After My Secret Identity Was Revealed, My Crush Said He’s My Biggest Fan - Chapter 6

How did he manage to get into the Hongda summer camp back then?

He would never forget a single detail from that summer, and with spring in full bloom, the origin of everything felt somewhat magical. That day, his mood rolled over and over like a roller coaster, and it was impossible to summarize precisely what he felt. In the end, however, he only felt an incomparable sense of awe, surprise, and nostalgia.

“Lin Yu, you might not be able to stay in the dormitory this weekend.”

One day in March during his second year of high school, his head teacher, Qian Ying, suddenly walked over to Lin Yu’s desk. The teenager, whose hair had not yet grown long, paused his action of packing his school bag and cast a puzzled look at the teacher standing opposite him.

Looking into the outstanding boy’s eyes filled with confusion, Qian Ying, who understood his family situation, inevitably felt a bit of heartache. She pressed her lips together and said with difficulty:

“No. 1 High School is lending its venue to the Provincial Education Department for a teaching and research meeting, and Principal Zhao specifically instructed that no students are allowed to stay at the school for these two days. So you might have to go home and stay for a couple of days. If you run into any bad situations, you can call me. No matter what, I will rush over to help you right away.”

Lin Yu felt a hundred relunctances in his heart about going home, since Meng No. 1 High School was currently his best sanctuary. But looking at Qian Ying’s troubled expression and thinking of Principal Zhao’s firm and resolute style, he ultimately struggled and nodded:

“It is fine, I will go back. If something happens, I will trouble you, Teacher.”

That night, Lin Yu stepped out of the school gates of No. 1 High School alongside the vast majority of his classmates to the sound of the eleven o’clock evening bell. The summer night in the southwestern spring city was by no means stuffy, yet he felt as though he had been thrown into a steaming 30-to-40-degree steamer from another region, and his mood simply could not brighten up.

The school bag on his shoulders pressed down on him, making his entire body sore. As a key high school ranked in the top three of the entire city, homework was never in short supply. It seemed he was not going to have an easy weekend.

Harboring such a gloomy mood, Lin Yu took the bus back to the old residential complex where his family lived without saying a word. He was already prepared for a fierce showdown with Lin Zhishu the moment he stepped inside, but when he took out his key with extreme irritation and opened the door, what he saw was an unexpected figure.

“Teacher Xie? Why are you here?”

Seeing the middle-aged woman in a suit with an extraordinary demeanor sitting on the sofa, surprise flashed in Lin Yu’s pitch-black pupils. He swept away his previous vigilance and frustration, walked over to the water dispenser to pour a cup of water for the woman named Xie Nanqin, and then listened to her ask:

“Mingchuan, how have you been getting along at school recently?”

“Pretty good, better than during the break.”

Hearing Lin Yu say this half-jokingly, a complex light flashed instantly in Xie Nanqin’s eyes. Then she raised her head to look at the black-and-white photo of a young woman hanging on the living room wall, and continued without any discernible emotion in her voice:

“If Lin Zhishu is still acting like before, why don’t you come stay at my place this summer vacation? You are about to enter your senior year, and you cannot let him affect you anymore.”

“Thank you, Teacher Xie. I indeed have this plan, I just do not know if Lin Zhishu will agree.”

“He will have to agree whether he wants to or not. Even if he is still your father in the eyes of the law, protecting you through your senior year of high school is not a problem for me.”

Speaking of this man’s name, Xie Nanqin’s tone clearly carried a hint of impatience. She seemed to utterly detest this irresponsible and cold-hearted man, and as soon as she finished this sentence, she changed the subject:

“Forget it, let us not talk about this person. Do you have any plans for this vacation? Would you like to visit the top two universities?”

That final question almost startled Lin Yu so much that he jumped off the sofa. As an upcoming senior high school student, he naturally yearned for China’s top two universities, but upon suddenly hearing this, he was completely stunned by Xie Nanqin’s casual tone.

Seeing his reaction, Xie Nanqin seemed extremely satisfied. She raised her eyebrows and continued to explain:

“Shenfeng successively received summer camp notices issued by Hongda and Huaqing today. The admission qualifications are selected by province, and all upcoming seniors can apply. Only those two universities sent official notices to Shenfeng, but students can apply on their own. With your grades at Meng No. 1 High School, there is definitely no problem. Do you want to try?”

Lin Yu naturally would not refuse, especially since he was one of the top students in science at Meng No. 1 High School. Under Xie Nanqin’s guidance, he collected and organized a lot of information, and then took a deep breath, clicked confirm, and submitted his application to the two top universities in China.

Later on, Huaqing University overlooked him, but he received the admission email for the Hongda summer camp. Seventeen-year-old Lin Yu stepped into Hongdu on the August wind, and the sound of cicadas and the scorching sun hit him full in the face in front of the royal garden-style imposing school gates. The lake reflections and ancient pagodas left an unforgettable mark in his youth.

The unrestrained and passionate laughter of the teenagers echoed in his mind. He followed groups of idealist companions into the teaching buildings, into the gymnasiums, and into this beautiful yet illusory romantic summer.

That was a memory Lin Yu cherished most. Although the chaotic and long senior year had made this summer camp feel like a lifetime ago, he had always kept every second by the pagoda and the lake locked deep inside his heart. Whenever difficult moments arrived during his senior year of high school, he would pull out a glowing, beautiful fragment of memory from his repository, trying to use those little starlight fragments to illuminate the dark road ahead.

The Hongda summer camp was an illusory dream Lin Yu would never forget in this lifetime. If phrased in terms commonly used on the internet, this was probably the legendary “five days of summer camp, a lifelong Yanyuan bond.”

