Excerpt: The People

After a few minutes of mathematics, the teacher checked his watch and deemed it time to go out into the courtyard for school- wide eye exercises.
“Because nothing beats boredom and reenergizes our brains like a set of eye exercises done with the entire rest of the school,” whispered Little Miss Hussy sarcastically to Chengdao as they filed down a walkway- path between two columns of desks. Chengdao snickered and nodded in vigorous agreement.
They entered the courtyard as all the other classes in the school entered and formed a set of neatly obedient rows and columns, with the oldest senior high school students in the front and the youngest junior high school students in the back. Chengdao’s class was in the back, but not the way back since he was in First Form; students in the Sixth Form were in the way back, too far away to hear the teacher calling out which exercises to do through a makeshift loudspeaker made out of some manilla paper folded up into a cone and some really durable tape.
“Bet you a hundred thousand I can make a better loudspeaker than that,” boasted Chengdao quietly to Mushroom next to him, eyes still closed and rubbing the pressure points on the top part of his cheekbones.
Mushroom snuck upon an eye to make sure Chengdao was still doing his exercises and closed his eye again. “I do not believe it, but I definitely do not have that kind of money,” he replied.
Chengdao smiled, eyes still shut. “Coward.”
A girl in their class who was in the row directly in front of them stopped her exercises in spite of herself in order to turn around and sigh dramatically at the two. “Shut up you guys, I can’t hear the teacher,” she whined.
Chengdao stuck her tongue out at her and amiably blew a raspberry, eyes still shut and fingers still massaging pressure points to the direction of the teacher.
She sighed dramatically again. “No, seriously you guys are really annoying. Can you do us all a favor and shut up?”
Mushroom ignored her, as he was used to tuning out female voices thanks to his being the only male other than his father in his five- piece family. Chengdao, however, opened his eyes in annoyance.
“Why don’t you shut up? You are the one bothering us now.”
The girl rolled her eyes now that Chengdao could see her doing so. “Well, you clearly started it,” she retorted, putting her hands on her hips. She was turned all the way around now, having completely forgotten about eye exercises.
Before Chengdao could reply with something witty, a teacher came by. “Hong Liangliang, you should be ashamed of yourself for disturbing the poor boys behind you. Turn around at once.”
The girl now identified as Liangliang looked alarmed and, without a second glance at Chengdao, whirled around into her assigned position and continued her exercises without further complaint.
But later that day in their introductory physics class, Chengdao felt a sharp jab in the back. He turned around in his seat to beat the pulp out of whoever did that, but only saw the girl Liangliang who had bothered him earlier that day. She had jabbed him with the nub of her pencil. Chengdao rubbed his back reflexively in delayed pain.
“You started it,” she said. Having had to stand up a little out of her seat to poke him, she sat back down in her chair. Without giving him so much as a second glance, Liangliang ignored him and began to copy down what the teacher was writing down about Newton’s Laws.
Chengdao frowned inwardly. What was that all about? He was about to turn around again to take serious notes like the serious student that he was and had to prove himself to be when he felt another poke, this time into the meatless part of his arm just above his elbow.
“Ow woman, can you stop?” hissed Chengdao in response, turning completely around this time. “You nearly took out my joint there.”
She smiled pleasantly as she slowly sank back into her seat again. “Good. You deserved it,” she said. The girl returned to taking notes again, but very obviously half- heartedly as she kept giving Chengdao darting looks out of the corner of her eyes to make he was still very much confused.
Chengdao was very much confused indeed and also very irritated. One of his pet peeves was having blame pinning on him for something he did not do, even if it was a joke. He leaned towards her desk behind him, tilting his chair to balance his whole weight on its back legs.
“How is it that I deserved it?” he muttered under his breath. The chair wobbled and he grabbed the edge of the girl’s desk to keep from falling. Chengdao stole a look at the teacher; he was still scribbling on the board and sprouting off something about equal and opposite forces that happen when two come into contact. Chengdao turned away again but picked up his pen in his free hand in order to quickly push his chair back into position and pretend to be taking notes if he had to.
“So, why is it my fault again?” he asked.
The girl turned her eyes on him slowly and dramatically rolled her eyes in that way she thought was sooooooooo cool. “Because you started it, of course?”
“Started what?”
“Bothering me.”
“Um, why would I ever do that?”
“Um, I don’t know, why would I know what’s going on in your sick stupid boy- head?”
“Hey hey hey. What is with this unnecessary insulting?”
“Who said I was insulting you? I am only telling the truth.”
“I am not stupid.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“Uh, yes you so, so did.”
