Chapter 6 Taking Without Prior Notice Is Stealing
Ding-a-ling... The bell rang. The second class was Chinese.
The Chinese teacher's surname was Liao, a short fat middle-aged man. He had a good sense of humor and liked to quote classic authors in class, so Alina quite liked his class. Students were obviously more enthusiastic about Chinese than mathematics.
The class flew by in a happy and relaxing atmosphere.
Generally, after the second class, it was for morning exercise. Alina didn't know if it was the same in the novel.
Bong! Bong! Bong... Bong! Bong! Bong...
A smile appeared on Alina's face as she heard the familiar music.
As the music started, students in her classroom began to walk towards the door. Alina stood up and turned to her desk-mate, "let's go, shall we?"
Yana was still angry with Alina's prank, so she refused relentlessly. "No!" she said.
Well, Alina wanted to find a guide, but since Yana didn't want to show her the way, she decided to follow her classmates.
The morning exercises were on the campus playground. All students in the classrooms rushed to the stairs, which became overcrowded all at once.
Alina followed her classmates closely to the playground.
When students arrived at the playground, those who came from the same class stood consciously together and boys and girls stood separately in two straight lines. Alina was behind a girl in the middle of the queue.
"The ninth set of morning exercises begin. The first section, stretch..."
A student was demonstrating on the stage. Alina followed earnestly.
When morning exercises finished, Alina felt very comfortable.
With the teacher saying "dissolve", the crowd returned back to the classrooms. Seeing so many people packed together, Alina decided to wait for a while and go upstairs later.
She stood under a tree besides the teaching building. The warm breeze was blowing, she felt cozy and relaxed.
Hand in hand, two girls passed by and glanced at Alina quickly, whispering
"See? She is THE Alaina!"
"Really? She's not that pretty. How can she be confident..." She couldn't hear what they said next.
After the two girls, some more girls made a detour intentionally to pass by Alina.
Alina pretended that she didn't notice and kept enjoying the view. 'After all, it won't hurt!' she thought.
The corridor was almost empty. She let out a sigh of relief and walked into the teaching building.
Before she approached the door of the classroom, she heard noises coming from inside.
A boy, short and thin, held up a piece of paper and read it with a grin. His classmates all burst into laughter upon hearing his words.
The paper in the boy's hand looked a little familiar to Alina. With a poker face, she walked into the classroom.
"You didn't know. I often peeked at you and my heart beat fast every time I looked at you..."
Seeing Alina coming in, the boy stopped reading with a guilty conscience. The other students looked at each other nervously, and then fixed their eyes on Alina, waiting for her response. Alina thought she might be wrong at first, but the other students' reaction told her that the paper in the boy's hand was exactly the love letter she put on the desk.
Well, being stared by so many classmates, she probably should say something, or else they might feel disappointed.
The boy stood stiffly on the stage and looked uneasily at Alina.
When Alina met his eyes, a slight smile appeared on her lips. She said, "Take something without prior notice is stealing. Do you think you can steal from your classmates without accusation?" Hearing himself was accused of stealing, the boy's face turned red in embarrassment. He thought it would be funny, so with the support of his friends, he took Alina's love letter secretly and read it on the stage. Now being confronted and questioned by Alina, the boy was so embarrassed.
However, teenagers usually have a strong sense of self-esteem. Even though they know they are wrong, they won't apologize, especially to a girl publicly.
"Although this love letter is written by you, the receiver is Leo. What's the problem of reading it out loud? Leo didn't reject!" The more he spoke, the more he thought it was a piece of cake. He gradually calmed down.
Hearing this, Alina couldn't help laughing, "This classmate, did you forget to bring your eyes, ears and brain with you today? Yes, I wrote this letter to Leo, but he gave it back to me before class this morning. S this letter has nothing to do with him now.
"1
Alina paused for a while and continued, "without my permission, you stole my letter and used it to make fun of me, have you considered your behavior might hurt me?"
The boy's face blushed scarlet. He wanted to retort, but couldn't find a word. After all, he was wrong.
"Eddie just read your love letter. How much harm can it cause? By the way, you even committed suicide for Joseph in Class 125, this prank is nothing to you. "Cary was a friend of Eddie. He saw Eddie was humiliated by Alina in front of the whole class, he couldn't help jumping out to rescue his pal.
Hearing this, the other students became excited again. They had heard of the rumor and gossiped about it for days, but no one dared to ask Alina whether it was true or not.
Now that Cary asked recklessly the question everyone wanted to know, the other students were willing to hear the answer. They all held their breath and waiting eagerly.
Alina was speechless and amused. How came it couldn't hurt her? Besides, "when did I commit suicide for that Joseph? Who told you that? Why didn't I know?" "Everyone fresh students in our high school knew it! You committed suicide and were sent to the hospital." Cary shouted.
Alina replied, sounding a bit frustrated, "Who said that I was hospitalized because I committed suicide? I fell down stairs by accident at night and lived in the hospital for a few days. Who started the rumor? He must be insane! "
No wonder she was following by strange looks since she entered the school today.
"The rumor was not true?!" One of the classmates asked in disbelief.
"Why should I commit suicide for him? I'm young and attractive. I have a rich and loving family. Besides, I have a cute desk mate. Why would I commit suicide for someone else? He is neither handsome nor talented. I would not give up my wonderful life for an ordinary boy!"
The students looked at each other and said nothing. It sounded reasonable.
The third class was English. For Class 126, their English teacher was Mr. Su, their head teacher.
