With no classes from Yu Bei that day, Chen Qingning returned to her dorm after work and pulled out an iPad she hadn't touched in ages, diving into focused study.
When Qu Xiao came back from dinner, she found her roommate following along with a sign language video, mimicking the gestures with real effort.
She was burning the midnight oil, and Qu Xiao was shocked: "You're learning sign language?"
Chen Qingning paused the video, picked up her tall straw cup, and took a sip: "Yeah, Yu Bei gave me homework."
Qu Xiao set down her bag, went to the balcony to wash her hands, and called out: "What homework?"
Chen Qingning hugged her knees: "Twenty-five common signs."
Hearing this, Qu Xiao dried her hands, walked back to her desk, pulled open the bottom drawer, and fished out an A4-sized book, holding it up enthusiastically: "I have a beginner's sign language textbook—want it?"
"No—" Chen Qingning's refusal rang through the room.
Qu Xiao froze: "Why?"
Chen Qingning massaged her temples: "Just looking at books gives me a headache."
Qu Xiao had a sudden realization, then lowered her head to fiddle with her phone. She screenshotted something and sent it to her: "This is an online national sign language dictionary—it has real-person video demonstrations. You can search for anything you want to learn."
Chen Qingning closed her eyes: "No."
Qu Xiao was puzzled: "Then you're just using Xiaohongshu?"
Chen Qingning nodded: "Yeah, I found two videos—one teaches ten signs, the other fifteen. Together, that's exactly enough."
Qu Xiao sat down and tossed a crumpled paper ball into the trash bin: "If you're only learning twenty-five, it won't get you very far."
Chen Qingning: "That's enough. That's the limit of my effort—I won't do a single bit more."
Qu Xiao understood: "Fair enough."
Chen Qingning shot her an "OK" hand gesture and went back to mimicking the handsome male sign language blogger on her screen.
Seeing how focused she was, Qu Xiao smiled softly, left her seat to shower, and came back rubbing her hair dry. The girl who'd been glued to her screen half an hour ago had now closed her tablet, sitting up straight with her phone's front camera on, recording her sign language practice.
Qu Xiao suddenly felt she'd misjudged Chen Qingning, and her teacher's praise reflex kicked in: "You're so dedicated—you even review after learning."
Chen Qingning turned to her: "Huh?"
Qu Xiao: "I mean, aren't you recording a video?"
Chen Qingning craned her neck: "Yeah—don't talk—" She suddenly yelped: "I have to re-record again!"
Qu Xiao opened her mouth: "Sorry for interrupting."
Chen Qingning sighed: "It's fine, I had to redo it anyway—I yawned in the last take."
Qu Xiao couldn't help but laugh: "Then I'll wait to blow-dry my hair."
Chen Qingning said: "No, go ahead—it adds a sense of real life. My roommate's getting ready while I'm burning the midnight oil."
Qu Xiao asked: "Are you posting it on social media?"
Chen Qingning leaned back in her chair, her long hair cascading down like a torrent of gold-black silk satin: "No, I'm sending it to Yu Bei, asking him one by one—'Is this right, Teacher Yu~'"
Those last five words came out in a voice that unconsciously thinned to a whisper, barely a breath.
Qu Xiao was silent for a moment, then made a "go ahead" gesture and stopped bothering her.
At midnight, Chen Qingning's videos had received no feedback or guidance—not even a hint of "typing…" on the other end.
Yu Bei, are you dead—? Chen Qingning cursed inwardly while typing out a concerned message: "Brother Yu, did I do something wrong?"
Pathetic.
Chen Qingning critiqued herself—how could she be this pathetic? And yet, it felt so good.
In the past, she'd always stood on the backs of those foot-washing servants. Now, squatting down this low, she actually felt a strange electric tingle shooting straight through the top of her skull.
The night was thick as a swamp. Qu Xiao slept like a log. Chen Qingning put on her earbuds, scrolled through Douyin, and waited for Yu Bei's reply.
One of her mutual-follow foot-washing servants sent her a private message.
Nio: Heard you went to help with rural revitalization?
Chen Qingning squinted and glared: Scram.
Nio: So fierce?
Chen Qingning: Who told you? Shen Can?
Nio: Yeah. Your IP's in Anhui too, right?
Nio: Still awake?
Chen Qingning: Waiting to curse you out.
Nio, as sharp-tongued as ever, afraid of nothing but a flat life, burrowed around like an earthworm: Then aren't I just delivering myself to your door?
Chen Qingning tossed him a bomb emoji.
Amid the smoke, he warmly invited her: Wanna play Goose Goose Duck? I'll get Chi Zi on.
