Pencil Marks

With nothing but her own courage to rely on, small-town girl Su Nian gets into Mingde High School, the top school in the city.

Quiet and reserved, she isn't good with words and feels completely out of place at the prestigious school, with all its polished glamour and lively crowds. She never tells anyone how poor and desperate her circumstances are. Used to enduring every humiliation alone, she finds her only confidence in books and endless practice problems. She thinks her high school years will be nothing but studying with her head down and quietly trying to catch up.

Then, during a transfer exam, she meets Jiang Yubai.

He is a born star, blessed with an outstanding family and exceptional talent. Cool-headed and disciplined, he lives by the rules, admired by everyone and distant from all. He never lets anyone distract him.

Their worlds could not be more different, and they would never have crossed paths if being assigned to the same class hadn't brought them together day after day.

In an empty classroom on a Friday, he quietly saves her from embarrassment with a simple, “I bought too much.” On a rainy evening, he walks her home under his umbrella, letting half of himself get soaked so she can have all the shelter and warmth. In the little moments of everyday life, he repeatedly bends his own rules and boundaries, hiding his special treatment of her in casual coincidences.

Su Nian carefully tucks all the fluttering in her heart into a kraft-paper notebook. She watches him from afar and follows him quietly, seeing him as the first ray of light to reach her in the dust. Timid and restrained, she never dares to disturb him.

No one knows that Jiang Yubai, usually so cool and disciplined, has long been paying attention to her stubbornness, her intelligence, and the quiet courage she shows when she is alone.

The evening breeze stirs the plane trees, and the pages turn through years of shared days.

This is a shy, unspoken first love between a girl from the dust and a boy who shines like a star. They hide their feelings and hold themselves back, yet their hearts are true to each other, and they are quietly falling in love.