Shi Niannian tugged at her sleeve, covering half her hand inside it, and shook her head.
Jiang Wang pressed his lips together without speaking, then laid down to sleep.
Shi Niannian quietly let out a sigh of relief.
The English teacher’s voice was very loud, perfect for dispelling everyone’s drowsiness in the first class of summer, reinvigorating them.
Jiang Wang, sitting beside her, suddenly moved, his eyes remaining closed, and tossed a small square piece onto the desk.
With a small clatter, Shi Niannian stared at it for two seconds.
A hearing aid.
So his ear hadn’t recovered yet. She had thought, as Jiang Ling said, that his hearing had already improved.
“Hey! That boy in the last row! Jiang Wang! Sleeping in the classroom must be uncomfortable. Why don’t you go home to sleep!” The English teacher shouted with her hands on her hips.
The classroom fell completely silent.
No one dared to breathe, afraid of displeasing the school tyrant.
Due to an accident, Jiang Wang’s hearing had severely declined, and without his hearing aid, many sounds were muffled.
There was a hissing noise in his eardrums. He frowned slightly, then felt his sleeve being gently pulled outward twice.
At first, he ignored it, but then it was pulled again, this time three times.
When he opened his eyes, he saw his little desk mate with her wrists resting on the edge of the desk, her slender, fair fingers carefully tugging at his clothes.
She was quite close.
He could see the transparent peach fuzz on her face, as well as a light brown mole on the left side of her nose bridge, and her naturally curled eyelashes.
He raised an eyebrow.
Shi Niannian bent her index finger, pointing at the lectern.
The young man unhurriedly sat up, the chair legs scraping against the floor, lazily leaning against the backrest.
The side of his face had a faint mark pressed into it.
The English teacher was very brave. The moment Jiang Wang sat up, she gave him a loud round of applause: “Well! How did you find our school’s desk for sleeping? Would you like to buy one to take home?”
As she spoke, she didn’t stop clapping, and tried to get everyone to join in: “Come on! Let’s all give Jiang Wang a round of applause!”
No one below dared to clap along. Although they had recovered from their initial shock and fear, they were all suffering from holding back their laughter.
The English teacher was not satisfied with failing to get everyone involved, and her encouraging gaze turned to Shi Niannian.
Shi Niannian looked up, and their eyes met.
“…”
The English teacher raised her hand, making a “please” gesture: “Come on, give your desk mate a round of applause.”
Shi Niannian glanced to the side; he wasn’t looking at her.
She sighed softly, pulled her hands out of her oversized school uniform sleeves, and clapped twice.
In the quiet classroom, besides the applause from the lectern, another round of clapping sounded from the corner of the classroom.
Finally, someone couldn’t hold it anymore and burst out laughing. Laughter spread quickly, and soon the whole class was laughing uproariously, and even the English teacher couldn’t help but laugh.
After Jiang Wang sat up, he leaned against the chair without moving, not reacting no matter how excited the English teacher was on the podium. Only when the faint applause came from beside him did he slightly open his eyes.
Expressionlessly, he turned to look.
The girl seemed quite surprised to see him turn his head, her two hands frozen in mid-air.
Jiang Wang looked into her eyes.
He could see the question in her eyes: Why can you hear?
After a pause of two seconds.
Jiang Wang laughed softly.
He probably hadn’t fully woken up; his laugh was lazy, rumbling from his throat, with a hint of weariness in the trailing sound, making one’s ears tingle.
Inexplicably alluring.
“I didn’t expect Jiang Wang to have such a good temper.”
During the afternoon PE class, with the sports meet just half a month away, after warming up, everyone was allowed to practice freely for their registered events.
Jiang Ling sat with Shi Niannian on the shaded stands.
A bottle of ice water sat by their feet, water droplets evaporating, falling in a line, drawing a circle on the cement ground.
“During English class, when you applauded him, I thought he was going to get angry,” Jiang Ling said. “But he smiled.”
She clicked her tongue, cupping her face, “And smiled so charmingly, I’m dying.”
Shi Niannian opened her mouth but didn’t know what to say.
Nearby, Xu Fei called out in a direction: “Jiang Wang! Want to play basketball with us?”
Jiang Wang walked out of the gymnasium, apparently having just washed his face, his collar also wet, raising his hand to catch the basketball Xu Fei threw to him.