After Ling He married Lu Zhi, Ling He's father's ill condition miraculously improved. It might be because their wedding had happened, so everyone was in better spirits.
Today was the day Ling Zhao left the hospital. Lu Zhi and Ling He went to the hospital to pick him up. Ling He's mother, Meng Jun, cooked a table of food at home and waited for Ling He's father to come home.
Although their parents lived across from each other, this was the first time that everyone had gathered together for a meal since becoming a family. Meng Jun could hardly stop smiling.
Lu Zhi didn't eat a lot, so she put down her chopsticks early. Meng Jun and Mo Zhu were already sitting on the sofa and chatting. Ling He was still drinking with Lu Yang, while Ling Zhao was on the side being envious since he could only eat some peanuts to satisfy his cravings.
Lu Zhi has nothing to do. Meng Jun saw that she was bored, so she took her to Ling He's room. She smiled and told her to take a good look around. Then, she closed the door and went out.
This was the place where Ling He stayed the most in before he went to college. The room was very clean, but it was not bland. The style was reminiscent of a tidy male high school student.
There are several posters of galaxies on the wall. In the bookshelf, aside from the exercise books for the physics competitions from high school, there were books about astronomy. Lu Zhi felt his love for astronomy again.
Her eyes scanned across the row of trophies he won in various competitions, many of which were won in high school. Lu Zhi couldn't help it and thought, he was so dazzling in high school, why did I miss out on him then?
She suddenly felt sad because they had missed out on so many years that they could have been together.
She picked up a physics exercise book and opened it to the cover page. What she saw was the neat and large words: Third Year, Class One: Ling He.
It's strange that just by looking at these words he wrote, she felt her heart pounding for no reason. It was like she returned to high school and became a young, worried girl.
She had to laugh and flipped through the book. Then, she saw a piece of paper fall out of it.
It was a letter. The paper had turned yellow, but the handwriting was still clear.
She stopped when she saw the first two words, and her eyes widened a little.
The letter began with—
Classmate Lu Zhi:
Hello, I'm Ling He, a second year student from class one.
Ling He wrote a love letter to me?
She calmed down for a moment and forced herself to keep being calm. She turned the letter around but did not see any other words.
This was a letter that only had a beginning.
But why didn't he keep writing it? Why didn't he give it to me?
Lu Zhi's hand trembled slightly because of her rising emotions. In the next second, she felt a familiar warm embrace.
Ling He came in at some point and put his arms around her from behind. The tip of his nose rubbed against her neck. He smelled faintly of wine.
"Ling He." She was ticklish and scrunched up a bit.
"Hm?" Ling He then opened his eyes and saw the letter in Lu Zhi's hand.
The letter he had not seen for a long time and had already turned yellow pulled on his heart strings.
He paused and asked, "Where did you find it?"
Lu Zhi didn't answer him, but instead, she asked him, "Why didn't you finish?"
Ling He closed his eyes and rubbed her neck again. His voice was flat, "Don't you dislike receiving letters?"
If Ling He only occupied a small spot in all of Lu Zhi's high school memories, then Lu Zhi occupied all of Ling He's high school memories.
In fact, Ling He didn't think he was a person with a lot of feelings, and his interpersonal skills were very weak. He had graduated so many years ago, and he always lacked any interest in classmate reunions. He couldn't name any of his classmates from back then. But the only memories of his youth were Lu Zhi, whom he had never been in the same class with, or even had any interactions with.
The first time he saw Lu Zhi, he was busy writing a paper when she passed by the window. His deskmate at that time hit him with his elbow, causing the coordinate line he had just drawn to be crooked.
"Quick, look, that girl outside is Lu Zhi. She is very beautiful."
Ling He looked out of the window. Lu Zhi and a girl were holding hands. The high ponytail flickered, and the sun was shining on her. Ling He was dazzled by the smile on her face.
