A Cafeteria Encounter and a Shared Purpose

At a certain time each day, a particular area of the school would come alive, with students streaming in, then departing with contented smiles. No one needed to enforce order; people instinctively adhered to its unspoken rules. Everyone gathered there shared a common purpose—a purpose no one was unfamiliar with, a place you undoubtedly knew well. It was the cafeteria.

“Hey, Yellow Dog, first floor or second floor for lunch?” Gao Qinghong, leading the way, turned to ask.

“Second floor, of course, it’s Wednesday!” Huang Zhouyu replied. “They have stir-fried shredded pork with potatoes and charcoal-grilled chicken drumsticks. After that, we can even grab a bubble tea for dessert.”

Gao Qinghong nodded, wholeheartedly agreeing with the suggestion. He then turned to me. “Master Yi, what do you think?”

“Whatever you guys decide,” I said. “This is my first time eating in the cafeteria.”

At my words, Gao Qinghong’s brows shot up in surprise. “First time? Do you usually go home for lunch?”

“Uh-huh,” I affirmed.

“Seriously?” he exclaimed. “You go all the way home for just two hours in the middle of the day?”

“There’s nothing else to do if I stay at school.”

“What do you mean? The day students in our class usually play ball on campus or head to the dorms to play games.”

‘That’s only possible if you have friends, though.’ Since I had nothing to do, I usually went home for a short nap. The bus ride there and back only took half an hour. I had grown accustomed to this rhythm of life, but if there were school activities in the future, staying and eating at the cafeteria wouldn’t be an issue.

“Speaking of which, we have quite a few day students in our class, don’t we?” Gao Qinghong turned back to ask Huang Zhouyu, who was trailing behind, typing a reply on his phone. “Huang Zhouyu, are you listening?”

“Yeah, about half our class are day students,” Huang Zhouyu confirmed. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but Huang Zhouyu was essentially the de facto leader for the male day students in our class. He was responsible for arranging weekend outings and mixers with girls from other schools.

Nanhui High School, as a key provincial school, had far more boarders from across the province than local day students. However, our class had a higher proportion of day students; it was rumored to be the only class where their numbers were roughly equal to the boarders.

“Want to play some ball after we eat?” Gao Qinghong asked. We stood in a long queue, surrounded by students chatting and laughing as they waited for lunch. We were no exception. “Master Yi, do you play ball?”

“Play ball…” ‘Reflecting on the past, the only sport I seemed to have participated in was running. There was a period when I was often ill, so my parents encouraged me to exercise more, leading me to frequently jog around my neighborhood. As for other sports, I suppose there was jump rope.’ “I’ve played before.”

Despite my words, ‘played before’ merely referred to physical education classes where the teacher allowed us free activity, and we’d grab a pile of balls from the equipment room. As a child, I’d mimic other students, repeatedly shooting hoops, but I never found it particularly interesting. After that, I’d just squat in a corner during PE.

“Don’t worry,” Gao Qinghong said, placing a hand on my shoulder. “I’ll teach you some basketball fundamentals. We’ll just mess around, and you’ll get the hang of it eventually. No guy dislikes basketball.”

“Don’t try to impose that ‘outdoor jock’ mentality of yours on Yi Chang, okay?” Huang Zhouyu interjected. “He’s a top five thousand in the Pokémon Master rank; he’s one of my kind.”

“Give it a rest, Yellow Dog,” Gao Qinghong retorted. “You’re not good at sports, and you’re terrible at games. Master Yi’s physique is much sturdier than your scrawny frame, and he’s tall enough. He’d have a huge advantage against me in basketball.”

I didn’t inherently dislike sports. The reason I didn’t engage in them much was that they couldn’t be played alone. During PE, when bored, I’d sometimes practice dribbling as the teacher had taught, continuing until the bell rang. While I didn’t know what made it fun, it was certainly good for exercise and passing the time.

“Just the three of us playing?”

“I wanted to call more people,” Gao Qinghong said, shuffling forward with the line. “But today, I’ll just help you practice first. Once you get better, we can form a team.”

For some reason, a deliberate sigh wafted from behind us. Gao Qinghong and I turned around simultaneously.

“What’s wrong?” Gao Qinghong asked.

“Nothing…” Huang Zhouyu’s face fell. “It just feels like my treasured classmate, whom I discovered first, is about to be ‘corrupted’ by you. It’s a bit of a lament.”

