Chapter 297: Chapter 297: Meet Zhang Yan
For these third-year high school students, time during these days is a very contradictory thing. When it comes down to each day and each class, everyone feels like it's going really slowly. But when you look at the calendar, you'll see that time is quickly slipping away day by day towards the college entrance exam day in July.
No one dares to take these limited days for granted. One extra point or one less point in the college entrance exam may mean the difference between being admitted to a first-tier university and a second-tier university. As the common understanding goes, it is generally easier to find a good job with a first-tier university degree than with a second-tier university degree, and the starting point is higher.
Although Feng Yiping can already afford to care less about these things, he is still working hard. These days, he goes to bed at 11 pm and gets up at 5 am, working even harder than before the college entrance exam. He has set his own goals and he doesn't want to let them down.
At the end of May, Huang Jingping finished her studies at the Finance College. After discussing it with her, Feng Yiping asked her to go back to her hometown to stay with her parents for a while. If all goes well, after Feng Yiping finishes his college entrance exams, the couple will go on the planned trip together, heading south and then north. After arriving in the capital, they will stay there to go to school, and then come home again. It won't be as easy as it is now.
The first weekend after Huang Jingping returned home, Feng Yiping called Zhang Yan for the first time and asked her to meet him on Sunday morning. Zhang Yan agreed without asking why.
At 6 o'clock on Sunday morning, Feng Yiping drove off. Jin Ling had been working at Youjia for more than a month and had just set off for the capital to look for office space there. Feng Yiping was able to get his car back, otherwise, with her car, she would really have a hard time getting around in the county below.
He was still very excited along the way. Although he always suppressed Zhang Yan in his heart and forced himself not to think about her during the week, every now and then when he received a text message from her, he would find that the more he suppressed her, the clearer the image in his mind became. He often dreamed of those days when he was sleeping at night.
Since he can't suppress it, avoid it, or abandon it, he might as well face it head-on. ƒreewebηoveℓ.com
On Sunday morning, after breakfast, after helping to feed the family pig, after washing the dishes, after going into his room to get dressed, Zhang Yan told his mother goodbye, promised his younger brother, who was pestering him to go with him, that he would bring back a watermelon, and then cycled off to the county town.
Although the last time they met was three years ago on the eve of the Spring Festival, Feng Yiping and Zhang Yan have kept in touch ever since. Apart from sending her gifts on her birthday every year, Feng Yiping also sends her gifts from time to time, which are very thoughtful and range from learning to life.
Meanwhile, Zhang Yanjia has also been influenced by Feng Yiping in many ways over the past few years. For example, Zhang Zuodong bought a house in the provincial capital early on, and for this reason the family has never built a house. However, whenever her parents mention this, they beam with joy. The value of that house has now nearly doubled, and the rent collected in a year alone is enough to cover her and her younger brother's school expenses.
So from her father, Zhang Yan could hear news of Feng Yiping from time to time: he had dropped out of school, published a book, opened company after company, merged with a factory in the city, opened nearly a hundred convenience store branches, appeared on TV, etc. Of course, she had also watched the rerun of Feng Yiping's interview.
In short, Zhang Yan could tell that when her father said these things, his words were full of admiration for Feng Yiping.
He's studying and running a company, so busy, and yet he still remembers to buy me all those little things, and they're all as expensive as this phone?
Zhang Yan thought this, and a smile came back to her face. She pedalled faster, and sweat began to appear on her forehead.
The place where she and Feng Yiping had arranged to meet was by the square next to the Chengguan Bridge. From afar, she saw a person standing next to a shiny silver car, waving at her, and her heart began to beat faster.
Feng Yiping watched Zhang Yan ride her bike closer and closer. Somehow, he didn't feel the same nervousness as he had when they first met. He was very calm. He watched her cheeks turn red from riding too fast, and smiled. He went to get a bottle of water and handed her some napkins, saying, 'Wipe your face!'
Zhang Yan took the water and gulped down a few big sips. She also didn't feel the same nervousness and trepidation she had felt when she first went out the door. She blurted out, 'You've grown so fast!'
