At first William and Sean did not have too much overlap in their life. William was good at sports, but he was admitted to the school as an art specialty student . He disliked studying. In class, besides sleeping, he painted or daydream. Sean was a standard super scholar. He was not articulate and was not good at social intercourse, but he smiled gently to everyone when they met. A goog-looking boy could always win popularity.

Later, they became deskmates coincidently in a re-exchange of seats by the teacher. The first sentence William said to Sean was: "You are so fragrant."

Sean's grandfather kept a courtyard of jasmine, diffusing frangrance all over the house, maybe including his body.

The second day Sean plucked a small pocket of jasmine to William, and then the latter one grinned, rubbing Sean's hair with his big palm: "Thank you."

William was not annoying at all. He obediently slept or painted at class as he knew Sean didn't want to be disturbed, and after class he went to play basketball with a group of boys with full vigor. Many girls in the class had a crush on William, talking about the gossip after class in knots.

William was also afraid of the teacher in charge. Sometimes he went early to copy English homework at morning self-study class. He only asked Sean with a brazen face: "Sean, lend me your homework......Sean...... "

The relationship between they two seemed to be tepid all the time until one day he saw William miss his step in a daze when he went upstairs. The boy tumbled directly and then there was a long gash on his knee. Sean got frightened and went to hold him hurriedly.

William lay prone on Sean's shoulder, enduring the pain and hissing: "You smell fragrant today."

"I just missed my step as my eyes were fixed on you." It was the next sentence, which made Sean go blank at that moment.

They were closer than ever. William took Sean to watch him play basketball. All he people laughed and said that every time as long as Sean was there, William would make a good performance with all his strength as if he took drugs. And also no little girls vied to take clothes or water bottles for William again, because he only allowed Sean to touch his stuff.

Later, one day Sean unexpectedly found that William, who hated reading most, was reading a book of foreign poems. His brow furrowed out of the strenuous reading, which looked silly and cute inexplicably. "Cultivate your literary temperament?" Sean laughed at him.

"You mention this book with the commissary in charge of studies yesterday. He has the ability to read it. Why don't I?" William raised his brow with youthful sharpness in his eyes.

Sean smiled: " This book is not interesting. I don't like it. He likes those less popular books. I like Zheng Jian. "

Early June, the jasmine raised by Sean's grandfather bloomed to the last phase. Knowing William liked flowers, Sean specially took him to have a look. They walked slowly for more than an hour to Sean's grandpa's house, which was suffused with the aroma of jasmine.

William suddenly cuddled him and sniffed at his neck like a big dog. His eyes were brimming over with deep smile: "It's the same aroma. You smell good."

Sean blushed inexplicably.

William began to study hard. He didn't play basketball again after class but painted instead. One day, he was asked by the physics teacher to carry the homework, and the album of paintings blew open by the zephyr beside the window. Sean was the only thing on the album------his face, hisprofile, his smiling and indifferent look and his appearances when he was contemplating or making a joke. The vivid, delicate and gentle brush strokes made Sean's heart pound severely.

In the final examination in the second year of senior high school, Sean ranked first and William came second. Sean was asked out. In the depths of the alley, his hand was grasped and then there was a book in his arms:" I've heard that you like Zheng Jian. I hope you like this book, by the way, like me."

It was in their senior high school days. They were together at the age of seventeen, and it had been fourteen years till this time.

William was thirty-one, and Sean was thirty.