Although Jiang Ran’s face eventually turned grim, she still allowed one of the “parallel turn circle friends” to accompany her back to the hotel, though throughout the journey back, the two walked three meters apart from each other.
Jiang Ran stared at the shadows on the ground—the elongated shadows cast by the streetlights. Whenever his shadow slightly approached hers, she would stop, turn around, and glare at him with a fierce expression.
Bei Jiao had long arms and legs, and occasionally, unintentionally failing to control his steps, he would cross the safety distance—when that happened—this man, who elsewhere would say, “If I say we go east today, no one dares to look west,” would obediently act like a rabbit, raising his hands with a helpless expression and stepping backward.
After repeating this three times, he finally spoke.
“Jiang Ran, what exactly are you hesitating about?”
As they reached an open square devoid of people, he gazed at the snowflakes falling onto the woman’s head about five steps ahead of him. He longed to reach out and brush them off, or shield her from them… He let this fantasy show plainly on his face.
At this moment, from such a distance, she could clearly see her reflection in his pitch-black eyes.
The heavy snowflakes drifting from the sky seemed to momentarily freeze midair, suspended by some mysterious magic. Her heart raced as he suddenly called her name directly, and she moistened her lips, thinking to herself that this situation was getting dangerous—everything felt somewhat off-track.
“A Jiao?” she called him.
“Mm?”
Caught off guard by such a gentle voice, he almost felt like he was dreaming.
“What exactly do you want to ask?” she asked, her tone indeed very soft.
“Nothing much. Just wondering why I have to stand so far away from you? Thirty minutes ago, we were practically glued together.”
“…”
Sometimes, Jiang Ran felt that the romantic thoughts in her mind were an insult to her own intelligence and a desecration of Bei Jiao’s childishness.
After all, everything he said sounded like dog barking.
“Glued together”—as if they had done something together!
Suddenly, her scalding, boiling brain felt like it had been doused with a bucket of icy water. Jiang Ran sobered up, silently glancing at Bei Jiao. Right now, she only had the urge to slap him again…
If not for the faint red handprint already on his face.
Maybe she should make it symmetrical and slap the other cheek too?
“Not just tonight,” she said slowly, “I hope that from now on, you also stay at least five meters away from me… Although that might be difficult, it might even be better if you don’t appear in front of me at all.”
“You’re still counting those three years on your fingers?” he scoffed, “What’s the point? You can’t forget me anyway. Even if you have thirty more years, it’ll be the same.”
Although this was the truth, even Jiang Ran herself suspected that the ending might indeed be like this—
But this was a dangerous topic she dared not even contemplate for more than thirty seconds in the quiet of night alone, and it was certainly not appropriate to be spoken aloud so brazenly and audibly.
“Who says I can’t forget? If necessary, I can even accept electroshock therapy.”
“Don’t say things you don’t mean, Jiang Ran.”
“…”
Shut up.
“Really? If you were actually trying to forget me, why did I just now manage to unlock your phone? Do you even remember your phone’s unlock password?”
“Oh, no, I don’t remember.”
“?”
“…That’s because I’m just too lazy to change it.”
“You’ve changed phones several times, but you’re still too lazy to change the password?”
“…”
Aaaaaaaaah!
Seriously, shut up!
“What are you struggling with?”
Now, from his tone, it sounded like she was the childish one.
Jiang Ran felt a surge of anger, irritably messing up her hair, shaking off some snowflakes that chilled her brain. She started blaming the excessive snowfall this year—it was only November, yet it was snowing as if in a rush.
Fuming, she turned around and walked off on her own, focusing entirely on the ground beneath her feet and never once glancing back at the person behind her.
But judging from their shadows, he followed her all the way until the very last moment, until they reached the hotel lobby, under the bright lights revealing everything.
Under the glaring lights of the hotel, the young man behind Jiang Ran silently shrugged his shoulders and slightly narrowed his eyes.
He gallantly (bravely, though his courage had mostly vanished) watched Jiang Ran step into one of the elevators without trying to squeeze in with her. Only after her elevator doors had completely shut did he hesitantly reach out and press the upstairs button again.
As for this, Jiang Ran felt absolutely nothing throughout.
