Chapter 337 No more hesitation
After the heavy snow, the winter solstice arrives quietly.

New Year's Day 1995 is just around the corner.

During the break after the Chinese class that morning, Li Yufei privately found Zhao Dong and Liu Zicheng to apologize, probably to express that she shouldn't have put all the responsibility on them, and also treated them to Huiyuan juice.

This made Zhao Dong and Liu Zicheng feel a little embarrassed, and they were even about to burst into tears of gratitude. After all, this proud ice-snow girl had never lowered her posture like this before. She had always been high up in the clouds.

Things moved forward much faster afterwards. Li Yufei followed Zhang Yunqi's suggestion and divided the teams into material group, discipline group, sound control group, logistics group, etc. There were so many students in the class, and there were always enthusiastic and responsible ones. As the general dispatcher, Li Yufei needed to know who could do what, and then assign a responsible leader to each team who could get things done. She didn't need to worry about the specific matters, but just needed to control the progress and solve emergencies in time.

On the day of the New Year's Eve party, during the last self-study class, the students of Class 156 spontaneously decorated the classroom, hung up colorful lights, and put out fruits and snacks. The atmosphere was as joyful as if it were Chinese New Year, but there seemed to be a sense of panic as well, as if time flies and three years of high school life are passing by in a flash.

At such moments, Wang Xiaokai is always the most active. Zhang Yunqi asked him to bring a karaoke set and a color TV, as well as a bunch of Hong Kong movies and Hollywood blockbusters. The students in the class were overjoyed!

Tonight is New Year's Eve, and they can watch movies all night.

After setting up the classroom, it was almost time to go home from school.

Everyone went to the second floor of the cafeteria in groups for dinner.

The school was on holiday at this time, and only a few students came to the cafeteria to eat. Even if there were, they were all boarders who ate from a big pot on the first floor.

There were 156 students in Class 60 at the beginning of the second year of high school. Over the past year or so, several students dropped out or transferred schools for various reasons. Now there are 54 students left. Together with the head teacher Wang Mingzhen and six subject teachers, there are 6 students in total, divided into seven tables, with almost 61 people at each table.

Zhang Yunqi naturally sat with Chu Jian, Wang Xiaokai, Yu Qingqing and Li Yufei. The head teacher Wang Mingzhen and English teacher Luo Lin also sat at their table.

The meal standard is a group meal plus a buffet. The group meal includes Jiangchuan roast chicken, tea oil live water fish, Fengyang blood duck, etc. Each dish is solid and tough. The most eye-catching is the mutton hotpot in the middle. On a snowy day, the red oil is fragrant and bubbling.

In that era, although students had enough food and clothes, most people could seldom eat such a delicious meal even during the Chinese New Year, especially the poor boarders. They could not even get full with the bland and low-fat big pot meals on weekdays. Moreover, they were at the age of growing up, so how could they resist such temptation? They gobbled up the plates of beef and mutton rolls, shrimp and crab meatballs, and fruit snacks on the buffet table next to them, finishing them one by one as the waiter brought them.

Li Yufei, the general person in charge of this event, said with a smile: "Everyone, eat slowly. There is all kinds of mutton, but everyone can take as much as they want. Don't waste it. Also, here, I think we should first thank Zhang Yunqi, a classmate of ours. Thanks to his sponsorship, we can have a smooth dinner together for the New Year's Eve."

Zhang Yunqi was stuffing rice dumplings into his mouth and was choked by Li Yufei. Seeing that everyone was looking at him, he had to pretend. He took the tissue handed to him by Chu Jian, wiped his mouth and stood up, smiling: "You're welcome. I remember when I introduced myself in the first class of the second year of high school, I said something like this. If anyone needs me, please feel free to speak up. It's the same now and in the future."

This sentence won everyone's applause.

Zhang Yunqi said: "Finally, I propose that we all toast to our head teacher and subject teachers."

The students who were wolfing down their food finally raised their glasses. Everyone was drinking beverages. The young men were full of energy. It was easiest to compete in drinking in such a large group setting. Now the activity had just begun. By then, everyone would be drunk and staggering. It would be a party for chickens. Besides, the teachers were all there, so who dared to serve wine?

