Jinding Hotel had dedicated banquet halls and private rooms for events. Fewer than sixty students from Class One of their third year had come to the reunion, so they had chosen a smaller private room. At a large hotel like this, the bigger banquet rooms had to be reserved two or three months in advance.
The moment Wang Cheng entered the hotel, an attendant approached him. Under her guidance, he arrived at Private Room 801 on the third floor. The attendant thoughtfully opened the door for him as well. Wang Cheng smiled and thanked her. Her face reddened slightly before she said, “You’re welcome,” and left.
It was already close to six, so almost all the classmates had arrived. Only a few people were still missing, and they happened to be the ones everyone most wanted to see. Wang Cheng was one of them, so whenever the door opened, everyone instinctively looked over.
“Wang Cheng!”
Wei Dandan had been checking the time constantly, barely paying attention when her friends spoke to her. Although Wang Cheng had promised he would come, there was still no sign of him even as the time approached, and she was getting anxious. Every time there was movement at the door, she immediately looked over. After all, she had already assured everyone that Wang Cheng would attend. Wang Cheng had been something of a notable figure at Shanhai High School. The moment Wei Dandan called his name, the private room quieted noticeably and everyone’s attention turned toward him. The faces were both familiar and strange. In a daze, Wang Cheng realized seven years really had passed. The youthful faces in his memories had been replaced by faces wearing masks that were sometimes genuine and sometimes not.
Wang Cheng nodded to her. Just then, a man one or two centimeters shorter than him walked over without saying a word and punched him lightly in the chest.
“Wang Cheng, you bastard. You disappeared right after high-school graduation and didn’t even keep in touch with your brothers. Now you finally dare show your face? If I hadn’t heard you were coming this time, I really wouldn’t have bothered.”
“I was afraid you’d blame me, so I rushed over pitifully to make amends. Men change a lot as they grow up. If you hadn’t opened your mouth, I wouldn’t have recognized you either.” Wang Cheng pulled his hand away and smiled as he hugged him. The man was Tong Yangyang, one of Wang Cheng’s classmates in high school. Back then, Tong Yangyang had been very fat and was known together with another overweight girl in the class as the “Double Fatties.” Seven years later, the former fat boy had become tall and thin, and much better-looking than before.
“How am I anything like you? Seven years and you haven’t changed at all. You’ve actually gotten even more handsome.” Tong Yangyang looked at him enviously. Wang Cheng had always been popular with girls in high school. Of course, because he was straightforward and easygoing, he had also gotten along extremely well with the boys.
“I was born beautiful.”
“Ugh.”
“Hahaha…”
“Your skin hasn’t gotten any thinner either. I can’t believe you can still say things like that.” Even though Tong Yangyang had been mentally prepared, he was still rendered speechless.
“What’s wrong with being thick-skinned? You live happier that way.” Wang Cheng did not care. “By the way, where’s Huang Tong’an? Didn’t he come?”
“No. You know what he’s like. That guy has never been punctual. I’m more worried he might not come at all. He used to attend at first, but later he stopped showing up to reunions very often. I haven’t had much contact with him these past year or two either.” Tong Yangyang sounded a little emotional. Seven years was a long time. Things changed, and people changed with them.
“If we’re meant to meet, we’ll meet,” Wang Cheng said.
“Come on, I’ll introduce you to the others. You definitely won’t recognize most of them. I had to go around and get reacquainted before I remembered who everyone was. They’ve all changed a lot.”
After losing weight, Tong Yangyang’s personality had also become much more outgoing. Among a group of men, he now resembled the Wang Cheng of years ago, silver-tongued and quick with words. Nobody would have expected the fat boy from back then to change this much. Wang Cheng later learned that Tong Yangyang worked for a fairly good company and was now a sales manager.
Without Tong Yangyang making introductions, Wang Cheng could only have guessed the identities of a few people from their faces. The rest of the names no longer matched the faces in his memory.
“Wang Cheng, do you remember him?” Tong Yangyang pulled over a man who was a little thinner than Wang Cheng but dressed stylishly and fashionably.
Wang Cheng studied him carefully for several seconds, then shook his head. He looked completely unfamiliar. There had definitely been no one like this in Class One during his third year.
“Haha, he’s the four-eyes from back then! I told you you wouldn’t recognize him. He’s a celebrity now, you know. If you want an autograph, better get it while you can.” Tong Yangyang laughed as if this somehow proved him right. “Four-eyes” naturally referred to a male classmate who wore glasses, and there had been exactly one boy in Wang Cheng’s class who everyone called that. He had sat in front of Wang Cheng, always wearing black-framed glasses with a bowl cut and a timid personality that made him look easy to bully. Just like Tong Yangyang, he had changed enormously as he grew older. Tong Yangyang still retained traces of his old appearance, but Gao Zhikai looked completely different.
