My Mister Ostrich Chapter 44

44 | Chance Meeting
I just thought of my friend. A lot of people call her Crab, and she’s a girl.

Gu Mingxi recalled a time when he was younger, about 7 or 8 years old. The kids at the compound were all a bit naughty and mischievous, and they didn’t really understand things. Some of them would be mean to him, like Zhang Jiaqi and Fu Liang, who never played frisbee with him.

At the time, Pang Qian was also still small. She followed Gu Mingxi everywhere. When Zhang Jiaqi brought kids over to bully him, Pang Qian would help him fight them off.

Pang Qian had always been very fierce. She really lived up to her “Crab” nickname. She was very good at fighting back, but still, she couldn’t fight against a boy several years older than herself. In the end, she and Gu Mingxi would always walk home all dirtied and dinged up.

They agreed not to tell their parents what happened. In the end, it was Old Zeng who told Gu Guoxiang what happened when he saw him.

A lot of the parents of the kids who lived in the compound worked for the metals company, and their positions would be lower than Gu Guoxiang’s. Zhang Jiaqi’s dad ended up being sent on a business trip to Lanzhou, Gansu Province for half a year. From then on, Zhang Jiaqi didn’t dare to bully Gu Mingxi and Pang Qian again.

A lot of time had already pa.s.sed since then. From third grade onward, no one really bullied Gu Mingxi again. They all remembered the words of their parents and teachers. Gu Mingxi was a disabled child, and they should leave him be.

Parents told their kids, “Don’t play with him if you don’t have to. If he ends up falling down, you’ll get blamed for it too. His dad is very powerful, so don’t provoke him.”

And so, in all of the Golden Compound, Gu Mingxi’s only remaining friend was Pang Qian.

Gu Mingxi lied on the muddy ground, his clothes long ago stained with dirt. His body felt a faint pain. He saw Buzz-cut and Blondie walking off, so he clenched his teeth and started pulling himself up. Suddenly, Buzz-cut turned around and started heading back towards him.

The events that had just happened caught Buzz-cut by surprise, and Gu Mingxi’s actions were contrary to his previous att.i.tude. He was only going to pull the chain from his ankle, but the youth acted as if he’d gone crazy. Not only didn’t he let the guy take away the chain, he even kicked him several times.

He was still lying on the ground, unable to stand up. He called out, “I already gave you the money! Don’t take the chain! It’s not worth money!”

Buzz-cut’s anger rose up from inside, and he kicked viciously at Gu Mingxi’s legs. Gu Mingxi couldn’t hide from it, his legs burning with pain now. Buzz-cut already saw that the chain on his ankle wasn’t gold, just some worthless beads, but his anger couldn’t be contained. He just had to take that chain. He couldn’t untie the knot, so he just tugged at it, but it still didn’t come off. Then he pulled out a blade to just cut it off.

Gu Mingxi shouted out loudly, his body continually flailing, his legs struggling endlessly. Buzz-cut’s hand slipped, and the chain wasn’t cut. Rather, there was now a hole in Gu Mingxi’s right leg.

Blood started flowing out, and Blondie got scared. He came over to pull Buzz-cut away, but he was unwilling to leave. Just then, a shout came from the exit of the alley, “What’s going on?!”

Blondie and Buzz-cut turned looked back, then started running. The person at the alley exit was about to chase after them, but seeing Gu Mingxi, he stopped in his tracks, a frown on his face.

He bent over to help Gu Mingxi up. Seeing the blood seeping out of his leg, he immediately said, “Kid, can you walk? If you can walk, I’ll take you to the store and help you stop the bleeding.”

Gu Mingxi lifted his head. The person was about 27 or 28 years old. He wasn’t tall, but he was very st.u.r.dy looking. His face was also a very honest-looking face. His skin was dark, and hanging from his neck was a golden chain as thick as a child’s finger.

He already saw that Gu Mingxi didn’t have arms. He sighed, “This place just keeps getting worse. In the past, those sc.u.mbags only blackmailed the pa.s.sing students. Now they’re even trying to take lives.”

Gu Mingxi didn’t want to return home in this state either. He didn’t want his mother to worry. Although this man didn’t look particularly friendly, he had saved his life. Gu Mingxi nodded, “I can walk. Thank you.”

