Secret Love at the Equator by Xia Zhiyao

Chapter 3: The Comfort of Childhood Friends

Li Yingze's answer was a simple,

"She has a boyfriend now." It was hard to tell if he sounded resigned or helpless.

That day, Shen Nianci walked him home until their paths diverged. It was a long walk filled with conversation, like catching up with a friend you haven't seen in ages.

Li Yingze opened up about his mom's expectations and his own dreams, but noticeably tight-lipped about anything related to Shen Nianci.

She'd once thought this was a new beginning, but now it felt more like the final chapter. It seemed every attempt to rekindle old connections ended the same way - a burst of reconnection, a fragile truce, and ultimately, another loss.

Their conversations were an enigma to outsiders. Shen Nianci would show them to her friends, who'd scratch their heads and say, "This makes zero sense to me!"

It was true, their exchanges were a private language, filled with references to shared dreams, poems, faraway places, and the unspoken realities of life.

That night, back in her dorm, Shen Nianci texted Li Yingze. "You should really think about this," she warned. "I have a terrible temper, and being friends with someone like me can be a challenge."

Li Yingze's reply was a playful jab: "Looks like the nice guy always gets the short end of the stick, huh?"

But their fragile connection didn't last a week. Li Yingze deleted her from his friends' list with a parting shot: "Yeah, maybe we're just not cut out to be friends."

Maybe Shen Nianci overplayed things a bit, or maybe she'd misjudged his role in her life. Even after deleting her from his friends list, Li Yingze never cleared their chat history.

Looking back, that time felt like a haze. All she could recall was this constant, almost obsessive focus on him. He was everywhere she looked.

The craziest thing she ever did? Skipping her final exam to see him, which of course landed her in hot water with a teacher. But she didn't regret it. For Shen Nianci, youth was about embracing wild passions, sincerity, openness, courage, and a complete lack of fear.

She also remembers creating a fake account to chat with him online. Ironically, Li Yingze knew it was her all along, just as she knew he knew.

Despite their strained dynamic, they still talked about poetry, distant dreams, even playing a strange game of pretending not to recognize each other. But Shen Nianci, with her impulsive actions, kept breaking the fragile beauty of those moments.

This confusing entanglement dragged on, making it difficult for her to move forward. He kept pushing her away with vague pronouncements like, "I don't deserve your affection."

Yet, she'd catch him gazing out the window at her classroom, or stealing glances from the playground towards the fourth floor. It was a bizarre push-and-pull.

Shen Nianci wasn't above sneaking into his classroom when he was gone. She'd sit at his desk, trying to see the world through his eyes. Each time, she'd leave a little memento: a note in his notebook, a pressed leaf in a textbook, a pilfered tissue from his cheap stash. Sometimes, she'd even tidy his messy drawer or leave cryptic messages in his books – none of which he ever seemed to mind.

Shen Nianci once pilfered one of his prize-winning notebooks, filled it with her own writing, and then snuck it back onto his desk. Li Yingze spent a whole night engrossed in it, finally approaching her with, "It's a lucky thing to grow up with someone." This echoed his earlier claim of unworthiness, but at the time, it went right over Shen Nianci's head.

Naive as she was, she didn't realize this was just his gentle way of letting her down.

"What's so lucky about that?" she thought.

In reality, the reason behind his repeated first grade wasn't laziness, but the fact that he'd spent his kindergarten to third-grade years studying in Shenyang. Returning, he was forced to repeat first grade, leaving him the odd one out. From then on, he grew up alone, a maturity perhaps born from that isolation.

Concerned about his solitude, Shen Nianci even tried to set him up with a classmate who lived nearby. Li Yingze, ever the loner, simply shrugged and said he was used to being alone.

This introversion became his calling card. He changed his personal signature to: "Lone wolves stalk the night, while sheep huddle in fear."

Back then, Shen Nianci couldn't crack his enigmatic shell. She dived headfirst into understanding him, empathizing with his every word. But by the time she figured it out, Li Yingze was already a distant memory.

Maybe that's the biggest heartache of youth: someone who shapes your early years, leaving an indelible mark. You chase their shadow, stumbling and learning with each misstep. You mature, finally gaining some perspective, only to realize the paths have diverged, each of you on your own journey.

Holding on felt futile. A few heartfelt words couldn't bridge the growing distance between them.

Even years later, a pang of regret still hits Shen Nianci whenever she thinks of him. The river of time had brought them together. It was a fleeting moment of connection before they boarded separate trains on their individual journeys.

Shen Nianci couldn't shake the feeling of "what if." The thought gnawed at her – maybe if she were prettier, things would have turned out differently. This wasn't just insecurity; shortly after they met, Li Yingze dated a classmate of hers.

Shen Nianci didn't care about her looks, but everyone seemed to agree the girl was beautiful. Dislike festered within her. It wasn't just because she'd dated Li Yingze, leaving him heartbroken, but also because this girl had bullied Shen Nianci.

Shen Nianci gave Li Yingze the cold shoulder during that time, her every glance dripping with icy disdain. It was clear to her the other girl had made the first move.

At that age, when crushes bloomed like spring flowers, a pretty, intriguing girl whispering promises of forever could be enough to sweep anyone off their feet. They'd had their own moments too, Shen Nianci remembered. After her confession, a mutual friend had asked him, "So, what do you think about her?"

His answer had been a hesitant, "How could I not feel something?" Clearly, he'd cared for her too.

Shen Nianci stopped pestering him after that. Their friendship had dissolved. All that remained was a yearly "Happy New Year" text message buried in her verification code. "I miss you," she longed to say, but it always died on her tongue, replaced by the generic greeting.

Li Yingze might reply occasionally, but mostly they existed as ghosts in each other's contact lists. The last time they spoke was June 2021, right after his college entrance exams.

Swallowing her pride, Shen Nianci sent a friend request, which he accepted. They exchanged a few messages, then radio silence again. Still, Shen Nianci couldn't resist the occasional cryptic post, hoping to draw his attention.

Finally, at 3 AM on a night when sleep eluded her, her frustration bubbled over.

In a fit of frustration, she typed out a long message that ended with a blunt, "If you don't feel anything, just delete me. Don't let me hang on to false hope."

The next day, around noon, while crammed onto a school bus, her phone buzzed. It was a reply from him: a single, curt "Okay."

Shen Nianci's fingers flew across the screen. "Just got out of class, coming over..." she typed, only to be met with an error message. They weren't friends anymore. Sinking back into her seat, she listened to the theme song of "Love Unexpectedly" playing on her headphones. An odd sense of relief washed over her. The answer, while final, was clear. No more ambiguity.

But the relief was fleeting, a drop in the vast ocean of lingering emotions. Moving on felt an impossible feat.