Chapter 5

Lin Wu cared too much about appearances to admit that the idiot was his cousin.

Ever since my marks had begun beating his by a wide margin, he had been even less pleasant when he saw me.

My aunt naturally refused to come.

Erya arrived at the staffroom in a rush on her bicycle.

Ms. Qin looked at me in disbelief. “This is your guardian?”

Erya nodded. “I’m her sixth aunt.”

I nodded too.

Shen Juan and her mother weren’t so easily fooled. “Don’t listen to them, Ms. Qin! That little girl’s her younger cousin!”

“Look what that wretched Lin Huisheng did! Our Juan’s getting engaged to Mr. Sun’s Heng next year. Now there’s this huge bruise on her face. How’s she supposed to show herself in public?”

“Compensation! Medical bills, extra nourishment, and whatever you call damages for emotional distress! Her family has to pay!”

Erya saw the cut on my back and flared up.

“Have you no shame? Your daughter cuts my cousin open, and you come here blaming her?”

“If anyone’s paying, it’s you!”

Shen Juan’s mother was famously aggressive. She would argue even when she had no case. She was about to begin a performance of tears, tantrums, and threats of suicide.

Erya said coolly, “If Mr. Sun hears how you’ve bullied his favorite pupil, do you think he’ll still let his son get engaged to your daughter?”

Shen Juan’s mother spat. “If Mr. Sun thinks anything of that idiot, pigs can climb trees!”

Before she had finished, Mr. Sun appeared in the doorway.

Erya winked at me. She had recruited him on her way here.

He cleared his throat. “Mrs. Shen, Huisheng is indeed the pupil I value most.”

“Both girls are hurt. My suggestion is that they apologize to each other and leave it there.”

Shen Juan’s mother feared Mr. Sun’s authority and was eager to be close to his family. She would agree to anything.

She said yes again and again.

But Mr. Sun went on. “Now their business is settled, we should settle ours.”

“When did we ever agree to an engagement between Sun Heng and Juan?”

“What age are we living in? We don’t arrange marriages like that anymore. Besides, they’re still at school. They can’t distract themselves with teenage romances. Don’t mention this again!”

Shen Juan froze, then covered her face and ran out crying.

As Erya cycled me home, she was enormously pleased with herself. “Wasn’t I clever? Bringing Mr. Sun to your rescue! Remember to repay me!”

Afraid Shen Juan hadn’t given up, she began taking me to and from school every day.

Whenever she saw Shen Juan, she made pointed remarks.

“Oh, isn’t this the girl whose crush’s father told her off? So desperate to get married—why bother with school?”

“I hear there’s a girl in Class Three who slashes people’s clothes out of jealousy. How vicious! Who’d dare be in the same class as her?”

Mr. Sun’s public criticism had already left Shen Juan ashamed and angry. She had lost all interest in her studies.

Her marks kept falling until she was almost at the bottom.

With Erya provoking her every day as well, she soon left school and went home to marry.

I was unaffected. It felt like watching a rather poor play.

I kept reading and solving problems, even asking Mr. Sun to find two advanced mathematics textbooks for my amusement.

Days passed, and before long two-thirds of high school was behind me.

Tuition and school fees were cheap then, but in the seventh year, the half of the money I had taken finally began to run short.

I went back to my parents’ house and searched all day. All I found was a silver bracelet of poor quality.

Since they hadn’t taken it with them, I thought it might not even be silver.

It was badly tarnished, almost black.

I stood in the busy market in town for a long time. Nobody even stopped to ask the price.

As the sky darkened, my hopes faded too.

Just as I was about to leave, a delicately featured middle-aged woman caught my arm.

She looked at the bracelet’s old-fashioned pattern and suddenly burst into tears, too choked up to speak.

Then, as if frantic, she searched her handbag and every pocket. All she found were a few chocolates.

In desperation she pulled a green jade bangle off her wrist and pushed it into my pocket.

As though remembering something, she told me to wait there. She would be right back.

Before I could grasp what was happening, she stumbled away at a run. In a moment she was gone.

I waited until it was completely dark. Everything around me looked frighteningly unfamiliar. Only then did I feel my way home through the night.