On Tuesday morning, Lin Mo arrived in the classroom ten minutes early on purpose.
He had suffered from insomnia last night; more accurately, a lack of sleep caused by over-excitement.
While lying in bed, he repeatedly thought of the feeling when Su Ran had touched his wrist. It was soft, smooth, and cool, like morning dew.
Then there were the words on the school badge: ‘Thank you for today. I want to see you tomorrow.’
It was too blunt to sound like something Su Ran would say, yet it was one hundred percent her style.
After reaching his seat, Lin Mo placed the badge in the outermost layer of his pencil case, leaving the zipper halfway open so he could see it at any time. He then opened his math textbook and pretended to preview the lesson, though his eyes remained fixed on the door.
At 6:55, Su Ran appeared.
Today, she wore a light gray knit cardigan over her school uniform, which made her skin look even fairer. Her ponytail was tied higher than usual, exposing the entire length of her snowy-white nape.
As she entered, her first glance landed on Lin Mo’s seat.
Their eyes met, and Su Ran’s pace faltered for a second before she walked to her seat as if nothing had happened. Lin Mo noticed that when she set down her backpack, her hand trembled, and she had to pull the zipper twice before it opened.
When the budding feelings of a teenage boy and girl reached almost the same frequency, it seemed to form an invisible wall of air, separating the two.
Before the morning study bell rang, neither Lin Mo nor Su Ran spoke to each other. It wasn’t until Su Ran got up to get water that a sticky note drifted from her fingers as she passed Lin Mo’s desk, landing precisely on his open textbook.
Lin Mo was startled. He pressed his elbow down on it and waited until she disappeared into the hallway before picking it up to look.
It was still printed text, but this time with a handwritten annotation:
‘Today’s weather forecast: Sunny becoming cloudy, high of 28 degrees, low of 19 degrees. Recommendation: Wear your school jacket; it might get colder in the afternoon.’
Below that, a line of small, handwritten words read: ‘You were still online at 23:47 last night. Lack of sleep affects memory. Recommendation: Rest before 11 PM tonight.’
Lin Mo raised an eyebrow. ‘How does she know I stayed up late last night?’
He had indeed scrolled through his phone for a while after eleven, but he hadn’t posted any updates.
Lin Mo thought for a moment and opened QQ. In this era, WeChat didn’t exist yet, and high school students all used QQ.
He checked his recent contacts, but Su Ran wasn’t there. Following a hunch, he clicked on “People You May Know.”
In the third recommendation slot, there was an account named S.R. The profile picture was solid black, the profile was empty, the location was hidden, and the status signature was just a single period.
S.R. was undoubtedly the initials for Su Ran. She didn’t seem to be trying to hide herself.
Lin Mo clicked “Add Friend.”
Verification message: ‘How did you know I stayed up late last night?’
Sent.
Three seconds later, his phone vibrated. The request was accepted.
S.R.: ‘You shared a song to your Space at 23:51. I saw it.’
Lin Mo rubbed his chin. This was even stranger. He had indeed shared a post-rock song last night, but he had set it to private.
Private shares on QQ Space couldn’t be seen by anyone, not even friends—unless the other person had special permissions, or… she had used some technical means?
Lin Mo felt a spark of interest and typed a follow-up: ‘How did you see it?’
S.R.: ‘I guessed.’
Liar.
Lin Mo stared at the screen and suddenly smiled. She wouldn’t lie to his face, but she would through a screen?
He replied: ‘Then guess what I’m thinking right now?’
This time, he waited a full minute.
S.R.: ‘Thinking about how I could see it.’
Lin Mo: ‘Anything else?’
S.R.: ‘Thinking… why is she so strange? She’s so scary.’
Lin Mo’s fingers paused over the keyboard.
He looked up. Su Ran was already back, her head lowered as she read a book. Her phone was in her desk, the light from the screen flickering against her face.
