Chapter 17: “So stubborn, Tong Xilin.”

The food on the table was plentiful, but aside from Zhou Qi, the other two clearly had very little appetite. After eating a random few bites, Tong Xilin just stared blankly at the dumplings, though he didn’t put down his chopsticks, slowly picking at the dishes so Zhou Qi wouldn’t feel awkward continuing to eat.

Unlike him, Kong Ji didn’t have to consider so much. He seemed to know that the two kids could eat more freely without him there. He didn’t stay long before getting up, phone in hand.

“Take your time eating,” he said to the two of them. “I’ve got something else to do.”

Tong Xilin didn’t respond. Zhou Qi stood up briefly to be polite, mouth still full of a prawn. “You’re leaving already, Uncle?”

“Mm.” Kong Ji pointed at him. “You, just eat.”

Zhou Qi grabbed a napkin to wipe his mouth. Seeing Tong Xilin still sitting motionless like a deaf-mute, he kicked him under the table. Only then did Tong Xilin look up. He couldn’t muster any words at that moment; his mind felt sluggish. He forced out a sentence: “Drive safe on the road.”

Kong Ji was already about to walk past him but stopped. Looking down at Tong Xilin for a moment, he reached out and placed his hand on his head, gently shaking it. “Call me if you need anything,” he told Tong Xilin. “Don’t let yourself be pushed around while living on campus.”

As the door to the private room muffled the sound of his footsteps, Zhou Qi slumped back lazily into his seat, returning to his usual unrefined manner.

“I thought you’d go home with your uncle.” He slid the plate of dumplings towards Tong Xilin. “Want any more?” Tong Xilin shook his head.

“You and your uncle definitely still haven’t made up. The vibe is off.” Zhou Qi poured all the vinegar from the dipping dish over them. “What exactly was that fight about during the Spring Festival?”

Tong Xilin’s heart felt painfully constricted. It already hurt—but Kong Ji’s parting words, “Don’t let yourself be pushed around,” compounded his misery exponentially, a suffocating mix of stifled emotions and bitter tightness. Tong Yuzhi had never said such things to him. The first person to ever say it was the very person who brought him the most grievance.

He thought very seriously about where to even begin if he were to confide in Zhou Qi. After much thought… he couldn’t say a single word. Not a word could be spoken. Whether it was his feelings for Kong Ji, or Kong Ji’s attitude toward him, absolutely everything could only be digested alone.

“Count your blessings.” Zhou Qi didn’t press further, understanding Tong Xilin’s tight-lipped nature. “He gives you money, doesn’t hit you or yell at you. If my dad were like that, I’d kowtow to him three times every morning when I wake up.”

If only it could be viewed as fatherly love, how easy it would be. Tong Xilin had no way to refute, nor any way to explain. He said quietly, “Just eat your food.”

“If you’re not going home after eating, come crash at my place,” Zhou Qi pushed a dumpling onto his plate. “Still one more day of break, saves you the annoyance of going back and seeing that Wu whatever-his-name-is.”

Tong Xilin didn’t refuse. At this point, anywhere felt the same to him.

Wu Zihao moved out that very afternoon. When the Lantern Festival break ended and Tong Xilin returned to the dorm, the upper bunk was empty, just a bare mattress.

“He moved out,” the chubby kid across from him, unaware of the history, even helpfully explained. “Don’t know why, but he went to another room.”

Tong Xilin said nothing. He felt the mint candy Zhou Qi had stuffed into his pocket. He took it out and offered it to the chubby kid.

“You’re actually pretty nice,” the kid accepted it cheerfully. “Normally you’re so quiet, I thought you’d be hard to get along with.”

Before evening self-study, the Head Teacher specifically called Tong Xilin out. She asked about his feelings, then said a few words on Teacher Lai’s behalf, claiming he hadn’t thought that deeply during the parent meeting, only focused on setting a positive example, and asking Tong Xilin and his uncle not to take it to heart. Tong Xilin wasn’t bothered. The Head Teacher patted his shoulder and told him to focus on reviewing and get a good score on the First Mock Exam.

