Summer, 2032.
Night had fallen.
Yang Mingyu sat alone in his spacious study, a faint wisp of steam still rising from the purple clay teapot on his desk, untouched.
The walls were adorned with various certificates of honor and awards. "National Super Teacher," "Lifetime Achievement in Education Award," "Peaches and Plums All Over the World"… Each award was polished to a gleaming shine, reflecting the light from the crystal chandelier above, making them exceptionally dazzling.
Just a few hours earlier, the city had held a grand retirement banquet for him. Leaders from the education sector, as well as his proud former students who were now pillars of society, each took to the stage to give speeches, their words filled with respect and praise.
"Teacher Yang is a monument in the field of education!"
"Without Teacher Yang, I wouldn't be where I am today!"
"Teacher Yang has spent his life embodying the meaning of 'teacher'!"
The accolades still echoed in his ears, but Yang Mingyu's heart felt hollow, continually sinking.
He ignored the congratulatory messages constantly popping up on his phone and had no mood to savor the glory of the banquet. His fingertips traced a yellowed, frayed photograph.
It was a group photo of his first class, Grade One, Class 14.
In the photo, over fifty young boys and girls crowded in front of the camera, some smiling carefree, others feigning seriousness, some with an undeniable hint of rebellion and confusion in their eyes. In the very center of the photo stood a similarly young version of himself, wearing a faded shirt, his face showing an unconcealed awkwardness and the glow of idealism.
These very children became the eternal pain in his heart throughout his thirty years of teaching.
It was over ten years ago when these “failures” held a class reunion for him.
The venue was a roadside food stall, with greasy tables, a noisy environment, and uncomfortable plastic stools. These students, now in their thirties, looked much older than their peers.
The class monitor, Li Lei, the once reserved boy who secretly read martial arts novels in class, was now a cashier in a small company, arguing over a few invoices daily. With a beer belly, he smiled broadly as he arranged things: “Come, come, Teacher, please take the main seat! Classmates, don’t just stand there, pour Teacher Yang some wine!”
The rich second-generation heir, Wang Hao, who was the most arrogant in class back then, always boasting that his dad’s company was going public. Now, he was just a construction foreman, his face flushed from drinking, slurring as he bragged to Yang Mingyu: “Teacher… I’m telling you, I’m in charge of… over twenty people now! Last month… I even took on a project for a residential area, earned… earned this much!”
He held up five greasy fingers, waving them in front of Yang Mingyu.
Yang Mingyu just smiled and nodded, but his heart ached. He remembered clearly that Wang Hao’s father indeed had a good factory back then, but in 2003, due to a wrong investment, the capital chain broke, and he went bankrupt overnight. If only someone could have given him a hint then…
“Where’s Zhao Min? Why didn’t she come?” Yang Mingyu looked around, not seeing the stubborn and reclusive girl from his memory.
“Oh, she’s busy,” a female classmate pouted, her tone a mix of jealousy and sympathy, “She’s a nurse at a community hospital. I heard she just worked a long night shift and was too tired to come. It’s true, raising a child alone and paying a mortgage isn’t easy.”
Yang Mingyu’s heart felt as if something had squeezed it.
A nurse?
The Zhao Min in his memory was calm, decisive, and had extremely strong practical skills, a promising candidate for a surgeon. But he had given up on her too early then, never getting the chance to discover this talent. He knew that Zhao Min later dropped out of school early due to family changes and suffered countless hardships.
“What about Lin Tian? The… the kid who loved playing games the most,” Yang Mingyu asked again.
At the mention of that name, the atmosphere at the table instantly cooled.
Li Lei sighed and lowered his voice, saying, “Teacher, please don’t mention him. I heard a few years ago he worked as an internet café manager, then got addicted to online gambling, accumulated a huge debt, and no one knows where he ran off to. It’s a pity, his mind was so good back then…”
“Good my ass!” Wang Hao chugged his wine and shouted, “He was just an internet addict! A good-for-nothing! If it weren’t for him back then, our class… our class wouldn’t have been like that, would it?”
Yang Mingyu’s lips moved, but he couldn’t say anything.
No, that’s not it.
Lin Tian was not a good-for-nothing; he was a computer genius. In that era, everyone thought he was wasting his life playing games, but only he, from the future, knew that behind that obsession was a self-taught mastery of code and logic. He should have been a formidable IT expert, someone who, like “Riwawa,” with his superb skills, a harmonious family, and a fulfilling life, would leave his name in the history of China’s internet!
But what did he do back then?
He confiscated his game console, called his parents, and criticized him in front of the whole class as “hopeless.” Repeated suppression, repeated disappointment, and eventually, he completely gave up on him, and in turn, Lin Tian completely gave up on himself.
After several rounds of drinks and dishes, the conversation gradually shifted from work and family to their high school life. The alcohol numbed their nerves and opened their floodgates, and some long-buried resentments began to surface.
