Shengliver’s Note: I have kept a dark secret in the deepest corner of my heart up to this very moment. Please read and find it out. In the intervening three decades, did Shengliver ever feel any guilt?

Back in 1984, when I was in Grade 2 middle school, I committed a “crime”, which regrettably my class director Mr Zhou failed to solve.

There was a girl in my class who was popular with everyone, students and teachers alike. She was Kathy. Her popularity stirred up the boys’ resentment, since we branded Kathy as the teacher’s pet. The truth was that the more we hated her, the more popular and confident Kathy became.

One day while drifting in class to my fantasy world despite the teacher’s buzzing speech, I came up with an idea. I made up my mind to do something nasty to Kathy, single-handedly.

That evening, when class was over and there was no one else around, I went to Kathy’s desk and checked out her Chinese textbook, which I was sure she would be using the next morning for reading aloud. Very quickly, I wrote curses on a slip of paper and inserted it between the pages. I thought I was clever enough not to use my own pen. That night in bed in the dorm, I laughed myself to sweet dreams, pretty sure that the next morning Kathy would put up a show in the classroom.

In the Reading Aloud period the next morning, all the students were chanting the texts like crazy, as if the roof of the dilapidated schoolhouse were about to be brought down upon us. All of a sudden, a girl started to cry and curse. All of us stopped reading, and what we heard was the girl’s swearing. We could not believe such obscenities should be coming out of such an innocent girl’s mouth. What was even stranger was that she was not my target. She was Kathy’s deskmate.

Oh my God. What a terrible blunder! Mentally I went through what I had done the evening before, but I was 100% sure that the note had been placed in Kathy’s Chinese book. It turned out that Kathy had borrowed her deskmate’s book and used it the evening before. Oops.

The wronged girl would not stop. She cursed and swore and cried as if she had recently been bereaved. Naturally Mr Zhou the master was brought to the scene.

He started to investigate. First of all, all the “bad” boys were summoned to his office. After a storm of verbal abuse, Mr Zhou ordered them to confess. Poor boys. They had not done it. They ended up howling in Mr Zhou’s office because he attempted again and again to coerce each of them into an admission.

Seeing that the boys would not confess, Mr Zhou had no alternative but to send them back to the classroom. Then someone informed the teacher-turned detective that the words of the message were reminiscent of Shengliver’s hand. At first Mr Zhou brushed it off, because in his eye Shengliver was a shy, timid and good-natured boy. He had never heard me swearing in the classroom at least. There being no other clue available, however, I was summoned to Mr Zhou’s office.

“Shengliver, did you do it?” the master asked tentatively.

“No, I didn’t, sir,” I replied.

“Then why is the handwriting yours?” he continued, smirking as if I would confess on the spot.

I went ahead, “Mr Zhou, do you really believe that I would have been such a fool? If I had done it, I would never have used my own hand.”

My answer plunged my dear teacher into brooding. Since he could not extort a confession from me, I was released.

The same day while I was not in the classroom, Mr Zhou checked out my stationery. He even scribbled some words on paper using my fountain pen. He became dead sure that my writing implement was not the crime tool.

It seemed as if Mr Zhou were stuck in a cul-de-sac. He was as hopeless as he was helpless. Poor man! After some deliberation, he got me called back into his office.

This time Mr Zhou turned harsh and accused me of being the culprit. His words were such that I almost freaked out. But in my heart, I told myself that there was no way I would admit it since he had no proof. Mr Zhou had me stand in the office for several hours on end, without any supper.

At the end of his tether, Mr Zhou ended up letting me off the hook. Back in the classroom, he announced that the investigation was laid to rest, although no criminal had been caught.

The master hollered, “No one shall mention it again!”