TBTTSP - Chapter 11
Chapter 11: Zhang Xu Has No Story (4)
If we turned back the clock a hundred years, I'd definitely be on the first list of traitors.
I decided to take Shang Yi up on her offer.
To be a rich woman's daughter.
The day my head teacher announced to the class that I was the first-ever recipient of our school's first scholarship, the room fell silent.
My desk mate sat propped up at her desk like a statue of "The Thinker" for a long time. She didn't say a word to me after class, as if the scholarship would have surely gone to her if it hadn't been mine.
The head teacher was like an MC on stage, trying to hype up the crowd. "Everyone, applaud! Applaud!"
A neat wave of applause followed. Amidst the waving red flags and thundering claps, the head teacher called me up to say a few words.
Having absorbed the principal's style of public speaking, I thought I'd copy him: first, describe the setting; second, thank the sponsors; and third, hope everyone works hard alongside me.
But when I stood on the podium and saw everyone's envious yet deliberately disdainful gazes, my vanity was gratified to an immense degree for the first time.
I was speechless, so I could only say with false modesty, "Thank you to all our teachers for their diligent cultivation."
Beneath that short message Shang Yi had written to Xu Wanqing, I added a line: Thank you.
It was from the bottom of my heart, genuine and sincere.
I simply wanted to express my gratitude for the vain pleasure the scholarship had brought me.
But who would have thought that Xu Wanqing would so quickly learn the convenient method of adding a "+1"?
She wrote "Ditto" below it.
At the time, I couldn't figure out why Xu Wanqing would even want to piggyback on my expression of gratitude. Thinking about it, what did she have to thank Shang Yi for?
It wasn't until I discovered that my house had more books than the county bookstore that I realized: Shang Yi was buying books for Xu Wanqing.
I opened the notebook. I don't know when the two of them became sisters, addressing each other as "Younger Sister Shang." They were so affectionate it made my head spin.
Shang Yi had meticulously compiled book lists and bought them, moving a whole bookstore into our home with a wave of her hand. Xu Wanqing would reply below with a "Received," so cold and unfeeling. The only time she properly expressed thanks was when she piggybacked on my message.
They were both using my body to converse with each other. I hoped no one else would see, or they'd think I was going crazy.
Zhang Xu bought books for Zhang Xu, received thanks from Zhang Xu, and it was all witnessed by Zhang Xu.
It gave me a bit of a headache.
It was my own slow reaction, too. Only now was I starting to feel that three people in one body was a bit crowded. The price of real estate in the underworld can't be more expensive than in Beijing, can it? If this kept up, I'd have to consider collecting rent. I'd make a fortune.
At first, they had both been restrained, trying to live in a way that matched my personality so outsiders wouldn't notice a difference.
But their personalities were becoming more and more prominent. Maybe once they got familiar, they stopped acting like guest souls and were prone to taking things to extremes.
Take Shang Yi, for example. Buying books is one thing, but who buys a whole roomful of books in a single week?
I now sleep amidst piles of books. They say diligence is the path up the mountain of knowledge, but I was just getting squeezed in the middle of it. If I stretched my foot out in the middle of the night, a couple of books would come crashing down on my head, and I'd have to respectfully put them back in their place.
Xu Wanqing, on the other hand, had organized all the books, sorting them into categories and pasting on little labels with traditional characters. I didn't dare touch them, afraid she'd scold me the next day for not cherishing the books.
This woman was also prone to extremes.
That time she entered the poetry competition for me, she gave no thought to what my actual talents were and brazenly won first prize, getting me into the city-level competition.
My head teacher even came over to drink with my uncle. The two of them got drunk, their faces and necks flushed red, and started planning my future for me, debating between Peking University and Tsinghua.
The head teacher said I was brimming with talent and that Peking University's program for gifted youth would definitely want me. My uncle said he'd long seen that I was destined for bigger things, that working in a barbershop was a real waste, and told me to go tutor my cousin in English.
