Confession to You in Early Summer (GL) - Chapter 6

Students who hadn’t participated in the long march couldn’t truly understand the pain of walking seventeen kilometers. Those first-year students who had been dismissive and excitedly ran ahead all received a painful lesson.

The more joyful they were running at the beginning, the more painful it was when they had to crawl on their knees to complete the entire journey.

However, the second-year students who should have been prepared didn’t seem to fare much better. The first half of the journey was filled with laughter and chatter, but in the second half, they were dragging each other along, not wanting to walk anymore but having no choice but to continue.

Yan Wei couldn’t take it anymore halfway through. Blisters had formed on her soles, and every step was excruciating. She simply found a rock that looked relatively clean by the roadside and sat down to rest for a while.

This outdoor activity was a double test of physical strength and willpower. Yan Wei could study in the classroom all day without being distracted, but her body succumbed to the seventeen kilometers of the long march, forcing her to stop and massage her calves to rest.

Jiang Youyi, after the water incident with Yan Wei, had already run off silently, not saying a single extra word, and was probably close to the finish line by now.

Zhou Xiaoxiao sat down beside Yan Wei. Students passed them one after another, and there were also those who couldn’t walk anymore, stopping in twos and threes to take a break like Yan Wei.

“Yan Wei, isn’t your home in Yizhou? The long march ends here, and we get the afternoon off. Are you going home?” Zhou Xiaoxiao took a sip of water and chatted idly with Yan Wei.

There was a four to five-hour bus ride between Yizhou and Fudu. Yan Wei usually stayed at school and didn’t go home often, only returning during the small long holidays in a semester. The Qingming Festival had a three-day holiday, and after deducting the travel time on the highway, there were still two days for rest.

“Mm, I’m going back.” Mentioning going home, Yan Wei’s mood was a bit low, but she didn’t let Zhou Xiaoxiao notice.

Zhou Xiaoxiao’s home was in the city, but her parents didn’t care much about her, so she usually stayed at school on weekends as well. However, she should be going home for the Qingming Festival.

“Oh,” Zhou Xiaoxiao replied, sounding a bit disappointed.

Yan Wei asked her, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Zhou Xiaoxiao sighed, swinging her legs. “It’s just that my parents are going back to their hometown for Qingming Festival and didn’t take me. They told me to stay at school by myself. Everyone in the dorm is leaving, and the goddess is leaving too. I’m all alone and miserable, it’s so hard!”

Yan Wei couldn’t help but smile. It was a pity she had to go back; otherwise, staying and keeping Zhou Xiaoxiao company would have been nice.

“There are a few classmates in the next dorm whose homes are far away, they probably won’t go back. You can ask them to hang out together then. Two or three days will pass quickly,” Yan Wei said, feeling rested, and stood up, shaking her legs.

Zhou Xiaoxiao shrugged without expressing an opinion.

The remaining half of the journey was particularly difficult for Yan Wei. If she hadn’t been concerned about her image, she would have wanted to give up directly and lie down on the spot pretending to be sick, asking a patrolling teacher for a ride.

However, in the end, she still persevered and completed the entire journey, returning to the parking place with Zhou Xiaoxiao and the last few unfamiliar students before six o’clock.

The students of Class 11 had all arrived, except for Yan Wei and Zhou Xiaoxiao. After the torment of seventeen kilometers, the girls were visibly haggard. Some were playing on their phones while leaning against their seats, and others were chatting.

The school’s management of mobile phones was relatively strict. Usually, teachers absolutely didn’t allow students to bring mobile phones to class, but for this rare outdoor activity, Teacher Xu turned a blind eye to these phone-playing behaviors and let them be.

The boys were howling and wailing, but at the same time, they were roughhousing in the car, not looking tired at all.

Yan Wei and Zhou Xiaoxiao got on the bus and found that the only two remaining empty seats were separated, one in the middle of the carriage and the other at the back, one in front and one behind.

