Chapter 4 The Ugly Duckling Turns Into a Swan
Li Li shook her head, mysteriously refusing to tell Pei Shangxuan who she liked. He pondered the whole morning and at lunchtime, tugged at Li Li to ask, "In which class?"
"What?" His abrupt question caught Li Li off guard.
"This morning, you told me you liked someone." Pei Shangxuan curled his fingers and knocked on her tall forehead, "What's your memory like, girl?"
"You don't know him." Li Li's cheeks flushed with embarrassment, making Pei Shangxuan feel a sudden chill.
He rolled his eyes in annoyance, "Li Li, who is he?"
"Caniggia."
Cornered, Li Li had no choice but to reveal the name of the "Son of the Wind." As expected, she saw Pei Shangxuan's clueless expression. Li Li perked up, proudly pouting her lips at Pei Shangxuan, "Told you, you don't know him. He's a forward for the Argentina Team, nicknamed 'Son of the Wind'. I've never seen someone so handsome." She paused for a moment, and in her mind added, "Of course, you're not too bad yourself."
As a boy with nothing better to do, Pei Shangxuan would play soccer with classmates on the playground, but he rarely watched matches. Moreover, the World Cup was broadcast at dawn, and he would be deep in sleep, simply unable to wake up.
Pei Shangxuan, unwilling to be outdone, went home and persuaded his dad, who wasn't a soccer fan, to watch the game together. Li Li had been saying things that left him confused quite often, and he didn't want to widen the gap between them any further. As to why he cared so much about the distance between them, Pei Shangxuan himself couldn't figure it out.
On June 15th, Pei Shangxuan asked Li Li in the school auditorium which team would win the Hercules Cup. Li Li was certain about Argentina, while he chose Germany. Years later, it turned out they were both wrong.
After advancing to the second year, Li Li and Pei Shangxuan's seating arrangement as desk mates was solidified because they got a new homeroom teacher.
Tao Haijuan didn't move up to the second year with the class. Although she had many creative ideas for managing the class, she adopted a laissez-faire approach to students' grades. In this hands-off situation, Class Four had only Li Li scoring first in the grade to save some face, while none of the other students even made it into the top fifty. In 1990, when grades were the measure of all things, Tao Haijuan had to take responsibility for her lack of effective teaching.
The teacher who used to lead the graduating class of the third year, La Fengzhu, became their homeroom teacher. She shuffled the seating charts, pairing good students with underachievers, hoping that the strong students could help improve the grades of the weak, and thus raise the class's overall performance.
"Not wrong, but too pragmatic," Li Li commented. Pei Shangxuan laughed, tugging at her ponytail and exclaimed, "Who cares, at least we don't have to change desk mates every week now. After three weeks, who even remembers what was said?"
Li Li swatted Pei Shangxuan's hand away from her hair so forcefully that he cried out in surprise. Rubbing the back of his hand where Li Li hit him, he grumbled about how her roughness would make it difficult for her to ever get married.
"Mind your own business." Li Li rolled her eyes, picked up her new English textbook to preview vocabulary, and couldn't be bothered to pay further attention to Pei Shangxuan, who was lingering on the words "not getting married"—a phrase Li Meiqing often uttered, which Li Li found off-putting.
When Li Li started reading, Pei Shangxuan would get bored and look for ways to grab her attention and chat with her. He couldn't stay still like her, calm and undisturbed.
"Li Li, if you're still not married by thirty, I will take it upon myself to marry you," he said as he leaned in close and pushed aside the English book covering her face. At fourteen, his understanding of "marriage" was limited to the dictionary definition and the sensational dramas by Qiong Yao.
She looked at Pei Shangxuan with disdain and said, "If at thirty you still haven't managed to deceive a wife with that face of yours, I might take pity and consider you, you fool." After saying that, Li Li put her textbook back up.
A playful remark made its way to the ears of gossipers and turned into a whirlwind of rumors. Pei Shangxuan was one of the handsomest boys in the grade, while Li Li epitomized the phrase "all brains no beauty." Strangely, the rumors only highlighted her supposedly unattainable crush on Pei Shangxuan, with no version suggesting that Pei Shangxuan, who was among the last in terms of grades, was fortunate to be seen with favor by her.
Li Li let it slide with a laugh. She was unaware of when the rumors started to run rampant, but by the time she noticed, she had become a topic of discussion among the girls in every class, and even a trip to the restroom was enough to stir whispers.