Huang Zhouyu’s words left Gao Qinghong utterly bewildered. He tried to comprehend the statement, then arrived at his own conclusion.

“What the hell?” Gao Qinghong cursed.

****

What happened after lunch was simple: I learned dribbling and shooting from Gao Qinghong on the indoor basketball court. The process itself was rather unremarkable; he would demonstrate, I would imitate, and we’d repeat the motions to build muscle memory. Huang Zhouyu, meanwhile, sat on the sidelines, visualizing drills, practicing positioning and dribble moves.

The indoor gymnasium wasn’t usually open to students, but Gao Qinghong, as a member of the school’s basketball team, had free access.

Gao Qinghong poured himself a cup of water from the indoor dispenser, took a small sip, and then stopped, looking at Huang Zhouyu with a mischievous grin. With a quick dash, he stole the ball from Huang Zhouyu, who was about to shoot.

“Can you even do it, you scrawny dog?” he taunted.

Huang Zhouyu, it seemed, lacked much temper. Though slender, his height was average among boys; however, standing next to Gao Qinghong, he was more than a head shorter. The subsequent practice session mostly consisted of Huang Zhouyu being playfully bullied, eventually devolving from basketball rules into pure roughhousing.

After watching for a while, I decided to head to the resting chairs to take a break.

The row of chairs was strewn with items left behind by others, or perhaps the basketball club members treated the area as their personal lounge, leaving their belongings haphazardly scattered. Some chairs were piled with towels and water bottles, even sneakers and deodorant.

I found a relatively clean chair and sat down, then began to zone out. Zoning out was a peculiar talent of mine; I could do it anywhere, under any circumstances, appearing to be deep in thought yet truly thinking of nothing, simply emptying my mind and achieving a state of complete relaxation.

Gao Qinghong and Huang Zhouyu’s play grew more serious as they continued, the scuffing of their shoes against the court growing more forceful, their movements swifter. It must have been nearing afternoon class time, as the murmur of other students’ conversations could be heard from outside the gym. I pulled out my phone and saw that class was still half an hour away. I decided to lie down on the bench for ten minutes.

As soon as I lay down, I felt my head hit something. I reached up and found a Bluetooth earbud case, featuring a long-haired Rei Ayanami printed on it.

I placed it aside, then lay flat on the chair. My limbs were already aching and numb from an hour of training; I felt like I could close my eyes and sleep until evening. But I figured the other two would wake me up. Hopefully, they wouldn’t get so lost in their game that they forgot.

Lying there felt strangely restless. ‘What if they really forgot the time or didn’t wake me? Should I set an alarm?’

‘I truly couldn’t rest easy.’

‘Was it the psychological pressure of an impending class, or just discomfort in an unfamiliar environment?’ When I finally noticed, the sound of the basketball bouncing and their footsteps had ceased. Outside, the sound of footsteps grew more frequent… ‘They haven’t left me behind, have they?’

Ah, I suddenly understood. I recalled the pranks often seen in movies and TV shows, where friends would startle someone awake or draw on their face while they slept. The reason I thought this was because I sensed a warmth nearby, and heard deliberately hushed footsteps, yet the rustle of clothes still reached my ears.

‘Given this, what was the best reaction for someone being pranked in such a situation? Should I feign sleep and let them have their fun, or snap my eyes open and confront them? Which would be more interesting? How complicated, navigating social interactions.’

‘Never mind.’ It was better to handle it my own way; past experiences had taught me it was best not to attempt things I wasn’t good at.

As I opened my eyes, my blurry vision collided with the ceiling lights, forcing me to squint again. I sat up, rubbing my eyes. In a daze, I felt certain someone was standing before me, yet their build was neither as broad and sturdy as Gao Qinghong’s nor as slender as Huang Zhouyu’s.

My gaze went straight to them, first noticing full hips and thighs. Looking up, the curve of her hips tapered inward to a slender, willow-like waist. Further up still, a mountainous bust and the shadow it cast obstructed my view, preventing me from seeing her face clearly.

She, no doubt, couldn’t see my face either. So, she sat down beside me, her face descending into view as she settled.

“Why are you sleeping here?” the girl with the high ponytail asked. Her phoenix eyes, though seemingly fierce, were actually filled with gentle kindness. “Class is about to start, you know.”

“Then why are you here, Student Mei?” I slapped my forehead; the nap had left me feeling even groggier instead of refreshed.

“You can just call me Ruolan.”

“Alright,” I said. “Then why are you here, Ruolan?”

