A good night’s sleep.
The next day was a day that would cause those who heard of it to cry – Monday.
It wasn’t that bad for students who lived in the dorms, but those who went home could be said to have brought thousand points of reluctance to school for morning self-study.
Lu Chu and 7 had arrived to class earlier, but, Zhang Cheng, who said that he wanted to come to school earlier to copy his homework had only stepped into class the minute the bell rang.
They had to change seats on Monday morning, so the class was in a state of chaos, with some people were wailing, while others were rejoicing.
After changing seats, Lu Chu and 7 had moved down a row to their right, from the third and fourth row in the middle to the fourth and fifth row by the door. Qian Wenhao was in the sixth row, while Zhang Cheng had moved from the last row to the first row.
Morning self-study had just started when Lu Chu received a note from Zhang Cheng, asking him to pass in homework to the front.
Helpless, Lu Chu shook his head, then passed his homework book and test papers forward.
During the self-study period, Lu Chu looked in Liu Qian’s direction, and saw that Liu Qian, who took a few days off because of her high fever, had come to class today.
After changing seats, Liu Qian’s seat had changed from the second row near the door to the third row near the window. She was further away from Lu Chu’s seat, and sat on the inside, closer to the window.
Now, she was currently looking down at a book, and because of her high fever a few days ago, she didn’t look that good, had bad dark circles under her eyes, and seemed drowsy and in poor spirits.
Lu Chu had never been up close or in contact with Liu Qian before, and had only seen her a couple of times from afar. Therefore, it was impossible to determine whether the cause of her illness a few days ago was caused by something supernatural, or it was simply just a coincidence.
Taking back his gaze, Lu Chu turned to look at Zheng Wei, who was only a couple seats away from him. Only when he saw that there wasn’t anything unusual did he concentrated on studying.
After morning self-study, Zhang Cheng came over to return Lu Chu’s workbook and papers, when Meng Yu had walked over from the last row to the front row, then casually sat on his seat to chat with Li Lan.
Zhang Cheng saw that his own seat was taken, and he was unable to go back for a while, so he simply stood where he was and started to chat with Lu Chu.
“Guess what?!” Zhang Cheng glanced in Meng Yu’s and Li Lan’s direction, then suddenly said.
Lu Chu placed his pen and paper down and asked, “what?”
Zhang Cheng tried to be mysterious, “Li Lan told me she slept very late last night, because last night, Meng Yu came to school to get some homework that she had left behind, as a result she – ran into a ghost!”
Lu Chu’s tablemate Liu Yang was the first one who reacted in surprise, and asked, “what happened?”
“Li Lan said that yesterday, Meng Yu called her in the middle of the night, and her voice was trembling in fear. She said that while Meng Yu was doing her homework at about eight in the evening, when she remembered that she had left her homework in their dorm room during the lunch break the day before, and since there would definitely be someone who stayed in the school dormitory, so the gate wouldn’t be locked. She came to school, and prepare to go back to her dorm room to get her homework.” Zhang Cheng took a breath and continued, “she went upstairs through the staircase, and passed by 604 when she walked back to her dorm room. Unintentionally, she looked inside, and then, in the dark dorm room, there was a girl in a white dress standing in the middle of the room, with her back facing her! Meng Yu was so scared, she didn’t care about anything else and ran out of the dormitory building!”
Liu Yang was startled, and whispered, “it’s fake…… right?”
604 was the mixed dorm where Liu Qian stayed. While the story of Liu Qian’s dorm being haunted had long spread amongst the girls, but amongst the boys, only Lu Chu and the rest had heard the story from Meng Yu. Once again, Zhang Cheng told Liu Yang about 604 being haunted, and after that, he even combined Liu Qian’s whole entire dorm falling ill with this haunted incident, giving Liu Yang a good scare.
After Zhang Cheng filled Liu Yang in about 604’s hauntings, Lu Chu asked, “how did Meng Yu know that the one she saw was a ghost? Maybe it was just a female classmate in a white dress.”
“It’s not,” Zhang Cheng said, “didn’t Liu Qian’s entire dorm end up with a high fever? So they’ve been on leave this whole time, and there wasn’t anybody in 604’s dorm room last night.”
Liu Yang interrupted and argued, “what if it was someone from another dorm?”
“I asked Li Lan the same thing, Li Lan said that Meng Yu told her that the white figure she saw—” Zhang Cheng lowered his voice, “was floating.”
Liu Yang shook his head, and still couldn’t believe it, “I think, it likelier that she saw something wrongly.”
Zhang Cheng asked him back, “but even if this was something that she didn’t see clearly, why would a girl in a white dress go to someone else’s dorm room in the middle of the night without turning the lights on?”
“Maybe…” Liu Yang paused, “to steal something?”
Zhang Cheng scoffed, “you might as well say she came to visit. In our school’s rundown dorm room, there’s nothing else other than textbooks, test papers, bedsheets and pillows.”
“Textbooks, test papers, bedsheets and pillows aren’t worth much either,” Zhang Cheng added, “right, Lu Chu?”
Lu Chu nodded, and thought; was it really something supernatural again?
Unfortunately, he couldn’t go into the girls’ dorm, if not, he could have tested to see if his ability to smell ghosts could be of use there.
