I didn’t know the lady, but I saw her often around town with her two small children. She appeared to be shy, always looking down, trying not to make eye contact. She often wore the same clothes, and so did her children. I felt her discomfort when I saw her at the supermarket checkout. She reminded me of myself years ago. We had to go through a tough time.
Back then, I couldn’t afford a new winter coat for my daughter, and I didn’t know what I was going to do. Luckily, my three younger children could wear hand-me-downs. One night, I said to myself in my heart that I wished someone to offer me help. I did it for the first time since my husband’s unemployment.
The next morning, a neighbour came into the place where I worked. “I know you must feel unbelievable, This morning, I had an overwhelming (无法抗拒的) feeling that you needed this,” she whispered. She insisted on giving me twenty dollars. My eyes started to tear as she continued, “I also have a box of clothes in my car that I was going to donate. Please take what you need.” It was really a shock of getting her help. Was this the response to my word the night before?
Going through the large box of clothes, I found several winter items for my children, including a dark purple jacket that looked like it would fit my daughter. Although grateful, I felt embarrassed. The woman must have sensed my discomfort. She raised my chin so I could look at her. “We all need help at one time or another, “she said. “One day, you’ll be the one helping someone in need.”
I thanked her and promised I would always try to pay it forward.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Looking at the lady at the supermarket checkout, I knew perhaps it was the proper time.
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To my surprise, she said, “Yes.”
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When John pulled into his mother’s driveway with his young daughter, Lily, the sight of the familiar lychee (荔枝) tree welcomed them. “Look, Lily,” John said, pointing to the towering tree in the front yard. “It’s the family tree.”
Lily smiled as John treated the tree as if it were a real family member, patting its trunk (树干) affectionately. As they were admiring the tree, the screen door opened and out stepped Grandma Mei, bathed in the warm Florida sunlight. Grandma Mei, who came from the province of Guangdong in China, was known for her green thumb, particularly when it came to lychees.
Seeing her granddaughter, Grandma Mei adjusted her baseball cap and asked if Lily was ready for some lychees. But Lily hesitated, for the fruit’s appearance was unlike any other fruit she had tried before. With a laugh, Grandma Mei gave her a gentle hug. “More lychees for me then, John,” Grandma Mei said.
“Let’s get busy!” John said with enthusiasm, rubbing his hands together. “Family tree’s waiting.”
Hearing Dad calling the tree by name, Lily couldn’t help laughing. “Laugh if you want, Lily, but this tree is really family. On cold nights, before family tree was fully grown, Grandma Mei used to take my blanket and throw it over that tree.” Grandma Mei nodded, adding that she had to protect the tree from bad weather so that it would become a big strong tree and grow fruit for the whole family.
John, eager to start the day’s work, began climbing the tree, determined to harvest the best lychees for the family. Lily watched in amazement, noticing the clusters (簇) of lychees, their skin rough yet inviting.
As John skillfully cut through the branches with a cutter, Lily expressed her concern for the well-being of the tree. John explained to her that cutting the ends of branches won’t hurt family tree. Instead such behaviour made it healthier and stronger.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Lily’s hesitation towards the fruit gradually shifted to curiosity and she wanted to try it.
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Later in the afternoon, they all sat under the tree, surrounded by boxes filled with lychees and sharing stories related to lychees.
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Although it’s been almost two years now, I can still remember that day as if it were yesterday. We were all glued in front of the television, when Dad came rushing into the house after work to tell us that he had just bought a new boat. He promised us that the following week he’d take us all on a fishing trip. We were all very excited and happy at the prospect of it.
The much-awaited day finally came. After we packed everything onto the boat, Dad started the engine and steered it slowly out of the harbour. We headed out until we were a good distance from the shore. Then, when we found what seemed like a good spot for fishing, Dad stopped the engine.
The sky was crystal clear and the sea was as calm as a sheet of glass. We spent a good couple of hours bathing in the sun, fishing rods in hands, without a care in the world. It was fantastic just being there, staring out at the beautiful blue sea. We caught a good number of fish.
We must have lost track of time, chatting and laughing, because the next thing I remembered was being put into a darkness which was so thick that one could almost cut it with a knife. Looking around, it was all pitch-black. Then, out of nowhere, a big wave came crushing into the boat, nearly overturning us all overboard. If that wasn’t bad enough, we could hear the rumbling (隆隆声) of thunder in the distance—it was unbelievable how the weather had changed so quickly before our very own eyes. The storm was rolling up on us fast and it wasn’t long before the rain started to come down in showers. The rain was so dense and heavy that we could barely breathe.
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Dad immediately rushed to start the engine but it would not start.