She had no doubt that he simply guessed that if he had insisted on squeezing into the same elevator with her, she might have lost her temper in the enclosed space and hit him again.
…
The next day.
Jiang Ran dragged her suitcase onto the shuttle van sent by the provincial team for their use.
The bar incident had originally made her, who had wanted to stay in Tonghua for a couple more days, pack her suitcase and flee back to Jilin overnight. As she climbed onto the van, she told herself to pretend everything had been a dream.
A bizarre nightmare.
At this point, it was already the third day after the opening ceremony at Songbei Ski Resort.
After arriving, Jiang Ran didn’t even go home to the villa. Instead, she rushed directly with her suitcase to the club’s office, which served as their base, to apologize to the club owner for not being able to attend the opening ceremony.
Fortunately, the club owner was very generous. Waving his hand with a two-hundred-pound beer belly, he smiled and said, “It’s okay. You don’t know that now our whole club has straightened their spines because of you—although they weren’t bent before—but now they’re even straighter!”
Jiang Ran: “…”
Club owner: “We have Jiang Ran! Sister, you’re too good. This competition in Tonghua had a bit of influence. Before we didn’t even advertise that it was the same track as the Winter Olympics. Our club’s riders didn’t send many, Li Xingnan and A Ju were both at home doing nothing! Useless stuff!”
He kicked Li Xingnan, who was sprawled on the sofa playing a game on his phone without even looking up: “Getting ready to shrink the toxic zone. Next time I won’t land here again. If you don’t leave, I will.”
His voice sounded a bit tired. Jiang Ran instinctively glanced at him and noticed he really did look exhausted.
It was hard to pinpoint exactly what was different, but he seemed to have grown a lot of unshaven beard, transforming from a Korean-style uncle into a homeless one.
She paused, wanting to ask what was wrong.
Unfortunately, the club owner had too strong a presence.
After being spoken to by Li Xingnan, the club owner clicked his tongue, swiped his phone screen a couple of times, and while half-heartedly playing a game, still stuck his head out stubbornly trying to chat with Jiang Ran: “This time our club almost had no presence at all! Annoying! Fortunately, sister, you cleverly added some drama—”
Jiang Ran: “?”
Jiang Ran: “I didn’t add any drama!”
The club owner didn’t even bother to listen to her explanation, sighing: “What a pity! The second most popular figure in the parallel turn circle, Bei Jiao, is from Chongli! I don’t understand, what’s so magical about the mountain top ski resort? It’s an old-established one, with outdated facilities—no heated seats or butt warmers on the chairlifts!”
“…”
Unfortunately,
he was probably there because he had no choice. Originally, he was in Jilin, but later he was forcibly exiled to Chongli—
And the person who exiled him was standing right in front of you.
Hehe.
“You can’t expect to have all the good things to yourself,” Jiang Ran said expressionlessly, “Can you really offer him a low salary to join our club?”
“Of course, I’m willing!”
“Then treat everyone fairly, or we’ll cause trouble.”
The club had over fifty riders, and paying each three thousand yuan a month would be enough to give the owner a hard time.
“…I do have a plan. I heard Bei Jiao is quite peculiar—he’s willing to teach complete beginners, and almost exclusively teaches beginners. If I asked any of you to hold hands and teach pushing down the slope, who would be willing? You’d run away faster than if you’d seen a ghost! Bei Jiao is different—he can teach. I can put his photo on the official website and launch a New Year blind box ski instructor promotion, where the hidden prize is a random session with Bei Jiao. Guess if I can make back his salary through him?”
“…Smelly businessman.”
“Even if I’m smelly, it’s useless. Unfortunately, no one wants to come to Jilin! I heard another Jilin club tried to poach him before, and even promised him money, but he still refused to come… Tell me, what’s so great about Chongli anyway? They close down completely by mid-December!”
Just as she was about to say something, she suddenly realized something was off.
The information was too much for Jiang Ran to keep up with. She was stunned: “What? Chongli is closing down? Why?”
“For the Winter Olympics, sister.”
“Oh.”
So annoying.
Can’t even escape it. Then why did she rush back so urgently? Songbei Ski Resort had just opened its main A2 trail for the first week, and it was already so crowded that you couldn’t even ski.
