No one expected that it would actually snow the next day.
When Xia Chan went out in the morning, all she saw was a vast expanse of white. The ground was covered with a thin layer of snow-white blanket, which creaked when she stepped on it.
When I arrived at the school, there were many more students outside than usual. Some were making snowmen, some were having snowball fights. Those who did not come downstairs did not stay in the warm classrooms. Most of them were lying on the railings outside, chatting and laughing with joy as they watched the falling snow.
This is the first snow since winter. Although it is not big, it is enough to make everyone excited.
Among the crowd lying on the railings, there was a pair of eyes following Xia Chan from the moment she stepped into the campus until she entered the teaching building. Although the outside world was covered with snow, he only had eyes for her.
Winter vacation is coming soon, and students have to arrange their own time. The blackboard notifies them to study on their own, and most of the students are attracted by the snow and go out, with only a few staying in the classroom.
"Axia, good morning!" Xia Chan had not taken a few steps into the stairs when Monet stood at the end and waved at her.
Xia Chan walked over with her head held high, her expression much softer, and greeted with a smile: "Good morning, are you feeling better?"
Monet walked down a few steps and walked with her, saying, "Some are healed, some are not. Which one are you asking about?"
Xia Chan glared at him, feeling that his kindness was being taken for granted.
"Yesterday's medicine was very effective. My face has stopped itching early this morning. There are still some small red spots on my body, but they will disappear in a few days. They are not a big deal." Monet explained slowly.
Xia Chan mocked him: "The face is healed, but the skin is itchy again."
Monet followed her into the classroom and sat down at the desk in front of her. He watched her take off her schoolbag and take out her English book with a serious look on her face.
He curled his lips: "Is reading fun?"
"It's not fun." Xia Chan lowered her head, picked up a pen, drew a line on the reading comprehension, and quickly wrote out a fluent English sentence.
Monet took one of her pens and spun it around, saying in confusion: "Life is only a few decades long, why do we always have to live the life that others expect of us?"
"To leave behind people who have the same ideas as you." Xia Chan answered without raising her head.
"Oh?" Monet became interested, stopped spinning his pen, and leaned over to ask, "Who am I? I really want to know, after knowing each other for so long, what do you think of me? Do you understand me? Tell me."
Xia Chan turned a page of the book and said, "I don't want to understand ."
"Do you want to know how I feel about you? I'll tell you." He supported his head with one hand and looked at her.
It was snowing heavily outside the window. He looked at the gray sky in the distance, his eyes filled with a warm and soft light.
He said as if no one was around: "Axia, you make me feel like a young butterfly wrapped in a cocoon, with no sense of security and no direction. You can only live by building layers of protective veil in your heart. You long for redemption and an outlet, but you can't break this solid shell. You always use your indifference to reject others' approach. You guard things you don't want to give up and are afraid of change. You always subconsciously reject me. It's better to say that you reject everything unknown. Because you don't know what you really want, so you don't care about anything."
Xia Chan's hand stopped on the page of the book, and Monet's hot breath hung in the air. He turned his head and looked into Xia Chan's eyes, with a smile on his face: "Axia, don't be trapped in your own cocoon. You have to learn how to break out of the cocoon and become a butterfly. You are a proud and beautiful butterfly."
Xia Chan looked up at him, as if she was meeting him for the first time.
The snow outside the window is getting heavier and heavier, goose feather-like snowflakes are floating in the air, the sound of the north wind is in my ears, and the dazzling white snow is in front of my eyes. Why is my heart not so cold anymore?
What words and scenes flashed through her mind in an instant. Xia Chan remained calm, quickly turned the page, and said coldly: "You're crazy, did you watch idol drama last night?"
Monet chuckled, threw the pen in her hand into her pencil case, and said, "You found me again. My face was itchy last night and I couldn't sleep. I watched Korean dramas on my laptop all night. I don't speak like myself anymore. I think it's a pity that the director didn't choose me to be the male lead. What a pity."
"That day..." Xia Chan hesitated to speak, with confusion and trouble on her face.
"Hmm?" Monet looked at her dazedly, tilting his head and asking, "What?"
