一池金鱼，和一个说好只是交易的夏夜

If you had to pick the single most unforgettable image from this summer, it would have to be this.

An abandoned swimming pool, a poolful of brightly colored goldfish, and two eighteen-year-olds who simply leap in and swim among the fish.

In that moment, the tutoring, the transaction — all of it seems to dissolve into that pool of water.

But to explain how this summer got here, we need to rewind a little.

Last time: to scrape together medicine money for her gravely ill grandma, Zhou Wan deliberately approached Lu Xixiao — rich but neglected — and an English tutoring deal bound the two of them together.

During this stretch, they had lessons together almost every night.

But the department head and security guard were always watching for students meeting in private, so the two had to wage a kind of guerrilla war with the teachers, dodging and hiding.

The funny thing is, the more they had to sneak around, the more they actually relaxed.

It was in all that hiding that, for the first time, they let their guard down and truly opened up.

One night after class, Lu Xixiao just got on his motorbike and drove Zhou Wan — who normally squeezes onto the bus — right to her door.

The summer night wind carried the sound of cicadas; neither said much, but something in the air had quietly shifted.

But the real climax was their final tutoring session.

Lu Xixiao remembered Zhou Wan once casually mentioning she loved goldfish.

That day, without a word, he bought out every goldfish at the street stall in one go, then dumped them all into the school's long-abandoned swimming pool.

The once-lifeless pool was instantly stirred into a colorful, fairytale world.

The two of them just dove in and swam among the poolful of goldfish, a joy that had nothing at all to do with tutoring or any deal.

Afraid Zhou Wan would catch cold, Lu Xixiao dug out two club T-shirts and had her change.

As she changed, Zhou Wan asked a question she'd held in for a long time: why are you so determined to go abroad alone?

Lu Xixiao's answer was soft but cutting: there's no one here worth staying for.

He turned it around: and what kind of life do you want for yourself?

Zhou Wan hesitated, and only said: I don't have the security to pick and choose the way you do.

You suddenly realize that these two kids, who seem to lack nothing and dare anything, are really only eighteen — and have run headlong into a world that offers them few choices.

Sadly, the good times didn't last.

The goldfish stunt was quickly uncovered by the school, and the teachers hauled them in for a harsh scolding.

At that critical juncture, Lu Xixiao stepped forward and took every bit of the blame himself, never mentioning Zhou Wan once.

Watching him shield her like that, Zhou Wan felt something she couldn't put into words.

To thank him, she pulled him into a little roadside noodle shop and treated him to a bowl of noodles.

It should have been the warmest night of the summer.

But Zhou Wan didn't expect the whole scene to be witnessed by someone else — a boy who has always kept her in his heart.

He has liked Zhou Wan since long ago, and watching her grow closer and closer to Lu Xixiao left him aching.

He turned on his heel and ran to tattle to Zhou Wan's grandma, so the moment Zhou Wan stepped through the door, grandma laid into her.

You see, on the surface this summer is nothing but tutoring and a transaction.

But deep down, Zhou Wan is still crushed under her hatred for the mother who abandoned her, and her anxiety over money.

And Lu Xixiao's clumsy but earnest protection, time and again, is quietly simmering this cold bargain into something else entirely.

The subtlest part is that even Zhou Wan herself is beginning to lose track.

Is her closeness to Lu Xixiao still a calculated step in her revenge plan, or has she genuinely fallen for him?

The summer is still long, and this relationship — agreed to be nothing but a deal — is only just starting to spin out of control.