What's wrong with you, student? Why are you walking so nervously?!"
Xie Yilin, in her early twenties, wearing glasses and having a well-proportioned facial features with thin lips and pointed chin. She is petite but has a big temper. She just graduated from school and is currently in the internship stage. However, her way of doing things is not like that of a new teacher at all. When she scolds students, she does it fiercely.
When I first entered the class at the beginning of the semester, I heard everyone talking about her taking over our English course.
I was unlucky enough to bump into her while joking around with Xu Qin.
Now it's not good; she stood there with hands on hips and stared at me through her glasses lenses making me feel uneasy.
"Sorry for my mistake, Xie Teacher. Please don't be angry."
I quickly apologized and then squatted down together with Xu Qin to help collect our homework books before respectfully handing them over to Xie Yilin.
"Hmph! You two are from Class 3 Grade 1?" Xie Yilin took the homework book and patted it before looking up and down at me and Xu Qin. Then she frowned and asked: "What were you doing just now?"
"We weren't doing anything special," I smiled back.
"Don't give me that playful smile," said Xie Yilin in standard Mandarin Chinese. Although she spoke fiercely, we didn't feel any ferocity in what she said which made us want to laugh even more when we saw how serious she looked. As a result, when Xie saw my expression, she became even angrier because as a teacher,she felt that her authority had been challenged by us.So immediately after asking us if we were dating each other,she warned us sternly:"You better focus on studying instead of fooling around!"
"Damn, is this woman already in menopause? Why does she have such a bad temper? I just bumped into her. It's not like I was trying to kidnap her or anything. Why is she so fierce?"
Seeing Xie Yilin entering the office, I couldn't help but roll my eyes and say to Xu Qin.
"Okay, let's stop talking about it. Go back to class quickly and later on, I'll tell you more about her situation. There must be a reason why she became like this."
Xu Qin worried that I would cause trouble again and pulled me back into the classroom.
After sitting down in the classroom, Xu Qin told me about Xie Yilin's situation.
Originally, this little teacher Xiao Xie has quite a background. Let's start with her hometown. She is actually from Huzhou, Zhejiang Province, which is about two to three thousand kilometers away from here and crosses provinces. It can be imagined how far it is. Moreover, Zhejiang is more developed than our Jiangsu province. People there generally do not come to live in our remote and poor place. This little teacher Xiao Xie graduated from a normal university, although only with an associate degree, but it should not be too difficult for her to find a job in her hometown area. But why did she choose to come to our broken place?
After Xu Qin's introduction, I learned that this little teacher Xiao Xie has some mental problems. According to Xu Qin's words, when she was in college, she had been in love once but something happened halfway through the relationship - the boy had a car accident and died unexpectedly - which greatly affected her and made her become mentally unstable . Doctors diagnosed her with depression and autism tendencies after graduation so finding work became somewhat difficult for her as many schools were reluctant to hire someone who was psychologically abnormal as a teacher because they feared that she would harm students.
So finally out of desperation she ended up coming here where we are located. Of course the main reason why she came here was because her ex-boyfriend was from this area; She actually wanted to come here looking for his shadow.
Hearing all of this makes me feel quite sympathetic towards Little Teacher Xiao Xie's situation; however I am very curious about how Xu Qin knew these gossips? When I asked about it ,she just nodded towards Zhang Kai next door.
Seeing this situation,I understood what happened: Zhang Kai must have spread these rumors around school since he is known as "the gossip king" at our school.So him knowing such things isn't surprising at all.
"Huzhou, Zhejiang? I've never even heard of that place before. I really don't know what it looks like." While talking to Xu Qin, I couldn't help but ask: "Where will she live in the future?"
"Of course it's the school dormitory for faculty and staff. Where else can she live?" Xu Qin said to me.
"That faculty and staff dormitory at our school is just a row of small shabby tile houses. Can she handle living there?" I asked with some concern.
"What else can we do? Unless you want her to come live at your house?" Xu Qin rolled her eyes and glared at me.
"If she wants to, then why not? My bed is spacious enough for one more person or even two more people. How about you come too?"I looked at Xu Qin and smiled.
"You have a dog's mouth that cannot speak ivory! Get lost!" Xu Qin spat on me, turned around and started reading her book without paying any attention to me anymore.
...
Time passed quickly; on the first day of school, everything was still the same - receiving textbooks, meeting teachers and students,and attending the whole-school opening ceremony. Before we knew it,it was already evening.
On this particular night, the boarding students were allowed to go home, but I stayed in the dormitory just like last year.
There weren't many people in the dormitory and it was very lonely at night. I lay on my bed, flipping through books out of boredom while reviewing my lessons and arguing with YunQingYue.
Later on, without realizing it, I fell asleep.
After falling asleep, I vaguely saw a white figure swaying in front of me. It occasionally made whimpering sounds that filled me with sadness. I wanted to ask what was making that figure so sad.
Suddenly waking up later on, I instinctively opened the door to check my surroundings and see if any evil spirits had entered.
After looking around for a while and finding nothing unusual, I was surprised.
"Hoo hoo hoo--"
At that moment came a gust of wind from outside the window. When I looked out to see what was happening, snowflakes were falling outside!
The sudden cold weather made me shiver uncontrollably. Standing by the window for quite some time now watching silently as snow piled up outside gave me an uneasy feeling; something bad seemed about to happen. The white shadow from my dream felt strange - it seemed like something my sixth sense picked up on its own accord - definitely not a good omen.
"Hey Tianjiu! Look how beautiful the snow is! Are you happy?" Just when things couldn't get more depressing for me someone spoke cheerfully behind me: It turned out to be Xiao Xie teacher playing around in the snow!
"Tianjiu come quickly let's build a snowman!" she said excitedly as she bent down picking up handfuls of fresh powder."
Seeing her behavior made me sigh inwardly because deep down inside i knew there wasn't anyone else there except us two.