The man helped him collect his backpack, stuffing the school books back inside. He carried it over his shoulder as he and Gu Mingxi walked out of the alley. He had a barbecue shop nearby. Their business was mostly at night, so they only opened when it was dusk out. There weren’t any customers inside, just two guys deftly preparing meat skewers.

Since the people working at the barbecue place often injured their hands from skewering food or grilling, the man had a first aid kit prepared to stop bleeding. He let Gu Mingxi sit down in a chair, and then he crouched down in front of him to help take care of the wound. The young boy felt very awkward. His clothes were extremely dirty, and some parts were even torn. The two empty sleeves hanging at his side caught the attention of the two kids working.

The man asked Gu Mingxi, “Kid, what’s your name?”

Gu Mingxi hesitated a moment and then said, “Gu Mingxi.”

“Xiao Gu.” The man helped bandage up his leg. He smiled as he said, “My last name is Sha. You can call me Shayu (Shark).” He pointed to the two kids in the back. “That’s Clam and Oyster.”

Gu Mingxi chortled. Shark gave him a strange look. “What are you laughing at? Are our names very funny?”

“No,” Gu Mingxi said. “I just thought of my friend. A lot of people call her Crab, and she’s a girl.”

Shark laughed out loud, “Kid’s got a big heart. He can even laugh at a time like this. I like that.”

He sent Gu Mingxi to the bus stop on his bike. He waited with him, and then asked Gu Mingxi how he lost his arms. Finally, Shark said, “Kid, in the future when you take the bus to school, and you have to cross through the factory area, you just let anyone who’s looking for trouble know that you’re Shark’s Barbecue’s boss’ Shark’s brother. I don’t know about elsewhere, but at least in the factory area here, no one will dare touch you.”

Gu Mingxi got onto the bus to go home. When he got home, Li Han was making dinner in the kitchen. Gu Mingxi went into his room to change his clothes. He made sure to hide away his bloodied clothing, planning to throw it out the next day.

When he took off his pants, he realized that his leg was bruised, and the bruise was pretty big. He bent over and touched the wound with his toe, then felt a biting pain.

Gu Mingxi sat on his bed, in a bit of a daze. He looked down at his right ankle again. Shark helped him disinfect and bandage the cut. He said the wound wasn’t very deep, so it shouldn’t be a big problem.

Gu Mingxi’s sight caught onto the chain around his ankle. From the moment that Pang Qian helped him tie it on, he’d never taken it off. Fortunately, it wasn’t cut off. That’s what Gu Mingxi thought.

That evening, Gu Mingxi sat at his desk, organizing his school books. They were new books, but they were already covered in dirt and torn now. Gu Mingxi thought for a bit, then decided to buy a few book covers over the weekend.

While he was tidying up his things, he realized that he hadn’t touched the math practice book that he brought over to Pang Qian’s house since he’d come back home.

Gu Mingxi remembered that he still had half a practice test to finish. He opened the book, and as he was flipping through the pages, he stopped. He saw Pang Qian’s handwriting.

She’d actually finished an entire set of problems, though he wasn’t sure when. Gu Mingxi thought it was pretty funny. In the multiple choice section, many of her answers were incorrect. And for the free response question, she’d done about half the work, before drawing a crying face on the page. She wrote, “Gu Mingxi, it’s so hard! I can’t do it!”

Gu Mingxi unknowingly drew into a smile. He did the problem set over, then went over to his bed and comfortably fell asleep.

That night, Li Han and Gu Guoxiang didn’t suspect a thing. The next morning, Gu Mingxi left the house early. He tossed out his bloodied pants and got onto the first bus to get to school. When he got off the bus, he unsurprisingly was unable to get onto the second bus. He thought it over, but still decided to just walk the remainder of the way to school.

As he walked through the machine factory area, he couldn’t help but take a look down the alley where he’d been extorted before. Then he walked past it in big strides. When he pa.s.sed Shark’s barbecue place, he saw that the doors were closed, and there was garbage piled up after a night’s work.

He didn’t stop, just walking past, minding his own business. Yesterday’s events were like a dream. If not for the bruises all over his body, he would suspect that none of it had happened.

But he didn’t have any plans on being friendly with Shark and these people. He was still a student. He was from a good family, he was taught well, and he was a good student. He and Shark were just strangers who met by chance. Their lives would never intersect with each other.

