"No, no, no!" Ding Xiang hurriedly tried to stop them, with an expression as if he was helping the goddess out of a difficult situation. "It would be such a waste to throw it away. Give me some. I'll eat it. I'll eat it! I'll eat as much as I can!"
The two boys at the front table also turned around and asked, "We can help, too."
Zhu Xingyao: “…”
She looked at Jiang Tu's cold face and felt that he might have misunderstood her. She really didn't ask him if he wanted to eat just because he was poor.
Li Xixi casually stuffed two apples at the table in front of her and stood up to shout, "Who wants chocolate apples? Come and get them yourself."
Zhou Qian came over and took two apples and a box of chocolates, then turned around and shouted, "Come and take them, it's not poisonous."
All of a sudden, boys and girls came over and quickly divided up the food.
"Thank you, goddess."
"No need to buy snacks during recess later!"
"It would be nice if it happened every day. Will the goddess beat me to death if I say this?"
Zhu Xingyao: “…”
She said seriously, "Yes."
Everyone laughed. Zhu Xingyao looked at the clean desk, let out a sigh, and complained to Li Xixi in a low voice: "Please don't give me gifts anymore. It's annoying."
Li Xixi added: "These guys have shit in their heads! Sending a bunch of food, are they trying to turn our goddess into a pig?"
Zhu Xingyao: “…”
She stuffed a box of chocolates into her arms and said, "Just shut up."
Li Xixi opened the chocolate directly, turned around and threw a few chocolates on Ding Xiang's table: "Lilac, please have some." She looked at Jiang Tu with a cold expression, retracted her hand that was about to throw chocolates on his table, coughed, and turned back.
Ding Xiang peeled one and put it in his mouth, then glanced at Jiang Tu: "Brother Tu, do you want to eat it?"
Jiang Tu said coldly: "No."
After school in the afternoon, Li Xixi said she was going to buy Jay Chou's album. Zhu Xingyao turned around and saw Jiang Tu, as usual, quickly packing up and getting ready to leave. The two hadn't spoken much the whole day. In fact, it was almost the same as usual. Jiang Tu was a man of few words, and he basically answered whatever others asked him.
He would not speak unless necessary.
... a very passive person.
Jiang Tu zipped up his schoolbag and looked down at her.
Zhu Xingyao thought she finally saw me. She blinked and said, "You leave so quickly after school every day, and I've never seen you play ball. What are you doing?"
Boys usually run away after school, either to Internet cafes to play games, or to the stadium to reserve a seat to play ball.
She hadn't seen him on the field.
Jiang Tu threw the bag over his shoulder and said calmly, "I'm going to work now. I'm leaving now."
He was tall and had long legs, and he quickly reached the door.
Li Xixi turned to look at Ding Xiang: "What kind of job does Brother Tu do?"
Zhu Xingyao also looked at Ding Xiang.
Ding Xiang shrugged. "Don't look at me. I don't know either. Anyway, Brother Tu often leaves right after school. Sometimes he seems to stay up all night. He won't tell me when I ask him. But from what I've observed... if he sleeps for half a day in class, he must have stayed up all night the night before."
Zhu Xingyao thought about it carefully. It had been more than a month since he sat at the desk in front of him. It seemed that he always had insufficient sleep for two or three days every week.
The welcome party was held on Friday night in the auditorium of No. 1 Middle School. Behind the auditorium was a playground, which was spacious enough to accommodate all the students in the school. Zhu Xingyao was very busy this week. She had to rehearse the entire program flow to avoid mistakes. The school arranged her performance to be the last one.
On Thursday afternoon, Zhu Xingyao brought the cello to school for the final rehearsal.
The cello is her baby. It was the first time she carried it to school and she attracted a lot of attention as soon as she entered the school gate.
Lu Ji, Zhou Yuan and Xu Xiangyang rode their bicycles to school together. As soon as they entered the school gate, they saw a girl in front of them carrying a red guitar bag.
The reason why the cello is called a cello is because it is really big. She didn't wear her school uniform this afternoon. She was wearing a khaki short jacket and slim jeans. She looked very slim, and the cello bag looked bigger than her.
Zhou Yuan quickly pushed him, "That bag looks heavy, you..."
You better go and show your courtesy!
Before he could finish his words, Lu Ji rode out on his bicycle.
"Zhu Xingyao."
Lu Ji called her name and stopped beside her.
Zhu Xingyao turned around and Lu Ji pointed at the music bag on her back: "It's quite heavy, right? Let me help you carry it."
"No, thank you." Zhu Xingyao smiled and refused, "I'm used to carrying it, so I don't think it's that heavy. You should go to class first, it's almost time."
She turned and walked directly toward the auditorium.
Lu Ji propped himself up on the ground and watched for a few seconds. Zhou Yuan and Xu Xiangyang stopped beside him. Zhou Yuan pointed at Zhu Xingyao who was walking away and said, "I heard that Zhu Xingyao's cello costs hundreds of thousands, the one in the video on the forum before."
There are many students in No. 1 Middle School whose families are wealthy, and art has always been priceless.
Common name: expensive.
Lu Ji retracted his gaze: "Not surprising, the price of a custom-made piano starts at tens of thousands of yuan."
Zhou Yuan smiled and put his hand on his shoulder, raised an eyebrow and said, "But your family has the money, you can buy her a piano, so go ahead bravely."
