Bai Qingxia's unusual dad [please keep reading!]]
Lu Yuanqiu froze. "What would happen?"
Bai Qingxia lowered her head and said quietly, "He'd chase people around with a stick and hit them."
Lu Yuanqiu's eyebrows shot up. "Your dad's that fierce?!"
A flicker of embarrassment crossed Bai Qingxia's face. Clutching her sleeve, she nodded lightly, then turned and walked in the opposite direction.
"Hey!" Lu Yuanqiu called.
Bai Qingxia turned back and looked at him questioningly.
"Where are your manners?" Lu Yuanqiu asked helplessly. "Aren't you going to say goodbye before heading home?"
A rare smile appeared on Bai Qingxia's cool, aloof face. "Bye," she said softly.
"Bye."
Lu Yuanqiu stood there smiling, his expression full of fatherly warmth.
Watching the girl walk away with slightly unsteady steps that otherwise seemed fine, he felt reassured. He turned, climbed onto his bicycle, and rode toward home.
Hearing the movement behind her, Bai Qingxia also turned back. She watched Lu Yuanqiu ride away, standing there for a long time.
Only when Lu Yuanqiu disappeared into the crowd on his bike did Bai Qingxia turn around again.
Facing the orange evening clouds on the horizon, she raised a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear. A faint smile rested on her pure, delicate face, bathed golden in the sunset.
The two backpacks, one blue and one pink, gradually headed their separate ways from the gates of Lucheng No. 7 Middle School.
Across the street, vendors' lilting cries advertised flaky pancakes and fried rice cakes, as though their calls gave voice to the quiet beauty of life at that very moment.
"I'm going to study hard!!!"
"I'm going to work my way to the top!!!"
"I'm getting into a Project 985 university!!! Or a Project 211 university!!!"
"I, Lu Yuanqiu, am going to be Lu City's top scorer!"
After returning home, Lu Yuanqiu planted one foot on a stool in the living room, pointed at the ceiling, and shouted these grand declarations to his father, Lu Tian, and his mother, Su Xiaoya.
Listening to her son's roars, his mother clapped adorably.
Lu Tian, seated at the table, merely snorted and spat a sunflower seed shell onto the floor.
Lu Yuanqiu suddenly thought his dad looked a little like Wei Xiang in his younger days, especially with that mocking attitude just now.
Lu Tian looked at Su Xiaoya beside him and said scornfully, "Look at that. Even the kid ranked dead last in his grade likes dreaming impossible dreams. Guess my dream of trampling Bill Gates underfoot and becoming the richest man in the world isn't far off either."
Su Xiaoya slapped Lu Tian's shoulder reproachfully. "Who talks about their own son like that? Can't you encourage him a little?"
"Pfft." Lu Tian snorted again, unconcernedly cracking more sunflower seeds.
Lu Yuanqiu sneered. "Sorry, but I ranked second from last in last semester's finals. I improved."
The sunflower seeds suddenly slipped from Lu Tian's hand. He stared over in shock. "Seriously, son?"
His reaction was understandable. Lu Yuanqiu had held the title of lowest-ranked student in his grade for two straight years.
"Of course. Someone missed the exams, so naturally I came second from last. At the next monthly exam, I won't have to sit in the very last seat of the very last exam room anymore."
The smile froze on Lu Tian's face.
He tossed his sunflower seeds onto the plate. "Damn it. Listening to this brat just wasted another few seconds of my life!"
"Back in my day, I could score thirty-seven on a hundred-point test! And you? You barely get twenty-something out of a hundred and fifty! Each generation's worse than the last, damn it. You didn't inherit a single one of my academic genius genes!"
Lu Yuanqiu fell silent. He seemed to have discovered why he was so bad at studying...
Lu Tian waved a hand. "Forget it. Might as well talk to a brick wall. I'm going to mind the supermarket."
Su Xiaoya looked puzzled. "Isn't Auntie Liu there? What do you need to go for?"
"Her grandson was born, so she quit and went home to look after him," Lu Tian said. "We're short-staffed now."
