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The sound quality of the little bee amplifier wasn’t very good; there was a faint crackling static. And yet, the English teacher loved using it the most. However, when the amplifier was held up to Zhou Linxiao’s mouth, his voice was rather deep, his speaking pace not fast, and when he spoke English there was neither over-enunciation nor swallowed sounds—the listening experience was exceptionally good.
In his self-introduction, Zhou Linxiao didn’t use complicated, long grammatical sentences, nor any obscure vocabulary. Xiang Di had originally thought she wouldn’t be able to understand, but she actually understood it almost completely.
This gave her a bit more confidence in her English level.
The English teacher was very satisfied. After taking back the little bee, she said to everyone in the class, “Did you hear that? This is what standard English spoken language sounds like. Listen to the plastic Chinese-style English you usually speak yourselves. Do you know how much effort I put into practicing my speaking back when I went abroad to study, just so students from other countries wouldn’t laugh at me—”
As she spoke, the English teacher began reminiscing again—about the past, and about how she had met her rich second-generation husband abroad.
“So you all, don’t think that just because the college entrance exam doesn’t test speaking, you don’t need to practice it. If you go abroad someday and people can tell your country’s accent right away, that’s really embarrassing, you know?”
The students had long since become immune to this kind of talk. No one could be bothered to refute her, letting the English teacher grow more and more excited as she talked.
“When learning English, the environment is very important. You should communicate with people more in daily life. Just listen to Zhou Linxiao—he grew up abroad, English is his native language. The pronunciation that comes out of his mouth is on a completely different level from yours.”
Since she had just said a couple of things about Xiang Di’s speaking, the English teacher naturally continued, “Xiang Di, since Teacher Chen arranged for you to sit with Zhou Linxiao, it’s perfect—he can teach you spoken English more often and straighten out your plastic English.”
A question mark popped up over Xiang Di’s head. Before she could answer, Zhou Linxiao spoke up directly.
“Teacher, I can’t teach Xiang Di.”
“How can you not teach her?” the English teacher said with a smile. “Do you think she’s too hard to teach?”
“No, you misunderstood. It’s not that Xiang Di is hard to teach—it’s that my own speaking isn’t good either, so I can’t teach her. I’m afraid of misleading someone.”
The English teacher let out an “Ah?”
“English isn’t my mother tongue,” Zhou Linxiao said. “I wasn’t born in an English-speaking country. I learned English even later than I learned Chinese. My previous English teachers all said my speaking has a very strong Spanish accent—it’s even less standard than when I speak Chinese.”
The English teacher froze.
Zhou Linxiao smiled faintly and continued, “Teacher, you studied abroad. Didn’t you just now hear that I also have a very heavy accent? Actually, even people born in English-speaking countries have their own accents. As long as you can communicate normally with people, any accent is fine.”
The classroom fell into an eerie silence for a few seconds. Zhou Linxiao’s tone was gentle, and his words were logically clear. Everyone wasn’t stupid—how could they not hear that he was actually mocking the English teacher, using her own authority against her?
This made the English teacher lose a bit of face, but she couldn’t really refute him. She could only nod and say, “Oh, maybe when I studied abroad, I didn’t come into contact with people whose native language was Spanish, so I didn’t notice your accent. Then since your speaking isn’t standard, everyone can take Bai Jiangxin’s speaking as the standard. Bai Jiangxin used to study at an international school—international schools all have foreign teachers teaching English. His speaking must be good.”
Trying to use Bai Jiangxin to salvage her stance on spoken English, but Bai Jiangxin didn’t give her any face at all and said directly, “No. My speaking isn’t very good either. My Chinese accent is pretty heavy.”
The English teacher: “……”
The class was dead silent. No one dared to laugh out loud. Only Ye Minjia, the one person who truly knew Bai Jiangxin’s speaking level, secretly laughed.
Yeah right. Back then, this guy’s speaking teacher was a proper Londoner. That affected, pretentious London gentleman accent—he and that teacher were practically copy-paste.
But there was no way he’d help the English teacher speak up. Who told her to look down on Chinese-style English first?
The English teacher didn’t actually have bad intentions—she was just showing off, using students as stepping stones to satisfy her vanity. Xiang Di was simply unlucky to get caught up in it. Now, the teacher was made a bit awkward by Bai Jiangxin’s words. Fortunately, the bell rang at that moment. The English teacher said “Class dismissed,” picked up her things, and quickly left the classroom.
Only after the English teacher left did the students laugh freely.
“So satisfying!”
Xiang Di looked gratefully at Zhou Linxiao. To thank him, she immediately decided to treat him at the school store—her treat, he could get whatever he wanted.
The prices at the school store weren’t high. She could afford it.
Zhou Linxiao said, “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go.”
Before leaving, Xiang Di didn’t forget her best friend Liang Qianqian, asking her if she wanted anything brought back.
The two of them left the classroom together. Watching their departing figures, Liang Qianqian couldn’t help sighing to Ye Minjia, “This Zhou Linxiao really knows how to deal with people. Xiang Di is so introverted—I spent half a semester before becoming besties with her, and he actually took her down in just one class.”
Ye Minjia pursed his lips, noncommittal, and tilted his head to glance at Bai Jiangxin, who was sitting in another group.
He really couldn’t understand why the homeroom teacher had arranged for Zhou Linxiao to be Xiang Di’s current deskmate. Wasn’t that deliberately making Bai Jiangxin, the ex, uncomfortable?
