Having been punished to stand outside twice on his very first day of school, Chen Ge's name spread across the campus in no time.
He stood at the classroom door with his bag in hand, watching the students who passed by — and they were all watching him right back.
"Chang Wenyu really didn't make this task easy. Every single student here looks like something's off about them."
The bell rang. Teacher Liu still hadn't returned, so Chen Ge obediently went back into the classroom.
He took the chair from the second student he'd knocked unconscious and placed it at his own desk, then sat down comfortably.
A new teacher began the lesson. Chen Ge paid no attention. He pulled a pen and paper from his bag and started thinking about how to find the children who qualified to become door-openers.
He was deep in thought when a small slip of paper suddenly appeared on his desk from the neighboring seat. On it were just two brief words — thank you.
Chen Ge was somewhat surprised. In his mind, the blood-red world behind the doors was nothing but despair and negative emotions. People here shouldn't be the type to say "thank you."
"Thank me for what? You got hassled because of me, so of course I had to step in. It was only right." Chen Ge turned to say this to his deskmate, Da Bing, but Da Bing didn't dare respond. He held his position motionlessly, making it look as though Chen Ge were simply talking to himself with no interaction between them at all.
"Are you scared?" Chen Ge knew what was weighing on Da Bing's mind.
"I'm sorry." A long while later, Da Bing passed over another slip of paper.
This time Chen Ge was smarter. He took his pen and wrote a few lines on the back of the note.
"It's fine. They went too far, and I couldn't stand watching it."
He handed the note back. After reading it, Da Bing picked up his pen again and wrote: "Me too. But I don't dare fight back. I don't have any friends, nobody speaks up for me, the teachers only care about grades, and I'm not very smart."
Between the lines of Da Bing's note, helplessness seeped through.
"Now you've got a friend. My name's Chen Ge. What's yours?"
"Li Bing. Because there's a 'bing' character in my name, and my face is big and round, they all call me Da Bing — Big Flatbread."
"Got it. I'll remember that."
"Chen Ge, I'm sorry about just now. I should have stood up. But I was really scared. Do you think I'm a total coward too?"
"Nobody is born strong. Besides, a person's character and way of thinking are highly malleable — it's a kind of adaptability to society and the environment you live in. I know you're actually trying hard, too." Chen Ge handed the note to Da Bing. A moment later, he took out a fresh slip of paper and wrote a sentence on the front: "Can you tell me about your past?"
Chen Ge suspected Li Bing might be one of the people he was looking for, so he began to probe.
"What do you mean, specifically?"
"About you — and about the other people in this class. When did they start bullying you?"
Reading the note, Li Bing hesitated for a long time before picking up his pen. He wrote a lengthy paragraph and passed it over.
"My real situation isn't what they say it is. My parents love me very much, so the things they say don't actually hurt me. In my eyes, they're just a bunch of devils who love picking at other people's scars. They build their happiness on other people's misery. As long as you put up with it, it'll pass. After all, there are still teachers here, and they wouldn't dare go too far. Chen Ge, I'd advise you to try not to clash with them in the future either. They've got their own little clique, and the guy you knocked out seems to know some gangsters outside of school."
The contents of the note left a bitter taste in Chen Ge's chest. The one being bullied had already lost the courage to resist, thinking only of escape. Perhaps deep down, they believed they would grow up someday, that they would leave this place eventually — so all they had to do was endure a little longer.