Chapter Ten (1)

  The dormitory building was filled with curses, but the principal, Qian, who was in the broadcasting room, was not affected. Instead, the dormitory manager, Wen, came out and shouted back at them: "You're rebelling! Go back to sleep!" But the students didn't take Wen seriously, and water splashed down from upstairs with a loud "gushing" sound. Wen jumped backward and cursed: "You bunch of stinky brats, stop pouring! If you pour again, I'll remember this!" The student who was pouring the water only heard the first half of the sentence and followed his orders, pouring out the rest of the water while shouting: "Get lost!" Wen had originally wanted to remain still to intimidate the students, but his feet didn't listen to his brain's control, and he continued to jump around to avoid the water. Yu Xiang thought this was fun and, since he was worried about where to pour out the water for washing his feet, took advantage of the situation and poured it down as well.

  "What's going on?" a voice in the darkness said.

  A voice on the third floor trembled and shouted: "It's Principal Qian!"

  The upstairs was filled with the sound of basins being collected. Yu Xiang hurriedly put away the basin, accidentally touching the balcony railing, and his hand slipped, hearing a "pa" sound as the basin fell to the ground. Principal Qian's body shook, seeing that thing still rolling on the ground in the dark, he went forward to press it down, finding it was just a basin, furious at those students who were not only rude enough to splash water but also thorough enough to throw their tools down and hurt people. Yu Xiang shouted "no good", hearing no response from below, thinking Principal Qian had been killed by his own carelessness. Principal Qian picked up the basin and roared: "You all go to sleep quickly tonight, I will definitely investigate this matter to the end!"

  Yu Xiang waited for the principal to leave, then snuck down to find his basin. The person on the first floor told him it had been taken away by the principal. Yu Xiang was only regretful, thinking that in the future when there was no basin, he would have to suffer with his face and share a drink of water with his feet. He returned to his dormitory, where there was still a little while before lights out, and ran over to chat with Yu Xiong next door. When he came back, he had forgotten his key, and the dormitory door had been locked again. He knocked on the door in embarrassment. A person from Room 1 came out to open the door for him. Yu Xiang looked at him gratefully, sighing that he was indeed a city boy, pale as if he had just been whitewashed. "What's your name?"

  "Oh, I'm Qian Rong." After thanking Yu Xiang, he began to suspect that Yu Xiong's words were insincere.

  In Dormitory 2, three people were lying on their beds reading books. Yu Xiang also didn't bother talking to them and climbed onto his bed to sleep. Although he had been living in San Zhong for over a decade, he had never actually slept in this kind of bed before. The bed was only one meter wide and just long enough for one person, seemingly tailored to each individual with precision, as if responding to the national call for "frugality". Thinking about it further, Yu Xiang wondered if San Zhong was a religious school - after all, the eighth commandment of Buddhism is "do not sit on high, wide and large beds".

  Yu Xiang lay in bed, thinking about how to spend his three years of high school. After the lights went out, Yu Xiang didn't dare move, afraid that if he turned over, he would fall off. Stiff like this and unable to sleep, the early autumn sky seemed to be competing with the summer sky for heat, so Yu Xiang could only get up and sit by the window and sleep for a night.

  The next morning, Yu Xiang put on the school uniform that cost 50 yuan. During military training, he would rather die from heatstroke than sunburn - the school uniform of Shi Nan San Zhong was long pants and long sleeves, and after wearing it for a few steps, he was already sweating all over; The shoes were also uniformly distributed by the school, with better sewing technology, and they felt like stepping into mud when worn. Yu Xiang's feet felt suffocated, and he cursed: "Damn it - this is not how to prevent comparison!" Shi Nan San Zhong has been strictly preventing comparison for many years, and in previous years, it was mandatory to wear school uniforms every day. The students protested loudly, saying that it restricted their individuality. Those who usually say this are people who have many beautiful brand-name clothes but are not willing to wear only school uniforms, and they have a strong backing. As a result, the school's regulations softened, and it was only mandatory to buy the uniform, but not necessarily to wear it. Of course, no one wore it. Yu Xiang had heard that the school uniform of Shi Nan San Zhong did not match the season, and the summer clothes could be used to hold water, while the winter clothes were so big that they didn't even qualify as fishing nets. Yu Xiang thought it was nonsense, but today he personally experienced it, and half of his views had been proven, and he couldn't help but mutter: "Why bother wearing it!"

