A Fish Swims By in Late Summer

[Complete]

Cold, tough boy vs. gentle, sweet girl

1.

Jing Dang was a cold, arrogant, unruly young prodigy. Yi Shuyao knew it the first time she saw him.

With the light of the basketball court behind him, the boy narrowed his sharp eyes at her. "Got nothing better to do? Who the hell asked you to meddle?"

At the time, Yi Shuyao had just come from the countryside to the dazzling city, and she was nearly scared to tears.

But on the day a heavy snowfall blocked the roads and made travel extremely dangerous, Jing Dang willingly carried her on his back all night, soothing her with a cold expression. "Yi Shuyao, I'm right here beside you. What do you have to be afraid of?"

Later, everyone at Minghai Middle School knew that Jing Dang, the school's most famous figure, cherished the soft-spoken girl with dimples to his very core.

2.

Who would have thought that after the college entrance exams, during a seaside trip, Jing Dang and Shuyao would become like strangers?

The girls speculated wildly, but every guess pointed to the same answer: "Jing Dang's a player. He must've gotten tired of Yi Shuyao."

"It's obvious. Do you even need to say it? Yi Shuyao can hang around Jing Dang all day, but the young master Jing can dump her whenever he wants."

No one knew the truth. Yi Shuyao was the one who let go first.

That day, Jing Dang stood before Yi Shuyao. His prominent Adam's apple bobbed as he exuded aggression. For the first time, he lit a cigarette right in front of her, grinning with reckless arrogance. "Fine. Get lost as far as you can."

Yi Shuyao left with red-rimmed eyes, never knowing that the once-spirited boy felt worse than dead that night.

3.

The day they met again, Yi Shuyao looked across the packed crowd at the man who was being fawned over by everyone.

They passed each other, and he didn't look at her again. His eyes were full of unfamiliarity.

Yi Shuyao followed his gaze down to his wrist. One glance was all it took for her heart to die.

When she was seventeen, she fell in love with goldfish and wanted one tattooed on her body, but she was afraid it would hurt. To comfort her, Jing Dang got a goldfish tattoo on his wrist instead.

Now the goldfish tattoo was gone, too.

Yi Shuyao's nose stung. She knew he had become untouchable again, just as he had been before, and that there was no chance for them anymore.

Later...

In a dimly lit private room, the man forcefully grabbed the girl's slender wrist and pinned her against the wall. His eyes were dark and sharp, his voice hoarse. "Yi Shuyao, do you have no heart?"

Her back hurt where he pressed her against the wall, but her nose stung even more. Hurt and humiliated, she said, "You got your tattoo removed."

Jing Dang curled his lip and yanked off his clothes. Before she could react, he suddenly bit her earlobe. His voice was hoarse, colored by the neon glow. "Yaoyao, my fucking heart beats for you."

Only then did Yi Shuyao see the many goldfish winding across his lean waist and up to his chest, right over his heart. They were vivid and alive, their warmth reaching back through every summer that had come before.

4.

That summer when they were seventeen, both their hearts beat with equal force.

The fish that swam into Yi Shuyao's life in the late summer of her seventeenth year only slowly swam into her heart at twenty-five. But fortunately, the summer of their seventeenth year would always burn bright, and that late-arriving fish would swim into every summer that followed.

Theme: Study hard