Su Ran was embarrassed by his laughter and turned to leave.
“Wait.”
Lin Mo stopped her, pointing at the notebook in her arms. “Can I take a look?”
Su Ran’s body froze, and her fingers tightened around the cover.
“No,” she whispered.
“Why not?”
“You’ll… think I’m weird.”
Lin Mo stepped in front of her, intentionally raising his hand to show her the band-aid. “I won’t. I promise.”
Su Ran looked up at him with a complex expression, mirroring the struggle in her heart. Finally, she handed the notebook over, adding, “Only one page.”
‘If there’s a first page, there’s a second. Do you think I care?’
Lin Mo took it with a smile.
The notebook was thick, featuring a dark blue hardcover without any decorations. When he flipped to the first page, he was stunned.
The written records he expected weren’t there. Instead, there was a hand-drawn diagram of a basketball court. The court was drawn with extreme precision using a ruler, with every position marked by coordinates. The diagram was labeled with pens of various colors.
Red circles marked his shooting positions.
Blue arrows represented his passing lanes.
Green dashed lines traced his movement patterns.
Detailed data was written on the side.
[Statistics]
Field Goal Percentage: 7/12 (58.3%)
Three-Point Percentage: 2/4 (50%)
Assists: 5
Rebounds: 3 (2 offensive, 1 defensive)
Turnovers: 2 (1 pass out of bounds, 1 traveling)
Stamina Drop Point: 18th minute (Increased breathing rate, increased frequency of wiping sweat)
Lin Mo scanned it, and a feeling of having opened Pandora’s box — or rather, a hidden treasure — washed over him.
There was an analysis below:
[Strengths: Excellent court vision, good passing awareness, stable mid-range.]
[Weaknesses: Clumsy left-hand dribbling, slow defensive lateral movement, stamina distribution needs optimization.]
[Suggestions: 15 minutes of left-hand dribbling practice daily; increase endurance training; lower center of gravity when defending.]
Lin Mo had started out of curiosity, but he became increasingly serious as he read. This wasn’t the crush-fueled diary of a high school girl; it was a professional scouting report. If the personal details about him were removed, this could be handed directly to the school team’s coach.
“How do you know all this?”
Lin Mo looked up at Su Ran. He already had an inkling of the answer, but he had to ask.
Su Ran looked down at her toes, which bobbed up and down nervously. “I just… learned from books. Basketball data analysis, sports physiology, basic statistics, and I watched a lot of game footage.”
Lin Mo felt his heart go hollow, softening uncontrollably.
“Why did you learn these things?” he couldn’t help but ask.
“…Because you play.”
Su Ran’s voice grew smaller and smaller. “I wanted to understand, and I wanted to help you.”
‘I wanted to help you’ — these words were ordinary enough, but coming from her, they seemed so incredibly humble. Like a sudden dagger, they pierced Lin Mo’s heart, turning his overwhelming tenderness into pain.
He remembered his past life. He had indeed hit a bottleneck in basketball. His left hand was weak, his defense was poor, and his stamina was lacking. Back then, he had never considered systematic analysis; he had just practiced aimlessly based on feeling. If he’d had this report back then, if he had discovered her worth sooner…
Lin Mo took a deep breath and continued, “Is there more?”
It hurt. It hurt so much. This was the punishment he deserved. He had to ask; he had to know everything she had done for him.
Su Ran hesitated for a moment before pointing at the notebook. “There’s… more in the back.”
If this were a moment ago, Lin Mo would have teased her by saying, “Didn’t you say I could only see one page?” But now, he couldn’t bring himself to smile. He immediately flipped to the next page.
The next section was a record of another game from a month ago. He flipped further. There were more. The thick notebook recorded almost every important game he had played since his first year of high school. Every game had data, analysis, and suggestions. When he reached the last few pages, he stopped.
It was a record from yesterday. It wasn’t a game, but just him practicing shots casually on the playground. She had recorded even that:
[4:23 PM — 4:47 PM, Individual Practice]
[Shot Distribution: Mostly from the 45-degree angle on the right (habitual position)]
[Continuous hits: 8]
[Status Assessment: Good, but clearly distracted (looked toward the plane trees multiple times)]
[Hypothesized Cause of Distraction: ‘Me?’]
Lin Mo’s face felt a bit hot. He had indeed been stealing glances at her lately. Su Ran’s face was also red enough to bleed; her toes were practically digging through the soles of her shoes.
Lin Mo closed the notebook, took a deep breath, and handed it back to Su Ran. She took it and immediately hugged it to her chest like a shield. Her voice somehow carried a hint of a sob. “How… how was it? Am I… a total creep?”
“Of course not.”
Lin Mo shook his head, then shook it again. “It’s professional. Extremely professional.”
Su Ran’s breathing hitched as she looked up, her eyes shimmering with tears.
