Tong Jia didn't contact Zhou Heng again. Zhou Heng also didn't contact her.
The two of them were just old classmates and not friends. Even if they were in contact, it was only for Zhou Yanchen, and no matter who, neither of them wanted to discuss that matter again.
She felt that she would never forget Zhou Yanchen. Although she had never liked him, this feeling was enough for her to remember him for a lifetime. However, Tong Jia thought that she might also never speak of him again. She didn't want to forget, but once she remembered, there would always be a pang of regret that she had lost something special.
She didn't even know when and for what reason Zhou Yanchen liked her. Of course, she didn't want to know these things from others. For Tong Jia, Zhou Yanchen slowly became a secret in her heart.
Tong Jia liked her current job very much. Other teachers had told her that the students in this section basically belonged to rich families, so some children had bad tempers. They all said that if she met them in class, to try to be patient. But in Tong Jia's opinion, the students in her class actually respected the teachers very much.
They were all twelve or thirteen-year-old students who hadn’t yet entered their rebellious phases. Because their family conditions were very good, their parents put great importance on their education. Even with their children, they knew that the most basic thing was to respect their teachers.
It’s just that she noticed that there was a student in the class who was very strange. He basically didn’t listen to the lecture, but when she asked him to stand up and read the text aloud, his English would be more fluent than most of his classmates. Moreover, he would often just sleep on his desk. In terms of appearance, his facial features were very exquisite. Obviously, he should be at a carefree age, but he always had a cold and detached facial expression.
Tong Jia followed a group of colleagues to the cafeteria to have a meal and sat by the window. She was a little curious and asked, "Shujuan, I heard that you’ve taught Class 5?"
"En." Shen Shujuan took a bite of the vegetables while nodding at Tong Jia's question.
"Then, do you know Song Chi?" Tong Jia asked.
"Oh, you’re talking about Song Chi. He’s a particularly smart student, what's wrong?"
"He doesn't seem to concentrate on the lectures, and he doesn't pay much attention to me when I talk to him."
Tong Jia was really enthusiastic about this profession. She couldn’t wait to teach the students everything she knew and hoped to understand every one of them.
Shen Shujuan put down the chopsticks and looked at Tong Jia in surprise.
"Don't you know? Something big happened in his family. I heard that when he was in elementary school, his parents died and now only he and his elder brother were left. The other remaining relatives were just their uncles and aunts. His brother, who had an accident recently, is still lying in the hospital unconscious."
"Huh? That can't be true, right?" Tong Jia opened her mouth slightly, shocked.
"Haven’t you heard of the Song family? Now that something has happened to Song Yancheng, the other relatives in their family became active again. They’re eagerly waiting for him to die soon so that they can rule the Song family’s property. After all, the only one left from the Song family is Song Chi, and he hasn't reached adulthood yet. Anyway, the situation is very bad." Shen Shujuan heaved a sigh.
Tong Jia was speechless. She had only thought of these incidents as plots for TV dramas. It took a little time for her to come to her senses.
Shen Shujuan held her cheek with her left hand and sighed.
"I’ve seen Song Yancheng before when he came to pick up Song Chi, he’s really handsome. No matter what, I still hope that he’ll get better, even if it’s only for Song Chi. If he dies, Song Chi’s life will be really hard."
"I also hope he’ll get better."
Tong Jia was sincere. Children without fathers and mothers would already suffer hard enough. Now that his only elder brother was also gone, she was afraid that it would be even more difficult for him.
When she got home that night, Tong Jia was ready to surf the Internet to research the Song family, but it turned out that her computer had crashed. Even restarting it was of no use. She had been using this PC for several years and it should have already been thrown away. However, Tong Jia was a person who cherished things. She had always been reluctant to throw away things that had been with her for several years.
After taking a bath, she laid on her bed. She didn't know how she thought of Zhou Yanchen.
It had been more than a month since he passed, and her life seemed to slowly return to normal, but Tong Jia knew that something had unknowingly changed. It seemed that thinking of Zhou Yanchen before going to bed every night had become a necessity.
He had left his secret to her. She had a lot of questions, but she would never have the opportunity to know the answer ever again.
Just when she was about to fall asleep, her phone on the bedside table rang. Tong Jia was surprised. She quickly sat up, picked up her mobile phone, and looked at it. Zhou Heng's name popped up on the screen, which shocked her even more. She thought that Zhou Heng would never have contacted her again.
"Hello?"
Hearing her voice, Zhou Heng seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. His voice was not as sad as it was before.
"Tong Jia, it will be Yanchen’s last Wei Qi soon. Yanchen’s parents hope that we could free ourselves to have a meal at their house. Could you spare them some of your time?"