She was just feeling frustrated about this when Li Xingnan was already daringly cursing the boss:
“There’s someone behind that tree across the way—Alright, you’re dead. If you don’t want to play the game seriously, don’t play it.”
Jiang Ran suddenly looked up at Li Xingnan.
The club owner, however, seemed long accustomed to this. Facing Jiang Ran’s surprised gaze, he waved his hand and explained, “He’s been like this for days. I heard he had a fight with Qiu Nian and was kicked out of your house. Now I’ve become a shelter for orphans… and still have to endure his temper.”
“Li Xingnan and Qiu Nian had a fight?” Jiang Ran asked in confusion. “Are we talking about the Qiu Nian we know?”
Li Xingnan could scare her off the couch with just a glare.
How could they even have a fight?
“Yeah, I was also very surprised. Qiu Nian stood up to him. Impressive, right? I’ve long told you people not to get into office romances—”
Jiang Ran was about to voice her opinion.
At that moment, the man who had previously had one leg draped over the sofa let his long legs slide off the edge, and his boots landed on the floor with a “thud.”
The sound wasn’t loud, but it successfully made the two chatting individuals simultaneously flinch.
“Finished discussing?”
The man’s voice was low and calm.
With a belly full of gossip she couldn’t share, Jiang Ran could only exchange innocent glances with the club owner, both staring at each other in silence.
…
Li Xingnan continued to lord over the office, but it didn’t affect Jiang Ran going home to snoop for gossip.
Dragging her suitcase, she arrived home where A Ju and Qiu Nian were applying cucumber slices to each other’s faces like two intimate sisters.
Compared to Li Xingnan’s disheveled state, Qiu Nian looked no different from usual. Glancing at Jiang Ran, who had just entered dragging her suitcase, he casually said, “You’re back. I thought you’d be back a couple of days later.”
The last bit of cucumber was perfectly applied to both faces, and A Ju “crunched” the remaining tip of the cucumber.
The two of them looked completely at peace.
“I went to the office first when I came back,” Jiang Ran opened her suitcase and started taking out the contents, “I saw Li Xingnan. If it wasn’t for the boss calling his name, I would have thought he was some homeless person.”
Qiu Nian was silent for a moment before saying, “Don’t worry about him.”
Jiang Ran wanted to know what had happened, but she didn’t ask. She knew Qiu Nian couldn’t keep quiet for long. So she put the clothes she needed to wash into the washing machine, took out her makeup bag, and as she shuffled around the room in her slippers, Qiu Nian asked, “Have you decided which World Cup stop you’re going to?”
Unlike the Summer Olympics, where athletes are directly selected by the nation and sent to compete under the national team’s name, the Winter Olympics differ because of differing sports philosophies in North America and Europe. Many athletes competing in the Winter Olympics aren’t even professional athletes.
In the summer, they might have regular jobs, such as lawyers, doctors, teachers, or even bricklayers or plumbers—
In the winter, they compete individually, yet also represent their countries in prestigious competitions.
Therefore, in the Winter Olympics, the qualification for athletes has never been decided by anyone, but rather determined by the FIS (International Ski Federation) points ranking.
Each Winter Olympics event sets a certain points ranking threshold based on the specific event. For example, in the Parallel Giant Slalom, the top 32 athletes in the Olympic qualification rankings as of January 16, 2022, before the Winter Olympics opening, who also have a single Olympic qualification race ranking within the top 30 and an FIS points score no lower than 100 points, would qualify. (*State General Administration of Sports Winter Sports Management Center regulations)
This year, as the host nation of the Winter Olympics, China has the right to send a maximum of eight athletes—four men and four women—in the Snowboard Parallel Giant Slalom event.
The FIS points have been accumulating since July 2020, and mid-December 2021 marked the final round of World Cup points races. There were a total of six stops and seven races worldwide, concluding just before the January Olympic Games opening next year.
This was the athletes’ last chance to secure a spot in the Winter Olympics.
With such a short time frame, visa issues were difficult to resolve. Even with a green channel for visas, each country had different quarantine policies upon arrival due to the pandemic. Therefore, it was definitely too late for Jiang Ran to accumulate enough points to qualify for the Winter Olympics.
