Hopeless Romance (GL) - Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Ye Du lived up to the spirit of Labor Day in her own way—spending the entire May 1st holiday toggling between cram school and practice exams. She hadn’t mentioned the math competition to Ye Sangshu yet, deciding to wait until she had made a firm choice. During a break, Ye Du consulted Teacher Wang about his thoughts on the competition and shared her concerns. Teacher Wang explained its significance and analyzed her strengths and weaknesses, but ultimately stopped short of telling her whether she should go. When Pei Lang emerged from a room, Teacher Wang called him over. “Come here, Xiao Pei. He’s in your school’s competition group; you can ask him.” The first half was directed at Pei Lang, the second at Ye Du.

“You want to join the math competition?” Pei Lang placed his bag on the sofa and sat down naturally.

“No, I’m still thinking about it,” Ye Du replied. She knew Pei Lang’s grades were good, but she hadn’t realized they were that good.

“What is there to think about? It’s not like you can just go because you want to anyway. Take the test first. If you pass and really hate it, you can just apply to drop out.” In Pei Lang’s world, few things required long deliberations. To him, life was like racing: you can’t foresee the consequences of every decision, and every consequence leads to more consequences. If you weighed everything that way, you’d spend half your life stuck in indecision. Time was the one thing he couldn’t afford to waste; once yesterday was gone, it stayed gone.

Ye Du found this logic novel, yet undeniably sensible. Whether she could pass and whether she’d want to stay were still uncertainties; the problem that had nagged her for over a day was suddenly resolved. Her perception of Pei Lang was updated once again.

After thanking him, Ye Du was preparing to leave when she heard Pei Lang ask behind her, “Is that Jiang Zhouchi in your class?”

Ye Du was mid-shrug into her backpack strap. Images of Jiang Zhouchi asking her to take a photo and the Jiang Zhouchi described by Jiang Xinwan flashed through her mind. She turned back to face him and confirmed it.

“What… kind of person is she?” Pei Lang seemed to choose his words carefully.

Ye Du glanced at the teacher and his wife busy in the kitchen and didn’t answer. After saying her goodbyes, she left. Pei Lang chatted with Teacher Mao for a few more minutes, and when he left the apartment, he found Ye Du waiting for him by the elevator.

Actually, Ye Du didn’t know how to answer. Her contact with Jiang Zhouchi was minimal; she mostly knew her through the gossip of others. She told him honestly that they weren’t close and she wasn’t qualified to comment.

Leaning against the elevator wall and looking at the advertisements posted inside, Pei Lang said, “A friend told me she likes me. I’ve heard of her—she’s beautiful and not exactly low-profile, so a lot of people know her.” Ye Du didn’t respond, merely curious how Pei Lang could talk about being liked so casually, as if discussing a common acquaintance.

“To be honest, just looking at her, I kind of like her too. But I feel like I’m flashy enough on my own. If I like a girl that beautiful too, don’t you think it might be… a bit much?” At this, Ye Du felt a pang of sympathy for Jiang Xinwan and Wang Zhu; the “crush” they had coveted for so long already had someone else in mind.

“Confess first. Jiang Zhouchi might not even say yes. If you actually end up together, then worry about the rest.” Ye Du remembered Teacher Wang’s comment that she was “good at applying logic to different situations.” As she finished speaking, the elevator reached the first floor.

“Fair enough. You work hard too; I look forward to seeing you in the competition group.” Pei Lang wasn’t sure why he’d shared this with Ye Du. Perhaps he just wanted someone to know, and since their social circles were worlds apart, he felt safe. He sensed she was the type who wouldn’t spill a secret even under threat or bribery.

As expected, Ye Sangshu was very supportive of the math competition. In her eyes, there was no reason to hinder anything beneficial to her daughter’s studies.

Ye Du received a call from Chen Pupu on the last day of the holiday. She didn’t mention the missed call from before; she just listened as Chen Pupu shared stories about attending a music festival with Yu Xiao. Chen Pupu joked that she didn’t even know when her parents had picked her up—she had slept straight through to the next day. After lamenting how exhausting music festivals were, she finally got to the point. The teachers at Yunchuan Middle School were masters of assigning homework as if they never had to grade it themselves. Between the festival and her exhaustion, Chen Pupu had wasted half the holiday. She had spent all yesterday afternoon frantically writing, but several subjects remained untouched. In her desperation, she called Ye Du.

When they met at the same KFC from their previous meal, Ye Du noticed a change in Chen Pupu. She looked exceptionally happy—a different kind of bright, radiant joy than before. Ye Du looked over the unfinished homework and left the math, which Chen Pupu struggled with, for her to do herself. Ye Du took over the English. As Ye Du put it, the worse a subject is, the more seriously you must treat it; otherwise, it only gets harder to improve. This was why she never allowed Chen Pupu to simply copy her math work.

English was no challenge for Ye Du, especially since she had already completed the same assignment. The real difficulty lay in forging the handwriting; their styles were vastly different. Ye Du practiced on scratch paper for a long time, mimicking Chen Pupu’s notes until it looked fluid. She started with a pencil, only switching to a pen once she felt confident. At first, she had to constantly refer back to the front of the workbook to avoid slipping into her own style. In elementary school, Ye Sangshu had sent Ye Du to calligraphy classes, and later she practiced with hard-pen copybooks. Her handwriting was distinct and sharp, making it difficult to suppress.

As she wrote, Ye Du felt like she was back in those childhood calligraphy lessons. Initially, the teacher made her practice basic strokes—the paper filled with horizontal lines, hooks, and slants. Later, she began imitating styles she liked. She used to find the “vertical-curve-hook” stroke difficult because the structure would look ugly if the pressure wasn’t perfect. Eventually, she realized that imitation was even harder. She had thrown her pen in frustration back then, though luckily it wasn’t expensive. There was always a template restricting her, and she couldn’t easily capture the essence of the original. Yet, through a mix of self-loathing for her work and the urge to quit, she had stuck with calligraphy for nearly four years. Because of this, she didn’t find mimicking Chen Pupu’s handwriting tedious. Instead, she found it fun. As she carefully inscribed each letter into Chen Pupu’s workbook, a strange sense of pleasure bloomed in her heart.

By the time she finished, Chen Pupu had fallen asleep with her head on the table. Ye Du checked her watch; it was 5:00 PM. The sky was gradually darkening. People drifted in and out of the restaurant, the rhythmic sounds of conversation and the door swinging shut filling the space. Ye Du packed up the table and sat quietly, waiting for the end of the holiday with the girl beside her.