Ti passed by and Hou Lin's sense of indecisiveness only kept on piling up. The frequent argunts between his parents always left him unable to choose sides because he didn't want to choose one parent over the other. If he said his father was right, Hou Luli would get upset and if he took Hou Luli's side, then Hou Fa would make a sour expression.
That's why he always leaned towards finding a middle ground. But doing that wasn't always a solution which he learned sooner than later when one day, his class collectively decided to not complete the last minute assignnt as a prank on the teacher.
That day, Hou Lin went to his mother and explained his predicant. "Mom. Everybody in my class is not doing tomorrow's assignnt. But I think that…I will be able to complete it. So should I do the assignnt?"
Hou Luli, who was exasperated reading the slightly more than expected expensive bills for the month, didn't clearly hear his question. "What am I gonna do about this…?" She pressed her temple, "Fa will just get another excuse to point fingers at . Ugh should I tell him about my extra parlor expenses…?" She muttered to herself.
"Mom?"
"No, no! That's not the right thing to do!" She quickly said while shuffling the bills.
I will be screwed!
"Oh…is that so?" Hou Lin blinked and asked.
"Huh what?" Hou Luli tiredly looked at him. "Sorry dear Mom is a little busy. Just do whatever you want, okay?"
"But I don't understand…That's why I am asking you. You said it's okay to not do the assignnt."
"Yeah so don't do it. Damn, I have to rush! Lin, I will be back in so ti. Take care of Cai for , pretty please?"
He did look after his younger brother, but his heart felt uneasy the whole ti.
The teacher will get angry if I don't do the assignnt, right…? Every teacher says to do the howork but Mom said it's okay to skip…
"Big bro, you should definitely not do the assignnt!" His younger brother, Hou Cai, urgently said. "Do you want to be the only person to complete the assignnt and then get bullied by your classmates?"
"I…will be bullied?"
He snorted. "Of course, you will. You know Fenfen I keep talking about from the other class? He did not show his answers to his friends in the test even when they decided it before. His friends got mad at him and they bully him now because they failed. If you do the sa, your whole class will bully you too because you didn't listen to them."
"I see…I guess then not doing the assignnt is the right thing," Hou Lin seemingly ca to decide.
But things took a worse turn than expected when the teacher called out everybody's parents in school because it was clear to her that the whole class had planned to mass ditch the assignnt.
Hou Fa was completely flabbergasted by this call as he couldn't digest that his son was a disobedient boy. In fact, Hou Lin was smart and he liked to study. So the fact that he didn't do the simple assignnt ca as a shocker.
"Lin, why didn't you do the assignnt? Don't you like studying anyway?"
Hou Lin wasn't sure what to say. "I-I asked…I asked Mom and said that it was fine not to do it…"
Hou Luli was left stunned. "Huh? When did you ask this?"
"Yesterday when you were looking through the bills. You said that…it wasn't the right thing to do…"
Hou Fa and the class teacher were beyond confused.
"Luli, how could you tell him not to do the howork? That's what students are supposed to be doing anyway, right?"
Hou Luli then rembered that Lin did approach her but couldn't recollect what he exactly ca to her for. "I…Lin, that is preposterous. Why would I tell you to skip your assignnt? You must have definitely misunderstood !"
"But I had asked you-"
"Enough, Lin. I an first you make a mistake and then you try to cover it up by saying that I was at fault. You purposely ca to when I was busy, didn't you?"
Hou Lin tried to speak but nothing ca out of his lips. "No…I ca to you because…"
I wanted to start my assignnt earlier so that I could complete it by my bedti…If I had waited after you returned from outside, I wouldn't have been able to complete it…
"Complete…bedti…"
He couldn't understand as to why sothing which was the right thing to do until yesterday suddenly turned into his big mistake?
"Cai also said…they will bully …"
The teacher gasped. "Of course nobody will bully you. If sobody does bully you because you refused to join their plan which was clearly wrong, then you should imdiately report it to the teacher."
Hou Lin was beyond exhausted. "Seriously what are you doing Luli? I don't know what the heck are you telling them? Lin, who was always so obedient, suddenly becos rebellious and Cai is completely talking nonsense. As if sobody would get bullied over a simple howork!"
Hou Luli glared at him. "You have so nerve to bla when all you know is only pulling all nighters for your work! Do you even know what is going on with your childrens' lives anymore?"
"Yeah and clearly you do because that's why we are standing here listening to a crappy complaint about Lin and wasting our ti here."
He scowled at Lin. "When your teacher gives you so work to do, you should just do it instead of joining your class gang in fooling around. You should at least know that much, Lin."
Lin stood there motionless, staring at their fighting parents, cursing and blaming each other.
So doing the howork was the right thing to do…
"No, that is dumb. You have to be smart," said an eleven year old Zhan Yahui who he brought to his ho after finding her collapsed and malnourished in an alley and offered her the last night's cooked al.
Zhan Yahui, who gobbled up the food, extrely famished, said, "You should have done your assignnt halfway and told your classmates that your parents are very strict and would punish you if you don't do the howork. But it would also make your friends feel betrayed because you ditched the plan. That's when you say that you started the assignnt because your parents forced you to but of course, you hated doing it so you left it halfway. That way, you won't beco their target to be bullied at all.
But at the sa ti, you give a different excuse to your teacher saying that you were diligently doing your assignnt but fell asleep while doing it. Since she herself knew it was a last minute job given, she would have understood you and wouldn't have called your parents because unlike the rest of the class, you at least tried to do the assignnt, even if it wasn't completed. That would have mattered to her rather than completely ditching it."
She snorted. "Doing the assignnt halfway was the solution rather than either not doing it at all or completing it all the way. Everybody gets to be happy. Your classmates, your parents and the teacher and you don't beco the target of anybody's anger. That's called smart work and that's the right thing to do."
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