You are my sunshine, my only sunshine.

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Previously on Back in Time/Cong Cong Na Nian… ep 2 recap

Anna’s Recap

If you still had any doubts that this is high school that we’re dealing with here, this episode definitely confirmed it. From the quintessential teenage rebellion to the mean girls gossiping, we got it all. There’s something so charming about seeing all our characters stress out over such silly things like who has a crush on whom. Then again, if you can’t obsess over these trivial things in high school, then when can you? Gotta love those carefree days.

After Fang Hui fainted at the school’s promotion ceremony, Chen Xun and Qiao Ran rush her over to the nurse’s office. Turns out that she was just feeling light-headed because she didn’t eat breakfast. Phew. Qiao Ran goes to find her some food while Chen Xun stays behind. Alone in the nurse’s office, he “lectures” her for not speaking up when she wasn’t feeling well, but she tells him that she thought it was no big deal. He tells her that she doesn’t need to be so polite around him and asks if she knows why he’s so worried about her. Just as Chen Xun is about to put the moves on Fang Hui, Qiao Ran comes back into the room. Just in time! (#TeamQiaoRan) He senses the awkwardness in the room and asks what’s up with them, and Chen Xun lies that he just finished telling a scary story to Fang Hui. Is he comparing his semi love confession to a scary story?

While Fang Hui and her classmate (the mean girl from before) are sorting through the class mail, they see that most of the letters are written to Chen Xun. Probably love notes…such a teen move. And right on cue, Chen Xun walks by and the mean girl calls out to him. He glances over at Fang Hui, causing her to immediately look away. Take a hint, buddy! The mean girl waits until he’s gone to ask Fang Hui if she likes Chen Xun, and she strongly denies it. She asks her if she wasn’t touched when he took her to the nurse’s office, and Fang Hui says that he was just being a good classmate. Mean girl says that if she doesn’t like Chen Xun, then she must like Qiao Ran! Fang Hui has an even stronger reaction to this and tells mean girl to stop being crazy, and then runs away. Uh oh, things aren’t looking good for my boy.

In the classroom, Chen Xun slips a note into Fang Hui’s pencil case and tells her to read it when she’s home. What did I just say! Teens and their love notes. Fang Hui defies his instructions and reads it by the bike stand. Chen Xun wrote that he likes her and if she feels the same way, then to leave him a note in his homework notebook tomorrow. While she’s reading the note, Qiao Ran comes up to get his bike. He asks her if she’s feeling better from before, but she just gets all flustered.

On their way home together, Qiao Ran whistles using a blade of grass, and Fang Hui is like so impressed. He reveals that he was tricking her with the grass, and he’s just doing some plain ol’ whistling. She asks him where he learned to do that, and he says Chen Xun taught him. Seizing the opportunity to get some info on Chen Xun, Fang Hui asks Qiao Ran how they met and became friends, especially since they have such different personalities. He tells her not to be tricked by Chen Xun’s playful attitude because he’s actually a really mature and responsible person when he needs to be. Dude, are you seriously talking up your love rival right now?!

The next day, Fang Hui looks at the homework notebooks, contemplating if she should leave a note in Chen Xun’s to let him know that she likes him too. She ultimately decides against it, and Chen Xun is majorly bummed out to not get a response back from her. When he sees her out on the schoolyard, Fang Hui purposely avoids him and walks in the opposite direction. Can’t be clearer than that, right? Chen Xun then overhears some of the girls in their class talking about who likes who (high school!), and they say that Fang Hui and Qiao Ran are mad tight. Hmmm. They see Chen Xun and ask him if he knows what’s Qiao Ran’s deal with Fang Hui. This only further pisses off an already annoyed Chen Xun, and he tells the girls that they watch too much TV.

Jia Mo makes a little trip over to the gym to watch her beloved Su Kai play basketball. He tells her that she should come by more often to watch them play and invites her to come out to eat with the team. She obviously says, and probably mentally marking this day as the best day ever. At the cafe, some guy bumps into Zhao Ye, spilling water all over him. They start arguing, and things are looking like they’re about to get real around here. Before the fists start flying, Su Kai tells Zhao Ye to leave with Jia Mo and that he can handle this by himself.

