She was sitting with her knees tucked to her chest when I joined her.
"Are you here to laugh at me?" she began.
"Are you angry?" I asked with a smile.
"No, I"m not," she said, turning her head away from me.
I laughed. "You are!"
"You cheated so it"s not counted. We agreed to count those in the air so why did you look in the can?" she asked furiously.
She was definitely unhappy. I explained, "I cheated because I"m not as good as you. You threw it so quickly so how was I supposed to count them? I could only resort to that method. You"re so amazing, will you teach me?"
I smiled inwardly at my ability to sweet-talk. It should be acceptable to act this shamelessly when coaxing kids, right?
"Your admission that you cheated means that you really didn"t win. Apologize first and I"ll consider if I should forgive you," she added.
"Alright, alright. I shouldn"t have done that. It"s not counted. Please forgive me," I said, trying to keep the smile off my face.
It was fortunate that she kept her head turned, or she would"ve been able to see how half-heartedly I was behaving.
She turned back slowly and I quickly covered my mouth and suppressed my smile before pulling a straight face.
"I"ll forgive you for now, but I"m still not convinced of you becoming my teacher. Did he really ask you to teach me?" she asked.
"He? Oh, the president? Yeah, he wants you to finish the Euler equation today before playtime," I responded.
She picked up a tree branch and started writing on the sand. It was Euler"s derivation.
I took my phone out and searched for his equations.
Learning math was just a hobby of mine in the past. Such complex equations were foreign to me.
I found the equation online and compared it to what she was writing.
Her accuracy caught me by surprise.
She was a genius, much smarter than I am for sure.
I wondered how I was going to teach her math when she could easily defeat me in that area. It was looking like it really was just the president that could teach her stuff.
What if I just blend in for a month? Since I was going to get paid anyway, I would just take good care of her and get ready for the reporter"s interview in 20 days" time. I had to leave a good impression to secure my credits, have fun in my final semester, and graduate safely.
It was the reason why I ended up in the inst.i.tution in the first place, so I couldn"t let anything change that.
"I"m done," she said, tugging at the corner of my shirt.
Comparing her work against my phone, I said after a short while, "All correct."
"You don"t say," she said drily. "So you"re done for the day? Can I borrow your phone?"
"What for?"
"I want to learn math and he lets me do it through the phone," she said.
"He? The president? He doesn"t teach you personally?" I asked, confused.
Xiaoyu was a rather rude child, which made sense since there hadn"t really been anyone to educate her on manners.
"He did at the start, but I started knowing more than he did, so I moved on to self-studying. Are you able to teach me, otherwise?" Xiaoyu didn"t wait for my response and instead started downloading VPN on my phone. She then went to Google and started searching for something on Wikipedia.
Judging from her speed and familiarity with the sites, she must"ve done this multiple times already.
"Why must you go over the firewall?"
"A lot of doc.u.ments, files, and videos within China are chargeable, unlike those from overseas," she replied off-handedly.
I looked on as she started reading about the trigonometric function and downloading relevant doc.u.ments.
She kept her eyes on my phone the whole time and thoughts filled my mind as I stared at her in admiration.
Xiaoyu really had an interest in math and learning. I initially had thought that the president turned her into a prodigy through force-feeding and strict discipline.
I got bored after some time, but Xiaoyu was still focused on my phone. I nudged her a little and asked, "Will you get distracted if I talk to you?"
"Yes, but I"ll let you ask me three questions as a sign of my forgiveness. Shoot," she said coolly.
"You"re studying math because you enjoy it?" I asked.
"Of course. I went to school and got bullied by the kids because I knew more than them. They regarded me as a freak, which is why I stopped attending cla.s.ses."
"Who taught you all these knowledge?"
"The doctors, nurses, and other staff took turns to teach me at first, but I"ve learned all the Chinese words they could teach by nine years old. I then started learning English, French, and German on my own."
"Oh my G.o.d," I exclaimed, my mouth agape.
"He taught me, too, of course, but nothing else piqued my interest until he showed me a difficult math question. Numbers are part of a self-forming system but are constantly self-contradictory. They require a strict calculation process but most of the time is incomprehensible."
It was my first time hearing someone explain math this way, and from a girl 12 years of age, nonetheless. After some time, I asked, "Then what do you wanna do, or rather be, in the future?
"That"s your third and last question. I want to be a mathematician. Of course, I"m only learning now but I plan to solve the seven difficult questions. I want to unravel the secret behind math." She paused then continued, "Find me all formulas similar to the trigonometric function and pick five basic but relevant questions for me tomorrow."
I took a deep breath, finally understanding what the president meant when he said I"d be surprised. Xiaoyu was really seeing things that normal people fail to.
"Hey, why are you in a daze? Did you hear what I said? He"s been doing what I tell him every day, so I"ll go back to him if you can"t do that," she stated, throwing my phone back to me.
"No, no. I can do it," I said quickly.
"Let"s eat and go down then." She pointed far away.
I looked up into the sky and noticed that the sun was about to set. Time had flown by, and it was only when I picked my phone up that I realized Xiaoyu had drained its battery.
"You"re going down too?" I asked.
"I wasn"t going to tell you at first, but since I"m a good person... My house is down the mountain," she told me.
"Don"t you stay here in the inst.i.tution?" I asked, confounded.
"I live in his house. I"m not a mental patient. This is the place where I learn, just like how elementary school kids attend school daily."
I nodded.
She got up, slapping away the dust on her clothes.
We had dinner together and I could hear the doctors and nurses talking about me rather obviously.
After we finished our meal, Xiaoyu and I took the same bus down the mountain.
I watched her walk into a corner neighborhood before I got into a public bicycle and cycled my way back to school.
Xiaoyu learned through my phone for the next 20 days.
All I did was to ensure that my phone battery lasted and to prepare questions for her to solve at home.
We grew closer, slowly but surely, and I started worrying about her future.
She was a prodigy, how could she spend the rest of her life in this inst.i.tution?
On the 20th morning, I received a call from the teacher.
Half-awake, I picked up the phone.
"Luqiao? What time do you start work? I"ll get the reporter to look for you and conduct the interview."
The word "reporter" jolted me out of my semi-hazy state and I immediately thought about making use of the interview to share Xiaoyu"s story.
"Today. I"m free today."
"Great. I"ll get the reporter to the East Mountain entrance and you"ll pick him up from there, is that alright? I"ll contact you later. I need to see good news tomorrow."
"Alright, no problem," I said before hanging up.
I received a message containing a foreign number.
I am going to publicize this huge story for Xiaoyu.
I got up and washed before heading to work.