Evan Lin finished speaking.
Wendy Wen wrapped up the announcement.
Everyone at the school, teachers and students alike, unconsciously let out a sigh of relief.
Quite a few people wiped their faces.
"Okay!"
Lynn Chen nodded seriously. The heavy stone that had weighed on her heart for so many years was finally set down.
It turned out she'd always felt guilty and sorry for the way she used to be—snobbish and harsh.
But now, with Evan Lin's words, all the emotions she’d bottled up for so long finally found release.
"Then we’ll wait for college!"
Lynn Chen stretched out her right hand toward Evan Lin, made a fist, then stuck out her pinky: "Let’s make a pinky promise!"
"Alright."
Evan Lin nodded.
Pinky promise.
Their two pinkies met mid-air, intertwining.
"Pinky swear—if you break it, you’ll hang for a hundred years!" (Note: This is a playful rhyme used in Chinese schoolyard pinky promises, symbolizing a vow that must never be broken.)
Lynn Chen murmured softly.
She spoke as she smiled.
If Evan Lin had really accepted her confession right away, Lynn herself wouldn’t have been ready for it.
All she wanted was to leave without regrets, to untangle the knots in her heart, and to make up for what she owed Evan Lin.
What Evan Lin said was the truth, too.
She wouldn’t have liked the Evan Lin who used to be so useless; at best, as she grew up, she would have treated him more gently over time.
Back then, Evan Lin wouldn’t have liked the plain-looking Lynn Chen either. And now, the current Evan Lin was even less likely to simply accept someone’s feelings.
But Evan Lin’s final words meant there was still room for possibility.
The impulsive decision Lynn Chen had just made now left her feeling a wave of relief.
"After we get to university, it’ll be a new beginning."
Lynn Chen thought to herself, quietly.
Everyone watching this scene had complicated expressions and sniffled.
Their emotions hadn’t settled yet.
Byron Yang smiled on the outside, but inside he was full of emotion.
Wendy Wen leaned back in her seat, glanced at the screen showing the two making their pinky promise, and smiled.
All around, the air was filled with swirling white paper.
Wendy Wen played 'Heart of a Dreamer' over the school radio.
The music had only just started.
The whole school was already exploding with excitement.
Students, fired up with emotion, shouted at the top of their lungs. Their voices pierced the clouds, echoing through the heat of summer.
Some were crying, some were laughing.
More and more teachers stepped out of their offices.
They stood in the corridors outside their offices, listening to the passionate, hopeful singing filling the campus. Many found their eyes growing moist.
Who hasn’t been young? Who hasn’t dreamed of love?
Time flows on like a river.
Once, those young people became teachers themselves, watching the next generation of passionate youth step out the school gates.
In another ten years, the young will have grown old. When they return, sword in hand, will their hearts still be the same as before?
Evan Lin stood among the crowd, still looking in the direction Lynn Chen had gone.
He reached out, touched his lips, then glanced at his left hand, where the sleeping dragon mark lay.
"Just now, why did you react?"
Evan Lin felt a flicker of doubt.
But the sleeping dragon in his left hand gave no answer at all.
It remained fast asleep, as if it had never awakened.
Yet, at the very moment Lynn Chen gave her first kiss, Evan Lin distinctly felt the dragon’s body tremble, ever so slightly.
Even if it was incredibly subtle.
The crowd kept cheering.
Underclassmen swept and watched the graduating seniors, eyes full of lingering envy.
When you’re in school, you want to graduate. But only after you leave do you realize the place you left behind was true paradise.