"Forget it, it's okay." Xia Chan gave up.
"Ah?" Monet thought about it, then suddenly realized something and gave me a sincere smile, "That day... I was serious. Axia, I like you, just like I like rock and roll."
She angrily said, "Get lost!"
He grabbed her ears with both hands, pulled them, shook them, and said, "Okay, I'll shake them and then get out."
The English book on the table was thrown over, and the figure who teased her had already run out of the classroom.
At that time, she didn't understand what Monet said, didn't understand what happened in the music room, didn't understand why he was sometimes serious and sometimes crazy , and never acted like a well-behaved student.
Many years passed, when a tear was torn in the sky of her memory, and she finally understood his soul and saw the deep affection in those jokes.
Unfortunately, none of us has the ability to predict the future and can only float with the tide of the present.
On Saturday, Ella asked Xia Chan out. When she saw Ella, she almost didn't recognize her at first glance.
Ella wore a festive red puffy skirt, her hair was slightly curled, her round face was powdered, her curved eyebrows were trimmed, and her crescent-shaped eyes were lined with eyeliner and light eyeshadow.
Ella's cheeks blushed. She ran to Xia Chan and turned around. When she smiled, there were two dimples on the corners of her mouth. "Does it look good?"
"You look so beautiful." Xia Chan stepped forward and took her arm. Looking at her elegant dress, she joked, "Are you going on a date? Are you asking me to be a third wheel?"
Ella rolled her eyes: "No, come with me to meet my online friend."
"No way." Xia Chan imitated her, and Ella started to tickle her when she got anxious.
"I've mentioned this to you before. I used to play WeChat and games with him. You even saw me hiding my phone. It was him. Do you remember 'Flying Man'? At the time, I was mainly afraid that you would say something bad about me. After all, there are a lot of bad people on the Internet." Ella began to explain.
Xia Chan nodded and agreed: "There are many bad people on the Internet."
"There are a lot of good guys here." Ella held her little finger and kicked the ground to move forward. "I have the ability to distinguish, okay? He is from our school and is quite a homebody, almost like living in a cave. We have been chatting for a long time and feel good about each other, so we both want to meet. Maybe, maybe I will be no longer single, hehe..."
"Then you drag me here, it won't bother you anymore?" Xia Chan pretended to be unhappy.
Ella clasped her hands together like a squirrel begging for chestnuts and looked at her pitifully: "Xia Xia, please, please, if the situation seems wrong, we will just run away."
A girl’s feelings are always a dream, and the prince charming in the dream may very well be a medieval dinosaur.
Who would waste time chasing girls online when they are doing well in real life? Xia Chan didn't want to dampen her fairytale dream.
Xia Chan sighed and said, "Do you know the name?"
"I know." Ella said, pulling out a cell phone from her pocket. "I still have his number. Let's meet nearby. I'll call him."
As he said this, the call had already been dialed, and in less than three seconds, a human voice was heard on the phone.
"Where are you?" Ella looked around with her phone in hand. "Da Fei, where are you? I'm here."
"Da——" Xia Chan stood there in a daze, her mouth opened wide in disbelief, pointing at her phone, incredulous, "Da Fei? Xue Fei? Are you talking about him?"
"Do you know each other?" Ella turned around, confused.
At this moment, Ella suddenly saw something out of the corner of her eye. She hung up the phone, stood on tiptoe and waved desperately: "Hey, hey, hey! We are here!"
Xia Chan looked back and saw the familiar "watermelon head" hairstyle going up and down in the air as he ran. Da Fei ran over with a bouquet of roses, shouting "Ella"'s name. When he saw Xia Chan, he smiled.
Under a row of magnolia trees behind him , Monet was walking slowly towards them, looking pleased with himself. He glanced at the three people present with an expression that said, "We are destined to meet again."
"The world is really small." Xia Chan smiled wryly.
She just didn't believe there were such coincidences in the world.
It was cold outside, so they exchanged a few words and then went to eat the "Oden" next door.
Xia Chan watched coldly, wanting to know what their plan was.
