eyes outside the box

On the way home from school, the scent of sweet-scented osmanthus trees on both sides of the street came.The children returning home walked together in twos and threes, and childish laughter came from time to time.

Duan Jiuze looked at the road in front of him, occasionally looking sideways at the children who were laughing.

By Duan Jiuze's side, Yang Bowen, who had bruises on his face and not so neat and clean clothes, was wearing a face all the way, carrying a schoolbag, and kicking the stones around his feet as he walked.

The two remained silent all the way until they got home.

"What's wrong with Wenwen? Got into a fight?"

As soon as he entered the door, Wang Qin saw the bruises on Yang Bowen's face, and hurriedly took him to him, looking left and right to see if there were any other injuries on his body.

Yang Bowen didn't speak, just let Wang Qin watch.It was even more impossible for Duan Jiuze to reply. He even changed his shoes and sat down at the desk in the living room, put down his schoolbag, and put his weekend homework on the table.

Seeing that the two children were silent, Wang Qin thought that the two brothers had quarreled and even started fighting, so she dragged Yang Bowen to the sofa and sat down, and then called Duan Jiuze to her side, wanting to ask what happened to the two of them.

Duan Jiuze was also obedient, Wang Qin asked, and he replied: "Someone in the class said I picked it up, Wenwen didn't like to hear that, and got into a fight with him."

As soon as Duan Jiuze spoke, Yang Bowen exploded: "They are talking nonsense! They say that Zeze is a child picked up from a garbage dump! They are lying! I will not play with those people in the future! They will talk about it later, once I say it, I will hit it once!"

Wang Qin frowned slightly, wondering why someone would spread these words to the children.

Wang Qin looked at Yang Bowen, then at Duan Jiuze: "Wenwen fights with others and you just watch?"

Duan Jiuze glanced at Wang Qin, but said nothing.

"No one is allowed to fight in the future. If Wenwen fights with others, you have to drag Zeze. You are an older brother, you need to be older and more sensible, understand?"

Duan Jiuze nodded, but he didn't seem to care much about it.

Wang Qin looked at Yang Bowen again, and said softly: "Wenwen, no matter what others say, we can't do anything. Our life is lived by ourselves, not by others. Mom has no other wishes, only I hope you and Zeze grow up well. You and Zeze are doing well, it’s better than anything else. You are all mother’s children. No matter who you see or where you bump into each other, mother will feel that Sad. So, don’t fight again in the future, can you promise mom?”

Yang Bowen looked at the expectation in Wang Qin's eyes and nodded seriously.

When going to bed at night, Duan Jiuze closed his eyes early, covered the quilt, and waited to fall asleep as usual.But Yang Bowen, who was beside Duan Jiuze, kept his eyes open and couldn't sleep for a long time - because the two were still young, they still slept together in the lower bunk, but each was covered by a small quilt.

Yang Bowen turned his head and looked at Duan Jiuze who seemed to be falling asleep, and couldn't help crawling from his bed to Duan Jiuze's side.

Duan Jiuze didn't sleep at first, Yang Bowen ran into his bed, he naturally knew about it, but he didn't know what Yang Bowen was going to do, so he just opened his eyes, turned his head slightly, and looked quietly at Yang Bowen in the dark.

"Zeze...are you unhappy?"

"No."

"I know you must be upset, because they said you were... picked up."

Duan Jiuze turned his head back, and said in a calm voice, "Get up tomorrow morning to do homework and sleep."

In the dark, Yang Bowen straightened up suddenly, with an unspeakable tangled voice: "Are you fighting because of what they said, so you don't help me?"

Wen Nuan left suddenly. In the darkness, Duan Jiuze frowned and pulled the quilt.

"Fighting can't stop the spread of rumors. Whether I help you or not, the result will not change, and the rumors may even increase rather than decrease. My mother raised our two children by herself, and her life is not bad, so it will inevitably lead to rumors Gossip. We..." Duan Jiuze talked for a while, and then felt that it was useless to talk to a second-grade child in elementary school. Whether the other party understood or not was a matter of two words, so he stopped talking and just pulled the quilt again.

Yang Bowen didn't know if he understood. He lay down, still rubbing Duan Jiuze's quilt, and even hugging Duan Jiuze seemed a little sticky.

Duan Jiuze couldn't tell how long it had been since he had been so close to someone. He stretched out his hand and pushed Yang Bowen, wanting Yang Bowen to go back to his bed.

Yang Bowen twitched, and instead of returning to his bed, he stretched out his small arms to hug Duan Jiuze: "Zeze, I won't let anyone bully you."

Duan Jiuze closed his eyes and didn't take Yang Bowen's words to heart, but he didn't push Yang Bowen away any more, and even touched Yang Bowen's sideways back to see if it was covered with a quilt.

Duan Jiuze didn't agree with Yang Bowen's fight in the afternoon, but he also knew that Yang Bowen was young, and it was normal to learn how to fight on TV when encountering such a situation.

As for the rumors, Duan Jiuze didn't take it to heart.

On the other hand, Wang Qin didn't seem to pay much attention to the rumors on the surface, but Duan Jiuze could feel that Wang Qin paid more attention to the details in dealing with the two of them in life.Basically, it is approaching towards equal treatment and trying to make a bowl of water level.However, because the change was relatively subtle at the beginning, and followed by a gradual change, Yang Bowen didn't notice anything.

