Chapter 58: Becoming Her
Ruan Xi lingered on the sofa for twenty minutes. When she left, she looked back every three steps, leaving a lingering fragrance in her wake.
Tong Yao stared fixedly at the sofa, which could be considered the scene of the crime. The residual warmth remained, and she could almost still hear the soft whispers from a few minutes ago. She gently clenched her hand into a fist, recalling the interlude of the evening, which ultimately turned into a sigh.
She was not unaware of the feelings hidden in that spoiled act.
Although it was just a little, she had caught its tail. She could have pulled it out, but she didn’t know how to face it after pulling it out, so she let go, allowing this little one to wander around her.
As a teacher, she was not unaware of the most correct solution—to make it clear, to state frankly that there would be no result between them, and to tell the child to focus on her studies—but a voice in her heart stopped her, saying, that… was not good.
She would regret it.
Tong Yao sat on the sofa, covered her face, and sighed again.
Let’s just wait and see what happens.
**
The school had an unwritten rule: “You can bring your phone, but you can’t be found out.” Ruan Xi had stopped handing in her phone since last week. At first, she was terrified that Labor Reform would notice, but as the class’s grades steadily improved, Li Hanqiang had apparently started to turn a blind eye to some minor infractions. As long as it didn’t cross his bottom line, such as playing in the classroom, everything was OK.
“These are my rules. If you’re not satisfied, you can say so now, and we can modify them. But if you make a mistake later and then tell me that my rules are no good, sorry, I don’t accept that.”
The above was a famous quote from Labor Reform.
Ruan Xi didn’t use her phone for playing, but to be ready to check for news about the newcomer manga competition at any time.
But unexpectedly, before the news of the manga competition arrived, she received a call from her younger brother.
It was noon on a Wednesday.
She hadn’t eaten lunch after school in the morning. As soon as she turned on her phone, it started to ring—the other party had probably called at the perfect time. The screen showed her amusing contact name—Ototo.
She had originally answered the phone in a happy mood.
“Sis.”
The voice on the other end was a little hoarse.
Ruan Xi was taken aback. Her brother, who always liked to act cool, rarely used such a weak voice. She found a shady tree, her brows slightly furrowed.
“What’s wrong?”
“Can you come to my school?”
Ruan Xiaobei said in a low voice.
“What’s wrong with you? What happened?”
“I… might be punished.” The boy’s voice carried a self-deprecating tone of bravado. “I asked the teacher if they could not tell Mom first. She’s so far away, she can’t make it. They asked if you could come.”
“…Me?”
“I lied to them and said you’re an adult.”
“You!”
“Sis… I’m begging you.”
Ruan Xi was both angry and amused. She had a bellyful of harsh words she wanted to scold him with, but thinking that she was indeed the only one he could turn to for help, she quickly calmed down. The siblings had a pretty good relationship since they were little. Her brother, who had always prided himself on being a man, had put down his dignity and humbly begged her. Her heart felt an indescribable tightness.
She decided to skip lunch. There were still more than two hours until afternoon classes, which should be enough. She went straight to her dorm, planning to change into some adult-like clothes. As she walked, she asked, “What did you do to get punished?”
“…Went online. Climbed the wall at night.”
“Once?”
“I got caught this time. They’re checking the surveillance.”
The boy’s voice was bitter.
“You’re something else,” Ruan Xi said softly. “The living expenses Mom gave you, she wanted you to eat better, and you used it to go online, to top up your games, right? Are you even human? She’ll be heartbroken if she knows.”
Everyone has a reverse scale that cannot be touched.
For example, her mother to Ruan Xi.
If her mother knew that the child she was so proud of had been deceiving her all along, had given up on herself and was living in a daze, and had to humbly ask for leave and then travel a thousand miles to accept this fact, how sad would she be?
She just wanted to go over and slap that self-deprecating Ruan Xiaobei awake.
“Sis, it’s not like that…”
“We’ll talk when I get there. I’ll be there soon.”
She hung up the phone and rummaged through her dorm for suitable clothes. In her pursuit of maturity, she ended up with a mismatched outfit, but she couldn’t be bothered.