With one more person targeting him now removed, Tong Xilin’s dorm life became uneventful and steady. He followed the rhythm he set for himself, focusing intently in class, diligently doing practice problems. Every morning upon waking and every night back in the dorm, he would take out his phone, glance at it, occasionally chat briefly with Zhou Qi, and look at the quiet message thread from Kong Ji.

But it wasn’t completely silent. Once every week, Kong Ji would send him living expenses—a thousand yuan each time. Tong Xilin, living on campus, had nowhere to spend it. His only expenses were his cafeteria card and water card, both very cheap. He accepted the money, then opened his memo app to record it, meticulously noting down every sum.

Before the Qingming Festival, the First Mock Exam results came out. Tong Xilin scored 678. A pretty auspicious number. First in his class, fifth in the grade.

Tong Xilin wasn’t satisfied. His essay hadn’t been good; expression was always his weak point, costing him too many marks. Zhou Qi, brandishing his own 320-point score report, called him a lunatic, then used his own dad as an example, saying if he ever scored 600, it would be his dad doing the kowtowing instead.

Tong Xilin didn’t know how to respond. Tong Yuzhi had never reacted to his grades, whether good or bad. Kong Ji had never seemed to care either. His joy and disappointment were like the bed frame above his head—always empty.

Back in the dorm that evening, he took out his phone. He saw Kong Ji had sent him a message just after 8 PM.

Kong Ji: How was the First Mock?

Tong Xilin clutched his phone, thought for a long moment, then replied: 678.

He typed another line: I thought you didn’t pay attention to these things.

He waited a few minutes, then put down his phone to go wash up. Just then, the phone vibrated on his pillow. Kong Ji was calling him.

“That impressive.” A smile laced Kong Ji’s voice.

Tong Xilin also heard the background noise—a noisy gathering, like a dinner party, other voices talking nearby. “Jiang Lin’s nephew is also a senior. Hearing them talk about the Mock Exams, I thought I’d ask you,” Kong Ji proactively answered the question in Tong Xilin’s WeChat message.

“Ah,” Tong Xilin responded, still unsure what to say.

“Wait for me a sec,” Kong Ji said. The background noise on the phone shifted from near to far, then went completely quiet. Kong Ji had probably moved somewhere private. He lit a cigarette, the lighter making a crisp click.

“Do you get a break for Qingming?” he asked Tong Xilin again.

“Yeah,” Tong Xilin answered honestly. “Half a day.”

“Still not coming home?” Kong Ji asked again.

“No,” Tong Xilin said, tugging his blanket while sitting on the edge of his bed. “Staying at school to review.”

“So stubborn, Tong Xilin.” Kong Ji exhaled a stream of smoke and chuckled, then raised a question with utter naturalness. “Don’t you miss me at all?”

Tong Xilin could almost perfectly picture the way he said it. Leaning by a window, eyes slightly narrowed amidst the drifting smoke, voice low and carrying a husky rasp.

“Uncle,” his Adam’s apple bobbed lightly. “Have you been drinking?”

“A little.” Kong Ji flicked the ash from his cigarette.

Then it’s not me you’re thinking about. Tong Xilin recalled the embrace from the Spring Festival and silently pursed his lips.

“I’m going to go wash up,” he said, no longer wanting to continue this call. “Don’t drink too much. Good night.”

That night, Tong Xilin studied until four in the morning, completing two full sets of practice exams without lifting his head. He didn’t feel tired, didn’t even notice how late it was. Only when his small desk lamp ran out of battery and went out on its own did he, in the darkness, hear the chubby kid’s snoring from across the room and freeze, pen in hand, on his bed.

It was clearly April already. He touched his leg through the blanket. Why was it still so cold?

