But Evan Ford could still clearly see his own eighteen-year-old face, water droplets sliding down, clean and pure, with a high nose bridge and fair skin. Even his eyes were clear and bright, with long eyelashes holding beads of water.

"I'm glad to see you again," Evan Ford smiled at the face in the mirror, his teeth white, his smile dazzling. "Now, it's the beginning of 1992. Do you know what that means?"

"It means, you have a handful of trump cards."

More than twenty years later, a man surnamed Lei would say: As long as you stand at the wind outlet, even pigs can fly. He would also ask you: Are You Ok?

Now it's the early 90s, an era of surging change, with opportunities everywhere. As long as you stand on one, you can soar.

Indeed, many people who seemed unlikely to succeed inexplicably took off in this era. Of course, you'd better not be too much like a pig, because this era also buried many people, including many who seemed destined for success.

Many who lived through this era look back years later and can't help but sigh that they didn't understand at the time and missed too many opportunities.

Yet those living in the moment actually don't understand either what kind of era they're in.

It's hard, even impossible, to define whether an era is good or bad, because they often coexist. Just as, in fact, the vast majority of people can't simply be defined as good or bad.

Some people later liked to see these few years in the early 90s as the last stretch of that once-innocent age.

Some people later reminisced: Back then, when you liked someone, it wasn't because they had a house or a car, but because that afternoon, the sunlight was beautiful, and he wore a white shirt.

But Wang Xiaobo said: Everything is irretrievably heading toward mediocrity.

This is the era, split and divided, with different groups of people standing on the sides of simplicity and chaos.

On one side is the world held by traditional workers, farmers, and petty citizens; on the other, the new class's world, where there are drifters, swindlers, elites, heroes, ambitious men, and scoundrels.

The eighteen-year-old Evan Ford was naive and pure, but the Evan Ford who has returned now, though with the same youthful face, has long since lost his innocence through the passage of time and the trials of life.

"Evan Ford, Evan Ford from 407, is Evan Ford there?"

In this era, calling out was the main way to find someone. Suddenly, Evan Ford heard her voice. Grace Young stood gracefully downstairs, wearing a white jacket, her hair in a ponytail, looking up toward the building.

Evan Ford glanced through the water room's glass window. At this moment, from her calm and natural demeanor, there was no way to tell she had come to break up, and her reason was so direct.

They were vocational school students, teacher training school students, so they had only half a year left before graduation.

Many people later didn't realize that there was once a stage in this country when vocational school students were extremely prestigious, especially in rural areas and small to medium cities. For ordinary families, getting into a vocational school was much harder and more glorious, and brought more joy, than getting into a key high school.

The batch of vocational school students graduating in '92, to which Evan Ford belonged, was probably at the tail end of this phenomenon. After that, things changed rapidly, and the diploma that once made them proud would later bring them immense trouble in work and life.

He couldn't afford to suffer this loss again in this life, muddling through with a vocational school diploma forever. Besides, shouldn't he at least experience university?

The shouting downstairs continued.

Evan Ford wasn't in a hurry. He took a moment to roughly think about the issue of taking the college entrance exam, but had no clue. Then, on his way back to the dorm to put his things away, he leaned over the corridor railing and responded with a smile, "I'll be down in a bit."

Chapter Two: The Later Cliché Plot

Evan Ford was putting things on the shelf when Brian Clark came to the door with an enamel lunch pail, tapping it with an iron spoon, and said, "Your girl is calling you downstairs, did you hear?"

"Your girl"—an amusing way to refer to someone. As one of Evan Ford's best friends at Linzhou Normal School, Brian Clark didn't really approve of his buddy's girlfriend.

The reason was that the ambitious Grace Young looked down a bit on people like Brian Clark, who were a bit lazy and roguish, and didn't like Evan Ford hanging out with him.

So, in return, Brian Clark was rather annoyed by her.

Evan Ford nodded and said, "I heard."

"Then I won't wait for you to eat together."

"Don't," Brian Clark was just about to leave when Evan Ford called after him, "Get me a meal too, I'll find you in the cafeteria in a bit."

After saying that, he raised his hand, hesitating in front of a row of similar-looking, chipped white enamel lunch pails on the shelf, and had to ask:

"By the way, which one is mine?"

"Are you stupid? You don't even recognize your own lunch pail." Brian Clark turned back, grabbed a set of lunch pail and spoon from the shelf, and said, "What, not eating with your girl? It's just about mealtime."

"She wants to talk to me about something." Evan Ford thought to himself, a lunch pail—after more than twenty years, would you recognize yours?

The two of them went downstairs together, and Brian Clark headed straight to the cafeteria as soon as they left the building.