His eyes never left her until she disappeared. The deskmate sighed with regret, "But she already has a boyfriend."
Ling He lowered his head. He picked up the eraser and silently erased the crooked coordinate line. Then, he drew a straight line again.
Later, somehow, the name Lu Zhi was like a spell, and Ling He began to hear her name from other people frequently.
Lu Zhi was lectured by the head teacher for putting on makeup.
Lu Zhi had changed her boyfriend again.
Lu Zhi was really beautiful during the dance at the New Year's party.
Later, he saw her again. It was PE class, and he accidentally saw her sitting on a bench in the school woods with another boy. Her head was on the boy's shoulder, and the boy's hand was on her leg.
He wondered, is that her new boyfriend?
He passed by them without openly gawking, but through his peripherals, his eyes were on the hand on her leg.
Sometimes, the classroom was too noisy, and Ling He liked to read on the rooftop.
Not a lot of people went there. For a long time, it was only Ling He going up there. Until that day, an unexpected visitor came in.
Ling He remembered that it was probably around the school's anniversary. Lu Zhi was chosen to do a dance performance.
At that time, she would go to the rooftop to practice every day during their lunch breaks and evening self-study.
She turned the music on to the loudest volume. Ling He thought to himself, it's really loud, much louder than the classroom. He didn't know why, but he didn't get up and leave.
He sat there and looked at her figure. Each of her moves was clean, and she looked like she was trying her best to perfect it. When she danced, she always had a vibrant energy.
Ling He was overwhelmed by an upcoming competition. But as he looked at Lu Zhi, he thought, it's no big deal, just keep going forward.
That was the kind of energy she had.
She really is a magical existence, Ling He thought to himself.
When Lu Zhi saw him, she was shocked. But her shocked appearance was so cute that Ling He almost laughed.
Lu Zhi: "Sorry, I didn't know you were here. Did I disturb your studying?"
In front of him, she was modest and polite. Her arrogant and aggressive appearance from before disappeared.
Ling He knew that it was because she didn't know him at all.
His grip tightened around the spine of the book and replied, "No."
Lu Zhi nodded and stopped looking at him.
It could be assumed that she probably had no impression of the only conversation they had in high school.
It was at that point that the name Lu Zhi really took root in Ling He's heart.
When he realized that he liked her, Ling He had thought about being brave and how he should at least take the initiative to let her know him.
He wrote down the beginning of the letter, but he didn't know how to continue for a long time.
He was guarded and extremely cautious. He wanted her to like him.
But one time after the flag raising ceremony, he was walking behind her and heard her talking with the girls around them.
She surprisingly declared, "Write a letter? Please! Do you live in ancient times?"
After returning home, Ling He silently put the unfinished letter into the exercise book and never took it out again.
He was lucky that he didn't finish writing the letter and handed it to her at that time. Otherwise, he might have been rejected.
"When did I say I didn't like receiving letters?" Lu Zhi retorted loudly. She glared and crossed her arms when she questioned him.
Ling He chuckled and pinched her cheek without explaining.
He was fine if he was the only one who knew how long he liked her.
Lu Zhi turned her head to one side. "I don't care. You need to finish it. You haven't written me a love letter before."
"Okay, I'll finish it," he said and yielded to her.
Lu Zhi stopped pretending to be angry. She put her arms around his neck with a smile and stood on her tiptoe to kiss him.
Ling He held her waist and leaned over to kiss her back. Lu Zhi's mind suddenly recalled Ling He's explanation about the sunlight when she went to listen to his lecture—
"Although we can look up and see the sun, it is 150 million kilometres away from the earth."
"We can also see the sun's rays when we open our eyes, but it actually takes 8.3 minutes for the sun's rays to reach the earth."
It takes 150 million kilometres for the sun's rays to reach the earth. Yet, Ling He spent ten years being secretly in love with her before he finally let her know.
And finally, ten years later, his unfinished letter reached her heart.