As for whether those rumors were picked up, they were replaced by new rumors in the day-to-day life, and were gradually forgotten in the layers of ashes, and few people mentioned them.

The focus of Duan Jiuze's life is naturally not rumors, not even this world, so everything that happens in this world, except for clues, basically has no value to care about.

Since Duan Jiuze came to this world at the age of four and a half, until now, all life seems to be very normal, and there are no new clues at all for the things he has always wanted to explore.

Duan Jiuze even wondered if he would inadvertently forget some clues due to the erosion of time, and get farther and farther away from what he wanted to find.

Duan Jiuze sorted out all the clues he could remember so far, and decided to find a special notebook to record them tomorrow.

Duan Jiuze briefly wrote down the previous two lives in his memory in his notebook, and then wrote down the things that might be clues.

However, even after writing down the important parts of the previous two lives, Duan Jiuze still couldn't see what he was looking for, and even the chapters related to the third life were all blank.

Under the warm desk lamp, the opened page of the notebook was blank, without a word.Duan Jiuze watched quietly, as if the blank notebook was covered with typefaces.

"Zeze, are you looking at this notebook again?"

Yang Bowen entered the bedroom with two glasses of milk, and saw Duan Jiuze looking at the blank pages in the notebook again at the door.He handed the milk to Duan Jiuze, just glanced at the blank page indifferently, and sat on the bed.

"Zeze, you've been watching it for five years, every day. What's so interesting about it? By the way, we're going to have a picnic tomorrow. Have you prepared the things we're going to bring?"

Duan Jiuze closed the open notebook, picked up the cup, and replied before drinking milk: "I don't read it every day."

Yang Bowen held his empty cup indifferently, tilted his head slightly and said, "I don't think you are very interested in tomorrow's picnic, Zeze."

Duan Jiuze drank the milk in one gulp, and took away the empty cup from Yang Bowen's hand, ignoring this sentence.

Seeing Duan Jiuze walking towards the outside of the bedroom, Yang Bowen chased him and said, "I think the picnic is good, and I don't need to go to class. It's a pity that tomorrow is Thursday, and there was an art class. You say Why not have a picnic on Friday? On Friday, after the picnic, it will be Saturday and Sunday, which is equivalent to a three-day holiday, how wonderful! There are no art and music classes on Friday, how wonderful."

Duan Jiuze went to the kitchen, washed and dried the cup and put it in the cabinet, completely ignoring Yang Bowen who was chattering.

The two walked back to the bedroom from the kitchen. Duan Jiuze made the bed, Yang Bowen looked at the time belatedly, and exclaimed, "Why hasn't Mom come back yet? It's already past nine o'clock."

While changing his pajamas, Duan Jiuze replied in a calm tone: "Mom said this morning that I will take the bus to Yunchuan Xiang's house today, and I won't be back until the afternoon of the day after tomorrow."

Yang Bowen yelled happily, and hugged Duan Jiuze excitedly: "We can sleep in the morning after tomorrow! Mom has never allowed us to sleep in on weekends, and now we finally have a chance!"

Duan Jiuze gave a perfunctory "Yes", threw Yang Bowen's pajamas to him, and went to wash himself first.

Although it was said that there was going to be a picnic, the students in each group distributed their own things to bring, but Duan Jiuze was really not optimistic about the meal at noon tomorrow.They are all twelve or thirteen-year-old first-year children, who really cooks at home?Even if it is made, whether it can be eaten or not is still a question.It is more practical to bring a few more packs of biscuits.

It may be because of the picnic the next day, and Wang Qin will not be at home for two days, Yang Bowen tossed and turned at night, so excited that he couldn't sleep.

Because they are junior high school students, Yang Bowen and Duan Jiuze now sleep separately in the upper bunk and the lower bunk.Therefore, if one person is so excited that he can't sleep at night, the other person will be affected to some extent.

When Yang Bowen was excited at first, Duan Jiuze kept ignoring him. At one o'clock in the middle of the night, Duan Jiuze finally couldn't help roaring, and Yang Bowen restrained himself a little.

It may be that young people are in good health, and it is rare to encounter such an exciting event as a group picnic. Even though he went to bed late the night before, Yang Bowen still got up early the next day.

The two rushed to the school slowly, and it was no surprise to see many students holding pots and pans at the school gate, talking excitedly while walking into the school.

Because last week it was agreed to have a picnic on Thursday this week, so there was no evening self-study on Wednesday night, and the morning self-study on Thursday morning was also cancelled, which was dedicated to the time for students to prepare picnic supplies.Except for a few families living in other urban areas, most of them went home excitedly all night.

Duan Jiuze and Yang Bowen carried biscuits and water in their schoolbags, and bags containing cutting boards, knives and spatulas in their hands, and walked slowly into the school gate.

When stepping into the school, the moment Duan Jiuze looked up, all he saw was white mist.Duan Jiuze had lived an uncommon life for several years, but at this moment, he didn't realize it.

But Yang Bowen, who was next to Duan Jiuze, saw that Duan Jiuze suddenly stopped moving, and called out "Ze Ze" strangely.

When Duan Jiuze heard Yang Bowen calling him, he turned his head to look at Yang Bowen, and found that the fog had dissipated completely in an instant.

Seeing Duan Jiuze stop, Yang Bowen frowned, and couldn't help worrying: "Zeze, are you feeling well?"

Duan Jiuze looked at Yang Bowen's worried face, then at the students walking around the campus normally, as well as the clearly visible buildings, and said nothing.