Lu Ji snorted: "Let's go."
Zhou Yuan hurriedly rode his bicycle to catch up with him: "Are you really not going to do anything at the party? Such a good opportunity..."
"Don't yell." Lu Ji turned around and glared at him, lowering his voice, "I have prepared a New Year's gift."
A boy from Class 7 also ran into Zhu Xingyao on the road. As soon as he returned to the class, he excitedly declared: "I just saw the goddess carrying a cello to rehearsal. We can watch the live show tomorrow night."
Ding Xiang poked Li Xixi's back with a pen: "Hey Li Xixi..."
Li Xixi turned around and glared at him: "Just keep talking, if you poke me again, I'll beat you up."
Ding Xiang: “…”
He scratched his head and said speechlessly: "You are so fierce, I just want to chat with you."
"You talk to Jiang Tu."
"He has nothing to say to me... and he doesn't know either!"
"… "
Jiang Tu was working on physics competition questions and didn't even raise his head when he heard this.
Li Xixi felt that Ding Xiang was quite pitiful. If she were to sit at the same table with someone like Jiang Tu, she might get depressed. She turned around and looked at Ding Xiang, "What do you want to talk about? The stars or the moon?"
Ding Xiang laughed dryly: "I heard in the men's room before that the goddess's cello costs hundreds of thousands. Is it true?"
Li Xixi: "Really? A new violin made by an independent Italian violin maker starts at over 100,000 yuan. Xingxing has several custom-made violins, and the most expensive one is worth nearly a million yuan."
Ding Xiang smacked his lips: "It's shockingly expensive."
Then he smiled and said, "This is worthy of the goddess."
Jiang Tu paused with his pen, staring at the test paper, slightly distracted.
After school that day, many people went to the auditorium to watch the rehearsal. Jiang Tu ran into Lin Jiayu in the bicycle shed. Lin Jiayu had just pushed her bicycle out and looked at him with a smile: "Jiang Tu, where are you going later?"
He squatted down and unlocked the bicycle, "Well, Liang's friend's bar is short of people, I'll go help."
This kind of temporary job pays well, but Lin Jiayu rarely does it. She's not as short of money as he is. She said, "Be careful, the bar is pretty chaotic. Don't offend anyone."
Jiang Tu got on his bicycle and looked at her: "I'm leaving first."
Lin Jiayu: "Hey, wait—"
He had already walked away, but he stopped and looked back, "What?"
Lin Jiayu pushed her bicycle forward. "I'm going to buy New Year cards later. A classmate gave me one, and I want to return it. What about you?" She blinked. "Did anyone give you a card? If so, I'll bring a few for you. It's impolite not to return the gift. Don't always be alone. Make some friends..."
Jiang Tu didn't have the patience to listen to her lecture, and said coldly: "No, I'm leaving."
The bar was in the city center, on the street behind Liang Ge's BBQ restaurant. Jiang Tu left his bicycle at the BBQ restaurant, changed out of his school uniform, and walked toward the bar. When he passed the boutique on the corner, his steps suddenly stopped.
Various exquisite small gifts were hung on the glass window of the boutique. His eyes fell on the hanging greeting card. A girl was sitting on the windowsill holding a cello, looking up at the stars in the night sky.
Jiang Tu stared at it for a while, then walked in and bought the greeting card.
As the New Year's Day holiday approached, places like bars were crowded. Jiang Tu put on a waiter's uniform and was handed a tray: "Seat 97 ordered vodka, please deliver it over."
Jiang Tu nodded: "Yeah."
He carried the tray through the red and green lights and approached seat 97.
When he raised his eyes, he saw the faces of Chen Yi and his group of brothers. He was very familiar with them and saw them once or twice every month. He stopped in his tracks and didn't want to cause any trouble. He was about to turn around and ask his colleagues to help him pass them over -
"Really? I saw her at the gate of No. 1 Middle School. She got out of a Mercedes-Benz with a cello on her back. The car must be worth a million. She is indeed the eldest daughter of a wealthy family."
"I saw it too. I think it's more beautiful and elegant than what I saw two months ago."
"Cello?" Chen Yi asked lazily, "Or an art student?"
"No." The younger brother took a sip of wine and became a little excited. "I caught a student and asked him. The girl's name is Zhu Xingyao. She is the school belle of their school. No wonder she is so beautiful. There will be a welcome party at No. 1 Middle School tomorrow night. She will go up to perform and play the cello. Brother Yi, should we climb over the wall and take a look tomorrow night?"
Chen Yi shook his wine glass and snorted, "I was planning to go to Hexi Lane tomorrow night. I heard that Jiang Jinhui won money last night. That bastard didn't pay it back after winning it, and always forced me to pay it back. He really deserves a beating." He thought of Zhu Xingyao's pretty face and grinned nonchalantly, "Forget it, I'll go and see her tomorrow night. To be honest, I miss that little beauty a lot. I even dreamed about her. Tsk..."
Before he could finish his words, there was a snap.
A glass of vodka landed in front of him and half of it spilled, all over his crotch.
"Your wine."
The young man said this coldly and turned away.
Chen Yi came back to his senses, stood up, grabbed his collar and pulled him back, and said harshly: "Jiang Tu, what the hell do you mean?"