The old monk had finished making lunch and called He Yuenan and Cheng Chang to the kitchen out back to eat.
Worried about Cheng Chang’s heart condition, he’d barely put any salt in at all—by the time the meal was over, the food was so bland it was almost painful.
Cheng Chang, though, wasn’t picky. After every one of his heart surgeries, he’d eaten more than his fair share of flavorless hospital meals.
He Yuenan, remembering that the first class of the afternoon was Cheng Chang’s English lesson, wolfed down a couple of bites, then fetched him the textbook. “Do you want to prepare the lesson first? Elementary English these days is really hard—they’re already learning tenses, and the vocabulary isn’t simple either. Look,” he flipped to a page and pointed, “these words are so long. I gave English back to my teacher the moment I passed my college exams. Reading this textbook without preparing feels like reading heavenly script to me.”
He checked his watch and clicked his tongue. “Only ten minutes till class. If you don’t have enough time, I can have the students start a little late—we’re pretty flexible about class times here.”
Cheng Chang took the English book and flipped through a few pages at random. It was just the past continuous tense—the words were long, but common enough. “No need,” he said. “I’ll just get a glass of water. Class starts on time.”
With that, he put his bowl in the sink and headed toward the office.
He Yuenan: “…”
The old monk was rolling up his sleeves to wash dishes when He Yuenan walked over and said, “I think I’ve just been insulted.”
The old monk said, “His mere existence is an all-around insult to you. Forget it, just remember he has a heart condition.”
He Yuenan gritted his teeth. “Fine. Forget it.”
He washed his hands, went out to the little playground, gathered the students from both classes, and led them up to the large classroom on the second floor. In a bright, rousing voice, he announced, “Class, today Teacher He has invited a new English teacher for you—”
Someone raised a hand. “Is it that really handsome guy who came to find Teacher He this morning?”
“We saw him on the playground earlier!”
“So good-looking, like a celebrity.”
“No, even more handsome than a celebrity!”
He Yuenan: “…”
The smile slowly faded from his face. He held it in, took a deep breath, and forced his mouth back into a bright grin. “So then, let’s welcome our new teacher, Teacher Cheng—”
Cheng Chang walked in from outside the classroom and stepped up to the podium. “Hello, everyone.”
The response from below started with a dazzled “Wow—” before scattering into an eager chorus of “Hello, Teacher!”
Cheng Chang smiled slightly. “My surname is Cheng. You can call me Teacher Cheng, or just ‘Cheng’ is fine.” He turned and wrote his surname on the blackboard.
Back in university, Cheng Chang had worked as a substitute teacher at primary and secondary schools, and later, studying abroad, he’d had to give a presentation nearly every tutorial session—he was well-practiced at explaining things clearly and systematically.
He Yuenan had originally planned to stand at the back of the classroom in case Cheng Chang needed help. But the longer he listened to the lesson, the more demoralized he became, until he slumped out of the classroom to go find the old monk.
He circled around but couldn’t find the old monk anywhere, until the smell of cooking oil led him to the kitchen, where he discovered the old monk had lit the stove fire again.
“What are you doing?” He Yuenan asked.
The old monk tossed a freshly kneaded dough round into the sizzling oil. “Saw you had flour, thought I’d fry up some flatbread.”
He tilted his chin toward the school building in the distance. “Who knows how much salt someone with a heart condition can handle—I didn’t dare put any in. Barely ate a few bites of lunch, my mouth’s gone completely bland.”
He Yuenan squatted down beside him. “Fry me one too, then. I’m about to starve.”
“You’re not used to such bland food either?”
“That’s not it.” He Yuenan said dejectedly. “He’s just too good-looking. Sat right across from me at lunch—I couldn’t help sneaking glances, nearly gave myself a heart attack. Couldn’t eat a bite.”
The old monk finished a flatbread and handed one to He Yuenan, then squatted down beside him to eat. “Not just handsome—rich too. He drives a top-spec G-Wagon. You know the G-Wagon?”
“I know it. Real flashy car.”
“Right. That police officer I filed the report with, he said afterward it was lucky the man was driving a G-Wagon—sliding down that slope, if it’d been some ordinary car, it probably would’ve been totaled, and he might not have made it out alive.”
The two men exchanged a look and sighed in unison.
After a moment, He Yuenan said, “Next time we help someone, let’s try not to pick one this handsome.”
“Handsome or not doesn’t matter. The key is he shouldn’t be this rich.”
“We really should look after our own feelings a bit, right?”
“Right.”
“The psychological damage is just too much.”
“Absolutely unbearable.”
A class period lasted forty minutes, and Cheng Chang finished quickly. During the break, not seeing the old monk or He Yuenan, he went back to the office, poured himself a cup of water, and sat on a chair outside, watching the students play.
A few girls of about eight or nine waved toward someone behind him and called out, “Xixi, come play!”
Hearing the name, Cheng Chang paused and turned to look, finding a little girl standing timidly at the top of the stairs, holding a book.
He’d already noticed her when class began—small in stature, with unusually clear eyes, listening with total focus. When he’d called on her to answer a question, her English pronunciation had turned out surprisingly precise.
Meeting his gaze, she gathered her courage and stepped forward, asking timidly, “Teacher Cheng, do you also teach Chinese?”
Teaching resources in the mountain areas were thin, and a volunteer teacher often had to cover every subject.
Cheng Chang asked, “What is it?”
“Can I ask you something?”
She held the book out to him. “I don’t understand this Tang poem.”
Cheng Chang glanced at it—it was Xin Qiji’s “Green Jade Cup: Lantern Festival Night.” He said gently, “This isn’t a Tang poem. It’s a Song ci.”