[TL/N: 尾七 (Wei Qi); last seven or final seven; a Chinese funeral usually takes place over 7 days, but the period of mourning lasts for 49 days with weekly prayers recited by the family every 7 days. The last week of the 49 days is called Wei Qi. A final ceremony, signifying the end of the mourning period, may be held after 100 days.]
Yes, it would be forty-nine days soon. Tong Jia felt stunned.
She gathered up her energy to reply.
"I’m okay with it. By the way, Zhou Heng, are uncle and aunt okay now?"
Zhou Heng remained silent for a while before he spoke.
"They’re getting older. They plan to adopt a child from a distant relative after a while. The child has no parents. I think this is good, since they need to divert their attention from Yanchen’s death. I think they’ll slowly get better over time."
"En, that's quite good. A dead man cannot be brought back to life, so we should all take our time." Tong Jia comforted.
"Like they say in our place, it’s time to reincarnate after Wei Qi," Zhou Heng said with a smile. "I went to the temple every day during this period, hoping Yanchen would be born as a good baby."
Tong Jia definitely hadn’t believed this before, but now she also sincerely hoped that Zhou Yanchen could have a new beginning and a better life just as Zhou Heng said.
After making an appointment with Zhou Heng to go to Zhou Yanchen's house, Tong Jia hung up and fell asleep after staying in bed for a while.
She had a dream. It was about Zhou Yanchen and something that had happened before.
It was after she had bought him a drink as a thank you.
Just when she was concentrating on a formula to solve a problem, someone stood in front of her. The light suddenly dimmed, and before she could look up, she heard a cold but tense voice.
“If you don’t understand, you can ask me."
She was startled and lifted her head up to look at him.
Zhou Yanchen's ears were a little red, but this time he didn't look away.
"Ah..."
She was still thinking about the formula in her head when she suddenly came to her senses after the sound. She looked at Zhou Yanchen in disbelief with her eyes wide open.
"Huh?!"
Zhou Yanchen must have approached her on impulse. Annoyance flashed in his eyes, but he soon calmed down and said, "If you don't understand, you can ask me. I'll teach you."
She was ashamed of the response she had given without thinking too much at that time. She pointed at the question that caused her a headache and said, "I can't solve this."
Zhou Yanchen took her pen, bent over, and took a look at the paper. In fact, the question was very simple.
“Scratch paper."
She quickly handed him the scratch paper under her elbow.
Zhou Yanchen began to solve it on the scratch paper. His fingers were slender and clean, and his body had a faint soapy smell.
He kept his voice very low, maybe to not disturb the people studying around them. She couldn't catch what he was saying at first, but after a while, she began to understand Zhou Yanchen's points without any difficulties.
After he explained the question, it wasn't too much to say that the concept became clear to her.
When Tong Jia woke up, she was still in a daze. She soon came to her senses, and her fingers unconsciously grasped the bedsheet. She always thought about how he could love her, and obviously, she doubted it, but now she was very sure. She finally believed that Zhou Yanchen seriously liked her.
She got up and prepared to wash up. No matter how she felt, she still had a class to attend today. After washing up, she went to the study. She was going to take the laptop for repairs. She didn't know when she turned on her laptop but she was really astonished!!
It was actually in good condition!!
Yesterday, she thought her laptop had been damaged beyond repair.
Tong Jia was overjoyed. She was very happy all the way until she got on the bus. Her current residence wasn’t far from the school, and there were fixed-route buses. There were not many people on the bus, but there was a man who kept rubbing against her, and as soon as Tong Jia moved, the man would follow her, and looked at her from top to bottom from time to time, which made Tong Jia extremely uncomfortable.
Just when Tong Jia couldn't bear it anymore and was about to kick him, the man suddenly screamed as if he had been hit by a ghost.
Immediately afterward, his body tilted again. The man became very angry and roared, "Who hit me?!"
The people in the bus immediately looked at him as if he was a lunatic.
Tong Jia was frightened and hurried to the back, keeping some distance from the man. If he was some pervert, then she wouldn't let him go that easily, but she couldn't afford to provoke him if he really was a lunatic.
The man returned to his senses, and he was blue in the face. Just as the bus stopped at a certain stop sign, the door opened, and the man covered his face while getting off the bus and cursing, "Damn it!"
[TL/N: Blue in the face: Exhausted from anger, strain, or another great effort.]
He had clearly felt that someone had slapped him twice! His face still hurt!
[TL/N: This translator says you clearly deserve it. Think twice before you molest someone. Ghosts will surely haunt you.]