Nie Xin’s suggestion was to take her to any of the stops just to let her experience the real world stage, get a taste of it, and prepare for the next Winter Olympics.
At that time, she would still be under thirty years old, and she could definitely keep competing.
But right now, she hadn’t decided yet which stop she wanted to compete at. Returning to Jilin, she wanted to discuss this with Qiu Nian and the others.
At this moment, upon hearing Qiu Nian bring up the topic voluntarily, she paused mid-motion as she had been cramming clothes into the washing machine, turned around, and looked a bit bewildered and shocked: “Did you and Li Xingnan argue about this?”
Qiu Nian was also surprised: “That was the previous topic… how did you connect the two?”
Jiang Ran “slammed” the washing machine door shut: “Just tell me whether it’s true or not!”
Qiu Nian’s face darkened, while Ajie beside her already had “yes” written all over her face.
“Li Xingnan doesn’t even like me,” Qiu Nian said. “He’s just obsessed with my body.”
Jiang Ran gripped the washing machine’s dial so tightly she almost pulled it off entirely.
Qiu Nian, now talkative, frowned and recounted the entire story—
That day, when Jiang Ran casually mentioned participating in the World Cup to gain some experience in the group chat, Qiu Nian was sitting on the couch watching TV with Li Xingnan. She put down her phone and nudged Li Xingnan: “Do you want to try too?”
Unlike Jiang Ran, who had only recently been picked up by Nie Xin and was a latecomer to the sport, Li Xingnan had joined a professional team two years prior after serious training.
His performance in the professional team was pretty decent too. He had participated in several qualifying races, consistently scoring around 20 points (ranking within the top fifteen), and if he had adequately prepared for the qualifying events before the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, he probably would have secured a spot in the competition, even making it into the top sixteen.
But later, Lin Shuang passed away, which hit everyone very hard. Jiang Ran stopped using racing boards and stiff boots altogether, and he himself couldn’t hold on for even a year. Eventually, he ended up needing psychiatric medication due to his mental state, and since those medications contained numerous banned substances, he simply retired.
At the time, Qiu Nian didn’t think much of it because everyone genuinely loved Lin Shuang, and Lin Shuang and Li Xingnan had practically grown up next door to each other, wearing the same pair of pants when they were little. Even now, during the Chinese New Year, Lin’s parents would still shed tears upon seeing Li Xingnan.
She had never brought up how Lin Shuang’s death affected Li Xingnan’s life path, nor did she think it was something worth arguing about. But that day, Li Xingnan, without even lifting his head, decisively said one word: “No.”
That single word made something in Qiu Nian’s mind snap with a “crack.”
“Why not?” she sat up straight on the spot and asked, “How long has it been since you could even touch a racing board? If Jiang Ran can do it, why can’t you?”
Li Xingnan remained silent.
Qiu Nian grew stubborn and irritated by his usual silence, and in that moment, she suddenly wanted to settle all the accumulated grievances between them. She asked a question that was a minefield for both of them:
“Are you still unable to get over Lin Shuang?”
Li Xingnan was still patient at that point: “You’ve known all along that Lin Shuang was just the catalyst for me to get into professional snowboarding with stiff boots. After that, it had little to do with her…”
“But wasn’t your retirement related to her?!”
“Yes, it was,” Li Xingnan replied in a low voice. “Who wasn’t heartbroken back then? Jiang Ran barely left her room for three months—”
“But she’s moved on now!”
Qiu Nian jumped up and interrupted him shrilly.
Li Xingnan seemed startled, turning to look at her expression. Seeing that she looked like she was about to cry, he unusually refrained from pulling her into his arms for comfort and instead furrowed his brows and asked: “Lin Shuang is gone now. Are you comparing yourself to a deceased person?”
In that moment, Qiu Nian felt like she had revealed the most despicable version of herself in her entire life—shame, guilt, anger, and jealousy were stripped bare by Li Xingnan’s calm and indifferent tone. At that moment, she thought to herself: I’m done. Men with an idealized image in their hearts are indeed untouchable, especially when that idealized image is already gone.
As she was being consumed by unprecedented negative emotions and could barely utter a word, Li Xingnan, as if trying to push her further into despair, suddenly pulled her waist without a word, expressionlessly laid her across his lap, and spanked her.