He focused and typed quickly: ‘I’m sorry, but you guessed wrong. I swear on my right to find a girlfriend—and that of every boy in this class—that Su Ran is not scary at all.’
‘Just ask me directly next time. You don’t have to go through so much trouble.’
Su Ran’s phone vibrated several times, but she didn’t look at it immediately. Lin Mo saw her clutching her textbook so tightly that the pages wrinkled.
Finally, she cautiously pulled out her phone. Her shoulders tensed the moment she saw the message.
It took a long time before she replied: ‘Will you tell the truth?’
Lin Mo secretly let out a sigh of relief: ‘Of course. I’m not exactly an honest person. I’m a bit vain, and I have a competitive pride that rivals anyone’s.’
‘Having a beautiful girl clean my desk every day and things like that… people wouldn’t believe it if I told them. Even I feel like I’m dreaming. To keep the dream going, I want to be honest with you.’
This time, Su Ran looked back at Lin Mo.
Across four rows of seats, her gaze was as complex as a tangled ball of yarn. There was suspicion and expectation, a fair amount of fear, and a hint of obscure, inexplicable hope.
Lin Mo didn’t look away. He even rested his chin on his hand and held her gaze.
Soon, the tips of Su Ran’s ears turned red, and she hurriedly turned her head back.
After hesitating for a moment, she lowered her head and typed: ‘Why did you stay up late last night?’
She spent a long time typing this single sentence. Whether through the screen or the air, he could feel the intense conflict in her heart.
Lin Mo didn’t have such troubles. He replied instantly: ‘Thinking about you.’
The moment it sent, he saw Su Ran’s entire body freeze.
With a thud, the phone slipped from her hand, fell onto her lap, and then rolled to the floor. The sound was quite startling in the quiet classroom.
Several students in the front rows turned around.
Su Ran hurriedly picked up her phone, her ears so red they looked ready to bleed. She didn’t dare look back at Lin Mo again.
—
During the math quiz, Lin Mo finished fifteen minutes early.
While checking his work, he intentionally changed a multiple-choice answer, switching the correct C to B. When he turned in his paper, he purposely walked past Su Ran so she could see his answers.
After the papers were collected at the end of class, Su Ran, acting as the study representative, took them to the teacher’s office. Lin Mo followed her and “ran into” her at the office door.
“I think I got that one multiple-choice question wrong.”
Su Ran didn’t stop walking, but she replied without hesitation, “It should have been C.”
Lin Mo tapped his forehead and said ruefully, “I knew it. Great, that’s five points gone.”
“…You don’t usually get those kinds of questions wrong,” Su Ran said in a very soft voice. She didn’t realize that her answer had already exposed that her eyes had never left him.
“I didn’t sleep well, so my brain is foggy. I’ll have to sleep earlier next time. 11 PM, right?”
Lin Mo sighed, casually mentioning the time from the note.
Su Ran didn’t dare answer, but her ears turned red again as she walked away quickly, as if fleeing the scene.
During the lunch break, Lin Mo didn’t go to the library. Instead, he went to the sports field.
The autumn sun was pleasant. He sat on the bleachers, watching the basketball team practice.
Chen Yu was sweating profusely on the court. Seeing him, he waved. “Come play!”
“My knee hasn’t healed yet!”
Lin Mo called back loudly, touching the band-aid on his knee. In reality, that minor injury had healed long ago. He wasn’t some fragile doll, but he needed a reason not to exercise right now.
After sitting for ten minutes, Su Ran, as expected, walked out of the school building.
She held a book and walked slowly around the track, her gaze “accidentally” sweeping over the bleachers. Seeing that Lin Mo was there, she didn’t approach him but continued walking along the track.
She did one lap, then two, until she reached the bottom of the bleachers on the third lap. Suddenly, she heard Lin Mo’s voice. “Why don’t you… come up and sit for a bit?”
Su Ran stopped and looked up at him. The sun was a bit dazzling, making her squint.