It is quite fast, because the nutrition has caught up. Feng Yiping is now a few centimetres taller than before, and his net height is now 1.81 metres.
'You're still young, you can grow taller too.' Zhang Yan is still young. She is now in the second semester of her first year of teacher training, and she will not turn 16 until the winter months of the second half of the year.
Standing here, the two of them still attracted some attention. The aunties and women in the square with their children occasionally glanced over. 'Let's go to the park,' Feng Yiping said, carrying Zhang Yan's bicycle into the boot.
There was only one park in Zhang Yan's county. It was very old, poorly maintained and somewhat run-down. However, the original trees were growing more and more spirited, and there was a spontaneous trend towards development into a forest park.
Feng Yiping carried two bags, and Zhang Yan held a picnic blanket. They found a flat patch of grass under the ancient tower at the park's high point and set it down. Then Feng Yiping took out various snacks one after the other, all of which Zhang Yan came to like later: potato chips, soda sandwiches, shumai biscuits, European-style pancakes, hawthorn slices, cherry tomatoes, dragon fruit, coconut milk...
'Did you get all this from your store?' Zhang Yan unembarrassed ripped open a European-style pancake.
'You have to pay for it too,' Feng Yiping replied, using a fruit knife to prepare the dragon fruit for her.
'It's still going from one pocket to another,' Zhang Yan said with a smile, not sure why, but in front of this person she had only met for the second time today, she felt particularly at ease.
'By the way, how are your preparations for the college entrance exam going? My father tells me that you hope to go to university in the capital?'
'I hope so!' Feng Yiping divided the dragon fruit into not-too-small pieces and handed her two disposable gloves, "Eat with these."
Zhang Yan took them and took a bite, revealing an expression that Feng Yiping was very familiar with, "It's delicious!'
'Then have some more," Later in life, it was Zhang Yan who took care of him, and now he finally had the chance to do the same.
The two of them ate and talked, but they didn't talk about anything serious. Zhang Yan told him about ordinary things at school and at home. It didn't matter what they said or whether they listened, the key was the atmosphere and who they were with.
Zhang Yan is still the same. She eats very slowly, but for a long time. For example, if she is not busy, she can eat a bowl of noodles for half an hour. But if she has enough time, she can slowly finish even the biggest bowl of noodles.
More than two hours have passed, and almost everything that Feng Yiping brought has gone into Zhang Yan's stomach, except for some cherry tomatoes.
'Zhang Yan,' Feng Yiping said to her seriously, 'if I go to the capital in the second half of the year, I don't think I'll have many opportunities to meet for the next year or two.'
'That's fine. With a mobile phone, it's easy to get in touch. I haven't told anyone about the phone you gave me, and now it only has your contact number on it.'
'I was thinking that by the year after next, you'll have graduated too, and you won't have to look for work elsewhere. Just have your father talk to my brother-in-law, and you can work in a convenience store or in the hotel that will have been built by then, okay?'
Without saying anything else, this matter needs to be settled in advance. Feng Yiping doesn't want Zhang Yan to go to a coastal school to teach, as he did later.
'You came here today just to tell me this!' Zhang Yan laughed. 'After I graduate, my younger brother will also be in high school. My father's idea is that our family will move to the provincial capital. He has also thought about it, and he will ask your brother-in-law to let me work in a convenience store!'
'That's good. By then, our store in the north will have developed as well. If you get tired of staying at home, just let me know and I'll have them transfer you to the capital as well.'
'Yes, I've always wanted to visit the Forbidden City and the Great Wall, and I also want to experience the winter in the north. You know, I really want to wear thick clothes and a fur hat and spend a winter in the north.'
Of course I knew. I even went with you on a special trip during the Spring Festival.
'No problem, we'll go together then.'
Zhang Yan: 'We've eaten too much of all kinds of things. At lunchtime, we went to the ramen restaurant next to the cinema and each ordered a bowl of Lanzhou la zhi mian. Naturally, she poured most of her bowl into Feng Yiping's.
After watching Feng Yiping walk away, she went to the fruit stand and picked out a watermelon. She rode slowly back home, not really able to pedal fast, as she had eaten too much today.