“How direct of you,” she said, a corner of her mouth quirking up. She then stood and looked down at me. “I came to pick something up for a friend. I’m in a hurry to get back to class too. Did you see it? It should have been left here.”

“The earbud case with Rei Ayanami on it?” My hand reached behind the chair leg, picking up the very thing that had disturbed my rest moments ago. “Here.”

She seemed more surprised than pleased. She took the earbud case and looked at me. “Do you recognize this character?” she asked.

“The female lead from *Neon Genesis Evangelion*. It’s a pretty widely known work, and the character herself is quite popular… probably,” I replied. “I don’t have authoritative data to back that up; it’s just based on my experience online. But its high status in anime history is undeniable.”

“So, why are you asking?”

“Uh, ah, I was just a little surprised,” Mei Ruolan stammered slightly. “…Yi Chang, do you know a lot about this sort of thing?”

“Anime?” I certainly watched it, but I hadn’t specifically studied it. Most of what I knew beyond the content itself was from the otaku culture enthusiasts in my class. “I just dabble.”

“Talking about drinking now, are we?” she teased.

Mei Ruolan’s polite smile held a hint of genuine amusement. ‘Had I done something to make her happy?’ Regardless, our hearts seemed to have drawn a little closer. Through such trivial matters, despite the lack of profound conversation, we had somehow learned a little more about each other.

‘Now might be a good opportunity to bridge the gap between Mei Ruolan and me. If I could just introduce another topic, say a little more, and make our time together last longer, I didn’t know if that would necessarily improve our relationship, but it certainly felt like the right thing to do.’

‘But what should I say? What would be appropriate? At this very moment, what could Mei Ruolan and I talk about?’

‘Ah, I’ve got it.’

“Um, you…” ‘To fully translate thought into language and words would invariably lead to distortion, I knew. Even with the most eloquent expression, one could never fully convey their thoughts to another. Therefore, I wouldn’t rely on words; what I needed to do was…’ The warning bell rang. Before my voice could successfully reach her, the students’ duty reminded us it was time to return to class.

“It’s time to head back for class,” a hint of regret tinged Mei Ruolan’s voice. ‘She must have also hoped for our relationship to deepen in that brief exchange of glances.’

‘Yes, it was truly a shame.’ Mei Ruolan had already taken the earbud case from my hand and turned to walk towards the teaching building. ‘I hadn’t seized the opportunity; I hadn’t said what needed to be said sooner.’

‘I wouldn’t rely on words. Genuine thoughts, once shaped into words, were embellished, processed, then detached from their original meaning, only to be misunderstood by the listener, ultimately conveying nothing at all.’

‘But some things, if left unsaid, the other person would never know. How many times had I felt the powerlessness of words and refrained from speaking? I couldn’t confirm if things would have changed had I made a different choice. But, at least I should try. Even if it ended in failure, there were things we wanted the other person to understand.’

So, I quickened my pace, catching up to her. Ultimately, we were headed to the same class.

“Ruolan.”

Upon hearing my voice, she paused and turned back. Hurried footsteps filled the hallway around us; our standing there, facing each other, must have been conspicuous, but she seemed accustomed to others’ gazes. She calmly and quietly awaited my words.

“Are you still going to help out with the basketball club today?”

“Yes.”

“So you won’t be at the club activities today?”

“That’s right. I’ve already told Tianman, but please apologize to her for me again when you see her.”

‘Human interaction shouldn’t be like this, relying solely on those few, sparse commonalities as topics of conversation. It would surely be like celestial bodies, briefly intersecting only to miss each other, then, as time flows, intersecting again at the next stage of life, only to miss each other once more.’

“No,” I said. Mei Ruolan tilted her head, indicating her confusion. “I’m not going to the activity room today either.”

“Why is that?”

‘What was it I truly wanted to convey to Mei Ruolan? What did I really want to say?’

“I want to watch you play basketball,” I said. “Is that okay?”

The class bell rang, its sound lingering for over ten seconds, yet we remained foolishly standing in the hallway. If we returned to class now, we would surely be met with the stares of the entire class. ‘Should I pray that the teacher hasn’t arrived yet and that the discipline committee member would be magnanimous?’ But these were all secondary concerns. All these worries were overshadowed by the moment. She and I, a late boy and a late girl—if a teacher walked by, they would surely ask, curious, what we were doing.

I voiced my thoughts, turning my intentions into words.

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Mei Ruolan said, smiling.

And in the hallway of this school, my words found their echo.