Chapter 6

Grandma Su had no patience left to wonder whether he was kind or not.
“Xiaoxiao, come eat,” she said sharply.
But Su Xiaoxiao poured him a cup of hot water first. “Do you want to eat with us? My grandma’s cooking is really good.”
Of course, Jin Qishan already knew that.
Who in the entire building didn’t know how good Grandma Su’s cooking smelled?
Before Su Xiaoxiao moved in, no one noticed. But after she came back, every day the neighbors would guess what delicious dish Grandma Su was making this time.
When Jin Qishan didn’t move, Su Xiaoxiao stopped insisting and went to eat by herself.
Suddenly, the sound of a key turning echoed from the door.
Grandma Su looked up, sure enough, it was Dong Xiaohong.
Holding the candle, she called out, “Xiaohong, you’re back! Your boy’s at our place.”
Before she could finish, Jin Qishan abruptly stood up, grabbed his schoolbag, and walked out.
“Aunt Tian, I’m so sorry to trouble you,” Dong Xiaohong said with a polite smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Why’d Qishan go to your place?”
Simple and honest, Grandma Su never saw through the pretense.
“He probably forgot his keys again, was sitting at your door. Power’s out, pitch dark in the stairwell, and he scared poor Li Yue half to death,” she explained. “When I found him, his clothes were soaked and he was burning with fever. We lifted him onto the couch and tried to get him changed, but he wouldn’t let us. I don’t know what’s wrong with this kid, won’t answer when you talk to him either.”
Dong Xiaohong gave Jin Qishan a gentle, approving look before turning to flatter Grandma Su. “Aunt Tian, you’re so kind. Thank you for taking care of him, what would I have done without you? One of the children at kindergarten didn’t get picked up today, so I had to stay late.”
“You’re such a dedicated teacher,” Grandma Su said, smiling. “Your clothes are wet too, go get changed before you catch a cold.”
Then she suddenly remembered. “Oh, right, he had a temperature, 38.9. We already gave him some medicine, but keep an eye on him. If it gets worse, take him to the hospital right away.”
“Thank you, Aunt Tian.” Dong Xiaohong patted the boy’s head with a smile. “Come on, say goodbye to Grandma.”
Jin Qishan stayed silent. Dong Xiaohong forced a polite smile, opened the door, and ushered him inside.
Su Xiaoxiao knew better, Dong Xiaohong wasn’t a good person. She didn’t care whether Jin Qishan had a fever or not.
When the door across the hall finally closed, Grandma Su suddenly realized the Jin family probably didn’t have any candles.
She lit two and handed them to Su Xiaoxiao. “Take these over.”
Knock, knock, knock.
She had to knock three times before the door opened. Jin Qishan stood there, now wearing a dry short-sleeved shirt.
“My grandma asked me to bring you some candles,” Su Xiaoxiao said.
He didn’t take them.
Just then, Dong Xiaohong appeared, smiling faintly. “Oh, thank you so much, Aunt Tian, Xiaoxiao. Qishan, take them.”
Only then did he reach out to accept them.
The flickering light illuminated his wrist, bruises, dark and purple, stood out clearly against his skin.
Su Xiaoxiao froze in shock, but before she could react, bang! he slammed the door shut.
Scars. Those scars…
No wonder he always wore long sleeves in the summer.
This was her own writing, how could she have forgotten?
Dong Xiaohong didn’t just refuse to let him eat or enter the house, she beat and cursed him regularly.
The physical pain, the emotional humiliation, all of it twisted him down the path of madness.
Su Xiaoxiao’s chest ached. She had written his childhood to be as tragic as possible, all for the sake of a more dramatic story.
Writing it had been one thing. Seeing it unfold before her eyes was another.
She’d been wrong.
Everything Jin Qishan suffered, was because of her.
…
Jin Qishan’s fever lingered on and off for two or three days before finally breaking.
When Su Xiaoxiao saw him again, it was Monday.
Perhaps from the illness, his face was pale and his spirit drained.
After the first period ended, Su Xiaoxiao glanced toward the back corner of the classroom.
There he was, “Bird’s Nest Head” Jin Qishan, fast asleep on his desk.
In the very back row, a tall, chubby boy named Feng Zihao rolled a paper ball in his hand and tossed it toward the corner.
Whether by chance or on purpose, it traced a perfect arc through the air, landing right on top of Jin Qishan’s head.
“Feng Zihao, what do you think you’re doing?” Jin Qishan rubbed his head, immediately spotting the culprit.
Feng Zihao looked simple and honest, but in reality, he was sly and skilled at sizing people up.
“Hehe, just throwing trash,” he said with a mischievous grin.
“Throwing trash? Why did you throw it on my head?” Jin Qishan exploded in anger, clenching his fists and taking a few steps toward Feng Zihao.
Jin Qishan was short and thin, completely insignificant next to the tall, burly Feng Zihao.
