chapter 2
Jiang Tingrou would never know that Wu Man and I were not just from the same hometown.
Over a decade ago, we were classmates at the same elementary school.
Back then, I had nothing to do with the word “stylish”-my hair was cropped into a boyish buzz cut, my complexion was as sallow as if smeared with mud, and I had grown into my teens without ever using a sanitary pad.
Wu Man had it even worse. She was two years older than me, and her father and stepmother wanted to sell her to an old bachelor in the neighboring village. She refused, and was beaten within an inch of her life-her face was so swollen it looked like a pig’s head, her features barely recognizable.
We were rivals, often pulling all-nighters just to beat each other by a point or two on exams. We were the top students in our class.
But it didn’t matter. That year, both of us were called home by our families.
Poor-no money to continue studying.
Originally, my fate was to help my parents with farm work and take care of my younger brother at home. Wu Man’s fate was to be tied up by her father and sent to the old bachelor’s house.
But then we met Yue Yue.
Yue Yue was only eighteen that year, the youngest among the volunteer teachers.
The other volunteer teachers told her, “Just get your volunteer credits and leave. This place is too poor; it’s not something we can save.”
Yue Yue said, “If I can save even one, it’s worth it.”
She came to my house and convinced my parents to let me continue my studies.
Wu Man’s situation was even trickier. Yue Yue called the relevant authorities, contacted journalists to expose the case, using both threats and persuasion.
That eighteen-year-old girl feared nothing. Somehow, in the end, both of us really did go back to school.
Yue Yue taught us math and English.
She taught with all her might; we learned with all our might.
When her volunteer teaching ended, Yue Yue left all the money she had on her, telling us to buy textbooks.
She was actually quite poor herself-rumor had it she relied on scholarships and student loans to get through college.
But she still left us all the savings she had scraped together, saying we needed it more than she did.
On the day she left, she called all of us to the old, dilapidated playground.
On the exposed, worn concrete, under the vast, brilliant starry sky, Yue Yue asked each of us to share our dreams.
Wu Man said she wanted to be the general manager of a big company.
I said I wanted to be a beauty pageant champion.
The youngest crybaby in our class clung to Yue Yue, refusing to let go, smearing snot all over her, and said she wanted to be a fashion designer.
Yue Yue cried too. She stroked the crybaby’s head and said, “You must all remember your dreams.”
She didn’t know that, in fact, we all shared a common dream.
That was to study hard, get into college, and go to the big city to find her.
But that dream would never come true.
Six months after leaving our mountain village, Yue Yue died.
She fell from the Luxury Hotel Owned by the Jiang Family, landing on the hard concrete, blood splattering everywhere.
That day was the birthday of her good friend, Jiang Tingrou.