Chapter 1: Overnight Rain

For my dear Meng Xiaobei, to whom I dedicate this story.

We truly met over nothing more remarkable than drinking water.

It must have been an afternoon in early summer. I can still remember the cuffs of my short sleeves catching a few fibers of the wind.

—Jian Zhen, Splitting Silk in April

Night was beginning to fall. Outside the university, barbecue stalls were gradually setting up, smoke curling through the darkness. Milk tea shops, stationery stores, cake shops... They stood packed side by side, no different from the streets outside universities in Dancheng or any other city.

Dusk settled over everything, leaving only a faint trace of daylight.

Carrying a travel bag, Su Nan entered Chongcheng University.

After stopping several times to ask for directions, she finally spotted the sign for the “School of Journalism and Communication,” partially concealed beneath the shadows of the trees, just before darkness completely fell.

The student reception desk on the first floor was still staffed. Su Nan signed in, collected the conference materials, and headed to the hotel that had been arranged for her to rest.

She had come to Chongcheng at the request of her advisor, Lin Han, to attend a communications summit being held at Chongcheng University. Lin Han had taken on three graduate students the previous year: one academic master’s student and two professional master’s students. The two professional master’s students, one in the north and the other in the south, were busy with internships, so most of the errands and grunt work fell to Su Nan.

Saturday morning, in the school administration auditorium.

Su Nan arrived early and found an inconspicuous corner to sit in, keeping her head down as she reviewed her presentation. The corners of her few pages of notes had curled from being clutched in her hands, and her palms were drenched in sweat.

People gradually filled the room. Just before the forum began, she put away her notes and glanced toward the front row.

In the third seat sat Chen Zhiyu, an associate professor in Chongcheng University’s School of Journalism and Communication.

Su Nan’s advisor, Lin Han, had been a close friend of his for many years and had instructed Su Nan to make sure she greeted him while she was here.

“Professor Chen.”

Chen Zhiyu was looking down at an anthology of academic papers. Hearing her, he raised his head.

“I’m Professor Lin Han’s graduate student, Su Nan.”

“Oh, hello.” Chen Zhiyu closed the book, rose to his feet, and extended a hand to her. “Professor Lin mentioned you.”

Su Nan hurriedly shook his hand. Then she slipped the backpack off her shoulders, took out a cardboard box, and said, “Professor Lin asked me to bring this to you.”

Chen Zhiyu accepted it. “Why is it so heavy?”

A professor beside him laughed. “What is it?” He curiously took the box and weighed it in his hands. “Goodness, it feels like a brick. You carried this all the way from Dancheng? Professor Lin is something else. Couldn’t she have just mailed it?”

“Professor Lin said she wouldn’t trust it to a courier,” Su Nan explained.

“Then it might be a gold brick.”

Chen Zhiyu smiled and thanked Su Nan. He told her to take her seat and said he would treat her to a simple meal after the forum ended.

The forum lasted two days and was divided into four sessions. The first featured presentations from student representatives. After all three students had finished speaking, the moderator for the session asked questions and offered critiques.

When Su Nan finished her presentation, she returned to her seat and sat down unsteadily, her heart pounding. She had no idea whether she had left out any important points.

Her roommate sent her a WeChat message asking when she would return to Dancheng. She was about to reply when she heard Chen Zhiyu clear his throat. She hurriedly locked her screen and looked up.

Holding the microphone, Chen Zhiyu rose to his feet. “I heard that eight students were originally invited. Once they found out I would be moderating, four politely declined.”

The room erupted in laughter.

Chen Zhiyu specialized in the history of communication studies. Although Su Nan was not a Chongcheng University student, even she had heard that he maintained exacting academic standards and failed an exceptionally high number of students.

Su Nan could not help sitting straighter.

Chen Zhiyu first critiqued the other two students’ papers and raised several questions.

“Next is Su Nan’s presentation...” He paused. “There has already been a great deal of research on group dynamics, so I won’t raise any specific questions here. This forum has shown me the fresh perspectives and new approaches of the emerging generation in communication studies. I have found it very illuminating as well...”

With a few vague remarks, he skirted around offering any real critique of Su Nan’s work.