Feng Zihao, looking down at Jin Qishan who was half a head shorter, grinned. “Who told you to sit there? I threw it, it just happened to land on you.”
“Apologize to me.” Jin Qishan’s eyes glinted with a fierce intensity as he clenched his fists, standing on the verge of an outburst.
Feng Zihao shrugged nonchalantly. “Not my fault. Who told you to sit there?”
Taking advantage of the chaos in the back row, Wang Xiaoxia poked Su Xiaoxiao with a pencil, eager to introduce her to the class “celebrities.”
Su Xiaoxiao turned around.
Wang Xiaoxia pointed her pencil at Jin Qishan and whispered, “That’s Jin Qishan. Stay away from him. Nobody in our class plays with him. He always gets last place on tests. My mom says if we play with him, we’ll fail too.”
Wang Xiaoxia’s deskmate, Dai Lainan, chimed in: “Yeah. Xiaoxiao, don’t play with Jin Qishan. He’s bad, likes hitting people. The teacher even calls him a wild child.”
Others quickly joined in, one by one gossiping about how “bad” Jin Qishan was.
Su Xiaoxiao glanced at him, half a head shorter than Feng Zihao, yet his presence unmatched, and thought, Has Jin Qishan already turned dark?
According to the original story, Jin Qishan didn’t fight back until ninth grade, after the grandmother who loved him most passed away.
The teacher wouldn’t let him take leave to mourn because of the approaching high school entrance exams. Dong Xiaohong threw away the keepsakes left by his grandmother. Classmates mocked him as an unwanted wild child.
That’s when he first raised his fists at someone else.
Before that, he had been nothing but a paper tiger. From then on, he became a true monster.
Su Xiaoxiao asked Dai Lainan, “Has Jin Qishan ever hit anyone?”
Dai Lainan hesitated, her face turning red. “He… he… he’s hit…”
“See? You don’t even know who he’s hit,” Su Xiaoxiao smiled. “Maybe he doesn’t even hit anyone at all?”
Despite being contradicted, Dai Lainan felt no embarrassment.
She just thought Su Xiaoxiao’s smile was sweet, like a little fairy.
“I just heard it from others” Dai Lainan mumbled.
Su Xiaoxiao continued, still smiling: “Hearing isn’t as reliable as seeing. Wait, even seeing isn’t always reliable, we need our own judgment.”
The other eight- and nine-year-olds couldn’t fully grasp what Su Xiaoxiao meant, but they realized this new classmate was remarkable, aware of things they didn’t understand.
They all stared at her with awe.
Su Xiaoxiao laughed wryly, seeing their naive, confused, admiring expressions.
She turned away with a deep sigh, realizing how tough her future would be.
Every day with these little brats, I might go crazy.
“Ding ding ding, ding ding ding”
The bell rang. All the students immediately sat down, except Jin Qishan, still standing in front of Feng Zihao, waiting for an apology.
Yao Yulian stepped in with the bell.
She scanned the back row, then slammed her Chinese textbook onto the podium. “Jin Qishan! Why aren’t you sitting in your seat? What are you standing there for? Go back and sit properly!”
The whole class focused on Jin Qishan.
But he didn’t move, stubbornly staring at Feng Zihao.
Yao Yulian already disliked him.
No teacher liked a student who was both failing and disobedient.
Now he was challenging her authority, she disliked him even more.
“Jin Qishan, if you don’t go back to your seat right now, fine! If you like standing so much, you’ll stand for the whole class!” she snapped.
She marched to the back row, grabbed his collar, and pushed him against the wall. “Stand there! I won’t let you sit down, you’re not going back today!”
Su Xiaoxiao looked at him.
He stared back at Feng Zihao with defiance, while Feng Zihao grinned provocatively.
Looking around, most of the other students were delighting in his misfortune.
He had been bullied first, yet only he was punished. No one questioned the fairness, no one cared.
The teacher didn’t ask about the context, and no one spoke up for him.
Yao Yulian then climbed the podium and tapped the blackboard for silence.
“Everyone look at the board. Feng Zihao, why are you looking back? If you look again, you’ll stand with Jin Qishan.”
Feng Zihao pinched his nose, saying in his silly way, “Nope. He smells.”
His ridiculous expression made everyone burst into laughter.
Jin Qishan looked at the laughing classmates, burning with both anger and resentment.
The more they laughed, the more he hated them.
Why did everyone treat him this way?
Why was he always the one in the wrong?
No one listened to his explanations. No one believed him.
Why? Why?
What exactly had he done wrong?
He scanned the laughing faces one by one, determined to remember their expressions.
Then he saw Su Xiaoxiao, and froze.
Her small face was different, she neither mocked nor rejected him. Her expression was complicated, unreadable.
Their eyes met. Su Xiaoxiao raised her hand and innocently asked, “Teacher, if someone does something wrong, should they apologize?”