BSS - Chapter 5
Chapter 5
Deng Chuan was stunned.
Xu Wei didn't smile often. In over a month, what she had seen most were her polite, faint smiles—either for courteous but distant social interactions or to reassure her students. They were always just enough, very thoughtful and considerate, yet also distant and calm. But now, when someone like her who rarely smiled did, it was truly worthy of a breathtaking glance and a lasting memory.
Xu Wei smiled at her, and only then did Deng Chuan notice her eyes were a beautiful phoenix shape, the corners tilting up slightly. When they made eye contact, it created an illusion of deep affection and radiance.
Xu Wei said, "Student Deng Chuan. Let's make a pact. You tell me, and I promise I won't tell anyone else."
A trick for coaxing children.
Deng Chuan thought, yet was somehow convinced, her mental defenses crumbling so quickly it was as if she had been waiting for Xu Wei to give her this way out. "Alright, then it's a deal. This is our secret." She quickly added, "That includes what I said earlier."
Xu Wei couldn't help but smile again. "Okay." She paused, as if feeling her reply wasn't sincere enough, and added with a serious expression, "No problem."
She glanced into the classroom and saw that some people were already looking their way. She pulled her hand back from the railing and said in a relaxed tone, "Let's go to the office to talk."
Deng Chuan stayed in the office until the evening self-study session ended, returning once in the middle to grab her monthly math exam paper. Jiang Meng saw that her expression was calm and showed no signs of anything unusual. She asked tentatively, "Why did Teacher Xu want to see you?"
Deng Chuan said, "Oh, she just wanted to ask me about something."
Jiang Meng packed her things and picked up her schoolbag. "Are you leaving?"
Deng Chuan sat down in her seat, turned slightly, and looked up at her, pen in hand. "I have to wait a bit. I'm going to finish correcting my test paper before I leave."
Jiang Meng looked like she wanted to say more, but Deng Chuan had already lowered her head, taking out her error correction notebook and scratch paper.
"I'm leaving then."
Deng Chuan replied casually, "Okay. Bye."
This was how they usually interacted. A moment ago, after crying, Jiang Meng had become very calm. She had only asked Deng Chuan to act as if today's events had never happened and not to avoid her intentionally. They would continue to be good classmates, good friends.
She had said, "Deng Chuan, I truly cherish the time I spend with you. Things are good right now. You don't need to respond to me, and don't avoid me. I liked you with all my heart during the best years of my life. I don't regret it."
She had also said, "You have to remember me."
Deng Chuan had agreed. In that instant, she looked into Jiang Meng's gentle, watery eyes, which were filled with both the pain and fulfillment born from love. Belatedly, she felt a numbness in her heart. For the first time, she experienced such a subtle shift in emotion—a mix of being touched, melancholic, and sentimental.
She suddenly regretted her earlier coldness. If she could have said things more gracefully, would this girl have been less sad?
The people around her left in twos and threes. Deng Chuan methodically finished the last calculation. She tidied her desk, checked the classroom's windows and doors, turned off the power switch, and then locked the door and left.
She had stayed late, and the academic building was nearly empty. Some of the vacant classrooms along the way still had their lights on. The staircase was silent. Just as Deng Chuan was about to head down, she suddenly heard the rhythmic sound of high heels from the hallway. To think someone else was here as late as she was.
The sound grew closer. Xu Wei saw her coming and raised an eyebrow. "Why so late?"
She asked with familiarity, and Deng Chuan also felt a bit closer to her. Her voice held a smile. "Hello, Teacher."
Xu Wei responded softly, and then the two fell silent, walking downstairs one after the other.
The moon was very bright tonight. Its light cast the shadows of trees and flowers onto the ground, and the only sound was the quiet chirping of insects. The noise from the student dorms seemed to come from a distance. Xu Wei walked a few steps behind Deng Chuan, occasionally stepping on her long, slender shadow. In this moment, the spatial quietness stretched time out, and in the silence, it felt as if a barrier had been quietly broken.
The teachers' dormitory and the student dormitory were two buildings side by side, separated by a small fountain. Deng Chuan reached the base of her dorm building, hesitating over whether to say goodbye to Xu Wei behind her. But Xu Wei seemed to see her hesitation. She stood still with her hands in her trench coat pockets, her expression calm, and took the initiative to speak. "Hurry back and get some sleep. Good night, Deng Chuan."
Deng Chuan's hesitant heart immediately settled. She couldn't help but smile at Xu Wei. "Good night, Teacher Xu."
When Xu Wei returned to her dorm, Qin Shu was sitting at her desk writing something. She walked over and glanced casually, discovering that the woman was actually still writing lesson plans.
Qin Shu heard her come in and said without looking up, "Sister Wei, you're back late today."
Qin Shu was Xu Wei's classmate in both high school and university. For graduate school, Xu Wei was accepted into their alma mater's program, while Qin Shu went to another university. Unexpectedly, after graduation, by a stroke of luck, the two became colleagues and roommates.
As Xu Wei hung up her coat, she replied casually, "Some students had a small conflict. I was just getting an understanding of the situation."
Qin Shu let out a "Ha." "Even the kids with good grades have conflicts? How bad was it?"
"One of them wants to apply for a dorm change."
Qin Shu was a chemistry teacher and didn't understand the intricacies of class management. "So what will you do?"
"It's nothing. I'll talk to each of them separately tomorrow."