“Honestly, our class was too miserable back then; the whole school called us ‘the slag concentration camp.’”
“Exactly, even the teachers looked down on us. I remember the dean, whenever he saw someone from our class, he’d look at us with disdain.”
“Whose fault is that? We ourselves weren’t trying hard enough.”
Yang Mingyu listened silently, drinking beer glass after glass, the bitterness in his heart a thousand times stronger than the taste of the alcohol.
Yes, not trying hard enough.
But why weren't they trying hard enough?
They were just at the age when they needed guidance the most, and they met a most confused version of himself, and a most powerless teacher.
At that time, Yang Mingyu had just graduated from university, full of passion, but he was assigned to the worst class in the entire school. He tried, he struggled, but facing the students' ironclad chaos and apathy, all his teaching methods seemed pale and ineffective. The students' indifference, colleagues' mockery, and leaders' "advice" were like mountains, ultimately crushing his pathetic idealism.
So, he gave up.
He stopped disciplining, stopped paying attention, leaving after class every day, treating Grade 14 as a "term" he had to get through. He poured all his energy into the later advanced experimental classes.
He succeeded. He guided generation after generation of outstanding graduates, his students were everywhere, he was laden with honors, and became known as a "master teacher."
But only he himself knew that in his dreams at midnight, he would always return to that summer of 2002, to that chaotic classroom, seeing those young faces, some rebellious, some insecure, some apathetic.
They were the sole and most glaring stain on his brilliant resume.
“Teacher… Teacher…”
A slurred voice interrupted Yang Mingyu’s thoughts.
He looked up and saw the athlete, Zhang Wei, swaying as he walked over with a wine glass. Back then, Zhang Wei was tall and strong, the star player of the school basketball team. But now, he was stooped, his eyes sunken, the marks of years of manual labor deeply etched on his face and hands.
“Teacher, I… I’d like to toast you,” Zhang Wei hiccuped, his eyes red.
Yang Mingyu quickly stood up: “Zhang Wei, you’ve had too much, sit down.”
“I haven’t had too much… Teacher, I just… I just feel so choked up inside…” Zhang Wei’s voice was tearful, “My life, it’s just like this. I injured my knee playing ball when I was young and had no money for treatment, then I couldn’t do anything else, so I could only go to construction sites to carry cement… Haha, no education, so I can only sell my strength, right…”
He tilted his head back and guzzled a large mouthful of wine; it ran down the corners of his mouth, mixing with tears, a picture of utter disarray.
The surrounding classmates fell silent, the atmosphere terribly oppressive.
Zhang Wei stared intently at Yang Mingyu, his cloudy eyes filled with regret, unwillingness, and a hint of resentment buried for twenty years.
Suddenly, he grinned, a mix of crying and laughing, and said word by word:
“Teacher, back then… if you hadn’t given up on us… would we… would we not be like this now?”
“Buzz—”
Something exploded in Yang Mingyu’s head.
This sentence, like a sharp knife, mercilessly plunged into the softest and most guilt-ridden part of his heart, then twisted violently.
Yes, if back then, I hadn't given up…
If I had been a little more patient to understand the talent behind Lin Tian's game addiction…
If I had been a little more caring to discover the family burden beneath Zhao Min's rebellious label…
If I had had a little more method to guide Zhang Wei to combine his athletic talent with sports science…
If…
The cruelest thing in the world is that there is no 'if.'
Yang Mingyu could no longer remember how that class reunion ended on such a sour note. He only remembered Zhang Wei’s words, echoing like a curse in his ears.
In the study, he tremblingly brought the class photo closer to his eyes.
He looked at himself in the photo, how ridiculous! A failure who couldn't even save his first batch of students, yet he became a "master teacher" in others' mouths.
How ironic!
A violent pain erupted from his chest, like an invisible hand, gripping his heart tightly.
Breathing became difficult, and the scene before him began to spin and blur.
He tried to reach for the quick-acting heart medicine on the table, but his arm felt heavy as lead, unable to lift.
His body slid softly from the chair, the cold floor against his cheek.
“Ding-dong—”
His phone rang again, a new congratulatory text message popping up on the screen, from one of his most accomplished students, now an associate dean at a prestigious university.
“Teacher Yang, congratulations on your glorious retirement! You are a role model in all our hearts!”
Role model…
The corners of Yang Mingyu’s mouth twisted into an incredibly desolate smile.
The group photo in his hand slipped to the floor. His gaze swept over the vibrant young faces in the picture one last time.
Lin Tian, Zhao Min, Chen Jing, Wang Hao, Zhang Wei…
One tender face after another, one sigh of fate after another.
Endless regret, like a tide, completely engulfed him.
In the last moment before his consciousness faded, his lips moved silently, using the last ounce of his strength, he murmured to the youths in the photo, forever frozen at sixteen:
“If… I could do it again…”
Then, everything plunged into complete darkness.