“I’m serious, I’m not lying to you,” Lin Mo said earnestly. “If you showed this report to the school team coach, I guarantee his jaw would hit the floor and stay there for 3 minutes.”
Su Ran asked skeptically, “You’re… really not afraid?”
“Why would I be afraid?”
Lin Mo asked back with feigned innocence. “You spent your time studying my technical traits and went through all this effort to help me improve. This is clearly a very heartwarming thing.”
Su Ran’s pupils contracted sharply. She clearly hadn’t expected this reaction from Lin Mo.
“But, but everyone says this is stalking, or surveillance… that it’s creepy…” She explained frantically, though she was essentially ‘explaining’ why she was a creep.
“That’s because they don’t know your intentions.”
Lin Mo looked at Su Ran and spoke in his most serious tone. “Don’t let other people’s misunderstandings make you deny your own talent. I’ll say it again: if you give this notebook to the coach, he’ll definitely treat you like a treasure. You have a talent for this. It’s the result of your hard work, and it’s definitely not ‘creepy’.”
Inadvertently, Su Ran’s gaze fixed on Lin Mo’s face. She stared into his eyes for a long time without saying a word. Then, she suddenly lowered her head, her shoulders trembling slightly. Like a balloon that had accumulated too much grievance, she “leaked” the moment she was poked.
Su Ran was crying again. Quietly, silently.
Lin Mo stood there and didn’t disturb her, waiting for her to compose herself. After a while, Su Ran looked up with red eyes, but her gaze was much brighter than before.
“You really don’t hate it?” she asked.
“Really. But I do have a suggestion.”
“What suggestion?”
“Next time you do an analysis, tell me in advance. I can cooperate with your tests. For example, if you say my left hand is weak, I can specifically practice with my left hand so you can see the data changes. Wouldn’t that be more accurate?”
Su Ran’s eyes grew even brighter. “Can I?”
Lin Mo laughed. “Of course! I am now solemnly inviting you, Classmate Su Ran, to be my, Lin Mo’s, analyst. I’m declaring in advance: there’s no salary, and you’ll have to provide me with sports drinks.”
“Okay!!”
Su Ran answered almost instantly, her voice rising several decibels. The sudden outburst made Lin Mo flinch slightly. Conveniently, the bell rang at that moment. He played off the flinch and muttered, “Scared the crap out of me.”
Su Ran didn’t notice. Her eyes were so bright they seemed capable of emitting lasers.
***
During the afternoon self-study period, while Lin Mo was working on math problems, a note was passed to him. It was Su Ran’s handwriting:
‘School team practice schedule: Mon, Wed, Fri 4:30 PM — 6:30 PM, Sat morning 9:00 AM — 11:00 AM’
‘Coach: Liu Jianguo, 49 years old, former provincial player. Style: Strict but scientific.’
‘Analysis of existing players: (Attachment 1)’
‘Tactical changes your joining might bring: (Attachment 2)’
‘Suggestion: If you join, aim for the point guard position to form a dual-core backcourt with Zhao Lei.’
Two mini attachments — two sticky notes — were actually stuck to the bottom of the paper. They were covered in tiny, dense handwriting.
Lin Mo patiently finished reading and wrote on the back: ‘You even analyzed this?’
When he passed it back, Su Ran replied quickly:
‘I looked it up last night. The school team has open practices, so I went to watch.’
Lin Mo froze. Last night? Wasn’t she supposed to be practicing piano at night?
He looked up at Su Ran. She was looking down at her homework, but her ears were red. Every time she did something ‘excessive’, her ears would turn red.
Lin Mo frowned and wrote: ‘You didn’t practice piano last night? You skipped?’
This time, the reply took a moment:
‘No, I practiced until 8:00 PM, then watched them until 9:30 PM.’
In other words, she had watched a full 1.5 hours of training at the gym last night just to do an analysis for him. Lin Mo didn’t know what to say. Gratitude? Being touched? Or should he tell her not to work so hard?
Finally, he wrote: ‘Thank you, but don’t do that next time. It’s tiring.’
Su Ran’s reply showed a hint of stubbornness. ‘It’s not tiring. It’s very interesting.’
After a pause, she passed another note: ‘Looking at things you like, researching things you care about… it makes me feel closer to you.’
This sentence was so direct that Lin Mo’s heart skipped a beat. He looked up, and Su Ran was also looking at him. Their gazes met across four rows of seats, and neither looked away.
At this moment, the noisy sounds of reciting, turning pages, and whispering in the classroom receded like a tide. It felt as if the entire world consisted only of the two of them and the sliver of sunlight slanting in through the window.
Lin Mo was the first to look away. He wrote on the note: ‘After school, at the basketball court. I’ll practice with my left hand for you to see.’
Then he folded the note into a paper airplane and gave it a gentle toss. The paper airplane traced an arc through the air and landed precisely on Su Ran’s desk. She opened it, read it, and looked up, her ponytail swaying gently with her mood.