Boarding students were not allowed to leave the school.
But Ruan Xi was an exception.
She showed the ID card Teacher Tong had given her. The guard thought she was running an errand for a teacher and let her out.
At noon, there was no Student Council checking for school uniforms at the school gate, so she passed through without any obstruction.
The young girl felt guilty in her heart. Teacher Tong had given her this ID card out of trust, but she was using it for such an opportunistic purpose.
Several tens of minutes passed, and the bus took her to her brother’s middle school.
She had been here a few times and was familiar with the way. The sound of reading came from the third-year school building, but at this moment, it was unsettling.
Standing at the door of the Student Affairs Office, she knocked and pushed the door open.
In the middle of the room was a small coffee table. On either side were sofas. On one side sat a teacher with a serious expression, and on the other was her brother, Ruan Xiaobei, with his head down.
She calmed herself and said to the teacher, “Hello.”
The teacher nodded.
“Hello, are you Ruan Xiaobei’s sister? May I ask if you are working now?”
“I’m a university student.”
She had lied.
She sat next to her brother. Ruan Xiaobei buried his head even lower, not daring to look at her.
“Since everyone is here, let’s begin.” The teacher drank some water and put the cup on the coffee table. “Here’s what happened. Ruan Xiaobei, when he was climbing the wall at night, was caught by the security guard and confessed to the fact that he went to an internet cafe all night. We looked at the recent surveillance and found that he climbs the wall very frequently, basically two to three days a week. There are also people in his dorm who cover for him. For such students, the school has always been strict with punishment. We have decided to give him a punishment of being on probation.”
Ruan Xi’s expression froze. She had been caught by Director Zhang when she went to an internet cafe on a weekend in her first year of high school to register for a manga competition. At that time, she had received a public criticism, which was not a big deal. But she knew the meaning of the four words “on probation.” Any further, and it would be “transferring to another learning environment,” commonly known as expulsion.
“Teacher… isn’t this too harsh?” she bit her lip. “He’s in his third year of middle school now, and his promotion is very crucial. Can you give him another chance?”
The teacher said lightly, “I’ve already given him a chance.”
“What chance?”
Ruan Xi was dazed, looked at Ruan Xiaobei, and Ruan Xiaobei turned his face away, saying nothing.
“He won’t say it, fine, I’ll say it.” The teacher sneered. “There are no unlicensed internet cafes around our school. You have to swipe your ID card. The high school department is in the next building. He must have borrowed an ID card from one of those third-year high school students. I asked him, but he won’t say. A few of the people who often climb the wall with him ran away and couldn’t be recognized in the surveillance. I asked him, but he won’t say either.”
Most of the surveillance in the school was unreliable, with low resolution, and people couldn’t be recognized at night.
The room fell into a brief silence.
Ruan Xi looked at Ruan Xiaobei and slowly said, “If he told… what would the punishment become?”
The teacher said, “As long as his attitude is good, he’ll get a demerit, and this matter will be over.”
Meritorious service to atone for a crime.
As long as he reported his accomplices, he would be dealt with leniently.
Ruan Xi knew very well that this was a difficult decision, but for the sake of her mother, for the sake of this family… she clenched her fists and said in a low voice, “Xiaobei…”
“I won’t say it.” Ruan Xiaobei looked up, his eyes bloodshot. “I won’t betray others.”
He was as if taking an oath, so firm that he didn’t seem like a third-year middle school child.
The teacher wasn’t surprised either. This conversation had happened many times. He stared at the boy in front of him and continued to ask, “Who climbed the wall with you?”
“I don’t know them.”
“Whose ID card was it?”
“I found it.”
“Where did you find it, and where is it now?”
“I forgot.”
The teacher smiled and threw up his hands.
“You see, there’s nothing more to say.”
Not all right answers are the ones that should be chosen.
Ruan Xi looked at the teacher in front of her and suddenly realized this.
The world is never as gentle as you imagine. It will sometimes force you to make cruel choices, and then throw you into regret or failure. Reality is not a frog being boiled in warm water; reality is the water suddenly boiling, and then someone puts the lid on.
