BSS - Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Deng Chuan's expression didn't change. She answered, "Okay."
She stood up straight, looked around, and dragged a chair over from the corner, moving it next to Xu Wei to sit down.
Xu Wei had already organized the key concepts into major categories. Once Deng Chuan was seated, she began to explain them to her one by one in detail.
Her voice was cool and clear, yet unhurried and methodical. It was laced with the captivating logic unique to mathematics as she calmly unraveled each topic. Sets, complex numbers, vectors, functions, linear programming—she explained the complex concepts and problem types with eloquence, moving from the simple to the profound.
Xu Wei was from the south. Her Mandarin had almost no accent, but at the end of a sentence, her final tone would soften slightly, like a little hook.
Deng Chuan listened with intense focus, but she couldn't help but spare a bit of her attention to secretly watch her. The top button of her shirt was undone, revealing a hint of her delicate collarbone. Her skin was like snow after a spring sky clears. The slender fingers holding the pen glided across the paper, making notes to aid understanding. When she finished with one side, she flipped the paper over, her knuckles bending with a different kind of charm.
After turning the page, Xu Wei didn't continue right away. She paused for a moment, giving them both a little time to breathe. She turned her head to see how Deng Chuan was following along, a hint of a smile in her eyes.
It was clear that Xu Wei truly enjoyed the act of teaching. Watching her, Deng Chuan felt a shared sense of the satisfaction radiating from her and suddenly realized that Xu Wei genuinely loved being a teacher.
Memories in her mind grew clearer bit by bit. Xu Wei was a good lecturer, and she was also extremely patient during after-class tutoring. Her students held her in high regard. She had an air of distance about her, yet she wasn't hard to approach. Deng Chuan remembered how Xu Wei was almost always the last to leave every evening. They had walked down the dark hallways together, Xu Wei's unhurried footsteps echoing behind her. Under the dim yellow streetlights, her voice was as gentle as the night. And there was that Saturday night, the window she had closed, the bag of fruit she had handed over.
The beauty of seeing flowers in a fog or grasping for the moon in the water lies in their haziness. Once the fantasies mortals project onto beautiful things become clear, they inevitably fall into banality. But Xu Wei was different. The closer Deng Chuan got, the more vivid that vague notion in her heart became.
Deng Chuan loved photography and prided herself on having an eye for discovering the beauty of rosy clouds and rainbows. But at this very moment, looking at Xu Wei's face so close to her, she thought that all she needed was a pair of eyes that could appreciate rosy clouds and rainbows, just to appreciate Xu Wei.
Deng Chuan was so lost in thought that she didn't snap out of it until Xu Wei asked softly, "Shall we continue?"
She quickly came back to her senses and nodded hastily.
"Okay."
Time flies when one is focused. Just as Xu Wei finished explaining the last key concept to Deng Chuan, saying, "Let's stop here for now. We haven't covered the other topics yet," the bell for the end of class rang.
They glanced at each other and shared a smile. The atmosphere was just right. Deng Chuan, feeling content, returned the chair to its original spot and said goodbye to Xu Wei.
Just then, a math teacher from the science track walked in and called out to Xu Wei in a somewhat flippant tone, "Teacher Xu, you're on evening study hall duty again today."
His voice was loud, shattering the quiet of the office.
Deng Chuan recognized him, thanks to his signature "Mediterranean" hairstyle and Su Mian's usual complaints about him. She'd said he was greasy, favored boys over girls, looked down on girls who studied science, was still single at his age, and liked to say inappropriate things to female students.
The Mediterranean man saw Deng Chuan standing still and raised his voice in surprise, "You there, student, is there something else you need? If not, hurry back to your classroom. I have something to discuss with your Teacher Xu."
Xu Wei frowned. The expression was fleeting; if Deng Chuan hadn't been intently watching her face, she would have missed it. She set her pen down on the desk and asked, "What can I do for you?"