Two girls were sitting by the window, with Jiang Youyi sitting in the back seat.

First come, first served. Yan Wei and Zhou Xiaoxiao were late, so there was no reason to ask others to sit in the aisle seats. Yan Wei glanced at Jiang Youyi and turned back to Zhou Xiaoxiao, who was behind her. “I’m not familiar with Zhang Yutong, so I’m embarrassed to sit next to her. Why don’t you sit beside her?”

Zhou Xiaoxiao had no objection to Yan Wei’s arrangement. The front was a bit better than the back, and Yan Wei was letting her have it.

But…

“Jiang Youyi doesn’t seem to be in a good mood. Are you okay with that?” Zhou Xiaoxiao was a little worried. Jiang Youyi’s emotions were too obvious. She hadn’t paid much attention to anyone since getting inexplicably angry earlier.

Yan Wei smiled. “I’m fine.”

“Okay then,” Zhou Xiaoxiao said, still a little doubtful.

Yan Wei and Zhou Xiaoxiao settled things, and Yan Wei walked straight to the back of the bus. Jiang Youyi was listening to music with her earphones in. Surrounded by the noisy environment, she was alone, turning her head to look at the scenery outside the window, appearing particularly quiet.

Someone sat down in the empty seat next to her. Jiang Youyi didn’t turn her head until the bus started moving, and then she realized that the person sitting next to her was actually Yan Wei.

Yan Wei took off the backpack she had carried all the way and hugged it in her arms. She unzipped it and rummaged inside. Her head was lowered, and a few strands of her long bangs that were tucked behind her ear had escaped, partially covering her face.

Her forehead, the bridge of her nose, her lips, and her jawline outlined a soft and varied curve. Her still-childish face exuded the full of youth, yet she was more composed and mature than most of her peers.

And excellent.

Jiang Youyi added silently in her heart.

Before Yan Wei found what she was looking for and looked up, Jiang Youyi turned her face away at the right time, as if the earlier glance had just been a casual one. When the reflection in her pupils disappeared, it also erased the traces of something else.

A hand holding two adhesive bandages was presented in front of her eyes. “Did you scrape your knee just now?”

There was a small hole in Jiang Youyi’s pants, and a bit of bl00d had seeped out at the edge.

Earlier, she had been tricked by Yan Wei and walked away in embarrassment and anger, even abandoning the Coke she had just bought.

Yan Wei had seen her fall from afar. Although she had immediately gotten up and walked around the bend at a faster pace, Yan Wei had carefully noticed that her steps were uneven, with a slight limp.

Mentioning what had just happened made Jiang Youyi angry. What exactly did Yan Wei mean?

Unable to accept a confession from a girl of the same s3x, yet insisting on being friends with her, making some ambiguous gestures that could lead to speculation but were still within the bounds of friendship.

If you like someone, be together. If you don’t, keep your distance. Choosing to be friends as a fallback because you can’t be lovers is just self-deception, harming yourself and others.

She didn’t want to deceive herself into saying she didn’t care, so she wanted to clear up her relationship with Yan Wei. But Yan Wei, how could she act like nothing had happened?

The adhesive bandages Yan Wei offered were not taken. Jiang Youyi ignored what was in front of her and looked down at her phone, her fingers quickly tapping on the screen as if playing some kind of rhythm-based audio game.

Jiang Youyi hadn’t been able to concentrate since just now, making repeated mistakes. At the end of a level, her rating set a new historical low, making her both annoyed and irritable. She really wanted to get angry.

That hand was finally withdrawn.

Jiang Youyi turned off the screen and put her phone in her school uniform pocket, turning her head to lean against the window, preparing to sleep.

The person next to her suddenly leaned over and unexpectedly pulled up her trouser leg.

Jiang Youyi was caught off guard, more startled than angry. She instinctively wanted to pull her leg back but was skillfully held down by Yan Wei. “Don’t move.”