That day, my cousin, under my uncle's orders, came to my house to wait for her tutoring session. But I was on duty that day. Lately, my English teacher had been calling on me so often that I'd been forced to learn that there are 26 letters in the English alphabet. Tutoring my cousin—who'd been first in her grade since the first grade and already had her path to joining the Party planned out—made me realize that this was the day my cover as an impostor would be blown.
Of course, I tried to block her at the door, but she was ready to charge at any moment.
It was like a game of the eagle catching the chicks. I was the mother hen, she was the eagle, and we circled around at the doorway. I was older and couldn't outrun a child, so she slipped past me into the house.
Once inside, she was so shocked by the mountain of books that greeted her that her two nearsighted eyes nearly bulged out like an owl's.
She reached out to pull a book from a stack, and I hurriedly stopped her.
This was no joke. These were organized books. If Xu Wanqing found out, there'd be another lecture full of her classical prose. Of course, I could just not look at the notebook, but Xu Wanqing made me very popular with the language teacher, so I still quite liked her.
Our language teacher praised me—or more accurately, praised Xu Wanqing—saying my writing was stunning, as powerful as a soaring dragon, and made me read Xu Wanqing's essays aloud in front of the whole class.
I didn't even recognize all the characters. I'd quickly wave my hands and say, "Teacher, it's not that well-written, let's just skip it."
"See? Our classmate Zhang Xu is humble and steady. No wonder she can write such fine essays."
So if my cousin dared to touch Xu Wanqing's precious books, I was ready to grab a pot and fight her to the death.
"Are all these your books?"
"Ah, no, they belong to a classmate."
If I said they were mine, my cousin would assume they were hers too, and she'd nibble away at my house like a little mouse until it was empty.
"Whose?"
She wasn't easy to fool.
In a moment of desperation, I thought of a name that could subdue this mouse: "Li Zhaodi."
The mouse sullenly withdrew her hand.
Li Zhaodi was my desk mate, our class monitor, the flag bearer on Children's Day, the Chinese class representative, the squadron leader… and first in the entire sixth grade.
My desk mate was famous at our school. She stored up knowledge like a hardworking squirrel and then unleashed it during exams, stunning everyone. Out of the four primary schools in the county, Li Zhaodi could take first place county-wide. She was our school's golden goose.
Our school was still just a collection of single-story buildings; a two-story building was considered incredibly fancy. The top students from other grades usually ranked outside the top ten in the county. Only Li Zhaodi charged ahead, firmly occupying the number one spot, her name on the lips of every teacher.
My cousin was quite wary of Li Zhaodi, seeing my desk mate as her rival.
For example, my desk mate gave a speech under the national flag once, so my cousin had to fight for the chance to do the same. But students below the third grade weren't allowed to give speeches under the flag, so my cousin lost.
For example, when the school radio station was recruiting student broadcasters, my cousin made sure to sign up before my desk mate could. But when she went to sign up, she discovered that my desk mate was the vice president of the radio station.
My cousin was repeatedly defeated but grew more determined with each failure. Many years later, when she was a senior executive at a foreign company and married, she would still, directly or indirectly, ask me about the whereabouts of the legendary Li Zhaodi. She felt a sense of defeat upon learning that Li Zhaodi had gone abroad and become an important manager at a major international corporation. That courage was already apparent in her childhood.
Having subdued my cousin with my desk mate's name, I then pulled out my phone and started to distract her, luring her into playing games, hoping she'd forget the pains of studying in the joy of gaming.
But the reason my cousin was successful was that her self-control, even from a young age, was admirable. While I could only cling to Shang Yi's coattails and live a life of hedonism, my cousin, amidst my occasional roars while playing games, calmly opened a book and started studying the third-grade curriculum ahead of schedule.
I didn't just use Li Zhaodi's name to suppress her for no reason.
I had noticed that Shang Yi and Xu Wanqing were, intentionally or not, trying to win her over. This led me to believe that my desk mate might know a secret about me that I wasn't aware of.
