The Last Period of Evening Self-Study

In countless cities in China, high school classrooms all look similar—— The long desks, the yellowed podium, the blackboard that was polished white day after day, and the countdown sign hanging in the corner of the blackboard. There are no romantic love letters about school uniforms, no confessions and holding hands in secret corners, just a group of people being pushed forward by time. Their lives are neatly cut up by early morning alarm clocks, stacks of test papers, messages from parent groups and constantly refreshing report cards. Some people write papers while wearing a jockstrap, some memorize chemical equations in the dormitory corridor in the middle of the night, and some put stomach medicine and rubber together as personal belongings. Lin Ze was an ordinary member of the class. His grades were average in the class. He could not live up to the aura of a top student, nor could he escape the teacher's encouragement. Li Hang beside him has a stable performance in the top five, but he has been suffering from illness all year round. Even so, he still insisted on sitting in the first row of the classroom, as if being closer to the podium would bring him closer to the future.