Mind blowing holidays (Dark clouds before sunny weather - Side story)

Chapter 7

Mo Xuanyu stood in place and could not believe his eyes when seeing what his teacher was handing over to him. It was a small box, roughly half the size of a shoebox, wrapped in a colourful paper with motives of toy cars and with a green ribbon decorating it. It was a gift, no doubt.

It was the last thing he had expected his teacher to do. After all, his own family had never prepared for him a present which he was supposed to take to school and give to one of his classmates in a way of lottery during the class Christmas party. Why should his teacher go to such lengths to prepare something for him? Neither he nor his family were obliged to give Mo Xuanyu anything; and yet, they always insisted on doing so.

Just some days ago, his teacher had brought new clothes for him. Even though it had not been necessary in the slightest, his oldest shirt only had one hole and he was managing to mask it quite well if he pulled the waistband of his pants a little higher. There was definitely no need to buy him five more T-shirts. He already had enough to get him through the week unless he had been very incautious and got them dirty. And even then, it was not anything that a quick sneak to the bathroom and a little bit of soap could not fix for the next day.

And here his teacher was, with a gift for the school party in his hand, obviously waiting for Mo Xuanyu to accept it. There could not be any mistake, A-Yuan and A-Yi already got their colourful boxes neatly stacked in their school bags.

"A-Yu, this is for you. It is the last day of classes today, everyone should bring a gift to share with their friends, right? So we have prepared one for you if you do not mind. Sorry we did not let you choose what is inside, we wanted to surprise you. But I am certain that you will not be disappointed."

His teacher was talking to him but Mo Xuanyu could barely understand the words. His eyes stayed fixed on the colourfully wrapped box, full of wonder and hesitation.

He did not need a gift; he had managed to prepare one in the end after several days of anxiously searching all around. He had had the luck of finding a newer looking pencil at school yesterday. There was no one around and he had let it lay there for the whole day before picking it up as lost possession. He had had somewhat guilty conscience over it, as if he was stealing, but the teacher he had tried to hand it over to had told him they would most probably not be able to find its owner and that he could keep it. He had also found a short piece of gift-wrapping ribbon discarded near the trash bins.

Truly, he had been lucky and had prepared his gift with the utmost care. He did not need his teacher to spend any more money on him. He could get by with what he already had. He did not want to cause trouble or be a burden.

His teacher must have guessed at least part of his thoughts because he scrunched down in front of him and looked him in the eyes: "A-Yu, it is fine to accept it. We want you to have a nice present to give one of your classmates. I promise it will feel very nice to see how much they will enjoy it."

To this, Mo Xuanyu could not say anything. Although the pen he had found was nice, he was sure that whatever was inside the gift box would make someone way happier. It could even be that for the first time in his life, he would actually see someone accepting a gift from him and not returning it with anger or at best awkward apology, requesting whatever Mo Xuanyu got as compensation. Perhaps for the first time ever, he would be able to fit in between his classmates and enjoy the Christmas party?

As much as Mo Xuanyu knew he should not be overstepping and wishing for something bad boys like him should never get, he could not stop himself. Ever since he had started living with his teacher's family, he had been continuously slipping. And the worst was, that he did not even care. He believed now that the family would not punish him, at least not too badly. They did not do so until now and it had already been quite a while. In fact, they were treating him just like their own sons, it never ceased to amaze him.

At times, he was even forgetting what a bad boy he was. It should have scared him to death and leave him inwardly a shivering mess terrified of when at last his teacher's patience with him would run out and he would finally be doubled over a chair and beaten black and blue. Or something worse. However, Mo Xuanyu found out that he did not care. It was too nice to live like this to fear the potential future repercussions.

Before he knew it, his teacher was suddenly pushing the gift box into his hands and closing Mo Xuanyu's fingers around it as if it truly belonged to him. It was so hard to resist.

"Teacher, I..." Mo Xuanyu wanted to object, but the adult did not give him a chance.

He smiled at him warmly while keeping the eye contact intact: "A-Yu, there is only one thing which you should say at a time like this."

It was the familiarity of the sentence that reminded Mo Xuanyu again of the trip to the clothes store. Back then, he had also been trying to reject his teacher's kindness and to explain that he did not need anything. Back then, he had failed spectacularly and his teacher had told him while paying what had seemed like an atrociously high amount of money that there was only one thing he should say.

"Thank you..." Mo Xuanyu whispered as tears gathered in his eyes.

He still did not understand why his teacher had gotten him a gift and why he was so insistent he accepted it. But he would not object anymore, he was way too happy. He was already looking forward to the school Christmas party. He could not wait till someone opened it and he would see how excited they were about the gift his teacher had prepared. He was sure it was something special.

"Good boy," his teacher smiled at him and patted his head gently.