At Zhou Ping's house.
The last note of the piano faded, echoing in the empty room.
Zhou Ping didn't move immediately. He waited for the sound to completely dissipate before reaching out and pressing the stop button on his phone's recording.
A complete audio file was thus saved on his phone.
This piece... he was certain it wasn't in his music library.
Of course, it was also possible his music library was too small.
He scratched his hair irritably and closed the piano lid.
How should he deal with this thing?
The recording file lay silently in his phone, like a hot potato.
Send it to Zhang Sheng and the others?
The musical appreciation of those guys, besides "awesome" and "holy crap," couldn't produce a third word.
Pay a music teacher?
Too much trouble, and he couldn't explain the origin of the piece.
Send it to... Song Yuqi?
As soon as the thought popped up, he immediately squashed it.
No.
Too bizarre.
He was already abnormal enough today; he couldn't add to the suspicion of being a "stalker" and "delusional."
Zhou Ping leaned back in his chair, feeling drained.
The energy consumed in one day was more than he had used in the past month.
He deeply missed his old self, who could just lie flat with a clear conscience, uninvolved in anything.
Energy conservation was the true meaning of life.
He firmly believed that there must be others like him in the world; he just hadn't met them yet.
Time passed minute by minute.
He forced himself to finish the remaining homework, trying to regain his inner order through familiar routines.
Footsteps came from outside the door, followed by his mother Wang Ya's voice.
"Pingping, finished your homework?"
Zhou Ping was startled.
"Just finished, what's up?"
"Come down and have some fruit."
"Coming."
Zhou Ping got up, double-tapping to light up his charging phone screen.
10:46 PM.
Unbeknownst to him, the chaotic day was finally coming to an end... He walked down the stairs instead of taking the elevator.
The huge four-story house was empty, with only his own footsteps echoing.
On the first floor, Wang Ya was already sitting on the sofa.
"Pingping, the holidays are coming soon. Is there anywhere you want to go?"
Wang Ya handed him a plate of sliced fruit.
"Haven't thought about it yet."
Zhou Ping picked up a piece of cantaloupe and shook his head.
When the holidays came, the place he most wanted to go was his two-meter-wide bed in his own room.
"Your dad and I have actually arranged a place for you."
Wang Ya's tone was casual.
"Huh?"
Zhou Ping's movements stopped.
Wang Ya looked at him and slowly uttered three words.
"Go to Boston."
----
The next day, in the classroom of Class 7, Grade 1, the morning reading was listless.
"What the heck?"
Zhang Sheng's shout woke up the drowsy students around him.
"You're going to Boston?"
Zhou Ping was sprawled on his desk, too lazy to even lift an eyelid, squeezing out a single syllable from his throat.
"Mm."
"Holy crap!" Zhang Sheng's chair legs scraped loudly on the floor, and he leaned in close. "No, what's going on with you? You were fine yesterday, how did you wake up wanting to go abroad?"
"My mom told me last night." Zhou Ping shifted into a more comfortable position, his voice muffled. "She said it was arranged a long time ago, to live there for a while, and someone would receive me."
"For fun?" Zhang Sheng's eyes lit up. "Boston has so many fun places!"
Zhou Ping finally bothered to open his eyes and glanced at him.
"You've been there?"
Zhang Sheng chuckled, rubbing his hands.
"Haven't been, but isn't there an opportunity now!" He slung an arm around Zhou Ping's shoulder, lowering his voice, his tone full of uncontainable excitement. "Old Zhou, take me with you? I'll just tell my family I'm going with you to broaden my horizons, they'll definitely agree!"
Zhou Ping thought about it.
One person was trouble, two people seemed... still trouble, but at least they could talk less on the way.
"As long as your family agrees."
"It's a deal!"
As the two of them were whispering, a faint female voice came from beside them.
It was Zhang Sheng's deskmate, a quiet girl wearing glasses.
"Are you... going to that Boston in the beautiful country?"
Zhang Sheng replied casually.
"Yeah, which other one could it be?"
The girl adjusted her glasses, seemingly trying to recall something, and whispered.
"I remember... Berklee College of Music, I think it's there."
"Can you take some photos for me when you go?"
Berklee.
College of Music.
These words, like an electric current, instantly pierced Zhou Ping.
His sprawling posture froze.
In his mind, the piano melody he had recorded played uncontrollably again.
Song Yuqi.
Peninsula.
Trainee.
Boston.
Berklee College of Music.
These words, originally unrelated, were now wildly colliding and connecting in his mind, finally converging into a huge question mark that made him unable to continue lying flat.
The nature of this trip, which he had found troublesome to death, seemed to have suddenly changed...
The forum post mysteriously sank on the afternoon of the second day.
No deletion, no comment control, just simply, no one talked about it anymore.
Because Zhou Ping, one of the parties involved, acted as if nothing had happened.
He still lay on his desk, his face covered by an open math book, sleeping soundly.
No matter how the surrounding classmates' gazes swept back and forth over him, he remained unmoved.
Instead, Zhang Sheng and the others were scratching their heads in frustration.
"Old Zhou, you really have no reaction at all?" Zhang Sheng kept his voice as low as a mosquito's buzz. "That post is saying all sorts of things about the senior! Aren't you going to explain?"
Zhou Ping didn't even lift an eyelid.
"Explain what?"
"Explain that you two aren't in that kind of relationship!"
Zhou Ping finally let out a muffled sound from under the book.
"What kind of relationship are we?"
Zhang Sheng was choked by this rhetorical question, and after a long while, he managed to squeeze out a sentence.
"...Never mind."
It seemed he had perfectly demonstrated the saying, "The emperor isn't worried, but the eunuch is."
The thing rumors feared most was when the person involved didn't take them seriously at all.
The more excited you got, the more you explained, the more enthusiastic the onlookers became.
If you just lay flat, they would find it boring instead.
During the last self-study class in the afternoon, Zhou Ping lay on his desk, seemingly asleep, but in reality, his consciousness was incredibly clear.
His phone was in the desk drawer.
The screen lit up.
A chat box with a Corgi avatar popped up.
【Song Yuqi】: What are you doing?
Zhou Ping's fingers reacted before his brain, taking out his phone and starting to type.
【Zhou Ping】: In class.
【Song Yuqi】: Oh, good student.
A few seconds later.
【Song Yuqi】: Then you still dare to reply to my message? Aren't you afraid your phone will be confiscated?!
Zhou Ping stared at the line of text, feeling like he'd been checkmated.
His brain, accustomed to weighing pros and cons, now had only one thought.
Reply.
Must reply.
【Zhou Ping】: Self-study.
Even one extra word felt like a waste of energy.
But it was these two words that inexplicably loosened the string in his heart that had been taut all day...