By the time Zhao Ye and the rest of the basketball team return to the cafe to back up Su Kai, they find him sitting there with his face all beaten up, and the other dudes gone. Su Kai tells them not to cause any more trouble and not to talk about what happened today. He specifically warns Zhao Ye that those dudes probably aren’t done messing with him, so he should probably avoid walking down small roads for the next few days. What a good guy!

After awkwardly running into one other at the bike stand the next day, Qiao Ran, Fang Hui, and Chen Xun walk into class together. The rest of the class immediately starts laughing, so you know that something’s up. When they look over at the chalkboard at the front of the class, they see that someone had written, “Fang Hui likes Chen Xun” (high school!)  in huge letters. Fang Hui gets super upset and is flashing back to the days when she was teased by her classmates about some boy. Qiao Ran quickly erases the chalkboard, but the class just continues laughing. Fang Hui turns, ready to bolt, but Chen Xun subtly holds her back and tells her to just go sit down at her desk.

When the Three Amigos are out in the schoolyard playing basketball, Zhao Ye asks the other two guys who they think wrote the words on the chalkboard. He theorizes that Fang Hui must have wrote it herself because she likes Chen Xun, but didn’t want to admit to it. Qiao Ran jumps in to say that there’s absolutely no way that Fang Hui could have written it. Zhao Ye asks if he’s so sure because he’s got something going on with her. Qiao Ran tells him that they’re just regular friends. C’mon Qiao Ran, c’mon. Chen Xun certainly isn’t buying it based on that jealous look he’s got on his face.

At the end of the day when they’re cleaning up the classroom, mean girl purposely pairs up Chen Xun and Fang Hui to work together. Jia Mo tries to tell her to grow up already, but mean girl just won’t shut the hell up. She keeps going on and on about Chen Xun and Fang Hui until finally Chen Xun grabs Fang Hui’s hand, takes her out of the classroom and onto the school’s rooftop.

Chen Xun asks Fang Hui why the sun is the sun. Before she can even answer, he says that the sun is the sun because it doesn’t care about what other people think about it. Who exactly is out there talking smack about the sun? Fang Hui says that she’s not the sun, but Chen Xun tells her that if she thinks she is, then she is. He says that in his eyes, she is the sun. THIS GUY. I don’t know if I should laugh or swoon over half the cheesy stuff he says. He teaches her how to yell off the rooftop as loud as she can, and vent all her frustrations that way.

While he’s watching some good ol’ Huan Zhu Ge Ge with his family, Chen Xun sneaks the telephone into his room. Haha, so 1999. Fang Hui also happens to be watching HZGG while eating dinner with her mom when Chen Xun calls her. He pretends to be calling to ask about homework when Fang Hui’s mom answers the phone. He tells Fang Hui that if their classmates still won’t leave her alone, then he’s gunna write, “Chen Xun likes Fang Hui” on the chalkboard. She tells him not to, but he says that he’s not scared one bit since he really does like her. Not wasting time, he asks her if she likes him. When Fang Hui doesn’t respond, he tells her to either say “yes” or “no” on the phone. After a couple agonizing moments of silence, Fang Hui just straight-up hangs up when her mom tells her get off the phone. Way to leave a brother hanging!

During basketball practice, Zhao Ye is going around saying that if Su Kai didn’t make him leave the cafe the other day, he definitely could have beaten up all of those guys in the fight. Sure. Jia Mo swings by the gym to look for Su Kai, and Zhao Ye snatches away the thermos that she’s holding. The guys play catch with it until Zhao Ye drops it, spilling the food in it. Su Kai comes out of the locker room to see the mess on the floor. Super embarrassed, Jia Mo grabs her thermos back and runs out of there.

Later when Zhao Ye comes by to apologize to Jia Mo about the thermos incident, she just ignores him. When Zhao Ye finally gives up on apologizing, Fang Hui asks her if they had fought. Jia Mo tells her that Zhao Ye can be really annoying sometimes. Yes, but in a lovable goofy way right? Fang Hui tells her that she shouldn’t get too upset by him because boys are inherently more immature than girls. Ha! Jia Mo tells her that even if that’s the case, Zhao Ye is still the most immature out of them all.