Chen Qingning frowned: Chi Zi? Who's that?
Nio: Chi Zhiyu. You even asked me for his WeChat before.
Life's passersby came and went in droves, and Chen Qingning couldn't be bothered to look back: Forgot. I can't talk right now.
Nio: Someone's with you?
Chen Qingning made it up on the spot: Yeah, and she's got huge boobs.
Nio: Alright, I won't disturb you then. Enjoy your drink.
Chen Qingning didn't say goodbye, switching back to WeChat.
Yu Bei, whom she'd pinned to the top of her chat list, remained silent as the grave. She casually changed his note to: 【Pure as Ice, Silent as Stone】, and went to sleep satisfied.
The next morning, when she ran into Yu Bei at the morning meeting, Chen Qingning grabbed the fabric of his sleeve at the elbow, stopping him from entering the classroom, and whispered accusingly: "Why did you ignore my messages? Do you have any basic human decency?"
Yu Bei brushed her fingers away: "I told you yesterday—learn the twenty-five common signs first, then I'll teach you."
Chen Qingning said: "I did learn them. Check your WeChat—there are exactly twenty-five videos."
Yu Bei: "A spot check isn't a punch card."
Chen Qingning: "I just want to know if what I'm learning is right."
Yu Bei said, "You take an exam and ask the examiner if you're right at the same time?"
Chen Qingning said with conviction: "I would. When I took the IELTS speaking test, I asked."
Yu Bei: "What did you get for speaking in the end?"
Chen Qingning: "No comment."
A laughingstock. Yu Bei said nothing, turning his attention to the class. The students were watching them like a flock of geese, craning their necks, thoroughly entertained.
Yu Bei stopped bickering with Chen Qingning out in the open. He had changed into a different jacket today. Last night, when he returned to the dorm to prepare his lesson materials, he'd unexpectedly noticed a few keyboard keys glinting faintly. After a moment's thought, he remembered it was the glitter from Chen Qingning's hair. He then checked the collar of the fleece jacket draped over the back of his chair—sure enough, the inside was sparkling, like scales left behind by a poisonous butterfly.
He had scrubbed it with laundry detergent for a long time.
The collar was clean, but a little glitter still clung to his fingertips, impossible to remove completely.
Just like the barrage of videos that kept coming one after another, the small window showing the girl's radiant smile. Yu Bei clicked one open—the radiance turned slick. Some lilies secrete a kind of mucus when their stamens bloom.
That was the feeling of watching Chen Qingning's videos.
Hard to imagine that someone who yawned through a ten-minute morning meeting could have her mind take a detour during morning exercises, belatedly drifting over to his side.
"'You take an exam and ask the examiner if you're right at the same time?'—ask the examiner if you're right…" Chen Qingning kept repeating his words: "You watched my videos?"
Yu Bei didn't deny it: "I watched them."
Her voice rose a notch: "All of them?"
Yu Bei said, "I watched the first one."
Chen Qingning pouted: "Then why didn't you reply to me?"
Yu Bei answered: "Busy. Didn't want to chat."
Chen Qingning shot back: "Liar."
Yu Bei didn't respond to that inaccurate assessment.
"You watched them," Chen Qingning kept emphasizing that fact, her spirits soaring: "You watched, you watched, you watched."
Different modal particles were chewed up and delivered with remarkable skill by her—closer to the meaning than the meaning itself, surpassing the meaning.
Yu Bei's brow furrowed slightly: "So?"
Chen Qingning smiled mysteriously, tilting her head to appraise his new jacket: "Why aren't you wearing yesterday's fleece?"
"Washed it."
"Because it smelled too good." She was smug, drawing her own conclusion without permission.
Yu Bei walked over to correct two boys who were zoning out, using sign language to warn them to focus on the exercises and not sneak in a chat.
One of them, a boy named Xu Yi, glanced at Chen Qingning and signed back to him: "You're chatting with Teacher Chen too."
Yu Bei shot him a glare.
Xu Yi fell silent and followed the rhythm of his classmates' movements.
One takes on the color of what one touches. Yu Bei felt it was necessary to rein Chen Qingning in—she'd only been here three days, and the students had already rapidly picked up bad habits. That wasn't an influence he welcomed.
When the exercises ended, the special education classes were led back to their classrooms by their teachers, while the hearing-impaired class scattered like birds.
Just as he was about to call out to Chen Qingning, who was fleeing the playground like she was escaping a disaster because of the cold, a student suddenly squeezed past his arm and called out to her.
It was Ge Lingxi.