Mr. Su arrived at the classroom two minutes earlier, so he heard Alina talking about life. He secretly agreed with her and spoke for her, "Alaina are right. There are rumors about her coming from nowhere. She asked for a leave because she fell down stairs by accident. I called her parents for confirmation. If you are still not convinced, I have a medical certificate."
Just at that time, the bell rang.
Hearing what the head teacher had said, the students finally realized that they misunderstood Alaina.
Then all her classmates looked at her apologetically.
As soon as the head teacher finished speaking, Eddie dropped the letter and fled back to his seat.
Alina smiled gratefully to her teacher, picked up the letter and walked slowly to her seat.
As soon as she walked to the seat, the bell suddenly stopped. Seeing her coming, Yana looked away awkwardly.
When Eddie searched for the love letter on Alaina's desk, she was right there, but she didn't stop him.
"Ok, our English class begin. Please take out your notebooks, we are going to dictate words in Unit Seven." The second bell was still ringing, the head teacher was already impatient. "Oh, my God! Dictation again?!"
"I can't remember any of them. How about we copy them from the book secretly?"
"Go ahead if you want. I dare not to take the risk!"
"Coward!"
Because they were sitting closely to each other, Alina clearly heard the conversation between the boys sitting behind. She just shook her head with a smile and took out a draft book and a pen. She quickly found the word list in Unit Seven and started to memorize them in her mind.
She did go over English, but had not reviewed Unit seven yet, so she had to make some effort at the last moment.
Ding-a-ling... The bell rang for the second time.
"Put away your English books. Let's start words dictation..."
In total, Mr. Su dictated eighteen words. Alina managed to wrote out fourteen ones, and she was not quite sure about the rest.
"Well, everyone please hand in your notebook to the group leader who will correct your dictation. You should copy those wrong words for 20 times each and let the group leader check again before school is over tomorrow. Are you clear?"
"Yes," answered the students unwillingly.
Alina didn't know who the group leader was, so she waited to see who the other students handed their homework to.
Although the punishment was simple and harsh, it was actually very useful. As the saying goes, good memory was not as reliable as written script, which could deepen memory.
"Have you all handed your notebooks over to the group leader? If yes, we'll start our class. Ok, boys and girls, let's begin our class."
With a master's degree, Mr. Su's English pronunciations were very standard. Even though Alina understood most of the content, she still listened very carefully.
When the bell rang, Alina stretched herself out. The fourth class was history, which she was not quite interested in.
During the ten minutes' break, Alina intended to go to the washroom. Because she didn't know the location, she turned to Yana and said "would you like to go to the washroom with me?"
For girls, going to the washroom together during school days meant they were good friends.
Alaina hadn't asked her to go to the washroom before, so Yana was about to refuse her without consideration. However, when she thought of the love letter, she changed her mind and said "okay". A big smile crept up on Alina's face. 'Great! Now I don't have to worry the location!' she thought happily.
They walked out of the classroom one after the other. As soon as they walked out, Alina slowed down and let Yana walked in front.
They went downstairs from the third floor to the first, then they walked to the back of the teaching building. There was a separate building, the washroom was right there.
Smelling the unique smell of the washroom, Alina felt lucky that she had invited Yana to come with her. Otherwise, it was impossible for her to find the washroom by herself before the next class began. The washroom was divided into several compartments. Alina found an empty one and got in. As soon as she took off her pants, she heard someone speaking.
"Linda, have you heard of the rumor about Alaina, the girl in Class M?"
"I don't know. What has happened?"
"I heard that she committed suicide a few days ago."
"What? seriously? Why did she commit suicide?"
"I heard that it was because of Joseph of Class 125, the handsome boy..."
"Ah! Is she all right?"
"It's okay. She survived. She came to school today. I saw her doing morning exercises."
"Well, the students in Class M are really idle. We've been exhausted from studying all day long, but they are still in the mood to have a romantic relationship. They are really different from us!"
"Of course, they are losers, being enrolled through the back door. We got the qualification, relying on our sound ability. It's completely different."
'It turns out that I am in a class of underachievers. No wonder that I don't feel like studying in a key middle school, ' thought Alina as she put on her pants.
She pressed the switch, opened the door and walked out.
The wash basin was at the entrance of the washroom. When Alina finished washing her hands, she didn't see Yana coming out, so she waited for her at the gate.
Soon, sounds of flush came out of the washroom. Alina looked sideways and saw three girls whom she didn't know.
The girl in front saw Alina, she was stunned at first and looked away quickly. The girl turned on the tap, washed her hands and glanced at Alina from the corner of her eyes.
'It must be them talking about me just now,' thought Alina. She glanced at them quickly and then looked away.
The three girls quickly washed their hands and passed by Alina. As soon as they walked out of the washroom, they leaned against each other. One of them even looked back.
Why hadn't Yana come out yet? Alina took a look at her watch. There were only two minutes left before the bell rang.
"Yana, Yana, are you still in the washroom?" Alina went inside and asked loudly.
After a long while, there was no reply. Just when Alina thought that there was no one in the washroom and was about to leave, there was a faint voice coming from a compartment behind her. "... I'm here. " With a relief, Alina asked, "what are you doing inside? Did you forget to bring tissues? Or are you ill?"
Inside the compartment, Yana's face was pale. She tried to support herself with one of her hands on the wooden wall. She was about to faint.
"I'm...fine. I'm just...having my period."☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐☐