After dropping the packages at Liu Man’s house, Yu Zhan said to her, “Now, you’ll need to handle the rest by yourself.”
Liu Man wasn’t planning on inviting him into her house either, “Thank you.”
Yu Zhan laughed, “Just how many times did you say thanks to me in one day.”
He snapped his fingers to the alaskan, “Paul, let’s go.”
Paul barked and walked up to him. His four paws were very graceful. They gently stepped on the floor tiles. You couldn’t even hear a stepping sound in the empty hallway.
“Oh yeah, for your cat food, I’ll have to transfer some more into the shop. Is Monday alright for you to pick it up?”
Liu Man knew that Daylight’s cat food was enough to support her for 2 days, “Sure, but I have a test on Monday, so I’ll pick up the cat food in the night.”
“What are you testing?” Yu Zhan asked.
“Piano, I’m a pianist, ” Liu Man didn’t lie to him. She felt comfortable around him, so he really couldn’t be a terrible person.
Yu Zhan was surprised, “Pianist? That explains.”
“Explains what?”
Yu Zhan smiled but didn’t say anything. He walked to the elevator and said to Liu Man,
“Good luck on your test for Monday.”
“Lend me your luck.”
Just as Liu Man had finished unpacking her packages, Zhang Pei came back home.
“Manman, I saw your dad today.”
“How is he?” Liu Man hurried out of her bedroom.
“He got skinnier, but still is in good health. He said for us not to worry about him. The environment in the detention center wasn’t as bad as we thought.”
In Liu Man’s memories, her father loved Liu Man very, very much. He would even pick the stars from the skies to give it to her if it were possible.
“I had to leave when we had only spoken a few sentences. This is considering the fact that we relied on the connections of your Uncle Sun,” Zhang Pei said, “Right now, I have the driving recorder and the surveillance camera footage. You could see that the delivery guy had bumped onto the car himself. Your dad had stepped on the brake, too.”
“But dad drank.”
“Exactly, the drinking ruins things,” Zhang Pei was both furious and helpless with her husband, “One sip of wine costed one life, which is 3 million.”
“Is the 3 million confirmed?”
“Yiyi and their lawyer wanted to meet the Wang family again next week. To see if they could rearrange again.” Zhang Pei said. She knew that the chances were low, but for the future of her daughter, she had to collect that 3 million. Zhang Pei planned to borrow from her family and go to work herself.
TL Note: Remember how Liu Man’s mom is a full-time housewife and didn’t work at all? Also, Yiyi is Sun Yiyi, otherwise known as Uncle Sun. Uwu
Zhang Pei walked up to Liu Man, patted her head, “You must work hard, graduate successfully and make us proud, ah.”
TL Note: The “ah” is like a sigh.
Zhang Pei’s sigh made Liu Man’s heart feel as if it had been pushed down by a boulder. She lifted her hands and held her mother’s skinny hands tightly.
Liu Man was already thankful that God had given her another chance to live. So what if her family had huge debt? She was willing to replace the old Liu Man and help with the debt herself. Like she was making it up for the old Liu Man for taking her body.
Monday, 8:30 am, piano room.
Liu Man’s class were assigned to piano room number 2. No one dared to be late, and everyone had arrived 10 minutes early to the testing room. The 3 proctors were already sitting inside, and everyone was sitting on their seats.
These kinds of tests were a piece of cake for the good students, like Li Xiaoru and Wang Nina. They felt confident and there was no pressure for them, but they worried for Liu Man, as they knew her level.
Li Xiaoru said, “Don’t worry about anything, just focus on hitting all the notes correctly, and then surely, the teacher won’t give you a bad grade.”
Wang Nina nodded her head, “The teachers won’t normally purposely give students a bad grade. The last time, the reason they didn’t let you pass was because you stopped too many times during the exam. Just look at how long you’ve been practicing, I think you’ll be fine.”
“The first thing is, don’t ever be nervous. I think you get nervous very easily.”=
Liu Man’s psychological quality was indeed quite a mess. She couldn’t preform in front of a large audience. Whenever people gathered to watch, she would become a nervous reck. In the entrance exam, if Tang Tu hadn’t been there as a “mental support” for her, she wouldn’t never slipped by the mark.
Liu Man also didn’t know what to expect of her scores. She was indeed very nervous.
Her Guqin skills had been taught by Madam Qu, and most of the times, her audience was only consisted of just Little Zhao and Madam Qu. On some occasions, other abandoned madams in the cold palace would follow the sound of the music and take a peek. They all said, so what if the music was the sound of an angel, it would only be played for these ignored madams like themselves anyway.
Li Xiaoru and Wang Nina played before Liu Man. When it was time for Liu Man’s turn, she heard her classmates say,
“We’ll have Liu Man at the bottom anyway. We’re fine, we’re fine, there’s no need to worry.”
“Haha, our school wouldn’t expel the last place.”
“At least it wouldn’t be so embarrassing.”
…
This, ladies and gentlemen, was how Liu Man’s classmates saw her.
Walking into the classroom, Liu Man first introduced herself to the three teachers. Among these three teachers, she knew two. One was the associate professor of the piano Major, one was her music theory teacher, and one was a middle aged lady who had beautiful makeup, in which Liu Man had never seen before.
When the associate professor and the music theory teacher saw Liu Man, they immediately gave her a low grade in their minds. Who didn’t know that Liu Man from the piano major? The prettiest girl in the grade, yet a classical flower vase.
“I am going to perform the piece, Butterfly, by Grieg.”
This was a fairly easy song for the piano majored kids, and the teachers weren’t expecting anything. Because they had listened to dozens of piano songs before Liu Man’s performance, they were a bit tired too.
The associate professor lightly said, “You can start now.”
Liu Man sat in front of the piano, put the music sheets she brought on the piano. She looked at the keyboard and was actually nervous. After a deep breath, she softly put her hands on the keys.
The melody that rang in the teacher’s ears a hundred times before came. Obviously, there was nothing too particular about her playing.
They quickly wrote some comments and a low score on her sheet, desperately wanting to end this session, so that the next student could come in.
But the middle aged woman quietly said to the other two, “Listen closely, this girl’s pretty interesting.”
Butterfly, just like its name, is a very romantic piece. Excellent musicians can make the listeners feel as if they’ve heard sunlight and beautiful butterflies dancing in the flower field from the rhythm.
After the convincing of the middle aged woman, the two teachers sat down and listened carefully. Liu Man’s piano skills were bad, alright, and her fingers had no skill or technique. Yet every note, every beat, was precisely played. No mistakes at all. Liu Man was like a wise man, persevering through her piece.
She was like a butterfly without its glamorous looks, working hard to keep going, yet not stopping to look back.
The teachers knew Liu Man’s average score. To achieve this level, they knew that Liu Man must’ve worked hard and practiced countless of times.
So they crossed out the low score and negative comments on her paper.
After finally finishing the piece, Liu Man bowed and thanked the teachers. While she was leaving the classroom, the middle aged women called out to her,
“Ms. Man, please wait a moment.”
Credits: Kathrien & Dora