16: Chapter 16 The Cafeteria Owner's Complaint, the Vice Principal's Conspiracy

What Fang Jiming did not know was that the vibration caused by his 30,000-yuan lunch airdrop at No. 19 Middle School was far greater than he had anticipated.

The first thing to collapse was the Cafeteria.

The Cafeteria of No. 19 Middle School was located on the north side of the playground, a drab, single-story building.

One-third of the white tiles on the exterior wall had fallen off, and the murky exhaust from the range hoods had stained the ceiling a uniform, scorched yellow. From a distance, the entire building looked no different from a decaying tooth slowly turning yellow.

The Cafeteria contractor was named Zhao Guangming, in his early forties, and was the brother-in-law of Vice Principal Sun Yaozu.

This man had been contracting the Cafeteria at No. 19 Middle School for six years, with the contract automatically renewed every year.

The meal standard increased by one yuan each semester, but the quality of the dishes dropped by one level each semester. In six years, he had managed the school Cafeteria from inedible to toxic levels.

Today at 11:30 AM, Zhao Guangming was sitting at his office desk in the Cafeteria's kitchen, feet propped up, scrolling through his phone as usual.

On the desk sat a bowl of Cafeteria fried rice that he himself would absolutely never eat, waiting for the bell to ring so students would line up to get their food.

The bell rang.

He waited five minutes.

About a hundred students came into the Cafeteria, about the same as usual; mostly from Grade 10 and Grade 11, with fewer from Grade 12.

He waited another ten minutes.

That group from Grade 12 still hadn't really shown up.

He called over a Cafeteria lady and asked.

"Why are there so few Grade 12 students today?"

The Cafeteria lady wiped the grease off her hands with her apron.

"Not a single one from Class 18, Grade 12 came. I heard someone in their class treated them to food from outside."

"What kind of food from outside?"

"I don't know, it seems like it was delivered by some big restaurant. They drove several cars into the school; it was quite a spectacle."

Zhao Guangming's expression changed.

He put down his phone, walked out of the kitchen, stood at the Cafeteria entrance, and peered toward the teaching building for a while, vaguely seeing that there were indeed several white cars parked there.

Ten minutes later, he pieced together the complete information from other students.

The new homeroom teacher for Class 18, Grade 12 was surnamed Fang. He had ordered high-end private chef lunches for all 38 students in the class. The delivery vehicles drove into the school, and waiters wearing white gloves laid out tablecloths and served the food. The price of one meal was said to be several hundred yuan.

Zhao Guangming's face darkened.

He took out his phone and dialed a number.

The phone rang twice before it was answered, and a slow, middle-aged male voice came from the other end.

"Guangming, what is it?"

"Brother-in-law."

Zhao Guangming raised his voice by two notches.

"Do you know what that new teacher at your school has done?"

"Which new teacher?"

"The substitute teacher surnamed Fang in Class 18, Grade 12. He ordered food from some high-end restaurant for the whole class, the kind with white gloves and silver trays, delivered directly into the classroom to eat."

There was silence on the other end of the phone for three seconds.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu leaned back in the old leather chair in the Vice Principal's office, his right index finger slowly tapping the armrest.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. The students all posted it on their Moments, talking about Wagyu beef, abalone, truffles, and cake, several hundred yuan per serving."

Zhao Guangming swallowed.

"My Cafeteria meals are only eight and a half yuan per serving. Isn't he clearly slapping me in the face?"

Zhao Guangming's voice already carried a crying tone—not because he felt bad for the students not eating in the Cafeteria, but because he was crying over his own revenue.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu did not rush to respond to his brother-in-law's accusation.

He slowly sat up straight, and his right index finger stopped tapping.

Zhao Guangming continued to curse on the phone.

"He's a substitute teacher with a monthly salary of 3,700 yuan; where would he get the money to buy meals for the whole class that cost several hundred yuan each? There must be something wrong here, Brother-in-law, you have to do something."

"Don't rush."

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu's voice was unhurried.

"I will handle the Cafeteria matter. You go back and operate as usual first."

"How can I operate as usual? If he does this again tomorrow, my Cafeteria will be finished."

"It won't be finished."

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu hung up the phone and placed it on the desk.

He had been the Vice Principal at No. 19 Middle School for fourteen years and had seen countless matters, big and small.

But this was the first time he had encountered a substitute teacher paying out of his own pocket to buy takeout costing several hundred yuan per serving for the entire class.

This matter made him uncomfortable.

But the reason he was uncomfortable was different from Zhao Guangming.