“Teacher,” she said, “I think that education should not make children report and betray their friends.”
Ruan Xiaobei’s eyes widened, looking at his sister in disbelief.
“Friends? You call them friends? They’re a pack of jackals, colluding in evil!” the teacher sneered.
Ruan Xi was very calm and continued, “If his friends were here and could be like Xiaobei, I think that would be a reliable friend.”
If going to an internet cafe was a bad kid, then bad kids also have bad kids’ friends. Bad company is also company. Friendship is not something that only exists between so-called good people; it is a bond that is formed after people have experienced things together.
“Hilarious. What if his friends murder and set fires? He won’t report them either!” The teacher was a little angry.
Ruan Xi blinked. It was the first time she had debated with a teacher like this. She said softly, “This world is not black and white. Many things cannot be generalized. I believe in Xiaobei. In the face of major rights and wrongs, he will make the right choice.”
The teacher looked at her and didn’t answer for a long time.
**
Ruan Xiaobei’s final punishment was a one-month suspension.
Inevitably, her mother still had to be told.
Ruan Xiaobei took Ruan Xi to the station. While waiting for the bus, he said, “Sis, you’ve really changed a lot.”
The sister in his memory was weak, like a newborn kitten, without claws, without sharp teeth, pure and harmless. Now the kitten had grown up, but it was a leopard, stronger than all of them, surprising everyone around.
“Have I?” Ruan Xi said.
“You talk just like our Chinese teacher,” Ruan Xiaobei said, his hands behind his head.
Ruan Xi didn’t answer him, slowly turned around, and said, “What are you planning to do next?”
The atmosphere cooled down. Ruan Xiaobei kicked a can and said vaguely, “…I want to get into computers.”
“What did you say?” Ruan Xi glared at him, as if she was going to eat him.
“Wait, sis, I mean, I want to build a computer!” Ruan Xiaobei looked like he was afraid of being beaten. “I’m in the information competition at school, and everyone else has their own laptop…”
“Are you trying to say you went to the internet cafe to study?”
“Uh, actually… after finishing the competition’s study tasks, I would also play games for a while.”
Ruan Xiaobei said honestly.
Ruan Xi was silent and said, “The family doesn’t have money to buy you a computer.”
“Sis, I’ve saved some money myself.”
“How much?”
“…Five hundred.”
“You can’t build a computer with five hundred, can you?” Ruan Xi looked at the time and said.
“My classmates have a lot of spare parts. There are a lot of rich people at school. I got them from them,” Ruan Xiaobei laughed self-deprecatingly. “I have a CPU, memory, graphics card, and motherboard. I want to build a desktop, and I wanted to ask you…”
“Four hundred,” Ruan Xi took out her wallet and looked up. “This is all I can give you.”
The young girl’s heart was bleeding. This was originally the money she had prepared to treat Teacher Tong to a meal, but when she heard that her brother had begged for parts from others, she felt a little sad and still took it out.
In the future, when he enters society, computer skills are indispensable.
She would just consider it an investment.
“Sis, where did you get so much money?” Ruan Xiaobei was shocked. Most of his money was earned by selling snacks in the dorm. The dorm was full of rich gluttons, and people would buy even if the price was doubled. He hadn’t expected his frugal sister to have so much money.
“I’m being kept.”
The bus came. Ruan Xi jumped on, threw out this sentence, and her face couldn’t help but turn red.
She pretended not to hear Ruan Xiaobei’s anxious calls from outside the window.
She was right on time for her return to school. She ran quickly towards the school, but froze at the school gate.
Director Zhang was standing at the gate, scrutinizing every student who came in.
**
Author’s Note
PS: I know someone who built a computer that can play Assassin’s Creed for over three hundred yuan… the kind with a shoebox as a case.
In middle school, my friends and I were caught by a teacher for ordering takeout (the school didn’t allow it), and then the teacher interrogated us one by one to find out whose phone was used to order (we weren’t allowed to bring phones). No one knew who snitched, but everyone didn’t betray their friends, and in the end, we all had to call our parents.
