The hair tie was one she had casually bought at a roadside accessory shop, five yuan for a bundle.
Very ordinary, the kind you could see everywhere on the street.
No particular style.
And she had been using this hair tie to put up her hair regularly.
…
Lin Zhexia pinched the black hair tie, taking it off Chi Yao’s wrist: “Why did you wear it directly?”
Because of this simple hair tie, the atmosphere suddenly became ambiguous.
Perhaps it was her misconception, but Chi Yao’s gaze toward her contained some other emotions. However, those emotions disappeared in an instant, and when he spoke again, he said: “How else should I carry it, dangling in my hand?”
Lin Zhexia thought for a moment: “Carrying it in your hand would indeed be inconvenient.”
She glanced at Chi Yao’s hair and fearlessly said: “You could tie it up.”
She added, “When we were little, I braided your hair once, do you remember?”
Chi Yao: “And then you were chased out by me, do you remember?”
Lin Zhexia: “…”
She remembered.
She had secretly given him two little pigtails while he was sleeping, and because of those pigtails, Chi Yao didn’t speak to her for a week.
As they talked, they had already walked to the vicinity of their building.
Lin Zhexia, holding the hair tie, said to Chi Yao, “I’ll head back first.”
She ran into the building, and only after the door locked behind her with a “click” did she let out a sigh of relief.
She raised her hand to touch her earlobe and found it as hot as she had imagined.
Lin Zhexia lowered her head, looked at the black hair tie in her hand, and discovered that her current feeling was like the one on the high-speed train. So this was what it felt like to like someone—emotions could fluctuate so easily with it.
After the short holiday, Cheng’an No.2 High School presented an award to the competition team.
“So amazing,” during the flag-raising ceremony, Chen Lin repeatedly exclaimed, “I didn’t expect they would really get first place.”
Lin Zhexia looked at the people on the stage, momentarily recalling those brief two days in Haicheng City.
Chen Lin: “Speaking of which, when you went to Haicheng City, you were discovered by Old Liu?”
Lin Zhexia still felt very angry thinking about it: “It’s all that psycho Xu Ting’s fault.”
Chen Lin: “By the way, I heard there’s gossip in the competition team, something about someone confessing to someone else?”
“…”
Lin Zhexia hadn’t expected this kind of thing to spread.
Chen Lin: “Who confessed to whom?”
Lin Zhexia couldn’t casually disclose other people’s private matters, so in the end, she only said: “I’m not sure either, I haven’t heard about it, maybe it’s just a rumor.”
Life at school was the same as usual. The two days in Haicheng City seemed like a brief dream. Life hadn’t changed at all, except that the name “Chi Yao” had become different for her.
After school, Lin Zhexia was doing homework at home.
When she encountered problems she didn’t understand, she still habitually poked Chi Yao to ask—
I’m humbly seeking guidance—
Please tell me, physics competition first-place winner, how do I solve this problem?
A moment later, Chi Yao sent her a photo.
Chi Dog: [Image]
Class 1’s homework was mostly different from Class 7’s.
Lin Zhexia opened the photo and saw Chi Yao working on an unfamiliar test paper. Next to that more difficult test paper, someone had written a few simple steps with a black pen.
Lin Zhexia copied down those few simple steps.
After copying, she replied to Chi Yao with a kowtowing animated image.
Then, just as she was about to exit the chat box, before leaving, she caught sight of her previous nickname for Chi Yao: Chi Dog.
Even though there was no one in the room, she still felt a bit guilty as she looked back.
Confirming that the door was closed and there was no other movement outside, she clicked into the friend card and then clicked to modify the nickname.
She deleted the two characters for “Chi Dog,” stared at the empty box for a long time, moved her fingers, and carefully typed four characters: “Person I like.”
At that moment, Chi Yao happened to send her a new message.
Person I like: Did you understand?
Sometimes the nickname you give someone represents your thoughts about that person.
After changing to this nickname, even an ordinary chat box became special.
But Lin Zhexia hesitated at the chat box, modified the nickname again, and finally secretly changed it to two characters: Chi Certain.