Chapter 8: 7. How Much Do You Still Remember?
A real and enormous problem appeared before Zhang Luo.
Back to fifteen. Back to first year of high school.
Did it feel great?
It felt amazing.
But how much of that textbook knowledge did you still remember?
Did you think you were reborn right after taking the college entrance exam, at the peak of your life’s accumulated textbook knowledge?
No. You weren’t. You were already thirty, and had been a corporate drone for many years.
All that textbook knowledge—you’d long since tossed it God knew where.
Cracked.
Zhang Luo was completely stunned.
Fortunately, this was the first year of high school, not the third.
If someone told him right now that he had been reborn into his senior year, wouldn’t that be the worst luck imaginable?!
Zhang Luo felt his head swelling, while at the same time feeling thankful.
All of a sudden, this idle Sunday afternoon had something to do.
Read. Search for memories.
Liang Fengying knocked and came in. Seeing that Zhang Luo was actually reading, she was utterly shocked.
“You—”
Zhang Luo turned to look at her.
“Mom, I think I need to go buy a few tutoring books.”
The shock and suspicion on Liang Fengying’s face deepened.
However, that didn’t stop Liang Fengying from swiftly going to get her wallet.
An hour later, when Liang Fengying saw Zhang Luo really come back carrying several tutoring books, the expression on her face was truly something.
She was practically ecstatic in that Keyun head-clutching way, yet still forced herself to act as if nothing had happened.
After Zhang Luo returned to his room, it wasn’t long before he heard his father come home.
Then his mother lowered her voice and said to his father, “That boy Zhang Luo has finally come to his senses. He finally knows he needs to work hard!” The excitement and joy slipping out between every word reached Zhang Luo’s ears, and made his heart ache.
People always have to look back before they can understand certain people, certain things, certain words, and certain actions from back then.
Zhang Luo had once wondered countless times: if he could start over, would his life become a little better?
Now, he really could start over.
He didn’t know whether the life ahead would become a little better.
But that was what he thought, and that was what he would strive to do.
-
Zhang Luo spent the entire night, more or less flipping through the content of several main subjects and retrieving some of his memories.
It was just like swimming. Even if you forgot, as long as you had learned it before, after flailing around a couple of times, the feeling would come back.
At least Zhang Luo hadn’t been a poor student in the past. Reading textbooks didn’t feel like reading heavenly scripture to him.
At ten o’clock that night, his mother urged him to get into bed.
“You have to get up at six-thirty tomorrow. Hurry up and sleep,” his mother said. “We don’t have time to take you to school.”
Especially his mother. Because she had contracted the cafeteria, she had to get up at five in the morning and hurry to the early market for vegetables.
His father was the same. He basically left the house at seven.
Zhang Luo had already grown used to sleeping only after midnight.
Yesterday was Saturday, and he had only gone to sleep in the early hours.
Making him lie in bed this early only left him to let his thoughts run wild.
Forget playing on his phone—smartphones didn’t even exist yet in this era.
Even if they did, with how fiercely his family guarded against internet addiction, they probably wouldn’t buy him one.
Zhang Luo lay in bed, thinking about his high school days, thinking about things from the past, and unexpectedly, he didn’t really toss and turn unable to sleep. He fell asleep very quickly.
Mm. It must have been because studying had exhausted him too much. Too many brain cells had died, and his brain needed rest.
-
City No. 2 High School was about five kilometers from Zhang Luo’s home. It actually wasn’t far, but if he really had to rely on his two legs to walk, it would still be a bit tiring.
So Zhang Luo would usually ride his bicycle. When it rained, he would take the bus.
When Zhang Luo got up, sure enough, there was already no one at home.
First year of high school only required making it to the eight o’clock morning class. It wasn’t as insane as senior year, where there was also morning self-study.
Zhang Luo woke up at 7:20 in the morning.
When he sat up, sunlight had already spilled all over the room.