He didn’t tell any of this to Pang Qian, because he didn’t want her to worry. This was just a one time thing, a misfortune. Gu Mingxi told himself that he had to be more careful in the future, to be more low key.

In this world, there were too many unbelievable, unexpected occurrences and people. If you meet these things, you can only consider yourself unlucky. His luck wouldn’t always be bad though. Look, just a day ago, didn’t Shark come to save him?

At that time, how could he have known what was to happen two months later, something that brought him back into contact with Shark.

It was the week of midterms for the second semester. The year’s top 3 remained unchanged. It was still Xiao Yujing, Wu Min, and Gu Mingxi. Pang Qian ranked 7th from the bottom of her cla.s.s. She was pretty happy about it, since it was progress after all.

It was mid April. Because Youth Day (May 4th) was soon approaching, E City’s Board of Education organized an event and selected various outstanding students from various areas of the city. Over the two weeks before Youth Day, the education channel in E City would be showing a series that introduced these outstanding students for 20 minutes at a time.

Compared to the well-performing but simple students like Xiao Yujing and Wu Min, the school obviously wanted to recommend Gu Mingxi.

“Broken in body, but firm in spirit.” This type of story was most likely to be selected. There was always an outstanding, but disabled student who won awards. Of course, before making their recommendation, Teacher Dai asked Gu Mingxi his opinions on it.

Actually, convincing Gu Mingxi was very simple. Teacher Dai said, “Gu Mingxi, if you can get an award this time, it will be very helpful when you’re applying to college. Because of the society’s a.s.surance in your abilities, if a college were ever to reject you based only on the fact that you’re disabled, then you can present this award from the Department of Education. You can even go to the media for help. Of course, that’s the worst situation. But right now, what we want to do is make you a role model for students in the district, in the city. This can only benefit you.”

Gu Mingxi went home and asked Li Han about it. Li Han thought about it, then gave Teacher Dai a call to agree on this matter.

So, on an April morning, as Pang Qian carried her backpack to school, she came across a strange scene. There were a lot of people outside the cla.s.sroom. Some had cameras, some had reflectors. There was also a pretty lady carrying a microphone, who was fixing her makeup. Pang Qian looked around curiously, and was about to enter the cla.s.sroom, when Teacher Dai pulled her back.

“Pang Qian, I’m going to apologize to you first.” She pointed to a front row in the cla.s.sroom. “Today, we moved yours and Gu Mingxi’s desk up front. You’ll still sit in your regular seat in the back. Today, the TV station is coming to record Gu Mingxi’s daily activities. I arranged for Xiao Yujing to sit next to him today. Don’t think too much about it. I only want to show off Gu Mingxi’s excellence to a greater extent. If he can win an award, it will be very helpful to his future.”

Pang Qian didn’t really understand. Showing off Gu Mingxi’s excellence was one thing, but why did they have to change seats, and even deskmates? What did this mean? Xiao Yujing was ranked 1st in the year. Pang Qian was the bottom of their cla.s.s. If Gu Mingxi and Xiao Yujing sat together, that would be more outstanding? Is that what it meant?

But facing her favorite teacher, Pang Qian didn’t dare say any more. She nodded and carried her bag into the room.

She entered from the back door, then looked up front at Gu Mingxi sitting in the first row. His feet were up on his desk, organizing his things. He wore a white s.h.i.+rt, and foolishly(?) had a badge on his left chest.

Xiao Yujing sat next to him. That was Pang Qian’s desk, because she’d never changed desks. Pang Qian liked to draw on her desk. Before their English diction practice, she would write down the words that she couldn’t memorize. Before chemistry exams, she would scribble down formulas she didn’t know. Pang Qian’s forehead was covered in sweat. She’d even written Xie Yi’s name on her desk before. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever erased it.

Xiao Yujing lifted her head and looked at Pang Qian, shooting her a smile. Her hair was short, and she wore a white s.h.i.+rt. Her clothes made her look very pure and delicate. Pang Qian’s heart felt like it was stuffed up with a big rock. Even her pace started to slow.

She, more than anyone else, wanted Gu Mingxi to be recognized as an outstanding student. But she was Gu Mingxi’s deskmate!

From the day they started school. Ten years! She was his only deskmate!