Chapter 15

Old Zhang refused: “They picked Xiaoxia at first sight, so don’t get any ideas.”

I was in the first year of high school, my brother was in the fourth.

Mom gave me a hundred yuan a month for living expenses, and five hundred to my brother.

She said, “Mom can’t give you any more. Go cry poverty to someone kind, maybe she’ll give you a bit more. And save where you can.”

“Your brother’s school meals are expensive, and it’s a crucial time for him. He needs good nutrition.”

No need to explain, Mom.

I’ve long been used to your favoritism, and I don’t expect you to treat me and my brother fairly.

For someone as ordinary as me, high school is really hard.

No. 2 Middle School is full of students who were eliminated from No. 1 Middle School.

Most are city kids.

Their families are pretty well-off, and their parents aren’t willing to let them enter society too early, hoping they’ll spend a few more years in high school.

Whether they end up in Third Tier or a vocational college, at least they’ll get a diploma.

They spend money freely.

But I am extremely strict with myself.

Every cent is saved by Shasha scrimping and saving, so I don’t dare waste any.

If my socks tear, I mend them and wear them again.

If my underwear gets loose, I sew it tighter and make do.

I use a sanitary pad until it’s absolutely full before changing it.

In the cafeteria, I always get the cheapest bean sprouts.

All this is fine.

The hardest part is winter, when washed clothes won’t dry.

Every dormitory floor has a washing machine, but it costs one yuan per use.

I can’t bear to spend it.

Have you ever worn clothes dried in the shade?

They have a heavy musty smell that never goes away.

Back then, it snowed a lot in winter, and the nights when the snow melted were especially cold.

The thick quilt at home was taken by my brother, and Mom only gave me an old six-jin cotton quilt.

I slept in my sweater, and put my coat over the quilt, but when I woke up in the morning, my feet were still cold.

I know I’m not smart enough.

So I can only be the early bird.

I got up half an hour earlier than my roommates, and after lights out at night, I studied a bit more by the bathroom light.

But winter was too cold.

I inevitably caught a cold.

I coughed so much the sky seemed to spin.

I couldn’t bear to spend money on medicine.

Later, the dorm leader Xiaoan couldn’t stand it: “I have some leftover cold medicine, take some.”

“You cough like this at night, it keeps us awake too.”

At that time, I couldn’t care about bacterial or viral infections, cold or chill, or matching the medicine to the symptoms-if there was medicine, I took it.

Maybe because I’d rarely taken medicine growing up, it worked well. Three days later, my cough was much better.

Xiaoan was top of our grade, and only ended up at No. 2 Middle School because she had a fever and messed up her high school entrance exam.

After that, we became much closer.

I often asked her about study problems.

Unlike Shasha’s natural talent, Xiaoan’s grades were the result of both intelligence and hard work.

So she could always pinpoint where my thinking got stuck and help me work through it.

Finding the right method and teaching to the student’s ability is really important.

With Xiaoan’s constant guidance, I gradually unraveled the mysteries of studying.

From ranking eighty-fifth in the entrance exam, by the end of the first year I was thirty-fifth in the grade.

For me, that was already a good result.

I had agreed with Shasha to chat online for an hour at four o’clock on the fourth Saturday of every month.

After I kept mentioning Xiaoan, Shasha suddenly stopped talking.

I got nervous: [What’s wrong?]