And now, Lin Yu, who had long since lost his entry ticket to Hongda, sat inside the campus of an unfamiliar university, capturing fragments belonging to that memory once again through another person’s Moments feed. In the photos, Xia Chenxuan smiled so uninhibitedly, displaying his sharpness freely across the campus and classrooms, his slightly lighter-colored eyes filled with the swagger and anticipation belonging to an upcoming high school senior.

Yang Yuanran loved to banter with Lin Yu, but he always kept a clear head before major events happened, so right now he simply stayed quietly on the other end of the voice call, keeping Lin Yu company. The cicadas of the summer night drifted faintly through the screen window into the room, yet this originally pleasant sound inexplicably made one feel somewhat lonely.

Amidst the blurred cicada sounds, Lin Yu stared at this Moments post for a very, very long time. Until Yang Yuanran thought the call had disconnected itself due to a lack of signal, Lin Yu slowly spoke up again:

“It is nothing, just saw what he posted last August. We went to the same summer camp, and I was even thinking I could find myself in those photos of his. Such nonsense.”

He used a joking tone for the second half of his sentence, but Yang Yuanran knew his mood probably was not very good right now. The teenager far away in the southwest spoke casually to change the subject, and then Lin Yu pretended not to care as he swiped his fingers to exit Xia Chenxuan’s last photo from the Summer School Magical Night and started scrolling back up.

There was nothing particularly important further down in the album. High school students all over the world probably lived equally painful and uninteresting lives. The teenager who used to chatter excitedly and flood his Moments with activities had vanished almost entirely for a whole year, and when he finally reappeared, he posted only a single college admission result without even half a word of caption.

Seeing this, Lin Yu closed his eyes unwillingly.

He knew all too well what that blank year in the middle signified, and he knew that those friends he could not see were probably frantically congratulating Xia Chenxuan online for getting into a prestigious school. Those high school classmates, whether sincere or feigned, had given him similar blessings back then; yet no matter how good Qingda was, their congratulations would only make the lingering reluctance in the person’s heart grow even more intense.

How ridiculous. Was he not supposed to be checking whether Xia Chenxuan had a romantic partner? How did he manage to plunge himself into this inexplicable emotion all over again? Lin Yu shook his head in self-deprecation, and then continued speaking to Yang Yuanran:

“Finished scrolling, did not see any close male or female friends. He only posted one admission result and two photos of a trip to the Northwest for the entire summer vacation, did not even post about university registration.”

The topic was thus forcibly pulled back to the emotional channel. Yang Yuanran thought for a moment and tilted his head on the other end of the phone:

“To be fair, if he had the script of a deeply affectionate second male lead from a TV show, he probably would not have had the chance to post anything anyway. Wait, graduation photos!”

As soon as he finished speaking, however, Yang Yuanran realized he seemed to have acted foolishly:

“Forget it, forget it, pretend I did not say anything. If he had any connection to people from Mengze Shenfeng, it would be impossible for him to take a group photo even upon graduation. He could not possibly specially book a plane ticket to fly from Yanchun to Mengze.”

Reminded by Yang Yuanran, Lin Yu instantly realized where that fleeting sense of incongruity had come from when he was browsing Xia Chenxuan’s album earlier. The other roommate in Room B still had not arrived yet, so Lin Yu boldly continued his analysis:

“I was wondering what felt so strange about it, he did not post graduation photos.”

“No graduation photos? How is that possible?”

“Right? He is not someone who dislikes posting on Moments; he posted a bunch of class group photos back in his first and second years of high school, but I did not see any graduation photos.” Lin Yu became even more annoyed at this. “Since he made all those other things public, there should be no reason to block unfamiliar people from graduation photos, right?”

Lin Yu could clearly feel that terrifying quagmire of emotions rising to engulf him once again. However, it was already late, and tomorrow he had to deal with the English placement test and the grade-level ice-breaking class meeting; he had no time to torture himself with these thoughts anymore. Therefore, he casually said:

“Forget it, if worse comes to worst, I will just ask him myself once we get familiar with each other. I am not chasing anyone who has a white moonlight in their heart when I am doing nothing. I am going to sleep.”

“Alright then, get some rest early, we will talk more tomorrow.”

After his good friend on the other end of the phone said goodbye, Lin Yu smiled faintly and replied, “Mm, you too.” Then he intended to hang up the call, but the sentence shouted right when the voice call was first connected suddenly tightened everything in his mind:

“Hey, Xiaochuan? What do you want with your dad?”

Thus, the fingers holding his phone tightened involuntarily. Then he instinctively stopped Yang Yuanran, who was also about to hang up:

“By the way, Yuanran.”

“What is it, did you not say you were going to sleep?”

“Do not call me that anymore.”

“Ah?”

At first glance, these words sounded a bit inexplicable, but Yang Yuanran, who had a very close relationship with Lin Yu, did not take long to understand what he meant. Then the playful teenager felt speechless once more, and a sort of secret distress blocked his throat, making him inexplicably want to cry out of empathy.

Sure enough, after he fell silent once more, his good friend’s disappointed and self-deprecating voice came through the earpiece.

The climate of the unfamiliar coastal city was no longer spring-like all year round, and the youth who used to shine brightly all over was no longer full of spirit and ambition. The eighteen-year-old youth with messy long hair sat alone in the unlit dormitory, the dim yellow light emitted by the desk lamp gently covering his pretty eyebrows and eyes, yet failing to illuminate his completely darkened pupils. Lin Yu parted his thin lips slightly, speaking word by word:

“The things my mom left me have already been completely ruined by me.”

“Yuanran, I am no longer Yu Mingchuan.”