On the butt.
He didn’t hit hard, more of a warning than actual punishment, but that moment perfectly pushed Qiu Nian’s sense of shame to the limit. No matter how hard she struggled, she couldn’t break free. She felt her scalp tingling and every hair on her body standing on end.
Luckily, Ajie wasn’t home at the time.
“Otherwise, you’d have to come back to collect my corpse! What face do I have left to live?!” Qiu Nian sneered. “He actually hit me!”
After finishing this story, Jiang Ran placed her hands on her knees, unsure how to respond. Her lips twitched repeatedly, suddenly relieved that she had only learned the gossip after returning—otherwise, she wouldn’t have known what expression to use when facing Li Xingnan.
“You should have expected this day when you chose a boyfriend so full of ‘fatherly’ vibes,” she subtly pointed out, “being laid across someone’s knee and getting your butt spanked—”
“Ahh!”
“…”
Amid Qiu Nian’s scream, Jiang Ran closed her mouth with a helpless expression.
Just then, the screen of the phone beside her lit up, a new WeChat message came in. Jiang Ran glanced at it, then immediately averted her eyes upon seeing the sender.
Jiang Ran wasn’t the type who saw a message and thought, “I’ll reply later.”
She usually replied instantly.
So this unusual behavior caught Qiu Nian’s attention. She snapped out of her own emotional breakdown and asked, “Who is it?”
“A reminder about heating fees being deducted,” Jiang Ran said.
“Can the heating company make you look so reluctant yet subtly excited?” Qiu Nian raised one eyebrow. “What did Beijiao say?”
She didn’t even ask how they re-added each other on WeChat. The news traveled fast, but considering her unstable mental state at the moment, Jiang Ran didn’t dwell on it.
Besides, Beijiao hadn’t said anything at all.
Just sent a single “.”
The meaning was obvious:
[Nothing, just checking if I’m still not blocked.]
Jiang Ran threw her phone onto the sofa and continued packing her suitcase.
Qiu Nian peeked and saw the message still displayed on the screen. She clicked her tongue: “Such a humble little brother.”
Jiang Ran glanced at her, half-smiling: “At least I don’t have to worry about someone spanking me across their knee.”
Qiu Nian: “…”
…
Chongli.
At this moment, Beijiao was lying on the bed, hugging her phone with a look of despair, watching Zhao Keyan busily packing and preparing. She emotionlessly thought to herself: It’s okay. Even if she doesn’t reply, she hasn’t blocked me yet.
Then she thought again: Ah, what if she just forgot to block me and remembers again when I send a message!
Beijiao: “Ah, this is so annoying.”
Jiang Ran had just returned to Jilin earlier that day, and Beijiao followed back to Chongli.
This was the period just before the Winter Olympics, and Chongli was in utter chaos and turmoil—
It all started when countless snowboarders were stunned by an unexpected notice: during the Olympics, the five major ski resorts would immediately cease operations, and Chongli District would be sealed off, neither allowing people in nor out…
They hadn’t heard any of this beforehand.
Many people, coming for snowboarding, had rented houses near the resorts for the entire season and bought season passes for each ski resort. Now they had only skied for a month when suddenly they were told: Chongli is shutting down, get out fast.
They couldn’t accept it emotionally, nor financially, as each person was losing around ten thousand yuan.
Some landlords who were more understanding offered refunds, while others simply dismissed them with “force majeure.” The operators of the five ski resorts were also confused, continuously issuing announcements…
Amid the chaos, people began discussing where to go next.
Zhao Keyan asked the motionless Beijiao where she was going. Beijiao asked him instead. Zhao Keyan gave a helpless smile: “Of course Chongge stays here to wait for the competition. Beichao went back to Changbaishan. As for me, where else can I go besides Songbei in Jilin? At least there’s Rran to cover for me—”
Beijiao said emotionlessly: “Great, this local snake is always plotting how to bite me to death. I can’t wait to go there and offer myself as food.”
Zhao Keyan: “…”
Zhao Keyan sympathetically said: “How about we go back to Tonghua?”
Beijiao sighed deeply, turned over like a dead dog, and emotionlessly thought: Go back to Guangzhou. Back to Guangzhou. Everyone is skiing outdoors by now, and Guangzhou will be empty. If I want to ski, I can just go to the fridge. The rest of the time, I should study hard and make progress every day?
