CTF 0014

“Quiet! Quiet down, all of you!”

The Russian teacher loudly told everyone to be quiet.

“I wasn’t finished. Although you’re no longer going to take Russian in your college entrance examination, you’re still required to take it in your finals. There’s only a month left before the finals, so you must all continue to work hard, especially some of you who don’t consistently get good grades, or even get zero points. You don’t want this in your report. Remember that your student report will follow you for a lifetime!”

Xu Yin, who was called out in a roundabout way, nearly bit off her own tongue.

Huhu, she’d begun celebrating too early!

In any case, though, the removal of Russian from the college entrance examination was like a free gift that fell from the sky for Xu Yin.

For the next few days, she could not be any happier.

Two days after Tong Guihua sent the dress back to her sister, she brought another fabric material to Xu Yin.

It was satin, this time. Tong Guihua said that her sister wanted to make a modified cheongsam to wear to her wedding next year.

One after the other, her other classmates, who lived off-campus, also began lining up to commission new clothes from Xu Yin. They brought with them fabrics that had been entrusted to them by their relatives back home.

Taking into consideration the height and body shape of the intended wearer of the clothes, Xu Yin set to work designing the clothes that’d fit them best.

Xu Yin’s business continued to grow and expand every time she brought back a finished custom-made dress from home.

As her finals approached, her customers grew to include not only her classmates, but also her classmates’ relatives, other friends, and even her school teachers.

During one lunch break, she was called to the teacher’s office. One of the teachers gave her some sweets and told her that she was going to get married. Then, she presented the fabric that she’d brought to Xu Yin, and asked her to design something that’d suit her well.

Xu Yin quickly sketched a draft design. The teachers were initially astonished by her work but gained composure afterward. As they watched her, they didn’t hesitate in introducing business opportunities to her.

Some of the young female teachers even seemed to regard Xu Yin as their little sister.

Whether they had something to ask from her or not, they’d invite her to the teacher’s office, give her something to snack on, then chat about the current fashion trend with her.

If they had any good fabrics, they’d bring them to the school as soon as possible, so that Xu Yin could see what kind of design it’d be suitable for.

Xu Yin: “…”

Without her even noticing, she had turned the teachers and students of the No. 6 High School into her loyal customers.

In the blink of an eye, the end of June arrived.

The finals would be held next week. In order to study in peace, many students didn’t go home for the weekend. Even the students who lived in the city stayed in their classrooms to study independently.

Seeing how motivated everyone was made Xu Yin embarrassed to go home.

Her Russian grade only barely passed the line, so every time the Russian teacher was in her class, he would treat her as a special case and take special care of her.

It wasn’t anyone’s fault but hers—who told her to have such a bad grade only in Russian? She consistently scored full marks in Mathematics and English and her Chinese was excellent, but she remained hopeless in Russian.

This put the Russian teacher in an embarrassing spot and made him constantly doubt his teaching ability. If he’d taught her well, how could she get such good grades in the two other language classes, but not in his class?

Whenever he found out that he wasn’t in the classroom during the self-study sessions, he’d definitely ask Tong Guihua where she had gone. If he heard that she went home, he might actually run to her house to give her some extra tutoring.

Alas, having such a responsible teacher made it difficult to slack off.

“Yinyin, here!” During the break between their self-study sessions, Tong Guihua handed a tea egg. “This is from my sister’s fiance. By the way, he asked me if you could make another dress like the one you made before. He’ll pay for the fabric and other fees, of course. He wants to surprise my sister.”

“Is he in a hurry, then?” Xu Yin opened the practice book that now temporarily served as her ledger. “Our order schedule is already full until mid-to-late July.”

“No, no, he’s not. He wants to give it to my sister before her birthday. My sister’s birthday is on the third day of the Chinese eighth month, so in the Gregorian calendar, it would be in September. It’s still early.”

“Alright, then.” Xu Yin wrote the order down.