He shuffled out in his slippers. On the table sat a bowl, with another bowl turned upside down over it.
When he lifted it away, he saw a bowl of mung bean porridge inside.
Beside it was a bag of milk.
His dad had probably ladled out this porridge. Otherwise, it would definitely have gone cold.
Zhang Luo sat down on the chair and wolfed down two mouthfuls before remembering—uh, he hadn’t brushed his teeth yet.
Forget it. He had already started eating.
Only after he finished did he go and make up for the act of brushing his teeth.
Did this count as shutting the stable door after the horse had bolted?
Zhang Luo changed into his school uniform, put on his backpack, and went out.
On the stairs, he ran into Wang Futian again.
“Uncle Wang,” Zhang Luo greeted him.
“Hey, Xiao Luo!” Wang Futian saw him and called him to a stop. “When did you see me at Meimei Hair Salon?”
“Aiyo.” Zhang Luo thought, he was still hung up on this?
“Not long ago, Uncle Wang. I’m about to be late for school, so I won’t talk now.” Zhang Luo dashed downstairs in one smooth motion.
Wang Futian still wanted to call him back.
But he had already run off.
A teenager’s body really was great.
Light as a swallow.
He plunged headfirst into the sunlight.
Large plane tree leaves held up umbrellas of green shade.
The air was filled with the fragrance of all kinds of breakfast foods.
“Zhang Luo!” someone called his name.
Zhang Luo braked sharply, propped one foot on the ground, held the bicycle handlebars with both hands, and turned back to look.
A chubby little guy came trotting after him.
“Give me a ride!”
Zhou Hengyu.
His high school classmate.
Their two families lived very close to each other.
It was just that the two of them had always been only half-familiar, never getting too close.
That was because Zhang Luo had disliked Zhou Hengyu for being a literary youth—mm, a chubby literary youth—and hadn’t wanted to play with him.
In the end, after this literary youth grew up, he actually became an online novelist, and seemed to be quite famous too.
After his father’s accident, Zhou Hengyu had probably heard about it from his parents and specially transferred him a sum of money.
Even for the funeral, he had come with his parents.
Zhang Luo remembered it in his heart.
It was just that later, the man had done much better than him. Zhang Luo had thought about finding a chance to repay him somehow, but there had never been an opportunity, and he hadn’t dared to contact him of his own accord—
The other man had become a famous and wealthy online novelist, while he was nothing more than a corporate drone in Yuming, grinding himself to death with no future in sight.
To put it plainly, he felt inferior.
There was one time, though, when Zhou Hengyu came to Yuming for a meeting and arranged to meet him.
Zhang Luo, feeling very embarrassed, treated him to barbecue.
At the time, he had probably really been battered down badly. He felt that inviting someone to eat barbecue was too shabby to present properly.
Back then, Zhou Hengyu had successfully lost weight. Probably because he had come for a meeting, he was dressed in a suit and leather shoes. Sitting with him at a smoky barbecue stall, the first thing he said was, “You picked the perfect place. I had mouth ulcers a while ago and haven’t eaten barbecue in ages. I’ve been craving this exact bite.”
Nothing much actually happened that night. They just chatted about high school classmates, chatted about things in the neighborhood back home, and then parted ways.
At this very moment, as Zhang Luo looked at Zhou Hengyu, covered in soft little rolls of fat and trotting over, he felt an inexplicable excitement on the verge of bursting out.
“Give me a ride, will you? My bike tire’s flat,” Zhou Hengyu ran over and asked.
Zhang Luo smiled, nodded, and said, “Sure. Hop on.”
Zhou Hengyu grinned and swung himself onto the back.
Zhang Luo pushed down on the pedal and nearly failed to move.
“Holy shit!”
It was as if he were carrying a mountain.
“Your tire went flat because you sat on it, didn’t it?” Zhang Luo roasted him.
Ten thousand subscriptions, completed without a rushed ending!