The school bell rang, and everyone returned to their own seats.
Liu Yang muttered to Lu Chu, softly, “I’m still a little scared about what Zhang Cheng said, but Meng Yu should have probably saw something wrongly.”
Lu Chu shook his head, “it’s hard to say.”
Lu Chu sat in his chair and leaned against it, but because he had been thinking about this matter, he unconsciously started to sway his feet slightly, but ended up accidentally kicking 7’s leg, which had stretched out under his chair. He looked down, and noticed a shoe mark on 7’s clean pair of blue and white shoes.
Lu Chu turned back a little, gave 7 a somewhat shameful smile, and prepared to take his leg back, then he realised, he that 7 had used both feet to entangle around his right foot, and he couldn’t take it back.
The other’s skin temperature passed through the thin pants on their calves, and Lu Chu felt a little uncomfortable, and his cheeks were hot.
Liu Yang was still whispering his own opinion to Lu Chu on the matter of 604 being haunted. As he talked, he noticed that Lu Chu’s expression looked a little different, and couldn’t help but asked, “Lu Chu, what’s the matter?”
Lu Chu shook his head, “nothing.”
Liu Yang had to reason to doubt him, so he continued to talk about whatever he hadn’t.
Giving up on attempting to take his own feet back, Lu Chu gently pinched his slightly hot outer ear.
In the seat behind him, 7 smiled. His heart felt soft, with doting and happiness concealed deep in his eyes.
——————
Meng Yu was a girl who liked chatting, and couldn’t stay idle even for a single moment. She was extremely scared yesterday, so for the whole morning, she found all the boys and girls that she could chat with, and told them what happened with her, as a way to pour out and share her fear. By the end of the morning’s self-study session, the whole class knew that Meng Yu ran into a ghost last night, in the 604 dorm room, where Liu Qian lived.
Everybody had friends from other classes, and from what Lu Chu observed, everybody in their grade would know this by the afternoon.
Tomorrow’s goal, the whole school.
Liu Qian was a girl who looked a little bit quieter, and while she wasn’t that talkative, she was quite popular. After many people learnt about this, all of them went to ask her about it. Liu Qian was recovering from a serious illness, and she already didn’t look that good. Now, when she listened to everybody asking if their dorm really had a ghost, her tears had almost started to come out. She only said that she didn’t know, and said that she wouldn’t be living in school for the time being, or even go for the evening self-study session; she just wanted to go home early.
For the students in 2-1, although not everybody believed in the supernatural, but the more mysterious and unknown something was, the more enticing it became. Coupled with the fact that studying in high school was boring, when such an interesting thing had finally happened, everybody treated this as a conversation topic, and discussed about it with great interest.
Even during lunch time at noon, the enthusiasm about it haven’t wavered, and even Zhang Cheng couldn’t help but discuss this matter with Qian Wenhao.
Lu Chu listened, but didn’t make any comments.
.
They returned to their dorm at noon, and went to lay in bed for their lunch break after a short chat.
However, this nap didn’t last long, and everybody was woken up by the noise from outside before the alarm went off.
After Zheng Wei was woken up, he started to fold his blanket without saying a word.
Zhang Cheng sat up, annoyed, “damn! How can someone even sleep with that!”
Qian Wenhao covered his head with a blanket, and said in a muffled voice, “what’s going on outside?”
“Not sure,” Lu Chu folded his blanket, and replied, “let’s go out and see.”
7 heard him, and also folded his blanket, then went out of the dorm with Lu Chu.
Zhang Cheng thought that since he had been woken up, he could only sleep for ten or so more minutes, and whether he could fall asleep was another matter, so, he also got up and dragged Qian Wenhao out, saying that he wanted to go out and join in on whatever was happening.
Zhang Cheng and Qian Wenhao ran over to catch up with Lu Chu and 7.
“What happened?” Zhang Cheng asked.
The west end of the corridor was surrounded by a group of people, and everyone was talking about something noisily, with fear present on their faces.
The teacher in charge of the dorm came up the stairs with her slippers slapping against the floor, then she pushed everybody aside and asked, “what are you guys gathering around here for and not sleeping at noon? Stop being all noisy, or watch out because I’ll deduct your Quality of Life points!”
“Dorm teacher,” one of the male students, who didn’t look that good, said, “something happened……”
“What happened?” the dorm teacher asked.
Everybody gave way to the dorm teacher.
Lu Chu and the rest took the opportunity to squeeze forward.
Only to see that what everybody was crowding around, was the place where the hot water tank was in the west side’s washroom. The cover of the hot water tank was wide open, and the inner cover used to cover the automatic heating element had also been opened. The hot water was steaming, and there was a male student lying there, with his head stuffed in it.
From the side, one could see the deformed and ugly skin of the boy who had been scalded by the boiling water. It was terrifying, causing their hair to stand on its ends.
Zhang Cheng and Qian Wenhao were so frightened they took a huge step back.
Some of the boys in the vicinity had already started throwing up, while others disregard the school’s ban on carrying of electronic products, and took out the cell phone that they had hidden and called the police.
The emotions in Lu Chu’s eyes were hidden, and he felt it was difficult to say anything.
.
If a person stuck their head into boiling water, would they first suffocate, or burn to death?
Good question there hey