Chapter 156: System English

At daybreak, Zhao Jianguo stepped down from the roof on a ladder, still carrying the repaired Speaker in his hand. He didn't go inside, went straight to the Central Courtyard, propped the Blackboard under the jujube tree, and took a stack of carbon copies from his pocket to spread on the table. The edges of the paper were a bit curled, because they hadn't been pressed flat enough when dried last night, but he didn't mind.

At exactly six o'clock, he took out a whistle and blew three short notes.

"Here we are, here we are!" several children ran out from each house, clutching pencils and workbooks. Sha Zhuzi arrived last, still chewing a half piece of corn cake, his cheeks puffed out like a hamster.

"Stand in line, no alphabet today." Zhao Jianguo clapped his hands, "We'll learn to speak."

"Say what?" a child asked.

"Greet people." He picked up Chalk and wrote a line on the Blackboard, "First sentence—Follow me! Second sentence—How are you?"

The children stared at the Blackboard, looking bewildered.

Zhao Jianguo wasn't in a hurry; he shouted first, "Follow me!" while lifting his leg and stepping forward three strides. Then he turned, waved with a grin, "How are you?"

Now someone laughed. Sha Zhuzi grinned, leapt forward with a big stride, shouting, "Follow me! How are you?" his gestures exaggerated as if performing.

The others, seeing the fun, copied along. In an instant, the Central Courtyard was filled with hopping figures, shouts rising and falling. A little girl got so absorbed she nearly collided with the drying clothes line, flailing to stop, causing everyone to burst into laughter.

Zhao Jianguo stood at the edge watching, feeling a bit reassured. The Speaker had been smashed yesterday; he feared the children would be scared away, but this morning none of them were.

"One more time!" he raised his voice, "This time add actions—raise a hand, nod, smile! Whoever does it correctly gets a little red flower as a reward."

As soon as the words finished, Sha Zhu immediately lifted his hand very high, plastering an over‑enthusiastic smile on his face, his head bobbing like a pestle.

"Is this what you call greeting the Wealth God?" Zhao Jianguo couldn't help laughing, "Smile naturally, don't look like you're picking up five‑cent coins."

The group laughed again.

After practicing for over ten minutes, Zhao Jianguo ended the drill and had everyone form a circle and sit down.

"Now I'll test you—who can make a sentence with the newly learned words?"

Several children raised their hands. He pointed to the little girl sitting in the front row.

"I saw Aunt Wang yesterday, I said 'How are you', she froze for a moment and slipped me an apple!" the little girl said proudly.

"Not bad, practical." Zhao Jianguo nodded, turned to look at Sha Zhu, who had been holding back his hand, "What about you? Any story?"

Sha Zhu scratched his head, then his eyes lit up: "Got one!"

He sprang to his feet, his voice pitched higher: "Yesterday Second Dog snatched my newly bought mechanical pencil, I refused, he pushed me. I shouted—'If you don't leave now, I'll ABANDON you!'"

The whole room fell silent for a second.

Then uproarious laughter erupted. Someone laughed so hard they slapped their thigh, and even the old cat sunning itself under the Wall Base perked up its ears.

Zhao Jianguo forced himself not to laugh, kept a straight face and asked, "Then what?"

"Then he let go!" Sha Zhu said proudly, "He was probably scared; he didn't know what I was going to do."

Zhao Jianguo finally relaxed, coughed twice, then looked up: "Hmm… quick reaction, bold, worthy of praise."

"Then should I get a little red flower?" Sha Zhu rushed forward.

"A flower can be given." Zhao Jianguo said slowly, "But the word can't be used that way. ABANDON isn't a word for scaring people; it means 'to give up'. If you say you'll give up on him, he won't understand—he hasn't learned English."

The children, hearing this, began to argue among themselves.

"Then how should it be said?"

"You should say 'I'll tell the teacher'!" someone replied.

Zhao Jianguo waved his hand: "Next time you face this, you can say 'I'm not playing with you anymore', or just call out. But remember, knowledge is for solving problems, not for scaring people. However—" he paused, looking at Sha Zhu, "the fact that you thought to use the newly learned words to handle a real situation is the right approach. Keep it up."

Sha Zhu grinned, puffed out his chest and sat down, as if he'd just won a battle.

Zhao Jianguo was about to turn to the next page of his lesson plan when his eye caught a flash of a figure behind the West Wing Room window.

He kept his composure, continued the lesson, saying aloud "How to read 'Good morning'", while his peripheral vision quietly scanned.

It was Xu Da Mao.

The person had originally been peeking from the window crack, but the courtyard's loud laughter made him look a few more times, unintentionally exposing half a shoulder. Realizing he'd been seen, he immediately slipped back and hurried toward the Courtyard Gate.

Zhao Jianguo said nothing.

When Xu Da Mao had walked far enough, Zhao Jianguo slowly withdrew his gaze and bent down to tidy his handouts. Yet in that very instant he clearly saw a half‑sheet of paper flutter from the outside of the other's jacket pocket, yellowed, its edges ragged, bearing faint block‑style characters and a circular stamp‑like mark.

He noted the route—Xu Da Mao had exited through the narrow alley beside the Jia family's house, a place seldom trafficked.

"Next class we'll learn 'What did you do yesterday'." Zhao Jianguo clapped, pulling attention back, "Now each of you write a sentence about the thing you were most proud of yesterday."

The children bowed their heads and began writing.

Sha Zhu chewed on his pen barrel, pondering for a while, then scribbled crookedly, "I scared Second Dog away with foreign words."

When handing in the assignment, he even handed it to Zhao Jianguo directly, his face full of expectation.

Zhao Jianguo glanced at it, nodded: "Recorded, add one point to your score."

"Yay!" Sha Zhu jumped up, and as he left he didn't forget to turn back and shout, "Tomorrow I'll beat him with two words!"

The other children also left one after another, some reciting vocabulary as they went, others quizzing each other on pronunciation, and the Central Courtyard gradually quieted.

Zhao Jianguo cleared the Blackboard and handouts, slipped the stack of carbon copies into his canvas bag. He looked up at the sky; the sun had already crept over the roof ridge, warming the ground.

He lifted the water jug, took a sip, and was about to go back inside to change clothes when he suddenly heard a noise from the pickled vegetable jar.

Turning, he saw a gray‑furred mouse dart out from the bottom of the jar, its tail sweeping across the lid, making the iron lid wobble twice, emitting a light "Clank!"

He frowned, walked over to check the jar's rim. The lid wasn't sealed tightly, perhaps loosened by the children's morning running.

He pressed the lid down firmly; his fingertip touched a damp mark, sticky, as if something had just brushed against it.

Before he could examine it closely, footsteps sounded behind him.

Turning back, it was Sha Zhu returning, holding a notebook.

"Teacher Zhao! I just thought of another way to use 'abandon'!" he panted, "If I fail the exam, Mom will abandon me! So I must study hard!"