She hesitated for a few seconds before finally walking up the steps. She sat three seats away to Lin Mo’s left.
‘Is it really necessary to sit that far away?’
Lin Mo thought to himself that this behavior didn’t exactly scream social anxiety.
“What are you reading?” he asked curiously.
“Music Psychology.” Su Ran turned the cover toward him.
“Is it good?”
“A bit dull.”
The conversation was dry, like soup without salt. Lin Mo didn’t mind. He even found her effort to find a topic quite cute—she was as clumsy as a little girl socializing for the first time.
“Do you like Bach?” he asked.
Su Ran’s eyes lit up. “How did you know?”
“That book of sheet music in the piano room. It was all Bach.”
“Yes… he is very rigorous.” Su Ran looked down at her book and said softly, “Every note has its place. It isn’t messy.”
“Like the way you organize my desk.”
Lin Mo’s sudden comment made Su Ran’s fingers freeze on the page. She turned to look at her, her eyes filled with surprise and a soft sense of being understood.
“Do you really… not think it’s strange?”
Su Ran’s voice was incredibly soft, as if she wanted to bury herself in the ground. It was clear that she knew her behavior wasn’t normal, yet she had done it anyway.
Lin Mo felt a strange itch in his heart. He really wanted to get to know this little yandere faster.
“What’s strange?” he asked back.
“The things… I do.”
Su Ran’s voice grew even smaller, her toes turning inward. “Organizing your desk, keeping track of your preferences, carving the badge… everyone says I’m a freak, that I’m terrifying.”
Lin Mo thought about it. “It’s a bit unique, but calling it terrifying is an exaggeration.”
Actually, it wasn’t an exaggeration at all. Thanks to her ladyship, he had been scared half to death in his previous life.
“Why?” Su Ran asked, looking a bit bewildered.
“Because the intent is different.”
Lin Mo didn’t want to put too much pressure on her, so he acted as if he didn’t care. “If someone did those things to hurt me, I’d definitely be afraid. But you aren’t doing that.”
Su Ran stared at him blankly. “How do you know I’m not?”
Lin Mo met her gaze with a look of feigned innocence, explaining with a counter-question, “Do I even need to ask? If you wanted to mess with me, you could have done it long ago, right? After all, you know everything about me—including my home address. For all I know, you even know about those few martial arts manuals under my bed.”
It was just a joke to lighten the mood, but Su Ran didn’t laugh. Instead, her face suddenly turned pale.
“No, I wouldn’t. I… I wouldn’t…”
Her breathing quickened, and she waved her hands in a panic. “I wouldn’t. I… I never would…”
The poor girl was so flustered she couldn’t even speak a full sentence. Her repeated denials felt like countless needles pricking his heart.
Lin Mo softened his voice and smiled. “I know. That’s why I’m not afraid.”
A whistle blew on the field; practice was over.
Chen Yu ran over. He froze for a second when he saw Su Ran, but he still waved. “Lin Mo, let’s go! Back to the classroom!”
“Coming.” Lin Mo stood up and brushed the dust off his pants.
He took two steps and then looked back. Su Ran was still sitting there, bathed in the sunlight like a still-life painting.
“By the way, starting tomorrow, I’ll organize my desk myself.”
Su Ran’s shoulders slumped, as if her bones had been removed.
Lin Mo gave a mischievous grin. “But you can inspect it and give me a grade.”
Su Ran snapped her head up, her eyes bright again.
“Out of what?”
Perhaps fearing that Lin Mo would change his mind, she raised her voice slightly to make sure he heard.
“You decide.”
“Then… then 100 points. I’ll check it once a day.”
As Su Ran spoke, there was an irrepressible joy in her voice.
“Deal. But you have to grade it in person.”
“…Okay!”
Lin Mo turned and walked down the bleachers. Behind him, he heard a very soft sound, like someone humming a song.