An idea struck Lu Yuanqiu, and he hurriedly said, "Dad, I know someone who can take over Auntie Liu's job!"
"Who?"
"My classmate."
"A student? What the hell's the use of that?"
Lu Yuanqiu quickly grabbed the little old man and pleaded, "She can watch the supermarket after school in the evenings. Just pay her a little less!"
Lu Tian considered this in silence. "True. If it gets in the way of her studies, you'll have one less competitor in the college entrance exam."
Lu Yuanqiu looked at Lu Tian. Marveling at his dad's bizarre logic, he forced a smile despite his twitching lips and gave him a thumbs-up. "You really see the big picture, Dad. Exactly what I'd expect from an academic genius who scored thirty-seven back in the day!!!"
Lu Tian raised his chin proudly. "Of course!"
Su Xiaoya silently shook her head.
These two were hopeless.
Lu Tian smiled and patted his son's shoulder. "All right. Bring her over for an interview tomorrow. I'm off to the supermarket."
After his father left, Lu Yuanqiu looked around the living room in confusion. "Where's Lu Yidong?"
Su Xiaoya glanced at her daughter's bedroom door. "Your dad and I gave her a scolding just before you came home."
"Why?"
Su Xiaoya lowered her voice. "Your sister's been getting too close to an intellectually disabled man outside No. 65 Middle School lately. Her teacher told us about it. Your dad and I are worried she might get hurt. He may be intellectually disabled, but he's still a man."
Just then, Lu Yidong's bedroom door flew open. The little girl poked her head out and shouted, "Overalls Uncle isn't a bad person!!!"
She stood in the doorway wearing cute pink teddy-bear pajamas, her lips pouting in indignant fury, then immediately shut the door again.
Mother and son stared at each other in the living room.
Only after his mother quietly explained again did Lu Yuanqiu understand.
Apparently, a simple-minded middle-aged man was always wandering around outside his sister's middle school, Lucheng No. 65 Middle School. The students called him an idiot.
But hearing Lu Yidong call him "Overalls Uncle" suddenly brought back a memory.
Lu Yuanqiu had also attended No. 65 Middle School, and that intellectually disabled man had already been wandering around outside the gates back then.
Although simple-minded, the man was handsome and wore clean clothes. His family clearly took good care of him. He also loved wearing a pair of blue overalls, which made for a rather endearing contrast.
However, when Lu Yuanqiu was in middle school, the other students loved bullying Overalls Uncle.
They would throw stones at him, smack him on the back and immediately run away laughing, or surround him in a group and chant mocking rhymes...
Whenever that happened, Overalls Uncle never knew what to do.
Back in middle school.
Lu Yuanqiu couldn't stand it and would step forward to tell them to stop.
But Lu Yuanqiu remembered a girl at his school who hated it even more. Once, she had actually grabbed a broom and charged at the middle school boys bullying him, chasing them away.
At that moment, Lu Yuanqiu thought she was incredibly cool, like a valiant heroine protecting world peace.
However, Lu Yuanqiu didn't know her name. He only remembered that she was thin, with long, messy hair that completely hid her face.
Perhaps because the girl took such good care of him, Overalls Uncle always smiled whenever he saw her. He treated her with the affection he might show his own daughter, sometimes even waving his arms and stamping his feet in delight.
Staring at his sister's bedroom door, Lu Yuanqiu suddenly fell silent.
Back in middle school, there had been a girl who steadfastly protected Overalls Uncle.
Back in middle school, there had been a girl who steadfastly protected Overalls Uncle.
So Overalls Uncle had lost his protector.
So...
Had his sister taken that girl's place, carrying on her sense of justice by choosing to protect Overalls Uncle, who wandered around outside No. 65 Middle School with nothing but a simple, guileless smile?
At that thought, Lu Yuanqiu turned to his mother. "Mom, I think you should find out the whole story before deciding whether to scold her."
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Once again, please keep reading every day! I'll make it up to you with a flood of updates when the novel starts its paid run!