"Teacher Xu, my mother came back from a trip and brought some oranges. They're very sweet. Would you like to try one?" Seeing Xu Wei speak, the Mediterranean man paid no mind to Deng Chuan, perhaps thinking it was fine to have a student present. He spoke with eager attentiveness.
Xu Wei glanced at her computer, closed it, and said coolly, "No, thank you. You should keep them for yourself."
The Mediterranean man smiled shamelessly. "Come on, don't be such a stranger, right?" he said, making a gesture to hand them to her.
"Just take them. Teacher Xu, you won't even accept this little thing from me?"
"Really, there's no need. Please take them back."
Xu Wei finished speaking in a firm but not harsh tone, without even offering a smile. She stood up, grabbed a stack of papers from her desk and her jacket from the back of her chair, and said to Deng Chuan, "Let's go."
Then she added to the Mediterranean man, "Class is about to start. You should go back."
Seeing Deng Chuan hadn't moved, Xu Wei gave her a gentle push.
People were coming and going in the hallway, the jostling shoulders separating the two of them, one behind the other. Xu Wei didn't speak, and Deng Chuan was also silent. Gazing at Xu Wei's back, she couldn't help but glance back. The Mediterranean man was standing in the same spot in the empty office. The middle-aged man, with his potbelly, actually looked a bit desolate.
Deng Chuan didn't need to think to know that the Mediterranean man liked Xu Wei, and Xu Wei didn't like him. It was the first time she had seen this side of Xu Wei—unsparing and cold as she drew a clear line with him. She couldn't stop herself from thinking about her own situation. If an adult could be rejected so cruelly, what about her, a student? If Xu Wei ever discovered her feelings, would she treat her the same way she treated the Mediterranean man?
There were so many things separating them. Time, status, life experience—each was an insurmountable chasm. Deng Chuan's world was confined to a small three-foot desk, but Xu Wei was different. She had seen a wider sky, encountered more people and things. The depth and quality of their lives were fundamentally different.
Deng Chuan didn't need to think to know this, either. There was no way Xu Wei could ever like her.
Deng Chuan had to stop her scattering thoughts. Thinking any further would only lead to one conclusion: there was no possibility between them.
She intuitively understood the only way to handle these feelings at this stage: restraint and self-control. She had to wait. Wait until she was an adult, wait until she was no longer her student, wait until she could truly stand before her. Good food is worth the wait. Good wine needs no bush. She would hide her feelings, brew them into wine, and quietly wait for the day she could unseal the jar.
She had no experience; it was the first time she had ever liked someone. But she was about to learn the second feeling that comes with liking a person: endurance.
In that moment, a sense of responsibility overcame the desire to confess, and a deeper yearning overshadowed youthful impulse. It was as if Deng Chuan had grown up a little more. She gazed at Xu Wei's slender shoulders, so close they seemed within reach, yet as distant as the horizon.
Deng Chuan thought, since her life and Xu Wei's could no longer be in sync, she couldn't be her planet. So, she would just have to try harder and be her moon, shining alongside her.
Right now, the most important thing was the Gaokao.
The two returned to the classroom together. Deng Chuan sat down at her desk and saw that the exam papers for every subject had already been handed out. The slips of paper recording individual rankings had also been distributed.
She had done well this time, ranking second in her grade. The score of the person in first place was very close to hers, only three points higher. Everyone around her said it was a narrow defeat and a pity. She didn't think much of it, though. All exams before the Gaokao were just to test a student's grasp of the material; rankings were only a secondary reference.
Her desk was piled messily with papers. Wu Fuwu asked to borrow her math paper to make corrections. On his desk was a small countdown: "x days until the Gaokao." Deng Chuan saw it when she turned her head. An unexpected sense of nervous anticipation washed over her.