"Ah, Teacher Xu, ever the strategist."
Xu Wei broke into a smile, very similar to the one she had shown Deng Chuan outside the classroom. Qin Shu saw it and teased her, "Don't tell me you got your intel from that student you had a heart-to-heart with in the office tonight? Teacher Xu, how do you recruit your informants?"
Xu Wei sat down to remove her makeup. She focused intently, as if she hadn't heard Qin Shu's question, and said nothing.
"Sister Wei? Come on, tell me. I want to have a good relationship with my students too. Don't ignore me."
Seeing Xu Wei ignore her, Qin Shu only became more persistent. "Weiwei? Teacher Xu? Xu Wei-Xu Wei-"
Xu Wei sighed and said, "This month's lesson plans are due the day after tomorrow, aren't they?"
Qin Shu let out a miserable cry. "Don't say it out loud!"
The next day, Xu Wei spoke with He Ying and Bei Qingqing separately. The matter wasn't actually that complicated. Bei Qingqing was facing a problem similar to Deng Chuan's, only this time, the two girls had developed feelings for each other, and the one causing trouble was an ex-boyfriend. Once the teacher laid everything out in the open, and considering that changing dorms was indeed difficult, the two girls were awkward for a while but gradually made up. As long as it didn't affect their well-being or grades, Xu Wei always trusted that students were capable of handling their own emotional problems.
After all, most kids these days matured early, just like Deng Chuan. Thinking of Deng Chuan seriously making a pact with her to keep each other's secrets, Xu Wei couldn't help but smile again.
A small storm had thus dissolved into nothing.
That afternoon, just after the lunch break, Xu Wei remembered she had a class and hurried from her dorm toward the academic building.
The weather was beautiful. The sky was cloudless, a pure, deep blue. The ginkgo trees along the school path had shed their leaves, covering the ground like a layer of golden snow. A gentle breeze blew, and the butterfly-shaped leaves rustled, rising in a light wave. Xu Wei couldn't help but stop to take a picture.
After taking the photo, she put her phone away and saw Deng Chuan walking side by side with a girl of about the same height. In the distance, they stopped by a trash can on the side of the path, their heads tilted as they discussed something. Suddenly, the two seemed to reach some kind of agreement-Xu Wei smiled self-deprecatingly; that term didn't seem quite accurate. In any case, they finished their discussion and came to a consensus. The short-haired girl sprinted straight in Xu Wei's direction. Xu Wei was startled, then watched as she flew past her like the wind and plunged into the student dormitory.
She blinked, not quite processing what had happened. In the distance, Deng Chuan had already crouched down.
Xu Wei couldn't suppress her curiosity and slowly walked over to Deng Chuan. "Deng Chuan. What are you..." doing crouching here? Before she could finish, she spotted two small, orange figures peeking out from the flower bushes by the trash can.
They were two very small orange kittens.
Deng Chuan looked up, saw it was her, and stood up, greeting her with, "Teacher Xu."
Seeing that Xu Wei had already noticed the kittens, she didn't explain further. The two of them stood together by the path, staring at the two little orange kittens with a mixture of affection and wonder. The scene fell quiet for a moment, with only the rustling of leaves in the gentle breeze. Unconsciously, a very soft emotion stirred in both their hearts.
After a short while, Su Mian finally finished her sprint and hurried over, panting. She handed a can of food to Deng Chuan, and once she caught her breath, she greeted Xu Wei. "Teacher Xu."
Xu Wei hummed in acknowledgment and watched curiously as Deng Chuan skillfully opened the tin can, a fishy smell wafting out.
She placed the can on the ground and carefully pushed it toward the two little ones.
The kittens huddled together fearfully and backed away. But unable to resist the aroma from the can, they poked their heads out to sniff. After repeating this a few times to confirm it was safe, they finally both buried their heads in the can and ate heartily.
Deng Chuan crouched and watched for a while, then stood up. She took the tissue Su Mian handed her to wipe her hands and said, "Let's not watch them eat. Let's go." Then she said goodbye to Xu Wei. "Goodbye, Teacher Xu."
Xu Wei didn't say goodbye. She was going the same way. As they walked toward the academic building together, with Xu Wei present, Su Mian couldn't really talk to Deng Chuan. The three of them walked in silence for a bit before Xu Wei spoke up. "How did you have cat food? Did you buy it yourselves?"
Su Mian said, "We bought it online."
Xu Wei said, "Oh." Su Mian added, "We usually carry some with us, but we happened to have just run out today and hadn't restocked."
Xu Wei was curious again. "You usually carry cat food with you?"
Su Mian said, "There are a lot of stray cats at our school. When we ran into them before, we didn't have anything to give them. Getting food from the cafeteria isn't convenient either. So we bought cat food online."
Xu Wei glanced at Deng Chuan, who hadn't said a word the entire time. She was gazing at a fluttering leaf on a ginkgo branch, her eyes bright. Sensing Xu Wei's gaze, she turned her head, the corners of her mouth still holding the faint traces of a smile.
Their eyes met, and both paused for a moment, saying nothing. Xu Wei was the first to look away, picking up on Su Mian's thread. "I haven't really seen many stray cats. But sometimes I hear them meowing at night."
"They're usually by the trash cans. There are some near the cafeteria too," Deng Chuan said.
She was no longer looking at the ginkgo leaf on the branch, just gazing calmly ahead.
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