Return to the 1982 Staff Compound

Chapter 10 Good Girl

After returning home, they went to school without any rest. Qiu Huoming rode his bicycle and set off with his elder sister.

A group of children in the compound who were not yet of school age were chasing after his bicycle, shouting and yelling. Qiu Huoming pedaled a few steps faster and left the little ones behind.

He could already hear someone pointing at the door, as if they were talking about his bike.

Any slight disturbance in the compound will be known to everyone. Qiu Huoming shook his head. Some people may think that this era is full of humaneness, but too much is as bad as too little. There is no privacy at all.

On the way from East Street to Wucheng Middle School, you will pass by the Supply and Marketing Building. The area around there is extremely lively. Rural people drive tricycles into the city to purchase home appliances when they get married.

Qiu Huoming rode his bicycle through the crowd, bypassing the tricycles parked randomly on the roadside. He even put his hands off the handlebars in a coquettish manner when there were no people on the road. "I'm not bragging, my riding skills are definitely among the top ten in our county!"

"Brother, can I also learn to ride a bicycle?" Qiu Hongye asked courageously while sitting in the back seat.

"Of course, I'll take you to my little sister's school playground on Sunday and I'll teach you."

My younger sister’s school is close to home. There is no basketball court on the playground, so there are few people and no one to disturb her, making it perfect for learning to ride a bike.

"Okay, brother, do you think I can learn it?" Qiu Hongye's voice was filled with excitement.

"Of course you can learn it. Put the center of gravity of your body on your waist and hips. You will know it naturally when you learn it."

Qiu Huoming learned to ride a bike when he was in elementary school. Although his parents were not with him, they were very generous with their money. As long as he wanted a bike, he could buy it in minutes. This was completely different from the situation in this life.

He sighed in his heart, it's hard to have your cake and eat it too.

When they arrived at Wucheng Middle School, the old man guarding the gate glanced at them and let them pass.

The eldest sister was in a good mood and skipped up the stairs. She pushed the bike into the parking shed next to the corridor. She usually didn't pay attention to this place. There were quite a few rich students in Wucheng Middle School, and there were already quite a few bikes parked in the bicycle shed.

Qiu Huoming immediately spotted the Type 26 Phoenix bicycle near the door, and he glanced away guiltily.

When I returned to Class 3, Gu Xiaoran was already there. She didn't sit at her seat, but stood at the window with the study committee member He Xinxin, chatting in a low voice.

It seems that Gu Xiaoran is 2 cm taller than He Xinxin. One has long hair tied into a ponytail, while the other has ear-level hair. From the side, both of them look like beauties and are very pleasing to the eye.

Ding Yu stayed in the dormitory at noon. When he walked back to the classroom, his hair was still sticky, but he was unaware of it. He sat on a stool, holding his chin, and looked vaguely at Gu Xiaoran and He Xinxin who were standing in the front row window.

Qiu Huoming went to the bathroom and walked in from the back door. He slapped him on the shoulder and said, "What are you looking at so intently?"

Ding Yu was startled and glared at Qiu Huoming. Then he sighed and said faintly, "For a moment, I was a little undecided. Both of them are trying to get into my heart. What should I do..."

Qiu Huoming was speechless for a moment.

I could only glance at him with the eyes of a retard and ask, "Da Lang, have you taken the medicine?"

"Have you eaten it, Dalang? I have an older brother at home! I'm at most Erlang." Ding Yu rubbed his stiff cheeks, took out the picture book and put it on the table.

Qiu Huoming:...

Ding Yu flipped through a few pages of the comic book and suddenly stopped, "I can't even read my favorite comic book..."

Qiu Huoming:...

"Is your brain damaged by the fever?" Qiu Huoming stretched out his hand and placed it on his forehead.

Ding Yu pushed his hand away. "Will you come to my house to listen to music after watching the movie tomorrow? My brother brought back several tapes this time, including some by Teresa Teng. Have you ever heard of Teresa Teng?"

Qiu Huoming subconsciously thought of the familiar song "Sweet Honey", "Sweet Honey, your smile is so sweet..." He hummed it casually. This song has been popular for decades.

The original voice has the youthfulness unique to teenagers, and also has a slight bass sound quality. When he lowers his voice to sing, the characteristics are more obvious.

"You sing very well!" Gu Xiaoran had come back without knowing when. She leaned against her desk and looked at Qiu Huoming with some curiosity.

"Huozi has also heard of it. Teresa Teng has several more songs, all of them are nice!" Ding Yu turned his head to look at Gu Xiaoran: "Hey, classmate Gu, are you going to the movies with us on Saturday?" he asked expectantly.

"Shaolin Temple?"