  Sweating profusely, Xie Jingyuan heard the words: "This reflects the students' spiritual appearance." Yu Xiang shook his head, wanting to say "no", but seeing Xie Jingyuan's serious face, he suppressed himself and said it to himself. He thought that in this era, the spiritual appearance was becoming more and more like a "face", with good spiritual appearances resembling a dancer's face, perhaps with several layers of rouge; students' spiritual appearances were more like confessions from prisoners, which could only be extracted through coercion.

  Everyone in Room 1 jumped out, all wearing school uniforms and teasing each other. To show off their uniqueness, several people wore Adidas headbands. Xie Jingyuan didn't understand and asked Yuxiang: "What's the cloth on their heads for?" Yuxiang also didn't want to expose the vanity of human nature, saying: "It's for wiping sweat."

  The classroom was very lively, and even if a friend told a not-so-funny joke, they would still laugh out of politeness. Only when they became the best of friends would they stop giving each other face. Mei Xuan walked in and said, "Who is Lin Yuexiang?" Yuexiang quickly stood up and said, "I am." Mei Xuan recognized his appearance and said, "Go to the principal's office, Principal Qian wants to see you." The students all admired Lin Yuexiang's awesomeness, as he was summoned by the principal on the first day of military training. Yuexiang remembered that he had accidentally broken a basin the night before, but how could a basin speak? He nervously walked into the principal's office, where Principal Qian was sitting with the basin under his chair. Yuexiang saw the evidence and felt like he had been caught red-handed, slowly walking towards Principal Qian. Principal Qian put down his pen and said, "You've finally arrived, good, sit." Yuexiang wasn't fooled by the polite words, thinking that they were just a prelude to something worse, preparing to deny everything. Principal Qian took out the basin and asked, "Is this yours?" Yuexiang was about to make an excuse, but then he saw the number on the edge of the basin - it was undoubtedly his own. He didn't resist and said, "This... is mine."

  "How did it end up with me?"

  "It fell down accidentally last night."

  "Is it unintentional?"

  "Uh, last night I was drying clothes, no, hanging them out on the balcony, and they fell down when I touched them."

  Principal Qian couldn't find any weakness in this lie for the time being. Yu Xiang saw that the fabricated lie was very effective, and another lie emerged as soon as one was settled. With a glint in his eyes, he said: "No wonder I looked for it all night yesterday but couldn't find it - it turned out you had picked it up!"

  Principal Qian was deceived by a series of lies and also bore the crime of being careless, feeling bitter in his heart. He changed his angle of questioning: "Did you see anyone pouring water last night?" Yu Xiang said: "Those people on the third and fourth floors."

  "Why didn't you stop him?"

  "This... how am I supposed to go..."

  "This is what you did wrong. As a middle school student, especially as a first-year high school student at Shinan No. 3 Middle School, you should fully embody a sense of good and evil, and you should resent evil like an enemy. You didn't participate, that's good, but you also can't just stand by and do nothing, you have to go stop it."

  Yu Xiang's lies were so true that he even believed them himself. In his heart, he was indignant and thought: "Why scold those who see the evil deeds instead of scolding those who do the evil deeds?" He said: "But I'm just one person, I couldn't stop it."

  Principal Qian picked on Rain's words, unable to find anything wrong with them, so he had to pick on the right ones: "You're wrong again. Even if it didn't work out, you should still show the spirit of a student from Shi Nan No. 3 Middle School. You should stand up straight and try, only then will you know whether it works or not. Do you recognize your mistake?"

  Yu Xiang was afraid of not compromising again, so Principal Qian would have to give a grand lecture, and he could only nod in agreement.

  Principal Qian handed the basin back to Lin Yuxiang, pulled out paper and pen, and said: "You write a self-examination - it can't be called self-examination, it should be the understanding after this incident." Yuxiang didn't understand, so he wrote casually:

  Confession Book

  Yesterday evening, I heard that on the third and fourth floors of my dormitory building, there was a burst of water splashing outwards, wetting the clothes of the teacher in charge of managing students' discipline. At that time, I was hanging up some dirty laundry that had just been washed on the second floor of my dormitory building, and I saw the uncivilized behavior of my upstairs classmates, but I didn't stop them. Now I realize that my behavior was very bad, not in line with the provisions of the "Middle School Student Code", and lacking the basic qualities that a middle school student should have as a cross-century talent. I am determined to strengthen my collective consciousness, do well what I should do as a middle school student, no longer make such mistakes, and be more strict with myself, making myself a talent for socialist construction in our country.