Winter Time Rendering

Chapter 142: Chapter 59: The Worst Timeline

"Go cool off on your own."

Ruoping left him with those cold words and turned back into the funeral home.

Zhang Shutong watched her go. He remained standing there for a moment, his eyes on the slate-gray surface of the lake, before slowly sliding down from the railing and sinking into a squat.

But a moment later, Ruoping emerged from the funeral home again. From a good distance away, she suddenly tossed something toward him. Zhang Shutong caught it instinctively. It was a set of car keys.

"Take these and wait in the car. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself out here?" she said with a frown. "And another thing—don’t smoke in my car."

Zhang Shutong was just about to thank her, but she had already gone inside.

He hugged his frozen, stiff body and pulled open the SUV’s door. A faint, pleasant scent wafted from the interior. Zhang Shutong got into the passenger seat and reclined it slightly.

He stared at the car’s headliner, his body and mind completely spent. ’Honestly, I just want to fall asleep and not think about anything,’ he thought. ’But that’s just running away. At the very least, I need to figure out what happened first.’

He found Qingyi’s number and hovered his finger over the call button. Just then, a man rudely squeezed into the car. He turned to look—it was Song Nanshan.

His hair was slicked back meticulously, but his words gave him away the moment he opened his mouth:

"You know, Ruoping really knows her cars," Song said, patting and touching things around the cabin in praise. "Toyotas really are great. Indestructible."

Zhang Shutong was in no mood to ask what happened to Song’s Focus. He put away his phone. "You two fighting again?" Song asked. "You’re too old to be acting like this."

’Yeah, too old to be acting like this,’ Zhang Shutong thought. ’In fact, a word like ’squabble’ shouldn’t even exist in the adult world.’

Song kept rambling, talking about everything from Japanese cars to American cars, from the German luxury brands to the big three Japanese sedans.

Zhang Shutong wasn’t sure where he was going with all this, but it was actually nice to have someone rambling in his ear right now. So he just kept quiet and listened patiently to his old teacher.

"This wretched state... it’s not like you, Shutong," Song Nanshan said suddenly.

Zhang Shutong froze. ’You’re wrong this time, Teacher,’ he thought. ’The truth is, I haven’t been doing well for years. The only time I wasn’t a complete mess was probably those four days—the only time you seem to remember.’

But Song Nanshan seemed to relax, a nostalgic look on his face.

"I still remember how you handled yourself that night. Remember? When we were looking for that van. It was winter then, too, raining hard. We were both soaked to the bone. I was so worried I was about to panic, but you had already taken care of everything... I wasn’t going to bring it up, but in my eyes, you’re an incredibly capable person. Stop being so hard on yourself."

Zhang Shutong’s mouth opened, but no words came out. He wanted to apologize, to tell him he wasn’t as amazing as he thought. That he seemed to have truly let everyone down, even if he himself didn’t understand how things had turned out like this.

"You’re the student I’m most proud of," the teacher added.

Song Nanshan clapped him on the shoulder, just as he had when he was teaching him how to woo girls years ago. He reached into the inner pocket of his well-fitted suit, pulled out a piece of paper, and handed it over. It was a photograph.

"This is the graduation photo from back then. You didn’t take one at the time, so I kept it for you. I happened to bring it this time, thinking I might run into you. Take it."

With that, he got out of the car, cracking a joke as he left:

"I already paid to have the photo developed, so you don’t owe me."

The car door slammed shut. He was like a master swordsman. It felt like he’d said a lot, but his real message consisted of just three sentences—like a blade flourished countless times, with only three strikes meant to kill.

In the silence of the enclosed car, Zhang Shutong took the photograph.

It was their junior high graduation photo. A banner hung above their heads: YINGCAI MIDDLE SCHOOL, CLASS OF 2012.

Song had brought over a stool to sit right in the center of the front row. As their homeroom teacher, he sat with his legs spread wide in a carefree manner.

He was in the fourth row on the right, surrounded by his best friends. Du Kang was striking an over-the-top pose. Even Qingyi, whose face was usually a stoic mask, had a hint of a smile. Ruoping was right behind him and Qingyi, giving both of them bunny ears. The camera had caught the exact moment he noticed, turning his head to roll his eyes at her.

Then he saw Lu Qinglian. She was standing at the very back, as emotionless as ever, but a young girl all the same. Or at least, it was a color photograph... Holding this picture eight years later, he realized that the faces staring back at him were the ones he knew best.

The surface of the photo had grown sticky. Song, at his core, was still the same rough-around-the-edges guy from all those years ago. The memories, too, were viscous, like thick syrup. Zhang Shutong leaned back in the passenger seat, staring blankly at the picture.

He didn’t know how much time had passed. The sky was growing dark. He heard voices outside the car and saw Song approaching with his arms around Ruoping’s and Du Kang’s shoulders.

He was laughing. "All right, all right. What are you young folks doing, just hanging around a funeral home? Go grab some dinner before it gets completely dark. You all used to be inseparable, practically joined at the hip. It’s been years. If you’ve got beef with each other, just get it all out in the open. Drink ’til you drop, you know?"

Ruoping sighed. For a moment, she seemed to revert to the fiery young girl from their school days, the one who always had a headache from dealing with the three boys. She opened the car door. Du Kang, still reluctant, earned a sharp glare from Ruoping:

"Why are you being more difficult than I am?"

With a sour look on his face, Du Kang climbed into the back. He’d purposely left a seat free for Song. It used to be their teacher driving them—the four of them—around in that little Focus, all of them crammed together amidst the smell of smoke. Now, the roles were reversed.

But Song Nanshan said, "I’ll sit this one out. You kids won’t be able to let loose with your teacher around. Tonight, I don’t care if you cry or laugh, fight or yell—just have a good time."

The three of them ended up getting in the car. Ruoping had become quite a confident driver herself. She pulled the SUV onto Lake Ring Road, and the scenery outside began to fly by. She glanced at Du Kang in the rearview mirror and broke the silence:

"Your place?"

"My restaurant’s closed for the next few days," Du Kang muttered. "Let’s go to the old spot."

Ruoping nodded and said no more.

They all knew what "the old spot" referred to. Zhang Shutong asked Ruoping for permission, then lowered his window a crack. The lake ran alongside the road. As the wind whipped past, he could almost see the backs of four teenagers sitting on the shore, fishing.

The car entered the city proper. There were more private cars on the island now, and the downtown area was a little more prosperous than it had been eight years ago—but only a little. The three of them knew these roads like the back of their hands. They watched as Ruoping took a shortcut, weaving through a series of turns. When she was unsure, she’d ask Du Kang for a quick confirmation. The car finally slowed at the entrance to the commercial street. It was quiet today, with the same deserted air as always.

The street was open to traffic, and the SUV finally pulled up in front of the Nanhu Fish Restaurant.

Zhang Shutong unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car, looking over the surrounding storefronts. The street itself was much the same, lined mostly with two-story buildings, but nearly all of the shops had changed.

The night he and his teacher had plunged into the rain to find the van was still vivid in his memory. But now, he couldn’t find the little boutique that sold scarves anywhere.

"Count your blessings, city boy. What did you expect, some high-class establishment? It’s a miracle this Lake Fish Restaurant hasn’t gone out of business." Seeing him hesitate, Ruoping jabbed him with the remark before leading Du Kang inside to order.

But at her words, a sharp pang shot through Zhang Shutong’s heart.

He finally realized the source of the faint, nagging sense of wrongness he’d felt ever since the rewind:

Why is this commercial street...

...still here?

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