Su Nan was somewhat bewildered.

After the session ended, people gradually began to leave. Chen Zhiyu remained surrounded, with several students gathered around him and one question following another.

Clutching her backpack, Su Nan hesitated.

Fifteen minutes passed before the students finally left.

She saw Chen Zhiyu raise his head and survey the room until his gaze came to rest on her.

She had no choice but to steel herself and walk over. “Professor Chen.”

Chen Zhiyu picked up the suit jacket draped over the back of his chair and laid it across his arm. “Let’s go.”

A walkway outside Chongcheng University’s School of Journalism and Communication led to another campus gate. It was early summer, and a few Chinese roses were still blooming in the flower beds along the path.

After leaving the building, Chen Zhiyu stopped. Su Nan hurriedly stopped as well.

Chen Zhiyu felt inside the pocket of his trousers and took out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. “Sorry. I’m going to have a cigarette.”

Su Nan nodded.

He put a cigarette between his lips, lit it, and took a drag, but did not immediately continue walking. Turning slightly toward her, he asked, “Do you know why I didn’t critique your presentation?”

She shook her head.

“Lin Han and I have been friends for ten years. If I had critiqued it, I’m afraid our friendship would have ended today.”

Su Nan opened her mouth but could not speak. She lowered her head, pressed her lips together, and murmured an “Mm” so softly that even she could not hear it.

“You have no reverence for scholarship whatsoever. You aren’t suited to academic work.”

Having delivered his judgment, Chen Zhiyu turned and continued walking.

She stood there stunned for several seconds before following him.

It would have been a lie to say she was not embarrassed.

Lin Han had criticized her plenty of times before, saying that her papers contained no original ideas. She could manage research in the empirical tradition, but whenever her work involved the Frankfurt School, she could do nothing but go around in circles within old frameworks.

Su Nan knew this herself. But being criticized by her own advisor and being criticized by someone else were two entirely different things.

Did Chen Zhiyu’s assessment merely prove once again that deciding to pursue a graduate degree had been a mistake?

She remained dejected all the way to the restaurant.

“Su Nan.”

Only then did Su Nan emerge from her thoughts. She raised her head and met Chen Zhiyu’s gaze.

“I asked whether we have enough food or if you want to order anything else.”

She hurriedly said there was no need.

His gaze lingered on her for a moment. Chen Zhiyu closed the menu and picked up his teacup. “You really can’t take criticism?”

“No...” she denied instinctively.

Chen Zhiyu took a sip of tea and said slowly, “A few years ago, the dean had a doctoral student whose graduation was postponed twice because his dissertation repeatedly failed to pass. The dean couldn’t stand watching it any longer and asked me to tutor him. The dean was my doctoral advisor back then, which made the student my junior in the same academic lineage, so I still had to help him. In the end, I walked him through revising the dissertation, practically line by line, until he was able to graduate. There was no satisfaction in it. Everyone has their own strengths. Challenging yourself to do something you aren’t suited for only creates trouble for yourself and everyone around you.”

She murmured another halting “Mm.”

Chen Zhiyu watched her for a moment. He paused, then said nothing more.

After the meal, Su Nan prepared to return to her hotel, collect her things, and head to the train station.

“Would you like me to drive you?”

“There’s no need, Professor Chen. The subway is convenient, and my luggage is light...”

Chen Zhiyu suddenly paused. “If you hadn’t mentioned your luggage, I nearly would have forgotten the ‘gold brick’ you brought...”

“I’ll go get it for you!”

“I have two perfectly good hands and feet. There’s no need to trouble you.” Chen Zhiyu smiled and thought for a moment. “Go to your hotel and collect your things. I’ll return to the auditorium. You can meet me in the parking lot afterward.”

She was about to decline again, but Chen Zhiyu waved a hand, leaving no room for argument.

“Professor Chen... where is the parking lot?”

“Leave the school administration building, walk five hundred meters south, then turn west.”

But...

Which way was south?

The car traveled east toward the train station.

Chen Zhiyu drove steadily, signaling and changing lanes without making a single mistake.