After they sat down, Da Fei looked embarrassed and handed over the bouquet with sweaty palms: "This is for you. You said you like roses, but there are dozens of kinds of roses. I picked this one. I don't know if you like it."
Ella took the flower, her cheeks flushed, and nodded vigorously: "I like it very much."
Ella looked at Dafei, who scratched his hair embarrassedly, smiled brightly, and hurriedly called the waiter to take the order and serve the food.
Monet said nothing, just looked at Xia Chan who was meditating, with a smile on his face.
Da Fei was in high spirits, acting like a host. He first went to the front desk to inquire about some special dishes, then asked them about their preferences, scalded their bowls and chopsticks with hot water, and then helped to put them in order.
If you don’t know, you would think he is getting married today.
Xia Chan tilted her head to look at Ella, whose eyes were glued to Dafei, and her every frown and smile was full of tenderness. Xia Chan couldn't help but curse herself for following him. This girl forgot her friends for the love of a man, and the two of them might have already fallen in love.
"If it's not enough, let's order more!" Dafei enthusiastically asked them to feel free.
"That's enough, we eat so little." Ella encouraged him.
It's bad, it's bad, he's already started to betray his own people. Xia Chan was furious.
Da Fei carefully placed a pack of tissues in front of Ella, and said to her with a silly smile: "'Oden' originated from the Kanto region of Japan. It is easy to make and you can put anything into the soup and cook it in one pot. In winter, this thing is especially popular and many roadside stalls have it..."
Da Fei explained the origin of "Oden" to Ella in detail , and ignored Monet and Xia Chan. After he finished speaking, he realized, "Did I say too much?"
"No, I like everything you say." Ella said without hesitation.
The temperature around them suddenly rose, making it impossible to stay here any longer. Xia Chan could no longer pretend not to hear anything. She sat up straight, grabbed her shoulder bag, and made a poor excuse: "Ella, Dafei, it's hot inside, I'm going to take a walk outside."
After saying that, she didn't even look at their expressions and quickly ran out the door. As soon as she left, Monet's voice came from behind her: "I'm going out to get some fresh air, too."
It was obvious that she and Monet were just 100-watt light bulbs. Ella and Dafei could handle it, but she couldn't. She was worried that Ella would be deceived by netizens, but in the end, she was left out.
The snow outside has not melted yet and the ground is wet. There are a few red plum trees on the side of the road, with their fallen petals scattered all over the ground, as if they are sobbing in solitude.
She walked slowly forward, and Monet followed her. Suddenly he saw something on the ground and bent down to pick it up.
"Don't move." He whispered.
Xia Chan turned around helplessly. A shadow flashed before her eyes. A white hand reached out and touched her hair. Then it grinned at her and said, "Okay."
"What?" Xia Chan raised her hand to grab it, but Monet stopped her hand, straightened her shoulders, and raised the phone with his other hand.
With a click, the picture freezes. The boy in the selfie is full of smiles, and he holds the confused girl in one hand. The girl's black hair is like silk, with a few strands hanging messily in front of her forehead. A beautiful red plum blossom is pinned on the transparent crystal clip on her head.
Xia Chan snatched the phone away and said angrily, "Delete it now."
Monet swayed his body, dodged left and right, and nodded his head in appreciation in the chaos: "Genius, natural framing, perfect angles, especially the male protagonist, wow, it's so lifelike."
"'Lifelike' is used to describe inanimate things, like paintings and sculptures! Illiterate." Xia Chan was furious.
Monet nodded: "Yes, I am like a fairy, like a painting, like a beautiful Greek sculpture of a handsome man."
When a scholar meets a soldier, he cannot explain his reason clearly.
A quarter of an hour passed, and the fight was fruitless. Xia Chan thought that she had done something wrong in her previous life and was here to pay for it. Monet saw that she was out of breath, and said in a swagger that he was going to buy something to moisten her throat.
"Hot coffee, warm your stomach." Monet walked up to her from a shop not far away, looking proud.
Xia Chan slowly moved her eyes to the pocket where he put his phone. Noticing her intention, Monet slowly took a step back, raised his eyebrows and smiled, and stretched out his hand and said, "Drink it while it's hot."