Children her age often mistook every classical verse for a Tang poem.
The little girl looked at him earnestly, and though she seemed only half sure she understood, she nodded. “Got it. It’s a Song ci.”
Her eyes were clear and bright. Watching her, Cheng Chang asked, “I heard them calling you Xixi—which character is it?”
“The xi in ‘stream.'”
Cheng Chang made a soft sound of acknowledgment and took the book from her, flipping through a few pages. There wasn’t a single annotation in it.
Checking the inside cover, he saw it was a collection of Song ci poetry published sometime in the nineties—very old, likely picked up at a secondhand book market, or donated by someone who no longer wanted it.
He said nothing about it, just asked, “Which line don’t you understand?”
“All of it,” Xixi admitted, still a little shy. “I just saw there was a little star drawn next to the title, and thought it looked pretty, so I wanted to ask you about it.”
“The star’s probably there because this is one of Xin Qiji’s most famous works,” Cheng Chang said. “‘Green Jade Cup’ is the name of the tune pattern. ‘Lantern Festival’…”
He paused. “The fifteenth of the first lunar month—in ancient times it was called the Shangyuan Festival, now it’s the Lantern Festival.”
“The one where you eat rice balls.”
Cheng Chang nodded. “This poem is very famous. The first part describes what one sees and hears at the Lantern Festival—early spring night, fireworks bursting overhead, a whole sky of lantern-light like falling rain. On this festive night, the poet crosses paths with a young woman…”
“In the last line, he searches for her in the crowd, over and over, a thousand times, unable to find her—then suddenly turns his head, and there she is, standing in the dimmest, most sparsely lit corner.”
Cheng Chang’s manner was usually reserved, but as he said this, an unexpected note of old, distant coolness seemed to settle over his brow—as though, dressed in plain robes with his hair bound up, he might have stepped straight out of some ancient painting, a noble young scholar of refined bearing.
Xixi looked at him, unable to help feeling drawn in, and asked, “Teacher Cheng, are the lanterns at the Lantern Festival really beautiful?”
Cheng Chang paused for a moment, then smiled quietly and nodded. “Yes. Beautiful. Just like the poem describes. I’ve seen them. I loved it.”
Something unsettled stirred in his chest, but he didn’t dwell on it. After a moment, he went on, “What I just explained is only the surface meaning of the poem. Later on, the famous scholar Wang Guowei, in his ‘Poetic Remarks in the Human World,’ divided the lives of people who accomplish great things throughout history into three stages. The final stage is exactly this line—’I searched for her among the crowd a thousand times; suddenly turning back, there she was, in the dimmest corner where the lanterns fade.’ The ‘her’ in that line might not refer to another person at all—it might refer to oneself, to a different state of being.”
Seeing her look utterly lost, he smiled. “Chinese culture runs deep. You’ll understand someday.” He handed the book back to her. “Do you like reading?”
“I do.”
She asked, “If I have more questions, can I come ask Teacher Cheng again in the future?”
“You can,” Cheng Chang said. “Go play during the break. Remember to balance work and rest.”
“Okay.” Xixi nodded, carefully put the book away in the classroom, and went off to play.
Cheng Chang sat in silence for a while, then, as if remembering something, took out his phone.
He Yuenan, having finished his flatbread at some point, came over and stood beside him. “Was that Lu Xi just now, asking you about the Song ci?”
Cheng Chang made a soft sound. “You know about it?”
“The kids who study here mostly come from poor families. That Lu Xi, she’s had it especially hard. Her father died in a construction accident years back, and her grandmother’s seriously ill. With no money at home, her mother had to go work in Guangzhou—she might not make it back even once a year. The girl’s usually home alone with her grandmother, and young as she is, she’s already had to learn to care for a sick grandmother by herself. That’s why she loves reading so much—says she wants to study hard, make good money, take her grandmother to Guangzhou for treatment, and live with her mother. That Song ci collection was a gift from her mother when she came home last year. She still can’t fully understand it, but she reads it every day anyway.”
Cheng Chang said, “She misses her mother. No one can replace a parent’s role while a child is growing up.”
“Last time a batch of donated supplies came in, she got lucky and won a repeater tape recorder in the drawing. She treasures it like anything, carries it with her every day, practices her English with it.”
“No wonder her pronunciation was so precise when I called on her earlier,” Cheng Chang said. “By the way, what’s your phone number?”
He Yuenan immediately looked wary. “What are you planning?”
“I ordered some books online. They’ll arrive in a few days,” Cheng Chang said. “I want to set up a little reading corner for them—at least give them some annotated poetry collections to read.”
He Yuenan blinked, then honestly gave him his number.
Cheng Chang typed it in and put the phone in his pocket. “All right. I’ll call you when the delivery comes in a few days.”
He Yuenan looked at him for a moment, then said, “I think I’m starting to understand why the bodhisattva looks out for you.”
Cheng Chang raised an eyebrow.
“‘When poor, cultivate yourself alone; when successful, benefit the whole world.’ Teacher Cheng has a real humanitarian streak.”
He Yuenan checked his watch—time for the second period. Another volunteer teacher was off this week, so the two classes usually studied together. He called the students together and led them up to the second-floor classroom.
Cheng Chang sat quietly for a while, then, just as he was about to head back to the office, his phone buzzed several times in a row in his pocket.
Thinking it might be an issue with his book order, he pulled it out and found a voice message on WeChat from Liao Zhuo.
She’d already sent several messages before this, and had even called once, but Cheng Chang had been talking with He Yuenan and hadn’t noticed.
He tapped open the latest one. Liao Zhuo’s voice was frantic. “Forget it, there’s no time—give me your address, I’ll tell the police, get out of there now!”