Of course, although there was no wine, everyone had a very enjoyable and happy New Year's Day dinner. How could they not be happy when Zhang Yunqi was the one who made the money? After eating and drinking, the students went back to the classroom in groups of three or four to prepare for the New Year's Day party.

Zhang Yunqi and Chu Jian walked behind him. As they walked down the stairs, Chu Jian asked him, "How are the preparations for the evening singing show going?"

Zhang Yunqi laughed: "No, I have so many things to do, where would I have the time?"

Chu Jian pursed his lips: "You are so careless, what will you do if you get embarrassed later?"

Zhang Yunqi was very single: "What's the big deal? Am I the kind of person who cares about what others think? Just don't laugh at me."

When she first saw him, her face turned red: "I'll just laugh at you."

As they were talking, they happened to meet Li Yufei coming up from downstairs. She was the busiest person at the New Year's Eve party, running around and doing a lot of things, and barely ate a bite of dinner.

The three of them greeted each other. Zhang Yunqi saw that there were beads of sweat on Li Yufei's cheeks and asked if she needed any help.
Li Yufei glanced at Chu Jian, whose cheeks were slightly red, and turned to Zhang Yunqi with a smile and said, "Are you free? It just so happens that there are extra fruit snacks in the cafeteria. We should bring them to the classroom."

Zhang Yunqi thought about it, nodded, and said to Chu Jian: "Chu Jian, go back to the classroom first, I will come to find you later."

This sentence seemed to stir up waves in the hearts of the two proud girls. Li Yufei's hands hanging by her legs were clenched until they turned white, but the smile on her face was still sweet. She reached out and pulled Zhang Yunqi's arm: "Let's go, then, hurry up, the party will start soon, and I still have to prepare to host it. Nice to meet you, bye."

Say goodbye when you first meet.

She watched the backs of the two people disappear from her eyes. At that time, the sun had already set in the west, dusk was all around, and the endless snowfield was glowing with warm light. Her heart suddenly felt heavy.

She did not blame Zhang Yunqi for helping with the tasks assigned by Li Yufei, because it was a collective matter and any boy in the class should have such awareness. However, some of Li Yufei's recent actions towards Zhang Yunqi seemed to have exceeded the boundaries of friendship.

This made her feel inexplicably panicked.

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The New Year's Day party starts at seven in the evening.

Except for the students from Class 156, all the invited teachers were present. The head teacher, Wang Mingzhen, gave an opening speech. His words were very brief, and the general meaning was that everyone did not have much time left in this school, and the college entrance examination was getting closer and closer. Everyone should cherish the friendship with classmates, have fun today, study hard tomorrow, and do not leave any regrets for themselves.

After Wang Mingzhen finished his speech, the party officially began.

As the class's arts and cultural committee member, Li Yufei was naturally the best candidate for the position of host of the evening party. She wore light makeup, a pink dress, white stockings, black leather boots, and a white woolen coat. Her soft, straight hair was draped over her shoulders, with pink hairpins hanging on the ends of her hair. She stood on the stage holding a microphone, looking pretty and charming with a smile on her face.

The first program was a song performance. At the introduction of Li Yufei, the handsome guy in the class, Zhao Dong, came on stage with a guitar and sang Zhang Chu's "Sister". While he was singing, Wang Xiaokai stuffed melon seeds into his mouth with a look of disdain on his face. He had a lot of opinions about this class hunk, but it's true, Zhang Yunqi thought it sounded pretty good, and the girls applauded.

Zhang Yunqi remembered that the first time he heard this song was on New Year's Eve in 1994 in his previous life. It was quite a coincidence. At that time, he had nothing in the provincial capital of Lijin. He and a few classmates were drinking in the late night snack square on Fallen Street in Yuelu University Town. A makeshift rock band composed of several boys was singing this song:
“It hasn’t snowed this winter.

Standing on the road without blinking
My heart is still tender..."

