When she reached school age, Li Nanzhu was sent to a nearby ordinary primary school.
To her, this was not just a place to acquire knowledge, but a window to escape the freezing walls of the orphanage and peer into the "normal" world. It was a larger stage to practice those "exercises."
School was another world entirely.
Li Nanzhu breathed carefully, her heart thumping in her chest—half out of nervousness, and half out of... a nearly humble hope.
Perhaps, here, everything would be different.
She tried her best to keep her back straight, her face wearing a standard smile she could now execute with a perfectly angled curve—the kind belonging to "adults." She told herself to be "normal," to "fit in."
At first, everything went smoothly. The children were strangers to one another, all wearing the same uniform. Aside from a few who were particularly lively or timid, the differences were not obvious.
Li Nanzhu worked hard to learn everything in class, following every rule the teacher laid out. She could even answer questions that other children could not, and the teacher would praise her for her neat handwriting.
She carefully observed her classmates, mimicking how they made friends and attempting to respond to their casual talk with the smiles she had practiced countless times.
Though that smile occasionally caused others to pause for a nearly imperceptible moment of confusion, at least no one rejected her as the children in the orphanage did.
But soon, the differences began to manifest.
The school bell ringing was the moment Li Nanzhu looked forward to most, yet also felt the most apprehensive about each day.
The school gate was always crowded with parents coming to pick up their children. Mothers carried vegetable baskets, fathers rode bicycles, and grandparents held their grandchildren's hands, asking, "What did you learn today?" or "Are you hungry?"... The air was thick with the scent of home-cooked meals, concerned inquiries, and the warm bustle of families.
Li Nanzhu was always the last one to slowly pack her schoolbag, lingering before walking to the gate.
She had no one waiting for her.
The director would not come, nor would the care workers.
She stood in a corner by the school gate, watching faces filled with happiness and security being led away by their parents. Somewhere inside her felt cold and empty.
And so, she began a small, secret "ritual."
She would choose a family that seemed the "mildest"—perhaps a mother who always wore a gentle smile and would crouch down to adjust her child's collar, or a father who, though silent, always kept his eyes fixed on his child.
She could smell the pleasant scent of soap on that mother, hear that father's doting tone as he scolded his child for getting their clothes dirty, and feel the unreserved reliance and joy in the child's fingertips as they held their parent's hand. She could sense that wordless warmth belonging to a "home."
In those moments, a strange sensation would envelop her.
It was as if she had a part in those warm conversations, as if her own small, accepted shadow was among those retreating figures walking away hand-in-hand.
For a minute or two, she would slightly lower her head, pretending that she too was waiting. Maintaining a gentle smile, she would use the corner of her eye to secretly trace the back of the child being led away, imagining if that were her...
She felt like a shameful thief, peeking at and stealing the happiness of others.
This happiness did not belong to her; she knew that.
But that tiny bit of false warmth, leaking through the cracks of other families, became the only glimmer of light she could draw comfort from in her bleak days.
However, stolen things never last long.
The news that she was "from the orphanage" gradually spread through the class, though she didn't know how.
The children might have only a vague understanding of what an "orphan" was, but the attitudes of the adults were passed down clearly.
"She's from the orphanage... who knows what her character is like, coming from a place like that."
"Her parents could just throw her away, so they probably weren't much... well, you can't be sure about things like genes."
"Who knows if her mind has become warped after staying in a place like that for so long? I've heard the children there are all..."
"Our children are small and don't know any better. What if she leads them astray or provokes them?"
"Exactly, it's better to keep a distance. There are plenty of kids to play with; why bother with a time bomb?"
The parents' intentions might not have been purely malicious; it was more a protective rejection born of instinct for their own children's safety.
They had no way, and no desire, to explain the complex judgments and hereditary anxieties of the adult world to their children. They could only use the most direct and effective method of warning: "Don't play with that Li Nanzhu. She... she's different from us."
The children might not have understood "genes" or the metaphor of a "time bomb," but they could read the wariness in their parents' voices and the disapproval in their eyes.
At first, when she offered to lend someone an eraser, they would hesitate before taking it. During group activities, no one wanted to be in her group. When she walked over to join a game of jump rope during recess, the lively circle would instantly go quiet, and someone would shout, "We're full."
Even when she took the initiative to say hello, the responses grew increasingly perfunctory and hurried.
Li Nanzhu's stolen "happy times" also came to an abrupt halt.
Once, she habitually tried to get close to a mother and daughter who often waited patiently at the school gate. The mother reacted as if she had been pricked by a needle, quickly pulling her daughter to the other side. She cast a quick glance at Li Nanzhu—a mix of vigilance, pity, and a trace of subtle disgust—before leading her daughter away at a brisk pace.
Li Nanzhu froze in place. The gentle smile she had practiced for so long, which was just about to bloom, solidified at the corners of her mouth, looking incredibly awkward and pathetic.
Her heart felt hollow, but she wasn't particularly surprised.
After all, stolen things must eventually be returned, mustn't they?
So, when people still pointed and whispered about her, she would return a perfectly practiced, gentle, and harmless smile, her eyes calm, as if she couldn't hear their discussions.
When she was intentionally or unintentionally excluded from games, she would stand quietly to the side with a faint smile on her face, as if she were merely an observer.
When the teacher occasionally called on her, she would answer with that standard, well-behaved smile.
This smile was like a thin yet hard shell, helping her block out most of the direct malice.
No child dared to be as aggressive as the older ones at the orphanage. Although the teachers caught wind of the rumors, seeing that Li Nanzhu was always quiet, her homework neat, and her answers clear, they only felt the child was somewhat solitary and did not interfere much.
This gave Li Nanzhu a strange, cold sense of "security."
It made her even more certain that going to school was the right choice.
There were indeed "rules" here. As long as she followed the "rules," she could obtain a relative amount of "safety."
Compared to the orphanage, this was already heaven.
Just as she thought she would continue like this forever—wearing a smiling mask and quietly existing as an invisible person in the cracks of the campus—a faint but real light briefly shone in.
Rate on N.U.
