In the bedroom, perhaps because of the cold weather, Mo Jingchun had been swaying as he carried his little sister back from the classroom after the class meeting. The little one had fallen asleep, rocked by the movement inside his coat.
Mo Jingchun had planned to wake his sister so she could get up, take a bath, and go back to sleep. But after he jostled her a few times and got no reaction, and since it really was a bit cold, he gave up on bathing her.
After leaving the bathroom, Mo Jingchun put on his thermal underwear and rubbed his hair dry with a damp towel.
He had just sneezed while sitting at the head of the bed when the phone on the table vibrated, accompanied by QQ's distinctive notification sound.
Holding the towel in his left hand and continuing to dry his hair, Mo Jingchun picked up his phone with his right to check his QQ messages. Someone like him, who rarely got more than a few messages a day, would often open various chat apps even when there were no new messages, always hoping something might turn up.
When he saw the class monitor's announcement in the group, tagging everyone, his left hand stopped moving. Mo Jingchun thought it over for a moment, then shook his head and put the phone back on the table.
Mo Jingchun was certain that if he submitted an application, his name would definitely be among the eight recipients.
As far as the requirements for applying for student grants went, no one fit them better than Mo Jingchun. Objectively speaking, if he submitted an application, none of his classmates or teachers would say anything or object. At least, that was how it would seem on the surface.
Otherwise, it would be hard for the other recipients to convince anyone they deserved their places.
But Mo Jingchun had no intention of applying for a student grant, and he certainly wasn't going to write an application.
That was why, after glancing at the message, he left the group chat and put his phone back on the table.
Li Na and the others had just finished their small class meeting. They still had no idea that the person they had all tacitly agreed should receive the one Special Hardship Grant had never even considered applying.
Mo Jingchun wasn't afraid of being looked down on. He had been bringing a baby to class every day for so long that anyone who wasn't intellectually disabled could tell there was a special reason. A little speculation would be enough to guess that both of Mo Jingchun's parents might be gone.
The possibility that his parents had divorced was almost nonexistent. Mo Jingchun had gotten into Jing University, which meant a bright future lay ahead of him. What parent would stop supporting their child after a divorce, especially when there was also a little one who couldn't even walk yet?
Of course, every student in 21 Software Class knew about Mo Jingchun's family situation—everyone except Mo Jingchun himself.
His parents were both dead. He and his sister depended on each other.
There were two reasons Mo Jingchun didn't want to apply.
First, he wasn't short on money—not in the near future, and probably not even before he graduated from college.
Second, and most importantly, accepting the grant would be a kind of constraint for him, no matter how much money it was.
After all, once there was a little one at home, certain expenses that people might consider extravagant were unavoidable.
Take the formula Candy drank every day. Would Mo Jingchun buy a cheaper brand just to save money? No way.
If two stores sold the same infant formula, one at its usual price and the other above the usual price, Mo Jingchun would definitely buy it from the more expensive store.
He wouldn't mind even if that made him a sucker.
Rather than taking a grant for poor students, Mo Jingchun would rather earn the 8,000-yuan National Scholarship on his own merits. That was money he could accept without a second thought.
In the boys' and girls' dormitories, many students who had received the group announcement were already eager to get started, thinking about how to write their applications.
Some were even planning how to spend the money once they got it.
In the bedroom, Mo Jingchun had turned off all the lights except for a desk lamp.
His hair still wasn't completely dry. Sitting at the head of the bed, he was studying Discrete Mathematics on his own. He had already worked through two-thirds of the thick textbook. At his current pace, with the material getting harder as he went, he estimated it would take about two more weeks to finish. After that, he would read through the whole book a few more times, and he should have a decent grasp of it.
Of course, if he wanted to study the subject in depth, a month wouldn't be enough to work through the book, and even ten years wouldn't be enough to research it thoroughly.
After studying for about an hour, Mo Jingchun felt his hair. It was completely dry.
He put the book down, carefully lifted the covers, and went to the bathroom. When he returned to the bedroom, he turned off the last light, lay on his side facing his little sister Candy, and closed his eyes.
Mo Jingchun felt there was no need for him to set an alarm on his phone. Every time, his little sister Candy woke him up a minute or two before the alarm was about to go off.
But that was just a passing thought each time he woke up. He wouldn't actually dare turn off the phone alarm.
Who knew if the "Candy" brand alarm clock might run late one day because of the weather? If the "Candy" brand alarm clock let him down, who could he complain to?
He couldn't exactly tell the teacher, when asked why he was late for class, "My little sister didn't wake me up."
As usual, Mo Jingchun got dressed, lifted his sister out of the covers, and prepared to dress her.
But then... the little one's lower lip quivered, and a few tears squeezed out of her big eyes.
"Waaah..."
As soon as he put her on the bed, the little one crawled back under the covers by herself.
If Jing City didn't have heating in winter, Mo Jingchun couldn't even imagine how the little one would manage to get out of a warm, comfortable bed when the cold season came.
If she didn't want to get up, then she didn't have to. It was Saturday anyway, and it was pouring outside. All the windows were closed, yet the sound of the rain pattering outside still carried in.
More than half an hour later, Mo Jingchun heard the little tyke calling "Guo-ge" from under the covers in the living room. He wasn't sure whether washing Candy's face had helped, or whether it was time for her milk and she was hungry.
When Mo Jingchun heard her and went into the bedroom, he couldn't help laughing and crying at what he saw: as soon as Candy saw him come in, she crawled out from under the covers by herself.
As he sat her on his thigh to get her dressed, a text message came in. Mo Jingchun couldn't even be bothered to look. It was most likely from his carrier, or else one of those advertising messages from various apps.
A lot of them claimed you could unsubscribe by replying "T," but if you actually believed that, you'd already lost.
Only after handing his sister the bottle to hold herself did Mo Jingchun unlock his phone and check the message out of boredom.
What he hadn't expected was that the text was from the school's Courier Station. His maternal grandfather had asked his eldest uncle to send a package: Candy's custom handmade Teething Stick had arrived.
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