The exam papers were tidied up, sorted by subject, and stacked neatly. Her desktop was cleared, leaving only the few sheets of paper Xu Wei had written on. Deng Chuan stared at them, seriously considering for a moment whether she should laminate and treasure them. She looked at them again and again, but in the end, she chose to slip them into her notebook so she could see them every day.
Meanwhile, Xu Wei, standing at the lectern, inadvertently saw Deng Chuan's actions. She raised an eyebrow. She couldn't make out what it was about, but she felt Deng Chuan's movements were very solemn, which was in line with her usual earnestness.
The kid seems to be in a very good state, Xu Wei thought as she sat down at the lectern.
She couldn't stay seated at the lectern for long. Soon, a student came to her with an exam paper for analysis. The first one broke the ice, and many others were eager to follow. To avoid disturbing the evening study hall, Xu Wei stood up and gestured for the students who came to her to follow her outside.
Xu Wei remained standing outside.
In the intervals between tackling her papers and notes, Deng Chuan pretended to glance outside casually.
Xu Wei was wearing high heels of a suitable yet attractive height, and long pants that revealed half of her pale ankle. Perhaps tired from standing, she leaned slightly against the railing, holding up a paper and speaking to a student in a relaxed manner. In the brief gap between one student leaving and the next arriving, she tilted her head back and took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling slightly. From time to time, she would glance into the classroom.
She saw off another student. The next one was already standing up. Xu Wei straightened her posture and adjusted her collar.
The night deepened. The evening wind blew fiercely.
Xu Wei was only wearing a thin jacket over her shirt. The chill seeped into her bones. Her fingertips were turning pale from the cold, but the office was far, and it would be a hassle for the students to go back and forth. She felt the temperature was still bearable, so she remained standing there until the end of the evening study hall.
Back in the office, she drank a large cup of hot water as a remedy. But the walk back to her dorm was even colder. She walked quickly, but she still caught a chill. While showering, she started to feel shivers. Before falling asleep, a faint headache began to set in.
Qin Shu pressed the back of her hand against Xu Wei's forehead and said she didn't have a fever.
Clinging to a sliver of hope, Xu Wei added another blanket, thinking that perhaps she would be fine by morning.
Things did not go as she wished.
The next day, Xu Wei felt very unwell when she woke up.
Dizzy, weak, with a dry, itchy throat. She forced herself to get up and wash, and the sound of her voice when she spoke startled Qin Shu.
She managed to eat some breakfast and swallowed some cold medicine before heading to the classroom to teach.
Fortunately, the lesson plan for the day was to go over the monthly exam paper, which was relatively easy. She had little energy and pushed through the class, her voice growing hoarse by the end.
She had just sat down in the office when a student came looking for her. It was a student from the other class Xu Wei was in charge of. The girl had brought a question from an extracurricular exercise book. Xu Wei indicated that it was difficult for her to speak and wrote the solution on a piece of paper for her.
The girl studied it for a while, then circled a key step and asked Xu Wei how she had arrived at that line of reasoning and why that step was deduced in that way. Xu Wei silently wrote her explanation on the paper.
In the end, the girl took the paper filled with writing and said her goodbyes, admitting she still didn't quite understand but would study it more at home so as not to bother the teacher any further. She added with concern, "Teacher, you should drink more water."
Xu Wei cleared her throat and replied, "Thank you."
Her voice was already so hoarse it was just a whisper.
Deng Chuan walked toward them from the doorway, stepping aside to let the girl pass.
Xu Wei, pressing a hand to her groggy forehead, looked up at her and asked, "What is it?"
Her voice was very faint.
Deng Chuan didn't say anything, simply placing a bag she was holding on Xu Wei's desk.
Xu Wei took a closer look. She saw it was the antiviral oral liquid and cold remedy granules she had given Deng Chuan last time. In addition, there was a box of herbal lozenges.
For a moment, she was speechless, not knowing what to say. Her throat hurt even more. Deng Chuan also remained silent. The atmosphere in front of the desk froze.
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