Chapter 5

My name was changed to Yan Xuan[1]. 'Xuan' from the phrase 'warm sunshine and gentle breeze', pulled back into the sunlight from the underworld[2].

Unfortunately, even from the name, anyone could tell that I was merely Yan Yang's prop, an object to bring out his greatness by comparison[3].

But when they asked me whether I liked this name, I had to be grateful and thank them for giving me this name that finally resembled a human one.

I said, "I like it, I really like this name."

From then on, I was added to the household registration booklet, and my registered ‘previous name’ changed from 'Yan Yang' to 'Yin Ming'.

Just like that, the evidence that I had once been Yan Yang was erased.

Yan Yang, who was completely in the dark about this, seemed to like this new name even more than I did. He sprawled out on the sofa, rolling about as he looked at the household registration booklet like something new would pop out of it.

With a new name and new clothes, I was brought by my dad into a new school.

What had I looked like in that moment, you ask?

Like a scoundrel who had just walked out of the slums, ignorant of the world. A person who used to turn his body away and walk along damp, narrow and dark paths would always seem a little out of place now, stepping on a soft, plastic track in this vast school campus.

New clothes couldn't hide the moss that grew on my bones. Even if I wore sports shoes of the same brand as Yan Yang's, the path I took would still not be the same as his.

On the day I reported to school, Yan Yang was in class. My dad said, "Look to the west."

I looked in the direction he pointed at. Across the football field, then the basketball field, there was a row of small white buildings.

"Yan Yang has his classes there."

It was the primary school department, only about a few hundred metres away from the block I was to take my classes in.

"Both of you start school at the same time, but you're dismissed half an hour later than him," my dad said, "From now on, I'll pick you guys up every day after school. Later when Yan Yang is dismissed, he'll come and find you."

I nodded in acknowledgement.

I didn't know how much money my dad had spent to let me enroll in this school, but I later heard that the school fees for a middle school student who had transferred in were higher, possibly exceeding ten thousand yuan.

But this didn't make my opinion of him even the slightest bit better. In fact, it made me hate him even more.

He could casually throw out ten thousand yuan like this, but hadn’t been willing to give my mum and me just a bit more money for our living expenses.

To him, we probably weren't even worth as much as mud.

The more I thought about it, the more my hatred grew, and the more my hatred grew, the more I wanted him to die.

He was right about one thing though – since I was from that sort of crappy school, I really wasn't used to this environment. Even the sun seemed brighter here, so glaring that I could barely open my eyes.

On my first day of school, I sat in the last row because the seating was arranged by grades. I was an exception, so I could only sit there.

My classmates were all very friendly. Those who sat near me took the initiative to start conversations with me.

I didn't have much to talk about with them. The moment they opened their mouths, I knew we weren't of the same world.

What did they talk about?

They talked about which country they had travelled to during the holidays.

About how they had piano classes followed by art classes on the weekends.

About the new album some singer had just released.

About how they'd won yet another award.

Me?

I'd never been anywhere, I didn't know how to do anything, I didn't recognise a single singer, and I'd never won any awards before.

But it was fine. I didn't care about these things.

That day in class, I struggled to understand what was happening. I suddenly realised that it seemed like the teacher was glossing over most of the content in the textbook. It was only when I asked the girl who sat in front of me, did I then learn that it was actually because there was an unspoken understanding that the students had already attended enrichment classes outside of school during the holidays and gone over the textbook's contents, so in class the discussion would go a bit deeper.

This was something I had never heard of before.

If you asked me if there was anything that made me feel truly challenged, it would probably be this.

Despite the fact that I wasn't particularly intelligent and my dad wasn't expecting me to get any good grades at all, at the very least, I still wanted to do better than Yan Yang in this area. I couldn't actually let them look down on me as someone without a single redeeming feature.

Staring at the questions in the exercise booklet made my head hurt. I couldn't do a single one.

When school ended, everyone except a few students on duty left. The students cleaned the blackboard and swept the floor while I stayed in my seat, spacing out as I stared at the exercise booklet.

Suddenly, I heard someone call me. I lifted my head to see Yan Yang standing at the door. He looked like he was intending to come in, but didn't quite dare to.

He waved at me and called, "Ge! School's over; let's go home!"

Back then, Yan Yang was still small and short. Standing at my classroom door in his school uniform with his bag straps over his shoulders, he looked like a little doll.

I shot him a cold glare, tightly holding a page of the exercise book between my fingers. By the time I returned to my senses, the paper had been ripped by me.

"Okay." I packed up my things and stood up. When I got to the door, I smiled and asked him, "Did you wait very long for me?"

Yan Yang held on to both straps of his school bag, his smile so wide it almost seemed as though there was a glimmer of sunlight beaming from the corners of his eyes. He said, "Yeah, but I'm willing to wait for you!"

Willing to wait for me?

Yes, he had always been willing.

From that day onwards, he waited for me every day.

At first, it was waiting in school for me to be dismissed. Later, when he grew up, it was waiting in bed for me to fuck him.

It was all of his own will. Really; I had never forced him.

Footnotes:

[1] ‘Yan Xuan’: 晏暄, so now he has the same surname as Yan Yang. The ‘Xuan’ character means something like a warm sunlight.

[2] ‘pulled back into the sunlight from the underworld’: YX’s previous name was Yan Ming. ‘Ming’ alludes to death and the underworld.

[3] ‘Unfortunately, even from the name, anyone could tell that I was merely Yan Yang's prop, an object to bring out his greatness by comparison.’: The ‘Yang’ character refers to sunlight as well, but ‘Yang’ feels more like bright, glaring sunlight compared to the ‘Xuan’ character in ‘Yan Xuan’.