Pandora’s Box

Please READ disclaimer: My mandarin is absolutely terrible so this is mostly machine translated. I will try my best to keep the story as close to the original text as possible. If there are slight discrepancies, it is to make sense of the language gap and make it readable. This is by no means near sufficient compared to any translations taking place or is this meant to replace it. I simply really like this story and would like to share this. I am not a writer so my apologies in advance if there are grammatical errors. I’m a lone soldier here.

Before heading to bed, I sorted out my schoolbag and found a linear algebra notebook inside. I briefly glanced inside during the day, but I decided to take it out and inspect it a bit more carefully. The more I read, the more impressed I was with it.

This great class re-taker was not only good at recording notes, but also condensing and summarizing key points. I wasn’t able to understand anything during class today, but after reading through his notes, I was able to somewhat understand it.

Because I had a laissez-faire approach as a student (lazy), taking these classes for granted, I hardly ever worked hard and failed all subjects. If you didn’t put in any effort, you were doomed to fail. Therefore, failing would not cause major disappointments.

However, this big boss was different from me. From just his notes alone, it was apparent that even though he was a terrible student, he was a seriously studious student. Yet, if he was that serious about his studies, did he really failed his exams?

It turned out that diligent people did exist in this world who could not study very well.

Sympathetically, even though he looked like this brilliant, ice cold, blooming flower of intelligence, it was such a pity that his brain did not reflect that.

But even this individual could still be admitted to T University! I didn’t know what lengths he had to go through! With this thought in mind, I couldn’t help but to respect his efforts.

Because there was a chance that I would bump into the class re-taker, I had a bit more motivation to attend class. However, I realized that his attendance was rather inconsistent – of course, it couldn’t simply be due to only luck for one to fail every single class.

In the same course, he would make his appearance in some classes, and absent in other times. It was unpredictable.

In today’s English lecture, I finally saw him. This time, he arrived before me and sat firmly in the last row.

This was a tacit understanding of unserious students.

I rushed into the classroom and sat down beside him.

“Morning.”

He glanced over at me and gently replied, “Morning.” Then he closed the Surface Pro Tablet in front of him. He was furiously typing before I came over.

I felt that this Great Class Re-taker was a person who paid particular attention to time management. Sometimes when I was bored, I would play with my mobile phone, scrolling through Weibo, WeChat Moments, Tiktok, and Zhihu. On the other hand, I hardly ever see him do these time wasting activities.

He always brought his notebook and his Surface Pro Tablet, writing or scribbling quietly during class. Sometimes, he would poke me twice with a pen to wake me up and chatted with me only for a brief moment after class.

I asked, “You already bring a tablet with you. Why do you have to write in your paper notebook? Isn’t it troublesome?”

He replied, “For things that should be written down, it’s more practical to use paper and pen.”

“You’re quite traditional.”

He agreed, “Yeah.” “Tradition is good, tradition is virtuous,” I praised sincerely, “and your words are written beautifully.”

He looked at me and said, “Thank you.”

This great class re-taker had an obvious shortcoming; he was not good at carrying conversations. He was reserved and could only talk about various topics, if must. However, this didn’t bother me. My strengths consisted of nonsensical things, in which was enough to fill in the gaps when we got along.

“You didn’t come to class yesterday.”

“Well,” he said regrettably, “I had to do something yesterday so I really couldn’t attend.”

I insisted, “You seem to really be busy.”

“Well,” he responded, “Just a bit.”

“What are you busy with? Is it something I can help you with?”

“I had to finish up work.”

“Work-study program?”

He slightly smiled at that, “Well, there are not enough people in my family so I help out with some duties and exert myself. I also have a salary.”

He said this casually, as if he was simply helping out by cutting vegetables for a small restaurant opened up by his family to greet customers. I could not imagine him holding a plate since his temperament didn’t seem suitable for this role.

No wonder he studied so hard even though he re-took the class. He was essentially working and studying part-time. I had more questions to pry, but the bell rang and our conversation was halted.

I was peeking at him every now and then during class, but it didn’t mean anything special. I was curious. He was very quiet, refined, clean, fresh, very… Anyway, he was very different from everyone else here. Especially me.

“Lin Jing.”

“…” Who was I =.=

Professors always called out on me by asking questions whenever I was distracted. Before I could ever elicit a rescue signal, the great class re-taker had already pushed over his notebook over stealthily and pointed to the passage.

