maybe I should just repeat a year…”
“Even if you repeat, the juniors will know you liked Lu Ran. You can’t escape your past.” Rao Can laughed, lying beside Jiang Nuan, playfully snuggling against her.
Cheng Doudou also lay down, and the three girls cuddled together.
“But it’s okay. Everyone knows your brain has problems. If you don’t want to like Lu Ran anymore, you have a perfect excuse for changing your mind.”
When did having brain problems become a good thing? And isn’t a brain problem basically being a fool? What does “changing your mind” mean? She never had any “mind” for Lu Ran!
Rao Can’s words… were not comforting at all.
Once she got home, she’d have to face Lu Ran.
Before middle school, Jiang Nuan and Lu Ran weren’t close, but her parents always talked about how smart and excellent Lu Ran was, inheriting his family’s fencing skills.
Jiang Nuan was already annoyed, thinking it was just parents’ bias, thinking “other people’s kids” were better. Every time she heard Lu Ran’s name, she hummed “Use the nunchucks, huh-ha!”
Just wait until he tries to show off and gets smacked!
But in her third year, Lu Ran’s family moved upstairs, and their parents’ interactions increased. The first time Jiang Nuan saw Lu Ran in the elevator, she had to admit she was stunned for a good three seconds. But his subsequent annoying behavior made her regret those wasted three seconds.
She couldn’t imagine going home after being discharged and running into Lu Ran in the elevator, dreading the look on his face and what he’d say to drive her mad.
“Too bad. Your grades improved quickly last semester, almost reaching the middle range.” Cheng Doudou said.
“Impossible. With my lousy math, physics, and chemistry?”
“Because you had a strong cheat!” Rao Can laughed. “Use the remaining two weeks of winter break to have your cheat help you again.”
“Cheat? What cheat?”
“Lu Ran. Didn’t you cling to him for math, physics, and chemistry?”
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