Shen Xingruo returned to the dormitory slightly late because Shi Qin said she had ranked first in the year and wanted to treat her to a late-night snack.
Shen Xingruo hadn’t eaten dinner, and her milk had been taken, so she was a little hungry.
After finishing the late-night snack with Shi Qin, the two of them wandered around the stationery store near the school for a while. When they returned to the dormitory, there was only half an hour left until the lights out.
Li Ting was applying a face mask.
Seeing them enter, Li Ting glanced over but didn’t greet them. She continued to play with her phone, unable to see clearly under the mask what expression she had.
Zhai Jiajing didn’t walk with them today; she said she had a headache and went back to the dormitory early.
By now, she had already put on an eye mask and was lying in bed. It seemed she had already fallen asleep.
The dormitory was quiet for a moment, somewhat eerie.
Originally, Shi Qin had been sitting next to Li Ting, and their relationship had improved quite a bit recently. But today, Shi Qin overheard what Li Ting said to a few girls in class, which she found excessive. So, she couldn’t muster a friendly face and simply ignored her.
Shi Qin and Shen Xingruo took turns to shower.
When Shi Qin finished showering, Li Ting had just taken off her face mask and was washing her face at the sink.
Shi Qin waited for a moment and couldn’t help but ask, “Are you done yet?”
Li Ting replied, “Why are you in such a hurry?”
Shi Qin said, “You’ve been washing for seven or eight minutes already, I’m going to use the towel.”
Li Ting didn’t say anything and continued to splash water on her face slowly.
Shen Xingruo entered the bathroom after Shi Qin finished. At first, she could only hear the two of them whispering, probably because they were afraid of waking Zhai Jiajing.
But halfway through her shower, an argument suddenly erupted outside, and the voices grew louder.
She paused for a moment, then quickly picked up the pace of her shower.
When Shen Xingruo came out of the bathroom, the argument between the two had already escalated into a quarrel —
“You dare to say that about Xingruo in class today, how shameless can you be? What’s wrong with you?!”
“What’s wrong with me? I was just discussing grades with someone. Everyone thought she was doing exceptionally well, but when the grades came out, she didn’t perform as expected. Isn’t it natural for people to talk about it? And isn’t it because she knew her grades were a problem early on but kept quiet and pretended to be good, just to make herself look good and embarrass us for discussing grades? How ridiculous is that?”
“Shi Qin, spare me. You’re quick to curry favor with others, aren’t you? Have you ever taken a good look at yourself? Whose legs have you been clinging to? Do they even give you the time of day?”
“Me, currying favor? Me, ugly?! Li Ting, listen to yourself! Who’s the one always cozying up to those rich girls from Class Three? Who knows better who’s sucking up to whom? Have they ever given you a second glance?”
Shi Qin’s words hit Li Ting right where it hurt.
Li Ting exploded in anger and immediately reached out to grab Shi Qin’s hair, “What nonsense are you spouting?!”
Shi Qin, equally unwilling to back down, blindly clawed forward with both hands.
Shen Xingruo never imagined the two would come to blows. After a moment of shock, she shouted, “Stop fighting!”
No one paid her any attention.
Zhai Jiajing, who was usually good at mediating, lay motionless on her bed, seemingly deep in sleep, completely unaware of the commotion in the dormitory.
Shi Qin and Li Ting had no idea how long they had held onto their grievances against each other. Now, they were fighting fiercely while dredging up past conflicts, and the battleground was expanding.
Shen Xingruo, wearing only a nightgown with her hair still dripping, stood at the bathroom door. She couldn’t move forward and was forced to retreat by the two.
“I told you both to stop fighting—”
Before Shen Xingruo could finish her sentence, Li Ting suddenly got agitated, grabbed a ceramic cup from the sink, and smashed it against the mirror on the washbasin.
With a loud “bang”!
The square mirror, bought with dormitory funds at the beginning of the semester for eighteen yuan, cracked open with several fractures, and the shards flew in all directions.
“Ahh—!”
“Ahh—!”
Shi Qin and Li Ting screamed simultaneously, the sound piercing as any scream from the boutique store near the school entrance.
When they came to their senses, they saw Shen Xingruo standing expressionless at the bathroom door, a small cut on her neck either from the ceramic or the mirror, with tiny drops of blood oozing out.
Both of them turned pale.
At that moment, the dormitory supervisor heard the noise and came over, knocking on the door impatiently. “It’s almost lights out, what’s all this noise about?!”
Li Ting and Shi Qin’s faces turned even paler.
Shen Xingruo felt she had never been so wrong in her life.
Her vision blurred, but she still expressionlessly tore two pieces of paper and temporarily wiped away the bloodstains.
Then, she walked to the dormitory door and opened it.
Shen Xingruo: “Teacher, there’s a mouse in our dormitory.”
The dormitory supervisor frowned subconsciously and leaned back a bit. “Why are you afraid? It’s just a mouse… Alright, don’t be afraid. I’ll inform the head of dormitory management during tomorrow’s meeting, and we’ll arrange for pest control to come.”
Blood began to seep out again. Shen Xingruo calmly adjusted the strap of her nightgown to cover the wound.
“Okay, thank you, teacher.”
After seeing off the dormitory supervisor, Shen Xingruo closed the door behind her.