Chapter 7: New Journey

When the autumn sports meeting was in full swing, I faced the 400-meter final. Standing at the starting line, I noticed that six of the eight runners in the same group were wearing professional spikes, while I and another classmate were still wearing ordinary rubber shoes. This pair of Dabowen sports shoes is a typical outfit for students born in the 1980s. Although it is wear-resistant, it lacks explosive power. In the preliminaries, everyone ran in ordinary shoes, but I didn't expect that everyone would suddenly change their clothes in the finals, which caught me off guard.

After the starting gun sounded, the friction between the spikes and the track came one after another, and I clearly felt the disadvantage of rubber shoes at the start. Despite my best efforts, I only won fifth place in the end, missing the points. Wang Dong joked when he handed me a bottle of mineral water at the finish line: "I thought you were a long-distance runner." I held my knees and panted, secretly annoyed. If I wasn't exhausted, I really wanted to use that trick of sweeping away thousands of troops to confuse my opponent.

When I returned to the class formation, the head teacher comforted me and said, "Adjust your state, there are still 3,000 meters to go." I lowered my head and dared not look at the crowd, but I found that the little girl was sitting in the corner eating snacks with a faint smile on her lips. In order not to embarrass myself in front of her, I held back my tears. In the next relay race, the little girl withdrew on the grounds of physical exhaustion, which surprised me a little - after all, it takes courage to change people in collective events.

The men's 3,000-meter final became a key battle. Our class's total score temporarily ranked third, only a few points behind the second place. I was still wearing the big Bowen rubber shoes, and the fatigue after 400 meters had not dissipated. After the starting gun sounded, nearly 40 players from three grades rushed out like a tide. When I ran 1,500 meters, I was already half a lap away from the first place. Every time I passed the class formation, I could hear Wang Dong's cheering at the top of his lungs, and the head teacher waving the class flag and shouting was also particularly eye-catching. This feeling of being needed by the group ignited my fighting spirit. I gritted my teeth and accelerated to rush through the stands, but had to slow down and adjust after turning the corner.

In the last lap and a half, I found myself among the top seven. Looking at the top two who were far ahead, I decided to give it a try for the third place. In the last 200 meters, the cheers of the whole audience were deafening. I sprinted with all my strength, but I saw the back of the third place getting farther and farther away. When I crossed the finish line, I slumped on the ground. I was a little disappointed when I learned that I won the eighth place in the whole school, but surprisingly, this result was the first among the freshmen in the first grade! The head teacher patted my shoulder excitedly and said: "Good job!" The whole class stood up and applauded, and the students from other classes who didn't know about it cast puzzled eyes.

In the end, the class ranked second in the total score. I won a badminton racket as a personal prize, and the class got a football. Although I failed to become the focus of the whole school, this experience made me understand the meaning of persistence. During the winter vacation, I was addicted to the King of Fighters game in the arcade, and I especially liked to use Lianna - her lower kick was accurate and effortless. During the entire vacation, I was in the game hall almost every day, and even in my dreams, there were afterimages of joysticks and buttons.

On the first day of school, the little girl was still dressed in avant-garde clothes, and the light pink lipstick on her lips was particularly conspicuous. As a deskmate, I always look for opportunities to "accidentally" glimpse her collar. Once when she was sleeping on her stomach, the collar of her loose school uniform slipped down. I pretended to close my eyes and rest, but actually quietly adjusted the angle to appreciate it. In contrast, Yang Fang in the front row preferred to wear a camisole. Although the underwear style could not be seen, the well-developed curves were equally attractive. This kind of little thought unique to adolescence was quite common among boys at the time.

The new semester kicked off like this, and I continued to find a balance between academics and games. Although the test scores at the end of the last semester declined slightly, the restlessness and confusion of youth are slowly settling down with time.

At the beginning of the new semester, the little girl stepped on the bell and sat down as usual, packing her schoolbag as if no one was around. After a winter vacation, my hostility towards her has quietly faded. Yang Fang in the front row still has many admirers, and I am just the most inconspicuous one among many admirers. So I took the initiative to ask the little girl: "Have you finished your winter vacation homework?" She replied without raising her head: "No, do you want me to do it for you?" "Paid service." I responded half-jokingly. "How about giving you two slaps as a reward?" She suddenly turned her head and stared at me, her eyes full of provocation. This sentence pierced my memory like a thin needle. Thinking of the humiliation of being slapped last semester, I clenched the hem of my school uniform. Seeing that I was silent, she took advantage of it and poked my shoulder with her fingertips: "Do you want to add a few more?" "Same here." I lowered my voice and replied. "Oh, you're getting braver." She sneered, "Will you go shopping with us sisters after school?"

I looked at the clavicle chain that was faintly visible at her neckline, and thought of her tattooed girlfriends, especially the girl with a cigarette scar who always wore thick eyeliner. Just as I was about to say no, she suddenly leaned close to my ear and said, "It seems that the last lesson was not deep enough."

I suppressed my anger: "Why do you have to be like this between classmates?"

"Wait until you become a man." She flipped through the textbook with disdain, and the sweet smell of perfume mixed with lipstick hit me.

During the third class, the pain from the bladder made me restless. The casual schedule I was used to during the winter vacation made me completely forget the survival rule of holding urine on campus. As soon as the bell rang, I rushed to the toilet.

I pushed open the door of the toilet, and a familiar call came from the smoke: "Huang Zhong? This is the first time I see you go to the toilet during class." The speaker was Guo Qiang, a member of Kowloon, who was leaning against the sink and puffing.

"My stomach is upset." I replied vaguely.

"The stalls are full, I'll clear one for you." He walked towards the cubicle and slapped the door. There was a sound of flushing inside, and a little man with a red face came out a moment later.

"Go in." Guo Qiang handed me a cigarette.

"No, thank you." I slipped into the cubicle and after solving my physiological problem, I found that there were rolls of paper in the cubicle - this was a rare thing at the time.

When I returned to the classroom, the little girl was drawing a skull on the desk with correction fluid. The sun shone in through the window, and the fluff on the back of her neck was glowing with a golden halo. I suddenly realized that this girl who made me hate and annoyed might be growing hard in the quagmire of youth in her own unique way.

After that day, I began to deliberately keep my distance from her. But the gears of fate had already begun to turn. At that age when hormones were agitated, some stories were destined to bloom in pain.