"You know it too? I heard it's really nice."

"It's quite good, but unfortunately I've already seen it. However... you can lend me the tape to listen to." Gu Xiaoran sat back in his seat, half-leaning towards Ding Yu and said.

"No problem. You can come to my house with Huozi to listen to music on the weekend. I have a lot of tapes at home. You can take whichever one you like."

Ding Yu said cheerfully.

"Okay, what time? It can't be too late. My dad is very strict." Gu Xiaoran was somewhat tempted.

Qiu Huoming wanted to ask her, "Is your father the County Magistrate Gu?" The more he looked at Gu Xiaoran's face, the more he felt that she looked like the little girl he had cheated on when he was a child...

"Let's go to the movies after lunch, at three o'clock in the afternoon. Why don't you come to the theater to meet us?" Ding Yu said.

"Okay, three then."

Just as Gu Xiaoran agreed, the bell for class rang.

She turned around and sat up straight.

The first class in the afternoon is English.

Qiu Huoming took out the English book. This was the first time he had opened an English book. The dialogues in the textbook, which were very characteristic of the era, made him read it with great interest.

After a while, Teacher Yan walked in. She was in her 40s, wearing a pair of thick-framed glasses, two thick braids, and her clothes were extremely simple.

There was no listening test in English at that time. Everyone was learning dumb English. She had a heavy accent. She first led everyone to read the article from beginning to end, listed the new words separately, and then began to explain the sentence patterns.

It seemed that Teacher Yan did not expect most of the students to keep up with her progress. She asked and answered questions almost exclusively to a few fixed students in the front row.

After following her for a while, Qiu Huoming was a little worried that his accent would be distorted by her, so he decided to teach himself.

Ding Yu, who was standing by, secretly flipped through the picture book hidden in the textbook.

Qiu Huoming glanced at him. Qiu Huoming was going to immigrate in the future, so for his own good, Qiu Huoming quickly confiscated his picture book.

He tapped his textbook and whispered, "Pay attention to the class!"

Ding Yu looked painful and followed the teacher's instructions listlessly.

Qiu Huoming was very pleased that the boy was teachable.

The English textbook is not difficult, but the translation is very contemporary.

Qiu Huoming flipped through the textbook from the beginning with great interest. When he was reading attentively, the bell for the end of get out of class rang.

He marked the homework assigned by the teacher on the blackboard in his textbook, and then took out the political book.

"Huozi, do you really want to go to college?" Seeing how serious he was, Ding Yu yawned and asked.

"It's more real than real gold. I want to go to the south."

"Then I'll also work hard to get into college. Otherwise, it will be too boring for me to be alone in the county after you leave." Ding Yu sighed.

Gu Xiaoran, who was sitting in the front row, put down the English textbook he was reading, turned around, and said, "Why do you want to go to the south? Isn't Shenhai City good? It's closer to Wucheng County."

"Maybe there's gold everywhere in the south." Qiu Huoming said self-deprecatingly with the corner of his mouth raised.

"Then I will also take the exam to go to the south." Ding Yu said confidently.

"You probably don't know the current college admission rate, right? Let me put it this way..." Gu Xiaoran thought for a moment and continued, "For a district key school like ours, about 3-7 people can get in per class. If it's a county key school, at most 3 people can get in."

Ding Yu opened his mouth and managed to squeeze out a sentence, "So I have to be in the top 7 in the class to have a chance?"

Qiu Huoming patted his shoulder and said, "Ruzi is teachable! That's the truth."

Gu Xiaoran stared at Qiu Huoming and asked, "Are you so confident?"

"Isn't there a test tomorrow? You'll know after you try."

"I heard from He Xinxin that your grades are average. It must be difficult to improve your grades so much at once. I have some review materials. If you want to see them, we can meet tomorrow afternoon and I'll bring them out for your reference."

Qiu Huoming looked at Gu Xiaoran in surprise. This girl was really pretty and kind-hearted. He might as well wait until the weather gets hot and give her a popsicle, otherwise he would always feel sorry for her.

"That's great. Is it heavy? Or I can get it myself?" Qiu Huoming asked with a forced smile.

"I still have some strength left. Let's make a deal. I'll go back and sort it out after the exam tomorrow morning."

Gu Xiaoran turned around and continued flipping through the English textbook.

Not far away, Chen Yong was secretly observing their movements, then leaned over and whispered something in Li Ming's ear.

Li Ming turned his head to look at Gu Xiaoran, a blush appeared on his face, which was just seen by Qiu Huoming who was distracted. He rubbed his temples and turned to look at the wall of the playground, where there were several peach trees in full bloom.

Qiu Huoming muttered: "Spring is coming..."