Yan Wei’s words were like a spell. Jiang Youyi indeed stopped struggling, but her calf muscles were tightly tense, and her fingers were digging into the seam of her pants, like a tamed cat that was still wary.

Jiang Youyi was wearing a pair of loose-fitting cropped jeans. She was already thin, and with her trouser leg pulled up, it easily rolled to her knee, revealing a thumb-sized scraped wound.

The wound had stopped bleeding, a bit redder than her normal skin tone, covered with a thin layer of dried bl00d.

Yan Wei didn’t offer any meaningless concern, only silently tore open the adhesive bandage, gently covered the wound, carefully pressed down the edges with her thumb, then lowered the trouser leg, and said to Jiang Youyi, “Be careful when you shower these two days, don’t get water on the wound.”

Jiang Youyi: “…”

After speaking, Yan Wei retreated to her own seat, leaned back, and closed her eyes to rest.

The half-hour bus ride felt like returning to school in the blink of an eye.

After the students in front gradually left, Yan Wei stood up. Her feet felt grounded, but the soles were excruciatingly painful. She grabbed the back of the seat in front of her for support before she could stand steadily.

After getting off the bus, Jiang Youyi walked past Yan Wei from the side without saying a word.

It wasn’t even seven o’clock yet, and the sky was just beginning to darken. Many parents were waiting outside the school to pick up their children for the holiday.

Yan Wei had to take the school bus home, so she had to go back to the dorm first to pack her suitcase.

Zhou Xiaoxiao waited for Yan Wei to return to the dorm together. Seeing Jiang Youyi walk away, she approached Yan Wei and whispered, “Jiang Youyi just stuffed something into your bag.”

“Huh?” Yan Wei was surprised. “What is it?”

Following Zhou Xiaoxiao’s direction, she took a brand-new tube of ointment from the small pocket on the side of her backpack. Looking at the ointment’s main effects, she couldn’t help but smile, her eyebrows curving.

An ointment for disinfecting external injuries. Instead of keeping it for herself, she secretly slipped it to her.

Yan Wei and Jiang Youyi had been in the same class in their first year of high school and even in the same dormitory, but they usually didn’t interact much.

Last year, it rained for several consecutive days before Qingming Festival, so the long march was arranged after the holiday. That day, Yan Wei also got blisters on her feet, which broke and caused her pain at night, preventing her from sleeping. The next day, her soles became infected and inflamed, and she even went to the school infirmary. The girls in the dorm knew about this.

What surprised Yan Wei was that Jiang Youyi even remembered this.

Looking up and not seeing Jiang Youyi’s figure, Zhou Xiaoxiao asked suspiciously, “Why did she give you ointment?”

Yan Wei put the ointment back in her backpack and smiled. “I asked her to help me buy it, I just forgot to ask her for it earlier.”

Zhou Xiaoxiao always felt something was strange, but compared to the inconsistency of Jiang Youyi’s attitude, she was more concerned about why Yan Wei bought the ointment. “Are you injured?”

“Mm, sort of,” Yan Wei said casually. “Just a bit of a scrape, not serious.”

Zhou Xiaoxiao said “oh” and didn’t ask any more questions.

Yan Wei and Zhou Xiaoxiao returned to the dorm. Jiang Youyi came out with a bag on her shoulder, ready to leave.

“Jiang…” Zhou Xiaoxiao was about to greet Jiang Youyi, but unexpectedly, Jiang Youyi dodged and turned her head slightly, quickly brushed past her, turned the corner, and went downstairs.

Zhou Xiaoxiao frowned. “What’s going on with Jiang Youyi?”

One moment she gives Yan Wei something, the next she ignores her.

Yan Wei, however, happily curled the corners of her lips.

“What are you smiling at?” Zhou Xiaoxiao felt utterly confused.

Yan Wei stopped smiling and shook her head. “Nothing.”

She had just seen a blushing Jiang Youyi.