His car looked rather old and still had a manual transmission. Most cars on the market nowadays had already switched to automatics. The interior was immaculate. There was no fragrance inside, only a dry, clean scent.

Su Nan leaned slightly toward the door, putting some distance between herself and Chen Zhiyu.

She had been like this since childhood. She never knew how to interact with teachers or elders and was perpetually uneasy, afraid that they might criticize her.

“You don’t want to look around Chongcheng?”

“I have classes when I get back.”

“At this time of year, there’s dust and willow fluff everywhere. There isn’t much to see. Come in the winter. The snow is beautiful.”

She nodded.

After a moment of silence, Chen Zhiyu turned to look at her and smiled. “Don’t go back and complain about me to Lin Han.”

She hurriedly replied, “No... You—you were right.”

Her mind was preoccupied with making a living. Every two extra pages she read only brought her two more pages’ worth of anxiety and melancholy. With that sort of mentality, she truly was incapable of pursuing scholarship. She knew she was not cut out for it and merely wanted to muddle through these two years before finding a job. If graduate school offered her any real benefit, it would probably be the confidence to negotiate an extra thousand yuan onto her base salary when discussing a job offer.

They remained silent for the rest of the drive. When they reached the train station’s underground parking garage, Su Nan collected her luggage and thanked Chen Zhiyu.

The space around them was damp and dim. A row of white lights stretched into the distance overhead, eventually narrowing into a single glowing line.

Chen Zhiyu rested an elbow on the car window and lit a cigarette. He gave an emotionless “Mm.”

His thoughts seemed to have drifted far away, and his gaze rested on some indeterminate point in space.

Su Nan instinctively lightened her steps, pretending she was a wandering ghost as she silently slipped away.

After returning from Chongcheng, Su Nan resumed her dull life as a graduate student. Every week, she read, prepared book reports, ran errands for her advisor, and earned extra money tutoring students for the graduate school entrance examination on weekends.

In the blink of an eye, autumn arrived.

As their second year began, the professional master’s students were already setting out for round after round of campus recruitment, while the academic master’s students faced nothing but an even more tightly packed class schedule.

It began to rain at dusk. A fine early-autumn drizzle pattered against the leaves, leaving the campus dark and quiet.

Su Nan received a text message from her advisor, Lin Han. Only when she stepped out of the library did she remember that she had forgotten her umbrella.

The school administration building was three hundred meters from the library. After a moment’s hesitation, she pulled up the hood of her sweatshirt and ran into the rain.

When she reached the building, she took off her hood, brushed the rainwater from her clothes, and headed to Lin Han’s office.

The door was not closed, only left slightly ajar. Voices drifted through the gap.

After hesitating for a moment, she knocked.

“Come in.”

The office was divided into inner and outer sections. The inner section contained three offices, while the outer one was a tearoom for receiving visitors. A small pale-yellow lamp glowed on the table beside a low potted plant.

Steam curled slowly from two cups of tea.

Chen Zhiyu sat beside the window.

At the sound of the door opening, he raised his head and directed a calm gaze at her from behind his glasses.

Su Nan stood in the doorway. “Sister Han. Professor Chen.”

“You didn’t bring an umbrella?”

“It wasn’t raining when I left... I’ve been in the library all afternoon.”

“Sit down and have some hot tea.” Lin Han picked up the kettle and poured hot water into a disposable cup.

Su Nan sat at the corner of the table, accepted the cup, and quietly said, “Thank you, Sister Han.”

Lin Han sat down and propped her head on one hand. She looked at Chen Zhiyu, then at Su Nan, and smiled. “Professor Chen has been invited to teach an elective here this year. Have you heard?”

Su Nan nodded.

“Did you enroll?”

“...I did.”

In truth, she had not. That morning, the moment she saw the three characters of Chen Zhiyu’s name listed directly beneath Schools of Thought in Communication Studies, she had instinctively steered clear of it.

“That works out perfectly. Professor Chen isn’t familiar with our university, so you can be his teaching assistant.”

Su Nan froze. “...All right, Sister Han.”

Chen Zhiyu looked at her and smiled faintly, as though everything from before had scattered like clouds on the wind.

“I’ll be relying on your help, Student Su Nan.”