Chapter 48

The magical weekend was finally over.

Later, Xiao Chen did not contact her, and likewise, Yu Na did not contact him either.

She was even afraid that he would contact her, afraid of the tiny bit of anticipation that was mixed in that fear.

It was like she was crazy.

However, it seemed like she was the only one immersed in this drama queen game, and in the end nothing happened.

Yu Na did not discover that lifetime free pass for a while.

Usually when she had nothing to do, she would just stay in her bedroom.

Everywhere else was useless.

This was the first time she had looked forward to Monday's arrival so much. Only when Monday came could she put aside all her worries and devote herself to work.

After the flag raising ceremony on Monday morning, the class continued with morning reading while Yu Na was busy in the office.

Suddenly there was a knock on the office door.

At first Yu Na did not look up, but she heard a familiar voice - Qiao Rui greeted Wang Li who was in the office with her.

Then he walked straight up to Yu Na.

"Teacher Yu."

"......"

Seeing Qiao Rui, that extreme sense of embarrassment that had been bothering her struck again. She cleared her throat and acted as if nothing had happened.

And Qiao Rui had come to talk about proper business, still holding a notebook in his hand.

"I want to apologize to you."

"What for?"

"I didn't do the dictation homework yesterday."

"Oh?" she asked, "Why?"

"My brother doesn't care about me and lets me do whatever I want."

He looked very innocent, not like he was pretending at all.

When Yu Na heard this, her brain froze for two seconds.

She asked mechanically, "Why, why?"

"I don't know," Qiao Rui said pitifully, "I wanted to study, but he was in a bad mood. From the time he got home until this morning, he had a long face." "......??"

Could it be related to her?

No way...!

Qiao Rui looked around furtively like a thief, leaned in close to Yu Na, and asked in a low voice, "Teacher Yu, were you with my brother on Saturday night?"

If this was a private occasion, Yu Na might have just told him that she and Xiao Chen were university classmates and had known each other for a long time. She just didn't expect to run into him again in this city by chance.

But this was at school, and there were other teachers around, so it was not appropriate to talk about this.

She suppressed her urge to ask about Xiao Chen, and pretended to be stern: "Why do you care so much? Focus on your studies."

"No," Qiao Rui said, "when my brother is in a bad mood, he stops taking care of me!"

Yu Na sighed, took an extra chair from the side and put it next to her, "Sit here, I'll dictate to you so we can make up what we missed yesterday."

Qiao Rui did not fuss like before, and obediently sat next to her to do the dictation.

After the dictation, the other teachers in the office left one after another, leaving only the two of them in the office.

Yu Na carefully checked Qiao Rui's dictation results for him - out of the 30 words, he had gotten 6 wrong. Although the accuracy rate was still not high, compared to last week, it was a significant improvement.

"Not bad," Yu Na drew a big smiling face below his dictation notes, "but keep up the hard work."

She thought Qiao Rui would brag about himself, but he didn't. He took out his English workbook again, "Teacher Yu, there are some fill-in-the-blanks and reading comprehension questions I don't understand, could you please explain them to me?"

Yu Na looked at him amusedly, thinking, is this still the Qiao Rui she knew? How did he grow up overnight?

She patiently explained all of the questions he didn't understand.

After they were done, it was almost time for the first class, so Yu Na picked up her textbooks and USB drive and headed to the classroom with him. On the way, she said, "Maintain your current study momentum in all subjects. With your level, you'll have no problem getting into college."

"For English I can ask you, but for other subjects, especially math--" Qiao Rui's body shuddered, "forget it."

"Why?"

"When my brother is in a good mood he'll tutor me a bit, but when he's in a bad mood he tells me to get lost."

"Your brother is busy with work, ask your teachers, what are teachers for?"

"No way!" Qiao Rui shuddered as he recalled Sun Yan, "she's too scary."

Yu Na tapped Qiao Rui's arm with her book, "watch your language!"

Qiao Rui grinned foolishly and returned to the main topic, "But teacher, what's bothering my brother definitely has nothing to do with work. You don't really know him--he takes everything very lightly. Even if he knew the sky was going to fall tomorrow, he would just wait until tomorrow to talk about it. A typical optimist. So my analysis is that it's because of something else--" as he spoke he gave Yu Na a meaningful look, and slowly added, "maybe lovesickness."

"......"

Qiao Rui grasped onto her like a lifeline, pitifully begging, "Teacher, you have to help me! When my brother is upset, life is hard for me."

Yu Na gave a wry laugh. How could I help?

Was that fickle man of his so easy to appease?

That night, Yu Na was supervising evening self-study in the classroom, staring blankly at her chat window with Xiao Chen.

The input box contained an edited sentence: 【Qiao Rui didn't do his dictation homework yesterday?】

She really regretted that dinner they had.

She was afraid to chat with him, afraid that her messages would remind him of the drunken state he had seen that night. Because she had never lost control of herself in front of anyone before, she always handled things calmly. But she couldn't let it affect the students' studies because of her.

Yu Na closed her eyes, gritted her teeth, and sent off that sentence.

Oh well. Let bygones be bygones. Nobody is nobler than anyone else here!

Even if they had to part ways over this, so be it.

Xiao Chen replied very quickly:

: 【I was too busy yesterday, no time. Will make up for it tonight】

Yu Na: 【No need, he already made it up, but you need to supervise his dictation next weekend. With Qiao Rui's level, memorizing vocabulary is the most critical step to improving his grades】

: 【OK】

"......"

Yu Na tentatively sent another message:【I heard you were in a bad mood......】

:【A little】

Yu Na still sent out that sentence:【Because of me?】

No.

Please no.

But with his personality, he would surely deny it. Xiao Chen was the kind of person who buried things inside and rarely told others his troubles, he digested them himself.

But this guess was immediately proven wrong.

:【What do you think?】

Yu Na: "......"

His ambiguous response made her cheeks burn.

She could even sense Xiao Chen's facial expression through the screen.

Embarrassment mixed with contempt - he was probably cursing her as shameless.

Yu Na knew she was in the wrong, and patiently replied: 【Let me buy you a meal, OK?】

Yu Na: 【To thank you for taking care of me that night】

:【OK】

:【But I've been very busy recently】

Yu Na's heart sank, and she replied:【No problem, find me whenever you have time】

Yu Na: 【But best if it's on the weekend, I'm at the school in the evenings Mon-Thurs】

:【OK】

She thought the matter was settled with that.

The usual and most common way to repay someone was to treat them to a meal - one meal to dissolve ill feelings.

But plans could not keep up with changes, and something unexpected came even faster than this invitation.