“No I didn’t.”
“Well, fine. What did you call me then?”
“I said you were sick and stupid.”
“…right. I’m just going to ignore that because I can’t beat the beans out of you since you are a girl.”
“Hey! Why would you beat me up anyway?”
“Maybe because you are incredibly annoying?”
“I am not anno—”
“—and maybe because you are currently distracting me from listening to the teacher?”
“I am not distracting you, you are—you are distracting yourself—”
“Right. I’m turning around now.” Chengdao made a move to turn around.
“No!” Liangliang grabbed the edge of Chengdao’s sleeve, for his hand was still supporting his weight on the edge of her desk. He was about to shake her off when he remembered that that would throw him off balance and onto the floor. Carefully, Chengdao lowered the front legs of his chair to the ground and removed his hand delicately from her desk.
“No! I won’t let you turn around,” she said adamantly and folded her arms to emphasize her point. “We have not finished arguing yet.”
Chengdao turned around and started taking notes.
The girl sighed loudly. And sighed loudly again. And again. And again.
The teacher paused mid- sentence in writing and whirled around. “Hong Liangliang. This is the second time I have had to talk to you today. Stop bothering your peers and focus on your work, or I will contact your parents immediately.”
“Yessir,” she said hurriedly. A blush spread across her baby- fat cheeks. Liangliang picked up her pencil and continued to add to her notes.
The teacher, mollified, continued to write down and explain details about Newton’s Second Law, but the words would not go into Chengdao’s mind. He felt restless. Maybe it was because there had not been a break for about five hundred bajillion years. Well, just below one hour. But it felt so long and he was so restless and he could pay attention to the teacher because the teacher was just so boring and he was so bored and he wished he were outside and—
Chengdao whirled around surreptitiously in his chair. “Psst, Hey you. Psst.” The girl singled out as Liangliang ignored him with a singular- minded stubbornness, gluing her eyes alternately to the backboard and to the papers on the desk in front of her. She wrote carefully, meticulously, in handwriting that looked like it came or at least should have come fresh off Bi Sheng’s revolutionary removable type printing press.
“Psst. Psssssssst. Wench. Pssst.” She continued to ignore him. Chengdao was moved to poke her elbow with his pencil, the elbow upon which she supported the weight of her head as she was leaning on her hand with a determinedly innocent suck- up expression. Liangliang continued to ignore him, but there was a curious quiver at the edges of her determinedly expressionless mouth that betrayed her desire to laugh. Encouraged, Chengdao leaned over to poke her again.
“AHA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA I AM TICKLISH, YOU KNOW HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA MEANIE!!”
“HONG LIANGLIANG!” The teacher whirled around again, burning livid purple this time. Had he had iron hands, he would have easily crushed the piece of chalk he was holding with unveiled contempt in his fist. The teacher stomped forward to Liangliang row and, grabbing her ear with his other hand, lifted her out of her seat.
“YOUNG LADY. WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?” The teacher twisted the girl’s ear mercilessly as she squeaked in pain. “THIS CLASS IS THE FIRST FORM. THIS CLASS IS NOT THE DUNDERHEADS OF THE SECOND AND THIRD AND FORTH AND ALL THOSE OTHER FORMS. IF YOU DON’T WISH TO LEARN, YOUNG LADY, THEN YOU OUGHT TO GET THE HELL OUT. DO YOU WANT TO DISPLEASE YOUR FAMILY AND GET KICKED OUT??”
Chengdao snuck a glance at her. Liangliang was ghostly pale with little bright drops bejeweling her eyes. A bead leaked out and trickled down her cheek.
“N- n- n- no, sir,” she replied. The teacher gave her an extra twist on her ear to make sure. Liangliang yelped but did not verbally complain. “No sir, I will not do it again and I—I—” her voice cracked— “I will shut up and not disturb the class.”
Finally satisfied, the teacher released her ear. Both of Liangliang’s hands leapt up to shield her ear and attempt to assuage its throbbing. She sat down, picked up her pencil halfheartedly and sobbed quietly to herself.
The classroom sank into silence and Chengdao’s heart sank along with it. He felt oppressed and guilty for having gotten the girl in trouble. True, she was really, really, really annoying. But, he hated getting blamed for stuff he did not due and of course she would too. Plus, she did not even tattle on him. That was a sign of truly noble character.
He turned around quietly in his seat. Liangliang started at his movement and withdrew from him.
“Go away. I know you are just trying to get me in trouble.”
Chengdao shook his head. He leaned over just barely enough to whisper, “I’m sorry.”