When Zhao Ye comes to school the next day, everyone’s in a total shock because…his hair is dyed red! Fulfilling the promise he made when he lost the basketball game to Jia Mo, Zhao Ye is now sporting some bright red locks. Before they can even compliment him on his hair, the teacher punishes him by making him stand outside in the schoolyard. It starts raining while he’s standing there and all the dye starts running down his face. Jia Mo comes outside and holds an umbrella over him, while they both laugh at how ridiculous he looks right now. Aww.

Haven’t given up on winning over Fang Hui, Chen Xun asks her at the bike stand if she has a response for his question yet. She continues to respond to his questions with silence, so he ends up locking her bike. He tells her that she can’t leave until she gives him an answer, one way or another. He also tells her to come watch him play basketball, but she says that there will be too many people. Chen Xun promises her that he’ll make sure that she can see him. Laugh or swoon? Laugh.

Qiao Ran asks Fang Hui how her mood has been lately. I’m assuming he’s referring to the chalkboard message drama. She tells him that she’s fine now and doesn’t care about what other people are saying. While they’re walking, she suddenly stops when she sees the flowers growing on the side of the road. Fang Hui tells Qiao Ran that she heard that if you can find a flower with five petals, it’ll bring you happiness. They both start looking through the flowers, and Qiao Ran finds one with five petals for her. He presents it to her and wishes that she’ll be the happiest person in the world. Heart melt! Fang Hui also finds one for him and wishes him happiness as well. Heart melt again!

Chen Xun later asks Fang Hui if she watched him play basketball. She tells him nope. Before he can pout about it, Jia Mo comes running into the classroom to tell Chen Xun that the dudes from the cafe fight are outside right now. Fang Hui tries to stop him from going to fight the guys, but he does anyways.

The dudes got Zhao Ye cornered in an alley, but Su Kai, Chen Xun, and Qiao Ran, along with all the other boys in their class, storm in chase them away. That fight ended before it even started. Jia Mo and Fang Hui run over to find them, but they see that Chen Xun isn’t there. Fang Hui frantically asks where Chen Xun is, and then runs off to find him.

When Fang Hui finds Chen Xun, he asks her what she’s doing there. He wants to know if she really hates him that much. If she does, all she needs to do is say it aloud, so that he can get some closure. Fang Hui tells him that she doesn’t hate him; she hates people who fight.

Chen Xun asks her again if the answer to his question is yes or no. After some hesitation, Fang Hui says yes. He pretends that he didn’t hear her correctly, so she says “yes” again, but loudly this time. He then makes her ask him if his answer is yes or no, and obviously it’s yes! They stand in the middle of the street yelling, “YES!” at each other. How awkward would it be if someone walked by at that moment?

Later, Fang Hui is watching Chen Xun play basketball, like he had wanted. Her voiceover says that during that time, the phrase, “I like you,” was so difficult to say aloud. Even if you knew for sure what your feelings were, you still needed to find ways to confirm it. They took so many unnecessary detours back then. But that phrase, “I like you,” meant so much than the overrated, “I love you,” because it represented a more real and innocent feeling.

Extra Credit:

Qiao Ran told Fang Hui the story of how his dad got really sick this one time at home when he was just 10 years old, and he didn’t know what to do because his mom wasn’t home. It was Chen Xun who found an adult to make the emergency call for him.

Chen Xun hung up Fang Hui’s drawing for him on his ceiling above his bed so he can look at it when he’s lying down. Laugh or swoon? Swoon…I think.

Zhao Ye gets caught cheating on a test at school. Of course.

Fang Hui and Jia Mo take a personality quiz where the color umbrella you pick represents the type of guy you like. Jia Mo picks blue, which represents intelligence. Fang Hui asks her if that’s accurate, and she’s all, “OMG, that’s like so accurate!” Su Kai, anyone?

Zhao Ye tries to hide his red hair from his parents, but of course they find out anyways. His dad literally chases him down the street with a yardstick. Not just a ruler, a yardstick.