***
The basketball court after school was very quiet. The setting sun painted the sky a beautiful orange-red, and the clouds looked like ignited cotton. Only Lin Mo was on the court, practicing his left-hand dribbling.
Su Ran sat in the first row of the bleachers, the blue notebook spread across her knees and a pen in her hand. This time, she wasn’t recording; she was just watching. She watched the sweat on Lin Mo’s brow, his focused eyes, his frustration over a mistake, and the confident smile he showed when the ball went through the hoop.
After practicing for 20 minutes, Lin Mo walked over to drink some water.
“How was it?” he asked.
“You’re improving quickly,” Su Ran said very seriously. “The stability of your left-hand control improved from 63% to 71%, but the change of direction while breaking through is still a bit unnatural.”
Lin Mo really wanted to ask her how she calculated those percentages. But he didn’t. It wasn’t important.
“Did you get all the data down?”
“Mhm. Do you want to see?”
Lin Mo sat down next to Su Ran and took the notebook. This time, the record was even more detailed; she had even drawn diagrams breaking down his dribbling movements.
“You can draw, too?” he asked in surprise.
Su Ran smoothed a lock of hair over her chest, looking a bit embarrassed. “Not really. It’s just to record the movements.”
Lin Mo flipped through the sketches. Although the lines were simple, they captured the essence of the movements. One drawing showed the moment of his layup — his body extended, his arm raised, even the folds in his clothes were drawn… She was a true treasure.
“These are drawn really well,” he said sincerely.
Su Ran’s face turned red. “They’re not… I just drew them casually.”
“They really are good,” Lin Mo insisted, while encouraging her. “You could consider developing in this direction. Sports data analysis, sports science, drawing… I feel like they all suit you.”
Su Ran’s hand paused slightly. “I… never thought about it.”
“You can think about it now. You have talent; it shouldn’t be wasted.”
Su Ran lowered her head, her fingers twisting together. After a long time, she whispered, “My mom… wants me to study piano. Professionally.”
Lin Mo felt a pang of sympathy and asked softly, “What about you? What do you want to study?”
Su Ran didn’t know how to answer. This question was too difficult for her. From the time she was a child, her life had been planned out. What time to practice, what pieces to play, what competitions to enter, what schools to apply to. She was like a precision instrument operating according to a preset program.
“I don’t know.” Ultimately, Su Ran shook her head. “I never thought… that I could choose.”
The words were so light, yet so heavy. Lin Mo fell silent. He remembered that in his previous life, Su Ran had indeed pursued a professional piano career and achieved success. But every time he saw her in the news, her eyes were hollow, like those of an exquisite puppet.
“Then start thinking now,” Lin Mo said suddenly and firmly. “You can choose. Whether it’s piano or something else, you can choose for yourself, as long as it’s something you truly like.”
Su Ran looked up at him, her eyes filled with both confusion and a glimmer of light.
“Will you help me?” she asked.
“I will, as long as you want me to.”
Su Ran smiled. It wasn’t the sickly kind of smile anymore. Her eyes smiled first, and then the corners of her mouth curved up — a complete and genuine smile.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
The sun had completely set, and the sky gradually turned a deep blue.
“It’s time to go back,” Lin Mo said, standing up.
“Mhm.” Su Ran packed away her notebook.
They walked out of the playground side by side. The streetlights had just flickered on, casting long shadows on the ground.
“Lin Mo,” Su Ran suddenly called out.
“Yeah?”
“If… if I chose data analysis, would you think… I was surveilling you?”
Lin Mo smiled patiently. “No. That would be your profession, your choice. If I really play ball in the future, I’ll really need an analyst like you.”
“Really?”
“Really.” Lin Mo teased, “But that part about you providing the drinks was a joke. If you really go down this path, we’ll have to sign a formal contract and pay you a salary.”
Su Ran was amused. “Okay.”
When they reached the fork in the road, it was time for them to part ways.
“See you tomorrow,” Lin Mo said.
“See you tomorrow,” Su Ran nodded. She walked two steps, then turned back. “The songs on the USB drive… do you like them?”
Lin Mo stayed where he was, his eyes smiling. “I like them. I like them a lot. How about you let me hear a live version next time?”
‘The kind with only your piano.’
Su Ran’s face glowed softly under the streetlamp. “Okay.”
She left, her footsteps light. Lin Mo stood there until he saw her disappear around the corner.
His phone vibrated. It was a text from Su Ran:
‘Today’s data analysis report has been sent to your email.’
‘PS: Remember to change your password.’
Lin Mo smiled and immediately typed a reply:
‘I’m not changing it.’
‘PS: You have the right to control my inbox to prevent any other analysts from trying to poach me.’
Su Ran replied instantly, but with only an emoticon: ‘:)’
It was the first time she had used one. Looking at that smiling face, Lin Mo suddenly felt that being reborn was truly wonderful. It was so wonderful that he wanted to shout it to the whole world.