Time and space reverse, life goes back to the past, and now it is New Year's Eve of 1994. At that time and moment, at this moment, Zhang Yunqi is looking at the howling snow outside the window, and his heart is probably no longer gentle.

The party went on very quickly and the atmosphere was lively. Most of the performances were songs. Some were good, some were so-so, and some were out of tune. But this was a class party after all, so no one took it too seriously. It was just for fun. When it was almost eight o'clock, the host Li Yufei called Zhang Yunqi's name and said, "Next, please invite Zhang Yunqi to come on stage and sing the song "No More Hesitation" by the Chinese rock band Beyond."

Zhang Yunqi smiled and scratched his head, then walked to the front desk amid applause and took the microphone from Li Yufei. The prelude of music immediately sounded on TV. Before he even started singing, the audience applauded loudly. The seats for the party were arranged in an arc shape. Wang Xiaokai, the little fool, pounded the table with his hands and made a noise. Chu Jian, who was sitting opposite him, looked at him with a smile.

Zhang Yunqi was not nervous, but he didn't know why, the classroom in front of him and the faces of Aokiji always gave him an old yet familiar feeling, like the mottled old photos in his memory, familiar and distant. He couldn't help but think of some people and things from the past.

Many years ago, I remember it was probably the second semester of the third year in junior high school, the high school entrance examination was approaching, a girl handed him a love letter, which was passed to him by another girl in the class. There was no name on the letter, and the general meaning was that she wanted to be friends with him, but the high school entrance examination was coming soon, and in order to avoid distraction and study hard, she decided to wait until after the exam to reveal the name.

In fact, in terms of study, he had already jumped out of the Three Realms and was no longer in the Five Elements. He had long passed the stage of working hard. The upcoming high school entrance examination was not a problem at all. Therefore, he was quite bored at ordinary times and was very excited after receiving the love letter. So he quickly wrote a letter back and asked the female classmate who delivered the letter to give it to the other party. The letter was full of sweet love. However, after a long time and so many letters, he could not bear it anymore.

This thing needs an emotional sustenance. He didn't know who the other person was at the time, so the love words he wrote were just empty words. What does this kind of teenage mentality look like? There are more than 30 girls in the class, no matter how pretty or ugly, every one of them could be the one you fall in love with. The teenager's strong emotions have nowhere to go. Not to mention touching hands, he can't even imagine what the other person looks like in his dreams. He doesn't even have a specific person to masturbate to. It's really torturous.

After this happened several times, he wrote back a letter with a bad and impatient attitude, and directly told me not to reply unless I told him my name.

Sure enough, the girl never wrote to him again.

Until he graduated from the third year of junior high school, on the eve of the high school entrance examination, the class held a farewell party. At that party, he went on stage and sang a song. The title of the song was "No More Hesitation" by Beyond.

When he was singing, he actually had no idea how he sang, and he still can't remember it, but he always remembered that after studying, he took the lyrics written in a notebook and practiced them over and over again in poor Cantonese for many days and nights. But after he went on stage, he was so nervous because he had never seen much of the world that he stood there holding the microphone like a wooden stake.

This tension continued into the second half of the night.

After the party, the students went back to the dormitory in groups of three or four. He was halfway there when a girl came towards him.

The girl's grades were among the best in the class. She was pretty, had a ponytail, and her personality was a bit like Chu Jian, quite weak. She stopped him, stuffed a note into his hand, and said with a smile: "You sing really well."

Then the girl turned and left.

As it rises and falls, the ponytail dances in the moonlight.

The young boy’s head suddenly went “boom”!

He suddenly understood a very basic thing: it was this girl who wrote him a love letter, and it was this girl who wanted to be friends with him. All the details that were hidden in the corners of the past came to light, such as the slight smile on her lips when she asked him questions, the light in her eyes when they met face to face in the corridor, and her suddenly blushing face when he glanced at her in the playground.

However, he ignored it all at that time.