Wang Sichen had gone to pee. Ye Minjia decided to go over and give some guidance. He stood up and directly sat down in Wang Sichen’s seat.
“Bro,” he said.
Bai Jiangxin didn’t even lift his head. “What?”
“The kid who cries gets the candy. You’re not ignorant of that principle, right?”
Bai Jiangxin turned his head, frowning at him. “What?”
“Just now in class, you helped Xiang Di out too, didn’t you? So why didn’t you go find her and claim the credit?” Ye Minjia said. “Xiang Di already invited Zhou Linxiao to the school store. You’re not even included.”
Bai Jiangxin kept his head down, continuing with what he was doing, his tone calm. “No. You’re overthinking it.”
“Then why did you say your speaking was bad? Versailles much?”
“My speaking is average to begin with.”
“Is that so?” Ye Minjia smiled with narrowed eyes. “Then I guess all those trophies for speaking competitions in your room were won because your dad bribed the judges in advance?”
Bai Jiangxin closed his eyes briefly, put down his pen, and said impatiently to him, “What exactly are you trying to say?”
“I’m not trying to say anything.” Ye Minjia shrugged. “Xiang Di is being all sweet and cozy with her new deskmate. If you think it doesn’t matter, then just pretend I didn’t say anything.”
That word was a bit piercing. Bai Jiangxin’s gaze flicked over; he tugged at the corner of his lips. “Where’s the sweetness?”
Ye Minjia patted his shoulder and said, “Anyway, it’s sweeter than being deskmates with you.”
At that moment, Bai Jiangxin heard the mocking voice in Ye Minjia’s heart.
【With you just clapping your upper and lower lips together, you can poison yourself. You can’t even squeeze out a single sweet talk, what are you competing with him with?】
Sweet talk?
Bai Jiangxin’s brows showed disdain.
As if he didn’t know that what that little pervert actually liked was dirty talk—the rougher, the better.
Only her face was sweet; every other part of her was dirty and yellow1yellow = pornographic / lewd / sexually explicit.
─── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ───
Before coming to the school store, Xiang Di had said it was her treat. However, when it came time to swipe the card, Zhou Linxiao suddenly produced a campus card from his pocket and lightly blocked it in front of her.
“A lady having this intention is enough. When it comes to treating, it’s better to let us gentlemen do it.”
Just like that, Xiang Di was inexplicably treated again.
She didn’t want to take advantage of him and insisted on paying Zhou Linxiao back, saying she would treat him to lunch in the cafeteria.
Zhou Linxiao said there was no need. She insisted there was. If he didn’t eat today, then she would treat him tomorrow.
It left Zhou Linxiao both amused and exasperated. He could only say, “If you keep insisting like this, it’ll make me think you’re deliberately looking for an excuse to eat with me.”
Xiang Di let out an “uh,” afraid of misunderstanding, and said, “Then I won’t treat you. I’ll just transfer the money to you directly, okay? You have WeChat, right? I’ll scan you.”
Zhou Linxiao said he did, and held up the QR code of his WeChat ID for her to see.
Xiang Di put on a “hehe, this is where you don’t know as much as me” expression and kindly explained it to him.
“You don’t need to add WeChat to transfer money. You can just let me scan your payment code.”
Zhou Linxiao tilted his head at her, his olive-colored eyes looking at her openly. “I know. But I want to add your WeChat.”
“…Ah? Then let’s add each other.” Xiang Di didn’t forget her classmates’ instructions. “Perfect timing—I’ll pull you into our class group chat.”
She really envied him. If he wanted someone’s WeChat, he could just say it directly. She had wanted Bai Jiangxin’s WeChat for almost three years—last time, she only managed to add him because she had to transfer money to him.
And Bai Jiangxin, for some reason—she was so polite to him, so courteous, so careful to keep her distance, yet he still stopped paying attention to her.
Why?!
Xiang Di sighed, took out her phone, unlocked it, and opened WeChat. It automatically displayed the chat interface. Zhou Linxiao happened to glance over unintentionally and saw that the avatar pinned right at the top was a ragdoll cat.
─── ꒰ঌ·✦·໒꒱ ───
“Holy crap, Zhou Linxiao got added to the group.”
Someone in the classroom suddenly shouted.
In an instant, many people who had phones took them out to see what Zhou Linxiao’s WeChat was like.
“He got into the group so fast, who added him?”
“Look at the small text, Xiang Di added him.”
“Nice, nice. Xiang Di moves fast, got him into the group already.”
Liang Qianqian took out her phone and quickly struck while the iron was hot, wanting to admire Zhou Linxiao’s Moments.
However, Zhou Linxiao’s Moments weren’t open to the public. Just as she sighed in disappointment, Ye Minjia beside her also sighed.
Liang Qianqian said, “Didn’t you say you’d already taken Zhou Linxiao down? Why haven’t you added his WeChat yet?”
Ye Minjia didn’t say anything, only sighed.
Zhou Linxiao was added to the class group by Xiang Di—what did that mean? It meant Xiang Di and Zhou Linxiao had already added each other on WeChat.
With this pace, tomorrow they’d probably make it official, the day after they’d get married, and the day after that Bai Jiangxin would only be able to sing as a guest at their wedding.
Thank you for the special invitation, to witness your love. Ye Minjia opened his music app and immediately shared the link to this song with Bai Jiangxin.
Bai Jiangxin happened to be using his phone to search for a question and quickly replied: 【?】