Beijiao said: “I’m going back to Guangzhou.”
Zhao Keyan: “Not skiing anymore?”
Beijiao buried her face in the pillow: “I’m too scared to go to Jilin. If we meet in the short term, she’ll kill me.”
Zhao Keyan: “…I’ve wanted to ask about your face for a long time! Did she hit you again?!”
Beijiao: “That ‘again’ really hurts. Haven’t you ever been hit?!”
Zhao Keyan: “…”
Zhao Keyan was shocked, furiously tugging the hoodie of the teenager buried in the pillow, lifting him up like a corpse and shaking him: “Did you do it or what? Never mind which, what did you do to her?!”
Beijiao was weakly shaken in his hand.
Zhao Keyan let go, and she slid back onto the sofa like a pile of bones, hugging a pillow with her eyes closed, saying: “I didn’t do anything.”
Zhao Keyan hadn’t even relaxed yet when Beijiao added: “But it’s not like I did absolutely nothing.”
Zhao Keyan: “…”
Zhao Keyan: “Let’s go back to Guangzhou. We’ll see after the New Year.”
So two days later, during the early exodus of snowboarders from Chongli, which resembled the Spring Festival travel rush, Beijiao boarded a flight back to Guangzhou.
…
Twenty days later.
Guangzhou.
Suddenly returning from the north to the warm south, Beijiao initially struggled to adjust, sighing every day while flipping the calendar: Damn, another day of snow season wasted.
What frustrated her even more was that in these twenty days, Jiang Ran had shown no signs of activity. Although she wasn’t particularly fond of posting on social media, she used to post at least one update every ten days…
Unlike recently, where there wasn’t a single post, as if she had vanished from the world.
Beijiao had no idea where Jiang Ran had gone.
And as if in a childish grudge, since she didn’t say anything, Beijiao stubbornly refrained from asking, unlike before—
Before, everyone knew she had been blocked, so out of sympathy for her pet-like status, they would update her on Jiang Ran’s activities. Now that everyone knew they had re-added each other on WeChat, if she went around asking again, she would be laughed at.
Then the whole world would know that Jiang Ran still didn’t pay much attention to her.
She would be too embarrassed.
Although she didn’t have much face to begin with.
“Ah, so annoying.”
—She had been abandoned.
Outside the self-study room, the sun was shining brightly, while Beijiao lay listlessly on the desk, her pen idly and childishly scribbling on the test paper in front of her.
—She had been completely abandoned.
Sensing someone watching her from a distance, she lifted her head sharply and saw a few girls sitting at the opposite table whispering. Their eyes met with her dark, bright gaze, and they all blushed, as if caught discussing her.
Beijiao turned her head away, gazing calmly out the window, despairingly thinking: What’s the point? Why is it that Jiang Ran is the only one who seems blind or has no sense of aesthetics?
Feeling slightly annoyed by being stared at, she was considering whether to pack up and go back to the dormitory to study when her Bluetooth earphone signaled an incoming call.
Beijiao answered with a “Hmm.”
“China Post. There are two letters for you. Are you coming to pick them up at the school gate?”
Beijiao was puzzled. Who would still send letters these days? Who could it be?
After packing up, she arrived at the school gate, jumped off her bicycle, looked around, and saw a courier with a postal bag on his back. Their eyes met.
Three minutes later.
At the gate of Guangzhou A University, a tall young man stood holding two postcards, dazed.
The postcards were stamped with black ink seals from the Santa Claus Village in Rovaniemi, Finland, having traveled across oceans, genuine and authentic.
The first postcard—
[“Old lady will be first in the World Cup qualifiers!!”]
Signed by Jiang Ran.
The second postcard—
It had a very ugly and careless drawing of a dog’s head, followed by cold text that read [“Happy New Year”].
Also signed by Jiang Ran.
Beijiao thought to herself, “Damn.”
The winter sun in Guangzhou was so bright and warm.
She was going to be driven crazy.
Tai Sui Yellow Amulet Paper FuLu Taoist Love Talisman Traditional Chinese Spiritual Charm Attracting Love Protecting Marriage