Tong Guihua had kept the fabric in her dorm room. “I’ll give it to you later, in the evening. It’s this really soft and elegant lake green chiffon—the dress will definitely look gorgeous!”

“Don’t you want to get a new design?”

“Do you have any new designs?”

“Of course!”

Xu Yin drew two new designs without much thinking. “The key feature of a chiffon dress is its flowing and graceful drape. Which of these two designs do you think your sister would like?”

“She’d like either of them! Aaah—I like both of them too! No one would give me fabric for them, though. Urgh.”

“You’ll have someone in the future.” Xu Yin winked.

Tong Guihua gave her a punch and said, “You’re so annoying.”

Xu Yin laughed.

The two laughed and quarreled until the class bell rang.

Then, the Russian teacher walked in. Xu Yin immediately sat up straight and, well-behavedly, took out her Russian textbook. She began to memorize some of the words. Her planned strategy for her final exam was to memorize as many words as possible. She’d be satisfied if she could just pass the exam with a passing grade.

“Xu Yin, come out for a moment.”

After pacing around the classroom for a while, the Russian teacher approached Xu Yin’s seat and gently tapped on her desk.

Tong Guihua mouthed ‘good luck’ to her.

Xu Yin thought that the Russian teacher wanted to take her to the teacher’s office to discuss something with her.

Unexpectedly…

“Teacher Qu, what did you just say?” Xu Yin couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. She must’ve heard it wrong, right?

“You didn’t hear wrong. I’ve seen other teachers ordering clothes from you, and they turned out to be quite nice. So I thought of having you make a dress for my daughter too…”

A few minutes later, Xu Yin returned to the classroom with a few sheets of paper in her hand and a dizzy head.

“Why are you back already? Did he want to talk to you because you got a good score on the quiz earlier?” Tong Guihua asked in a low voice.

“No. Teacher Qu asked me to make a dress for his daughter and told me to choose the fabric.”

“What the heck? Has Teacher Qu been kidnapped and replaced by someone else?”

“…What are you talking about!?”

“Hehe. Isn’t Teacher Qu worried that you’re going to focus too much on designing clothes and flunk your exams?”

The corners of Xu Yin’s mouth twitched. “He said he originally wanted to find me after the exams, but a few days ago, his daughter’s mother happened to pass by Pingyang to visit her… By the way, I’m a bit confused, isn’t his daughter’s mother his wife?”

Tong Guihua was very excited to relay the gossip to Xu Yin. “Haven’t you heard? Teacher Qu has been divorced for many years. His ex-wife despised him for having a low salary at the time and ran off with a wealthy businessman from another city. That businessman already had two children, so Teacher Qu’s ex-wife left their daughter with him.”

“No wonder…” Xu Yin had a sudden realization. “Teacher Qu didn’t say it outright, but I could tell anyway. His ex-wife must’ve brought his stepdaughter along while she visited them. The stepdaughter made fun of Teacher Qu’s daughter for wearing unfashionable clothes. Teacher Qu must want to make his daughter happy, that must be why he asked me.”

“Then you have to make the prettiest dress for her!”

“That goes without saying!”

Xu Yin nodded. She knew just what fabric to buy and what design she wanted to make.

After they had lunch, Xu Yin took Tong Guihua to the local supply and marketing cooperative and got a piece of soft yellow polkadot fabric.

A little girl of Teacher Qu’s daughter’s age would probably prefer pink.

Unfortunately, the stores in their county had a limited supply of fabric. The pink fabrics were more popular and had already been sold out. Who knew when the next batch of pink fabrics would arrive?

Anyhow, Teacher Qu had mentioned that his daughter had fair skin. Soft yellow would not look any less appealing on her than pink.

“Do you have pure cotton white lace fabric?”

Xu Yin scanned the neatly arranged fabric display and asked the salesperson.

“We just received a few of those this morning. Which pattern do you want?”

Xu Yin chose a design with delicate hollowed-out small flowers and requested a narrow strip to be cut.