Wow, he neatly took notes and emphasized on key points with various highlighted colors! He was definitely worthy of being the king of re-takers!

I followed the tip of his pen’s guidance, reading along and stumbling in the process. This was really difficult for me. Even if I could see the words clearly, I was not able to read it well. I could only rely on my imagination to finish reading it.

My impromptu response obviously amused the professor and classmates, causing everyone to burst up in laughter. On the bright side, it was considered a talent to be able to read and create an impromptu response at the same time.

As soon as I sat down, I lowered my voice and quietly asked, “How was my reading skills?”

He thought for a moment and commented, “It’s very unique.”

“Then how many points will you give me?”

He obviously did not want to talk during class, but he still replied honestly, “5 points.”

I was flattered at first. Then, I thought for a moment before asking doubtfully, “What is the full score? 10 points?”

He lightly responded, “100 points.”

“…”

Well, I was embarrassed on behalf of my friends in Los Angeles.

After class, I tried to find topics to talk to him again, “Your English is pretty good?”

He said, “It’s okay.”

Was it okay? He was not humble when he was the great leader of class re-takers.

“Then why don’t you read the paragraph just now and correct me?”

He glanced at me but didn’t refuse. He gently turned the pages of the book with his long fingers, reading in a low volume.

When he read, I was stunned.

With my knowledge level, I couldn’t comment whether or not his accent was native. I could only conclude that he sounded comfortable and pleasant when reading, making me feel like I was watching the Discovery Channel.

I blankly stared at him.

“What’s wrong?”

I clapped my hands.

“…”

“More than okay,” I said, “You sound like those hosts broadcasting on TV.”

“Thank you.”

“Then, how about it,” I asked tentatively, “When you’re free, will you help me by tutoring me?”

He thought about it for a moment, then nodded, “Alright.”

Having a class re-taking student help me, a junior student, was a backwards way of tutoring. It was daring for him to teach and daring for me to learn.

“Wow, brother, you’re such an honestly good person,” I complimented while the iron was still hot, “Then let me pay my respects to this great teacher first. It’s better for you to choose a time. If you are free, let me treat you to a meal.”

He was stunned. He slightly raised his wrist to quickly look at his watch, and immediately retracted it back into the shirt’s sleeve.

I thought this action looked rather interesting. Nowadays, people would normally use their mobile phones to check the time. Boys of this age would only wear an expensive watch to only display their wealth. The display of time seemed to be the most useless function of the watch.

He was acting like such a grown up, displaying habits of old-fashioned adults.

After hesitating briefly, he said, “Okay.”

“Good, let’s go. There’s a lot of food in the nearby shopping mall.”

He replied with an “Um,” and picked up his schoolbag, standing up.

This was the first time I walked side by side with him, and noticed that he was really tall. I wasn’t short amongst southerners with a height of 175 centimeters, but he was at least half a head taller than me. He had good posture and his legs were long. He was also wearing a long coat, emphasizing his tall stature.

Entering the mall, I looked at the restaurant sign upstairs and downstairs, asking “What would you like to eat? Chose whatever you want.”

I was a little worried when I announced that arrogantly. Although I could not see the model of his watch, brand of his attire, or logo of his backpack, I could distinguish luxury brands from not based on their quality and build. After all, I had been around these circles many times before.

Based on this, I deduced that his financial condition was not poor, but my current finances were very limited. In WeChat, I only had 400 yuan sent to me by DV, and some extra change left. I figured that if I didn’t have enough, I would temporarily borrow additional money from DV and he would be fine with it.

He said, “I can eat anything.” I tightened my back.

When inviting someone out to eat, I was most afraid of responses like “Whatever” or “Anything to eat is fine.” No request was the hardest request.

As my face soured, he immediately changed his tone, “Or hot pot. What do you think?”

I couldn’t help but think to myself how considerate and sharp he was to my situation.

“Well, it’s best to eat hot pot in the winter.” I looked around and suggested, “What about Chaoshan Beef Pot?” If had been as rich as I was in the past, I would have invited him to Wagyu hot pot and order the Wagyu all-you-can-eat meal set for 1500 yuan per person. Now, we had to adjust from Wagyu to a lower quality cow.

I did not meant that Chao Niu was bad however.