“Wang Cheng, long time no see. Don’t listen to Tong Yangyang’s nonsense. I’m only a minor celebrity nobody’s really heard of.” Gao Zhikai greeted him openly. Without the glasses, his features stood out more clearly. He was not exactly handsome, but he had a certain cuteness. A face like his could indeed be popular with women in the entertainment industry.
“Every one of you changed so much. Looks like I’m the only one who stayed the same.” Wang Cheng smiled.
“Some people haven’t changed either. Their behavior has just become even more exaggerated. You’ll understand when you see them later.” Tong Yangyang sounded mysterious, but nobody picked up the topic. Anyone who had attended more than one reunion already knew what he meant.
Among the women sitting across the room, Wei Dandan had attracted plenty of attention after blurting out Wang Cheng’s name. When she previously told them she was in contact with Wang Cheng, nobody had believed her. Everyone knew Wang Cheng had vanished for seven years, and back in their third year, he and Wei Dandan had barely interacted. Still, Wei Dandan was not the sort to lie for attention, so everyone had looked forward to seeing the handsome boy from back then. Wang Cheng was the only classmate none of them had seen in seven years, and several people were curious about how much he had changed.
Wei Dandan was a little disappointed that Wang Cheng had not come over, but he had greeted her, and that made her happy again.
“Dandan, hurry and tell us. How did you and Wang Cheng meet again? He seems to have changed too. He’s even more handsome now.” Her old deskmate Lin Qi remembered the moment Wang Cheng walked in. He really did look more mature and handsome than before, enough to make a heart beat faster.
They had asked Wei Dandan before, but she had always refused to explain. Over the internet, nobody could do much about it. Now that they were face-to-face, she was not getting away so easily.
“There’s really nothing to tell. We just ran into each other by chance. He looked familiar, so I called out to him. I didn’t expect it to really be Wang Cheng. Then I remembered how everyone always mentioned him at previous reunions, so I asked for his phone number.” Wei Dandan gave them a simplified version of how the encounter happened.
“That’s so nice. I want to run into Handsome Wang by chance too.” Lin Qi cupped her cheeks in her hands. Wei Dandan was about to remind her that she was already the mother of a child and should mind her image when a sarcastic voice sounded beside them.
“Being handsome doesn’t put food on the table. He might look impressive on the surface and be washing dishes for someone behind the scenes.”
The two looked over. The speaker was a woman dressed quite prettily, though that was mostly after makeup. Without it, her face was nothing special. Wei Dandan and Lin Qi knew who she was because they had seen her at the last reunion. Notably, the woman had been one of school beauty Song Yuanyuan’s followers in high school, flattering her all the way from first year through third year. When Song Yuanyuan ostracized Wang Cheng, this woman had contributed plenty. Neither Wei Dandan nor Lin Qi liked her.
“Well, some people really do know themselves. With makeup that thick, who knows how frightening the face underneath is. Natural is still best.” Lin Qi stroked her own face, the mockery obvious.
“You!” The woman was so angry she started to stand, only for the person beside her to pull her back.
“Why bother arguing with a sallow-faced housewife? She’s just jealous of you.” The speaker was another of Song Yuanyuan’s old followers. The two of them had offended almost every other classmate in their efforts to curry favor with Song Yuanyuan and had practically no friends in the class.
Lin Qi almost laughed from anger. “The flower’s already rotten and you still think I’m jealous?”
The two women did not hear her clearly because someone else had arrived. It was Huang Tong’an, the man Wang Cheng had asked about. He had been Wang Cheng’s dormmate rather than a classmate, but after hearing Wang Cheng would attend the reunion, he shamelessly came along again. Huang Tong’an was handsome, just slightly less so than Wang Cheng, and had also been popular during their third year. The two often played basketball together. Whenever they were on the court, the place would be lively, especially with girls watching. Every time Tong Yangyang followed them, he barely even qualified as decorative greenery.
“Wang Cheng, I finally caught you.”
Huang Tong’an spotted Wang Cheng immediately among the group of men. No matter where he stood, Wang Cheng always drew the eye. Back then it had been because of his bald head. Now the hair had grown in, and he was still ridiculously handsome.
“Who caught whom is still up for debate.” Wang Cheng stood and punched him lightly in the chest. Huang Tong’an immediately grabbed his arm.
“Brother, you have no idea how much I missed you. I missed you so badly I couldn’t eat or sleep. Every moon hanging in the night sky was my heart pining for you.”
“That’s disgusting.” Wang Cheng hurriedly pulled his arm free, goosebumps rising all over him. Everyone else burst out laughing, especially Tong Yangyang. He had been fortunate enough to become friends with both men in high school and had always wanted to treasure those friendships, but each of them was better than the other at disappearing. He had seen scenes like this countless times before, the two competing to see who could be more shameless. Seeing it again brought the past rushing back. Time truly slipped away without anyone noticing. In the blink of an eye, they had all grown up.