Their methods of winning her over were like coaxing a child. A person my age would have scoffed at it, but my desk mate was still young, after all, and readily accepted their goodwill.
After some investigation, I found their methods were simple, like always sharing snacks and books with Li Zhaodi.
And also:
Shang Yi acted as a teacher, explaining English grammar to her.
Xu Wanqing played to her strengths, explaining the rules and meter of classical poetry.
But as a kid my age, I had no desire to be friends with such a little kid, so every time I myself sat next to Li Zhaodi, it was very awkward.
I still preferred to chat with the students behind me. We'd laugh and joke, counting the strokes in people's names and pairing up boys and girls with the same number, or drawing tic-tac-toe grids on blank paper.
After class, we'd go pick a type of flower we called cockscomb, though its real name was hollyhock. We'd grab a blossom, tear the petals in two, and stick them on our noses to pretend we were roosters.
It was pretty childish, but I had nothing else to do, and we couldn't bring phones to school.
And it was all because of Shang Yi and Xu Wanqing!
From then on, I had a tail.
After class, my desk mate stopped her diligent studying and just followed me around.
Because she had such a reputation for beating up boys, none of the boys wanted to hang out with me anymore.
Until one day, a few students from Grade 6, Class 1, made plans with some boys from another school to go to a KTV. I was walking in front, and Li Zhaodi was walking behind me.
Someone said, "Zhang Xu, hurry up. Didn't you get the scholarship? You can front the money for now."
I slung my backpack off my shoulder to get my cash.
Inside the heavy bag was only a Xinhua Dictionary.
"Zhang Xu, hurry, hurry!"
My hand felt like it had been swallowed by the backpack; I couldn't pull it out.
Li Zhaodi whispered, "They just want to spend your money. I hid it all. Don't give it to them."
"…"
She made me lose face in front of so many friends.
"I, I don't want to go anymore. I'm going home." I slung my backpack on and started walking back.
Li Zhaodi hurried to follow.
"You're just cheap! You got so much scholarship money and you won't even treat us!"
It wasn't my fault at all! It was my desk mate who did it on purpose!
"Let's go, we don't care about playing with them!" Li Zhaodi tried to pull me into her camp, which earned a round of laughter from the boys.
I felt extremely embarrassed and shook off Li Zhaodi's hand. "What gives you the right to control my money! Why are you so annoying!"
I quickly fled that awkward and contentious place.
Li Zhaodi never spoke to me again, and I guessed she was seriously angry.
This led to Shang Yi leaving me a message:
Zhang Xu!!!
Her usual style of using punctuation to convey emotion.
Even Xu Wanqing chimed in:
Miss Zhang Xu, one must not abandon a true friend in favor of seeking out crude company.
I ignored them.
Although I knew Li Zhaodi meant well, kids from my village just can't say the three words "I am sorry."
And even though she hid my money in my desk, she did it without my permission. Wasn't she getting a little too comfortable acting like my best friend?
And another thing, it was really embarrassing that day.
I actually wanted to apologize a little, but an apology might not have worked anyway. Li Zhaodi was so angry, she definitely wouldn't have forgiven me.
Besides, how much face would I lose if I apologized?
This time, Xu Wanqing's message read:
Miss Zhang Xu, this matter was truly improper. If there is a misunderstanding, remember that "the ocean accepts a hundred rivers; its tolerance makes it great." I hope you will cherish this friendship.
Shang Yi's message:
Zhang Xu, go and apologize!
The two of them, singing in harmony, had formed a united front.
I couldn't afford to offend either of them, so I had no choice but to stuff my most prized snacks into Li Zhaodi's desk with a little note.
She returned it to me, untouched.
What a girl with a temper.
Anyway, I couldn't bring myself to say the words "I am sorry," so I didn't.
This was a friend Shang Yi and Xu Wanqing had made for me, not mine. Why should I hang out with a good student like her?
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