The girl usually wore a ponytail, but today her hair was down. If it weren't for the familiar sky-blue padded jacket, Yu Bei might not have recognized her.
Just like what he'd seen from upstairs yesterday, Chen Qingning once again took out her phone and handed it to Ge Lingxi, trying to lower the difficulty of conversation.
Yu Bei walked along with the crowd, watching the two from a distance without effort.
Suddenly, Chen Qingning turned her upper body sideways, pointing one finger at Ge Lingxi while raising her other hand's thumb.
Then, the hand pointing at the girl made a loose pinching motion, stroking down from her left thumb.
She slowly, clumsily signed "you're so cute."
Her cheekbone puffed up from the side, showing she was smiling especially brightly.
Ge Lingxi froze for a moment, then broke into a radiant smile, signing back to Chen Qingning: "Teacher is cute too. When you smile, you're like the sun."
Chen Qingning muddled through another morning, seizing every opportunity in between to ask Yu Bei when he'd spot-check her progress.
Her exam-prep motivation had never been higher.
But the man's replies were indifferent, with a hint of deliberate delay: "When I'm free."
Bored to the point of desperation, Chen Qingning could only harass another unlucky victim: Xiao'er, what's for lunch at the cafeteria today?
Qu Xiao was rarely idle: No idea.
Chen Qingning: ?
Qu Xiao forwarded a link: The school's official account has a weekly menu.
Chen Qingning tapped in and skimmed it: Isn't this for students?
Qu Xiao: Teachers eat what the students eat.
Chen Qingning furtively glanced at Yu Bei, who was typing away on his laptop, then opened her pinned WeChat chat and forwarded the menu link to him.
A ding sound dropped onto the quiet desktop.
Yu Bei slid his mouse, lifting his eyes from behind the electronic screen.
Chen Qingning pointed at herself, circled her index finger beside her temple, then lowered it, sweeping it across her body with her left hand.
Then she pointed at Yu Bei, adding her middle finger, making a motion of feeding something to her mouth.
—I want to treat you to a meal.
How many fish had slipped through the net in those other twenty-four sign language videos?
Yu Bei thought, expressionless.
His gaze returned to the screen, and his laptop chimed again with a notification. He clicked on the green bubble icon flashing in the bottom right corner.
Teacher Chen: Baihe County Special Education School, Week 3 of this semester, portioned menu.
Teacher Chen: Spot check, by the way.
Yu Bei had intended to simply turn it off, but realizing Chen Qingning was right in front of him, he knew that a cold shoulder might invite even more antics. So he replied: Eating is eating, teaching is teaching.
Teacher Chen excelled at raising the banner of revolt, but she was equally skilled at sliding down the pole: Then let's just eat without teaching.
Yu Bei fell silent.
There was no escaping misfortune; the fastest way to resolve a problem was to face it head-on. He closed his laptop. "Let's do it right now."
The suddenness caught Chen Qingning off guard—her eyes went wide, and she craned her neck up.
Yu Bei pushed the laptop aside. "I'll quiz you right now."
Seizing the chance to be cheeky, Chen Qingning said, "Teacher Yu, so impatient? Can't wait a single second?"
"I can wait." Yu Bei made a move as if to pull the computer back toward him.
"Don't—" Chen Qingning called out in a fluster. "Quiz me! Quiz me, quiz me hard."
Yu Bei was at a loss for words.
He spread his hand open. "Give me the questions."
Chen Qingning froze. "What questions?"
Yu Bei said, "The twenty-five questions you're studying."
Chen Qingning said, "How would I remember those?"
Yu Bei inhaled, then let it out softly. "Then what's there to quiz?"
Chen Qingning gestured at his phone with her eyes, doubling down. "If you just catch up on my videos now, you'd know."
Yu Bei picked up his empty mug, intending to pour some water.
"Ugh, fine—" Chen Qingning pretended to wail. "I'll write them out for you right now."
She immediately bent down, pulled a crumpled piece of paper from her glossy black 22bag, flipped it to the clean side, and scratched her head while opening her phone.
Yu Bei went to pour water.
"I can't write…" The girl's plaintive voice chased after him from behind.
He turned around to see her holding up a fountain pen, looking at him with pleading eyes. "This pen won't write."
Yu Bei turned back, tossed her the gel pen sitting by his laptop, and received a spirited "thank you" in sign language before his gaze moved away without lingering a second longer.
Yu Bei pressed down the blue tap of the water dispenser. Amid the gurgling flow, a thin, airy, clipped male voice rose from the quiet office:
"Today we'll teach you ten sign language phrases you can use anywhere…"