An Art Student's Illness

Qi Zheng was every bit as tough as her name suggested.

She could carry a fifty-jin portfolio of drawing boards to art school entrance exams all over the country.

She looked frail, but she had muscle under those clothes.

She could swing the treasured guqin at Shen Mianfeng's home, which supposedly weighed sixty jin.

Shen Mianfeng: Back then, she smashed the guqin over my head. That's why our parents wouldn't let us hang out.

Qi Zheng: Bullshit. Your family was just too precious. Being an artsy type is a disease, and it needs treatment.

Shen Mianfeng shot a glance at Qi Zheng, who had only started painting in high school and was as vulgar as they came, then sneered. “The college entrance exam is almost here. And you still have time to set up a portrait stand under the overpass? Planning to start working early?”

Qi Zheng picked up her paint box... Hmm, she couldn't bring herself to do it, so she picked up the brush-washing bucket and splashed him instead.

She missed.

But Shen Mianfeng still caught a chill and fell sick.

In his feverish haze, he dreamed that Qi Zheng was mocking him for looking like a stuffy vampire from the seventies or eighties when he performed cello at the concert hall. She said that once they put the lid on his coffin, he could go straight to his funeral.

He gritted his teeth. “You clueless woman! I was playing Nocturne. Couldn't you tell what I meant?”

Qi Zheng, who worked hard to earn money and study, and had absolutely no musical aptitude: “I only went because he said it was free. But that thing sounded like cotton being fluffed. What's the point if it only looks good? I wasted half a day of setting up my portrait stand.”

Later, during college.

Shen Mianfeng: Testing the waters, testing the waters, testing the waters...

Qi Zheng: Clapping back, clapping back, clapping back!!!!

Shen Mianfeng: I'm out of ideas. How about the oldest trick in the book? Candles and a flower wreath downstairs, and I'll ask my junior to teach me guitar.

(Strategist No. 1: Get a grip!)

Qi Zheng: I feel like he's trying to provoke me. Is he planning to use his looks to ruin me? We haven't gotten along since we were kids, after all.

(Strategist No. 2: Sure, whatever you say. (Exhausted) ...)

As graduation approached, Shen Mianfeng had a sudden inspiration.

He arranged for the two strategists to meet. They hit it off immediately and laid a perfect trap.

A thick-skinned art girl x a refined, aloof music guy

* All characters have moral flaws / not a wish-fulfillment story

* Set in the 1990s. Conditions varied from place to place, so please don't nitpick about that here.

* If you have lots of triggers, please don't click in.

Theme: Hone your craft. Art has no boundaries.