Lu Ruoxi Side Story: Thorny Rose - The New Neighbor

From the day Ye Sanqi passed away, Ye Ruoxi understood one thing completely—in this world, the only person she could rely on was herself.

She poured all her hopes into her studies.

It was the only lifeline she could cling to.

Every night after returning home, she would drag out a worn-out wooden box from under her bed.

Inside were her textbooks and notebooks.

She didn’t dare turn on the main light, afraid of wasting electricity.

Instead, she worked at a rickety, old desk,

under the dim glow of a single yellow bulb, greedily solving problems and memorizing texts.

Hunger and exhaustion seemed to fade away in the face of those complex formulas and archaic classical passages.

Only one thought remained in her world:

Escape.

Get into Jingzhou University, the school her father had once mentioned.

Flee this suffocating place.

Flee her mother.

This thought was the only light in all her suffering,

the sole flame that kept her going through every cold winter night.

...

However, Zhang Cuilan was fickle.

She would set up a street stall for a while, then fall back into laziness.

Her efforts became sporadic—three days of work, two days of slacking.

The little money she earned from the stall would soon be lost in the mahjong parlor.

Their barely improved life would once again turn difficult.

Yet, for Ye Ruoxi, when her mother wasn’t running the stall, it gave her a brief respite from her exhausting routine.

At least she didn’t have to work late into the night every day.

She didn’t know whether this was good or bad.

Time passed silently and busily—three more years slipped by.

Ye Ruoxi entered the second year of middle school.

She had grown a little taller but remained frail.

Years of labor and malnutrition left her with an unhealthy pallor.

Her grades, however, were still unshakably the best in class.

...

That same year, new neighbors moved into the long-vacant house across the way.

A mother and son.

The mother, Lin Dongmei, was a gentle-looking woman.

Her son, Su Yang, was tall and lanky.

When he smiled, two faint dimples appeared—bright and warm.

They, too, had come to live in this noisy, dilapidated urban village.

By coincidence, after transferring schools, Su Yang ended up in the same class as Ye Ruoxi.

Su Yang’s family didn’t seem well-off either.

But he had a mother who adored him.

Lin Dongmei would often pat his head affectionately

and make him steaming bowls of noodles with two poached eggs.

Su Yang first noticed Ye Ruoxi in class.

The math teacher posed a difficult competition-level problem.

The entire class fell silent.

Only one hand went up—hers.

Her slender fingers looked rough, unlike a girl’s hands should.

She stood and fluently gave the answer, along with multiple solution methods.

In that moment, she seemed to glow.

A stark contrast to the cold, withdrawn girl who never spoke to anyone.

To Su Yang, she seemed like someone from another world.

But after school,

in the narrow alleyway shared by their homes,

he saw another side of her.

That day, Zhang Cuilan was screaming at Ye Ruoxi over five missing yuan from the stall.

Every vile, filthy word poured from her mouth like garbage.

Ye Ruoxi stood there, head bowed, silent.

Letting the cruelest insults drench her like dirty water.

Su Yang hid behind his door, watching through the crack.

He saw the girl everyone admired at school

now humbled like a weed anyone could trample.

His chest tightened with an unfamiliar ache.

Something—sympathy, indignation—quietly took root in his heart.

From that day on, he began watching her in secret.

He saw her hands in winter—red, swollen, cracked.

Saw her meals—always just steamed buns and thin vegetable broth.

Saw her small, busy figure under the dim lights of the night market.

He wanted to help.

But he didn’t know how.

He feared his concern might shatter the fragile pride hidden beneath her icy shell.

One day during P.E.,

while the boys played basketball,

Su Yang limped back to the classroom alone, his ankle sprained.

Passing the old row of faucets behind the school, he spotted Ye Ruoxi.

She was crouched there, rinsing something in cold water.

Closer, he realized it was her always immaculately clean white sneakers.

Someone had stepped on them, leaving a glaring black mud stain.

She scrubbed at it with an old toothbrush, over and over.

Su Yang instinctively stopped, hiding behind a tree.

Her profile was stubborn, focused.

As if she weren’t just cleaning a stain, but scrubbing away all the unfairness and filth life had thrown at her.

Only when the bell rang did she finally stand.

Wringing out the shoes, she slipped them on, still soaked, and walked step by step to class.

Su Yang then noticed—her ankle was injured too. She’d been hiding it all along.

Watching her lonely retreat, his heart clenched, sour and heavy.

Soon, the semester ended.

Final exam results were handed out.

Ye Ruoxi.

Total score: first in grade.

Teacher Li held the report card, both proud and pained.

After class, she called Ye Ruoxi to her office.

"Ruoxi, congratulations—top of the class again."

Ye Ruoxi merely nodded, expressionless.

To her, this wasn’t a surprise. It was inevitable.

The only medal earned through countless sleepless nights and silent endurance.

"How... is everything at home?" Teacher Li ventured.

She couldn’t stop worrying about this student.

"It’s fine." Ye Ruoxi’s voice was soft.

"Your mother... treats you well?"

"She’s fine."

Ye Ruoxi lowered her lashes, shadows falling beneath her eyes.

Teacher Li sighed.

She knew she wouldn’t get answers.

This girl’s heart was a locked door.

She decided to visit the home again.

This time, she would praise this brilliant student to her mother’s face.

Maybe then, that woman would value her daughter a little more.

Carrying a small bag of tangerines, Teacher Li stepped once more into the dim little courtyard.

Zhang Cuilan was stringing skewers for her spicy barbecue under the last light of sunset.

Spotting the bag in Teacher Li’s hand, her impatience instantly melted into a smile.

"Ah, Teacher Li! What brings you here? Come in, come in!"

She wiped her hands hastily on her apron, ushering the teacher inside.

Ye Ruoxi followed silently, setting down her backpack.

"Ms. Zhang, I came with good news."

"In the finals, Ruoxi ranked first in her grade again—far ahead of second place!"

"In all my years of teaching, I’ve never met a child as brilliant as Ruoxi. She’s a genius—a true genius!"