“Those dark circles—huge.” During morning reading the next day, Zhou Qi propped up his textbook and munched on his breakfast while sprawled on his desk, sizing up Tong Xilin’s profile. He felt this guy had truly gone off the deep end studying. “What time did you sleep last night?”

Tong Xilin hadn’t slept. After packing up his little desk around 4 AM, closing his eyes, he simply couldn’t fall asleep. His mind was full of Kong Ji’s “Don’t you miss me at all?” People really shouldn’t be idle. He lay in his dorm bed staring into the darkness. When he was doing problems, he could pour all his energy into it. But the moment his mind was idle, no matter how much he didn’t want to recall it, that alcohol-tinged embrace from that day replayed uncontrollably in his head.

He felt like he had a bit of PTSD. No matter what Kong Ji said now, it all circled back to Tong Yuzhi. So stubborn, Tong Xilin. Was Tong Yuzhi like that too? Probably. After separating, he went off to marry and have a child. He missed him so deeply that he was still thinking of Kong Ji’s name on his deathbed, yet was able to go so many years without contacting him. That must have been incredibly stubborn.

Lying awake with his eyes open until dawn, he finally suppressed the chaotic thoughts swirling in his head and reclaimed his identity as a College Entrance Exam candidate.

“Just ask for leave and go back to the dorm to catch up on sleep,” Zhou Qi, a veteran of all-nighters, was actually worried about him. “You look so frail. Don’t suddenly faint next to me in class, making me haul you all the way back.”

Tong Xilin didn’t feel tired. Pulling an all-nighter was strange that way. Stopping halfway through, the next day would be painful. But pushing all the way through, instead, felt numbing. It was just… everything felt a bit muddled.

Numb-brained, he forced himself through until lunch break. He and Zhou Qi went to the cafeteria to eat. Afternoon was the start of the Qingming break. Normally, he’d go back to the classroom to study after eating, but Zhou Qi pushed and shooed him back to the dorm, telling him to hurry up and sleep.

With his sluggish brain, studying really was inefficient. He waved goodbye to Zhou Qi, but still went to the classroom first to grab a workbook before heading back. Though it was only a half-day break, the dorm building was already half-empty. The other half were almost all studying in their classrooms. The entire third floor was very quiet. He happened to run into the chubby kid coming out of their room.

“Someone’s here,” the kid whispered towards the dorm room. “Don’t know whose parent. Seems like they’ve been waiting a while. I didn’t want to ask.”

“Ah.” Tong Xilin hesitated, wondering if he’d still be able to sleep properly.

The chubby kid hadn’t locked the door. He pushed it open a crack and peered inside, then froze at the doorway, hand still on the door, staring at Kong Ji standing in front of his bed.

“Back?” Kong Ji turned his head to look at him, tossing the phone he’d found under Tong Xilin’s pillow lightly in his hand. “Now you go to class without even taking your phone? I called and heard it buzzing under the pillow.”

“Didn’t want to be distracted. Haven’t brought it since moving in.” Tong Xilin stepped inside, pulling the dorm door closed behind him. “Why are you here, Uncle?”

Kong Ji gestured to the bags by the bed. Clothes, food, drinks—several full bags.

“Don’t want to see me, so I came to see you instead? Can’t even do that?”

He walked up to Tong Xilin, earnestly looking at his face, then crooked his index finger to gently brush under his eyes. His voice lowered, almost sounding pained. “Are you not resting well living here?”

In the past, if Kong Ji had shown such attentive concern, Tong Xilin would have been moved. Now, facing Kong Ji’s gaze, his heart churned with a bitter mix of emotions. All that floated up was Tong Yuzhi’s face. Are you looking at me right now?

After I clearly said those gestures, that tone, were too ambiguous, how can you still act like nothing happened, expressing it so naturally?

He desperately wanted to ask. The words reached his lips, then he swallowed them back down.

“It’s fine,” Tong Xilin stepped past Kong Ji, no longer standing so close. He moved towards the bed with a deliberate, stiff distance. “Thanks for coming to see me, Uncle.”