Chapter 101: Seven Friends: Fourth Brother (1/2)

I'll try not to make this story hard to comprehend, but life is not something that can be explained with just words.

I remember a saying that goes: It takes three years to learn something good, but just three days to learn something bad.

But how can a thoroughly evil person become good?

My answer? Seven friends.

They walked in front of me, falling into the depths of the unfathomable abyss on my behalf in order to put me back on the right path and to make me cherish everything that I have.

If not for these seven friends, I might've turned out to be a complete bad egg.

How did I meet Fourth Brother, you ask?

It might've been fate. I did badly in junior high and was relocated to a worse-faring school, Heng San.

My junior high was considered a reputable school so the experimental middle schools shouldn't be that bad, right?

Who knew that I would be the second worst student in the whole cohort?

During the first prelims in Heng San, I handed in an empty paper for English and came in third within the whole school.

I remembered trying to sneak a peek at another student's work that day.

When I saw how a female student only used X to solve her linear equation, I gave up on copying her work. It wasn't doable.

Miraculously, the top three students were all from my cla.s.s.

The first was our cla.s.s president, a girl, and the second was a committee member of the cultural cla.s.s. He was a rough fellow.

And in third place was me, a committee member in charge of hygiene.

Dorm distribution day.

Thanks to the halo effect, I became very considerate toward other students. I made sure everyone got a room so when it came to my turn, there was no spot left.

That was just the beginning of everything and also the start of my friends.h.i.+p with Fourth Brother.

Coincidentally, there were three Year 1 students who were also roomless. As such, the four of us formed a group and were given a room.

This room was on the first floor, beside the security's form, and was slightly different from other students'.

It looked more like an unused security room and all four of us weren't satisfied with it.

However, there was nothing we could do since the school had no more s.p.a.ce to accommodate us.

We made our ages clear the moment we met.

Boss was born in '92 so there was no question.

Second Brother was born in April '93.

Born in '94, I became Third Brother.

Lastly, even before we could ask, the last student spoke up, ”No need. I'm the youngest.”

It was only at a later time that we realized Fourth Brother was actually older than us. Older than me, at least.

No one questioned him during that time and we agreed that each of us would take turns being on duty for a month, starting from the youngest.

That meant that Fourth Brother would have to go first, but he only accepted it with a smile.

As I've already mentioned, our dorm was like a security room so it was half the size of a normal student dorm.

The students' rooms had four beds in four corners whereas the guard room could only accommodate two bunk beds.

Boss and Second Brother shared a bed while Fourth Brother and I shared the other.

Boss immediately claimed the bottom bunk and pointed upward. He said to Second Brother, ”I don't like high places.”

Without a choice, Second Brother made his way up without any complaints.

I looked at Fourth Brother. It was our first time to exchange eye contact.

He was a quiet person and wore a thick, black-framed gla.s.ses that made him look mature.

He had a common face that could disappear in a crowd.

He wasn't from my cla.s.s and I couldn't really remember his name, except that there was a Yunhuan somewhere in it.

I had no recollection of his full name. Yunhuan might've been his surname for all I knew.

Later on, I simply called him Fourth brother while he addressed me as Third Brother.

He extended his hand out, leaving me in shock.

We continued exchanging a long look before I finally reached my hand out for a shake.

He smiled again, saying, ”Comrade, please take care of us in the future. You should choose. Which do you prefer? The top or bottom bunk?”

I zoned out a little. Comrade? It felt like I was back in time before the reform started.

I smiled. ”Call me Third Brother. Comrade sounds weird.”

Fourth Brother returned the smile. ”My parents taught me that. They said it's good for socializing and networking.”

I did not notice much when he talked about his family until I realized how significant it was.

”I'll sleep on top. You can have the bottom, it's more convenient. Plus, I don't have as much stuff as you. Are you okay with that?” I asked.

Fourth Brother nodded and plopped down to the lower bunk immediately.

I was fine with it since I knew that the lower bunks belonged to all people.

If there were guests, they were going to be sitting on the lower bunks, and it would be silly to think that their clothes would be clean.

I repackaged my reason, of course, since I was from the city and it was true that I had little luggage with me.

Nevertheless, my home was still about 30 kilometers away so I had no choice but to stay in school.

Fourth Brother was from the neighboring city, Longwan District. Not much of a peaceful region to live in.

It would be easy for four strangers to face conflicts when living together.

Additionally, it was a lousy school.

It was common for students from various schools to get into fights, but it was different in our school.

If there weren't fights to be fought outside, we start beating our own people up.

There were nine cla.s.ses in school and almost all of them shared a frictional relations.h.i.+p.

You must be wondering why the princ.i.p.al and teachers aren't managing this matter.

Truth be told, the only thing they cared about was a promotion.

They had no obligations toward students' affairs as long as no lives were lost. When fights occurred, each side would give their own statements and they would be let off with a demerit. If caught again, they would be expelled. Standard procedures.

It was also common for a student to barge into someone's dorm to drag him out, so there were usually steel pipes or wooden clubs under the bunk beds.

There weren't knives but it was a different story outside.

During the first week of school, some students were already expelled from excessive fighting.

Being just beside the security house made it easy for us to seek help whenever necessary.

Also, as dormmates from four different cla.s.ses, we got to collect information about almost half the school.

We would remind each other about the commotions or conflicts that surfaced between cla.s.ses.

We quickly became a team.

Our boss, from the second cla.s.s, was the kind of person to add fuel to a fire.

He hid steel pipes under our beds to ensure that we had something to fight with if someone came knocking on our door.

Second Brother was a bookworm, often busy with his wuxia novels.

There was a vendor at the school entrance that allowed you to borrow books with a 10 dollar deposit.

Second Brother would give over a hundred in order to borrow a whole series.

He would recommend me books whenever I felt bored.

I was usually the neutral party and avoided b.u.t.ting into others' affairs as much as possible.

I believed that the word 'foreign' was a major cause of fights.

Even within a city, when those from the East came over to the West, they were regarded as 'foreign'.

Territorial fights were inevitable then.

And I was the kind of person that would go all out when triggered.

Fourth Brother was the type that paid no attention to the things going on around him. He had his phone in his hands all day.

I'm sure most of you haven't seen the first generation iPhone.

That golden apple advertis.e.m.e.nt was everywhere at that time.

I had thought that Fourth Brother was using a fake one, and I only got to know iPhone4 when I reached university.

I had no mobile in high school junior year and only managed to buy a Nokia after working for some time during my third year.

I remembered Nokia being kicked out by Android just two months after I got mine.

But I digress.