She took the coffee, sat on a stone pier, looked at the bridge across the river in the distance, and asked, "How do you know Ella?"
Monet pushed himself up with his hands, jumped onto the steps in front of him, sat on the railing, and smiled: "I'm just like you, I just found out not long ago."
Xia Chan felt something strange in her heart and looked over his body with a suspicious and inquiring look.
"I knew you wouldn't believe it." He laughed.
She snorted, "You are not credible enough."
He drank the rest of the coffee in one gulp, flattened the cup with his hand and threw it into the trash can beside him, saying, "I said Da Fei is a typical otaku who likes to surf the Internet. Your friend also likes to post and browse forums, right? It seems that they hooked up like this in the beginning, and then Da Fei searched for your friend's photo, and his love was unstoppable. He asked around to find out your friend's WeChat ID and game account, and visited her website and forum every now and then to get to know her. The two of them talked deeply and felt that they got along well, so they made an appointment to meet. If you want to talk about hiding it, then Da Fei's routine is indeed tacky, but it is not against the law."
She looked at him coldly, with the expression "birds of a feather flock together" written on her face.
"So ugly." Monet pointed at her face and continued, "It's probably not an online romance. Because before this, Dafei secretly stalked your friend several times, so they did have some contact in real life. Don't think too much about it, it's just a simple crush, wanting to see her, which is different from being a pervert. As for me, I accidentally saw a photo of you and that girl on Dafei's computer a few days ago, and then I knew you knew each other. You know what happened next. Believe it or not, this is what happened."
Her mind was clear and the explanation made sense.
"A photo of Ella and I? Why did Dafei put it on the computer?" She frowned.
Monet tilted his head and said with a half-smile: "You don't want to know."
She looked at him and said firmly, "I want to know."
"He liked that photo and wanted to make it a desktop picture, but there happened to be someone missing, so..." Monet turned his head, spread his hands in a width measure, and then used his palms as a knife to chop down the middle. "When retouching the photo, he accidentally photoshopped her out." As he spoke, he made a "crunching" sound as if he was cutting things into pieces.
Xia Chan's gaze could burn two holes in his back.
"But..." Monet turned over, looked at Xia Chan with a smile, and said, "I used the same method to set someone reluctantly on the desktop. It's very effective in warding off evil spirits. Look how energetic I am recently."
Xia Chan's hand holding the coffee shook and she almost spilled the coffee on the face.
The smile on Monet's face remained.
Perhaps recalling her acquaintance with Ella, her expression suddenly became heavy, and a hint of sadness appeared in her indifferent eyes: “Ella, she is a very good person.”
The atmosphere became a little solemn. Monet frowned slightly and looked at her with an unquestionable look in his eyes: "My buddy is also very good."
Although they have only known each other for a short time, for some people, once he identifies them as a friend, he will trust and protect them without hesitation.
This is his principle towards friends.
The street lights on the roadside lit up one by one. The two were silent and did not speak again.
Monet looked at the rows of street lights, then glanced at Xia Chan, and suddenly smiled, saying something inaudible: "Axia, I am actually a very good person too."
It's just that you don't believe it. You don't believe everything about me, just as you dare not admit that you don't seem to hate me that much anymore. If I work a little harder, can I catch up with the person in your heart?
There was a hint of smile on his lips, and his eyes were filled with overflowing tenderness.
He always had the ability to make her feel like a tsunami was coming in her heart just by talking.
Xia Chan looked at him expressionlessly, the night wind making her body feel extremely cold.
She said, “It has nothing to do with me.”
Monet was stunned, staring at her straight, and his unclear voice was blown away by the wind: " It has nothing to do with ..."
Unrelated? No, since they met, their fates have been closely related. He will cling to her, disrupt her life, occupy her heart, even if not all of her, he must have a place.
He was unwilling to be forgotten after several years.
He wouldn't allow her to forget.
It was a long, long time later that she realized that this man, who was as moody as the wind, was truly the nemesis of her long life.
I can't escape, I can't hide, I have no choice.