That night, Zhang Yunqi lay awake all night, thinking over and over whether he should say something to the girl or write a reply letter, but he was hesitant, thinking that there would be plenty of opportunities to meet in the future, so it was unnecessary, and he didn't know how to give her the letter after writing it in the middle of the night. He didn't dare to let other classmates know about this.

With such a hesitant mentality, a night passed. The next day, the third grade department had a three-day holiday before the high school entrance examination. The students went home directly. Zhang Yunqi did not see the girl. Later, he went to Fengyang County to take the high school entrance examination, which was not in the same school examination room, and he still did not see the girl.

After graduating from junior high school, he went directly to the provincial capital to attend a technical secondary school. He never met the girl again and gradually forgot about her. He only thought of her occasionally in the middle of the night, with mixed feelings in his heart. He thought he would never see her again in this life.

It was not until he graduated from junior college and had just entered society that he took a bus from the county town back to his hometown Yunxi and unexpectedly met this girl on the bus. She was only about eighteen or nineteen years old at the time, but she already had a one-year-old child on her back. She was wearing coarse cloth clothes and carrying a huge snakeskin bag in her hand, looking exactly like a rural woman.

In the 1990s, there were very few buses from Fengyang County to Longwan Town, only two or three a day. The buses were small and the environment was poor. The minibus was already full and the aisle was jammed. In order to catch this last minibus back to Longwan Town, the girl desperately squeezed to the door with her child on her back and a snakeskin bag in her hand.

When he saw that scene, his heart was filled with grief.

Why would such a student with excellent grades and a bright future drop out of school at such an early age to go back home to work as a farmer and marry someone else? At that moment, he deeply felt how difficult it was for these rural children in the 90s, rural children trapped in the plight of wheat fields, rural children deeply hurt by the urban-rural scissors gap and the three promotions and five unifications, to get out of the wheat fields, receive higher education and integrate into the big city!
He was proud of his young mother.

He felt sad for this classmate with whom he had once developed feelings for each other in his ignorant years!

Even though time has passed and so many years have passed, sometimes when he thinks of that girl, he always feels an indescribable feeling in his heart.

Regret? Lost?
Maybe if he had been braver at that time, not so hesitant, and replied to the previous letter and kept in touch, even if nothing could be changed, and he was just a simple friend, his feelings would be very different now, right? But what can I say, this may be the so-called youth. Youth without regrets is not a complete youth.

Looking back on all these events, one has to say that after more than 40 years of long life, Zhang Yunqi has become accustomed to all kinds of situations in the world, the drudgery of life, the ups and downs of life, and has experienced everything he should have experienced, but it is that period of time, the people and things in that period of time, that he can never forget and always miss.

Sometimes he wondered why this was so. Perhaps it was because he had not yet entered society at that time and had not yet shouldered the heavy shackles of life and struggled forward. In school, he was both good in character and in study. No matter where he went, he was the focus of attention. He had no worries, no distractions, and his mind was clear. Studying was not tiring at all, and his grades were outstanding. He was a treasure in the eyes of teachers and was favored by girls. He always felt that he was superior.

It can even be said that if a person's life needs to be measured by a point to determine the value of his life, then at that moment, in the summer when he was 16 years old, he had reached the peak of his life.

Later on, it’s all impotence.

Zhang Yunqi picked up the microphone.

Some hoarse singing voices floated over the classroom:

"Bored saw hesitation
It is not easy to achieve the ideal

Even though I have confidence and fighting spirit, I suppress it
Who decides whether I should go or stay?

Set the universe in my heart

I just want to rely on my own hands and wave towards my ideal…”

******
Pls. As an author, I actually wrote this chapter very capriciously. I used a lot of flashbacks and a lot of emotional parts. The stories and characters in it are actually my personal experiences. I just wanted to express something and reminisce something.

The girl who wrote me a love letter in this story had very good grades back then. I went on stage to sing at the graduation party, and she stopped me after the song. But she later dropped out of school. Actually, I also have her QQ number now, but I simply don't have the courage to find her to chat. Sometimes I think of her in the middle of the night, like now, and always feel that it would be great if I could live my life again.

(End of this chapter)