September 5th

Chapter 4

Xiao Zhan (if I remembered his name correctly) got scared of me and didn't say another word. Even when I asked him several times if it was he who played the piano in music class after lessons, the guy stubbornly ignored me. I frowned at his distant look, as if he didn't hear anything at all and I was not existed.

My mom interrupted us:

- What is the noise in the early morning? – she went down stairways, yawning sleepily.

Xiao Zhan took advantage of this, noticing that I was distracted by her appearance, and ran out of the teahouse. At first, I wanted to stop him, but at last I didn't dare to run after him in my pajamas and shaggy.

- Mom, was that him? – I asked. – The boy who played the piano here?

- It seems to be yes, but I didn't get a good look at him. Why do you ask?

- How did he get in here?!

Mom dismissed my question, intending to go back to bed, but explained reluctantly:

- I asked the cleaning lady to come in the morning and clean up. He must have come in, because she has left the door open. Mrs. Lee! Mrs. Lee, are you here?

The voice of a woman was heard from the kitchen, she appeared with mop in hand. So that's why the guy got here. I personally lost my sleep. There are many unexplained questions appeared. Xiao Zhan goes to our school? I have never seen him or heard about the guy with health problems. Did he know Xiao Ming? Did he create the music himself, or did he just repeat what he heard? How, in general, such a person can play anything like that?..

I was consumed by a curiosity that I couldn't satisfy. But now I finally found a composer, although now I doubted whether he really was him. Maybe I shouldn't confront Xiao Ming... I didn't know, I should have thought about a lot and met this guy again. I felt something like pity for him and wanted to understand everything correctly.

But the guy didn't come the next day, and, in general, from the moment I found out about him, he didn't appear in the teahouse any more. I casually asked my mom about his visits, but every time she shook her head. Among the information that Yixing obtained for me about other pupils, this guy also didn't appear, which put me in a stupor. He was right under my nose, but I has hurried and missed him due to my impulsiveness.

Jackson's report on the surveillance of Xiao Ming was also inconclusive. He had been following him for several days and nothing interesting happened to him. At least Jackson had never seen someone like Xiao Zhan next to Xiao Ming. The only thing that somehow interested me was Xiao Ming's habit of looking at the football field for a long time. According to Jackson, he could stare blankly for an hour in front of the field in front of him. What a strange hobby.

I didn't bother Xiao Ming anymore, and he wasn't eager to cross paths with me either. I waited for something. However, I was haunted by a strange feeling that I was not the only one waiting for something. The deputy principal, surprisingly, also didn't make any comments to me. In principle, I didn't seem to provoke anything, but I had the feeling that it seemed like the calm before the tempest. Like the teachers were waiting for one wrong step from me to strike me down.

The lessons were held, as always, in their age-old manner – boring and monotonous. Xiao Zhan didn't getting out of my head, filling all my thoughts. It annoyed me that I couldn't find him anywhere. He didn't attend my school and didn't come to the teahouse anymore. I even broke my pencil out of frustration. Still, I was worried about his connection with Xiao Ming. Should I ask a clever fellow directly?..

Our school system was one of the most stupid and discriminatory: only excellent pupils got all the benefits, and we, mediocre losers, only shreds from them. The school, as it were, tried to motivate non-achiever ones and bullies by this act, so that they would have a desire to correct their grades. But for many, including me, this didn't work at all, except to annoying. Because if for me it was a waste of energy, others ones simply didn't have enough knowledge, abilities or strength, which was frustrate them despite of their desire to become better. And now Jackson, Yixing and I were waiting at the very end of the line to get our lunches, when Xiao Ming was one of the first to get it. It didn't matter if we came before him or not.