Zhao Guangming was heartbroken over the money.

He cared about order.

The Cafeteria at No. 19 Middle School was an important link in his chain of interests. Zhao Guangming paid him no less than 150,000 yuan in management fees annually. Combined with various kickbacks from school infrastructure maintenance and teaching equipment procurement, the gray income that passed through his hands at No. 19 Middle School exceeded 400,000 yuan annually.

These funds could flow smoothly into his pocket because of one thing.

No one cared.

No one cared that the Cafeteria food was inedible, no one cared that the teaching building ceiling leaked, and no one cared that the playground track was worn smooth and no one repaired it.

The teachers just lay flat waiting to retire, the students just drifted through their days waiting to graduate or drop out, the parents had long given up on expectations, and the Education Bureau would rap their knuckles every year but never took any real action.

Everyone felt that this school was rotten to begin with, rotten to the core, and unchangeable.

This atmosphere of collective abandonment was Vice Principal Sun Yaozu's iron curtain.

For fourteen years, no one had lifted it.

And what was Fang Jiming doing now?

He was using an extremely simple and crude way to tell the students of Class 18: You deserve to eat well.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu stood up and walked to the window, his gaze passing through the layer of dust that had accumulated for half a year on the glass, landing on the basketball hoop on the playground that was so rusted it was about to collapse.

When a student begins to feel that they deserve better things, they will start to ask: Why wasn't it like this before?

Why is the Cafeteria food so inedible?

Why is the classroom ceiling leaking?

Why is the track ruined and no one repairs it?

Once these questions are asked, if traced upwards, they will sooner or later reach his desk.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu turned and returned to his desk, pulled open a drawer, flipped out a compilation of school management regulations, and turned to page 37.

His finger stopped on one of the clauses.

Chapter 6, Article 23: Food from outside the school shall not be introduced into the campus in any form without the approval of the school's logistics management department. Anyone who violates this regulation will be given a serious warning. If it causes a food safety incident, it will be referred to the relevant departments for handling according to regulations.

He picked up the red pen on the desk and drew a line under this regulation.

Then he picked up the office landline and dialed the extension of the director of the Academic Affairs Office.

"Old He, come to my office."

After hanging up, he dialed another number, this time the extension for the Personnel Department of the Education Bureau.

After the call connected, he lowered his voice.

"Old Chen, let me ask you something. That new substitute teacher in Class 18, Grade 12, Fang Jiming—you have his personnel file there, right?"

"Yes, what's wrong?"

"Help me check his background, especially his family's economic situation."

"What do you mean? What happened?"

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu's gaze was still fixed on the rusty basketball hoop outside the window.

"A substitute teacher with a monthly salary of 3,700 yuan spent 30,000 yuan to treat the whole class to a high-end private chef meal."

He paused for a moment.

"Don't you think there's a problem with these numbers?"

There was silence on the other end of the phone as well.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu: (￢_￢)

He put down the phone, took a blank disciplinary notice template from the drawer, and laid it on the desk.

The red pen in his right hand hovered above the paper, the tip trembling slightly.

Introducing outside food without approval, posing a serious food safety risk.

He recited this sentence in his mind, his mouth curling slightly.

This kind of reason would hold water at any school.

Food safety—four words that no one could refute, no one dared to refute.

Once this disciplinary notice was signed, the breach of contract clause in Fang Jiming's substitute teacher contract would be triggered, and the school would have the right to unilaterally terminate the employment relationship.

For a substitute teacher without tenure, it wasn't even worth filing for labor arbitration.

Vice Principal Sun Yaozu put down the red pen and did not rush to write.

He was not in a hurry.

Let Fang Jiming jump around for two more days.

The higher he jumps, the harder he will fall.

He folded the blank disciplinary notice twice and tucked it into the innermost compartment of the drawer, placing it together with several other old, yellowed forms.

Those old forms also had names on them.

There was the name of the young Chinese Language teacher from two years ago who wanted to reform the curriculum, and the name of the math department head from three years ago who wrote a whistleblower letter to the Education Bureau.

They were no longer at No. 19 Middle School.

Outside the window, the setting sun was dyeing the drab teaching building of No. 19 Middle School a sickly orange-red, and the noisy sounds of students laughing and playing after class drifted through the hallway.

Listening to those sounds, Vice Principal Sun Yaozu closed the drawer.

Fourteen years.

In this school, he had seen too many young people who wanted to change something.

Not one had succeeded.

Fang Jiming would be no exception.