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Suddenly, we started to hear what seemed like the sound of a helicopter approaching.
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As a senior editor in a famous press, I always think of days twenty years before when I was 18, I lived with my grandparents, and my parents earned their living in another city, struggling to support our family. I had taken to delivering newspapers to support myself and my education.
I would be up every morning by 5 am and walk five kilometres from where I lived to the newspaper office. By 6 am, I would collect 50 copies which must have weighed over five kilograms. My delivery range spanned (横跨) three kilometres. After distributing the copies, I would rush home—another three kilometres away—cook my breakfast, and be off to my school.
One Friday morning, I got home after my deliveries, finding Afzal, a boy from the neighbourhood, at my doorstep. Afzal said his mother wanted to see me. When I asked him why, Afzal said, “She will tell you.” Tired after walking around for over 11 kilometres, I was looking forward to breakfast and some rest. I assumed his mother wished to subscribe (定期订购) to the newspaper, so I followed him to his home nearby.
A woman in her 40s opened the door. I later learned she was Afzal’s mother, Mrs Kader. She asked me to sit, pulled up her chair next to mine and gently asked, “Tell me about your routine, right from the time you wake up in the morning.” I wasn’t quite sure why she wanted to know, but I told her about my morning job in a few words. She asked me, “How many miles do you walk every day?” I replied, “A little more than 11 kilometres.” My reply shocked her.
Then she patted my back and went inside, reappearing carrying a large plate full of food for breakfast for me. It was a heart y breakfast, one that brought back memories of happy days spent with my parents. Later, as I was about to leave after thanking them, Mrs Kader asked me to wait and she went inside again.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Then Mrs Kader appeared again, with a new bicycle.
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I bowed to Mrs Kader gratefully and left for school.
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Once upon a time, there was a farmer named Rakesh. He had purchased a farm in a village. One year, it happened that it rained very little in the village. There was no river nearby either. So, the farmer was worried how he would get water for his crops.
Incidentally, there was a well near his farm which had water. However, the well belonged to another farmer named Raghu. So, Rakesh persuaded Raghu to sell him the well so that he could apply the water for his crops. Raghu was a very greedy farmer. He said to Rakesh. “Sure, I will sell you the well. But once sold, I will not take it back. Anyway, it is of no use to me. So you can have it,” Then the well was sold to Rakesh.
The next day, Rakesh went to the farm and decided to take out the water from the well. However, to his surprise, Raghu was present there and stopped him from taking any water from the well. He said, “I have sold you only the well and not the water in it. If you want the water, then you will have to pay more for it!” On hearing this, Rakesh tried to reason with Raghu, but to no end.
Feeling cheated and trapped, finally, Rakesh decided to approach the local authority for a solution to this matter. When hearing Rakesh’s story, the officer Birbal said he would help to solve the problem and get him justice from Raghu.
The next day, Birbal came to the well along with Rakesh. He told Rakesh to draw water from the well. Then Raghu appeared and stopped them from taking the water from the well. Raghu said, “I have sold only the well to Rakesh, not the water in it. If he wants to use the water, then he has to pay extra for it.” Everyone fell in silence. Birbal thought for a while and came forward.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Birbal said, “If the water is yours, please empty the well of your water.”
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Hearing that, Raghu was scared.
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The M1 highway was closed down in both directions due to flooding, leaving thousands of vehicles stuck on the spot. Several hundred had been stuck for at least 30 hours since the road was cut at about 7.30 am on Monday.
Unluckily, I was one of the people who were waiting for help. There are almost 100 vehicles trapped on the road about 800 meters long. And one benefit was that there was a short road tunnel (隧道) that had provided shelter from the pouring rain as well as some lighting after nightfall. So how people have felt depended on how well they stored food. I was totally in trouble because of lacking food. I heard someone knocking on my window while I was worrying about my situation.
A man, who was driving a truck full of raw (生的) chicken leaving for downtown, opened his truck’s door and shared the chicken around by dinner time on Monday. This was a thriving community of shared resources and resourcefulness, where the truck driver dished out food that had been ordered for supermarkets. And others helped to cook the raw chicken by the tool which were found in their cars.
I took the chicken from the truck driver and, after expressing my thanks, I lost in thought: how do I cook this chicken? Just as I was looking around in confusion, a girl not far away waved to me, “Come over here, we have cooked meat.” “No, thanks,” I replied casually. But I was so hungry that I couldn’t help but walk over to her with the chicken. She took the chicken from my hand, cleaned it and put it on the grill (烧烤架). I was impressed by her masterful way. After a while, some meat was cooked and I took the meat she handed to me.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
As I got the hot chicken, I was filled with gratitude.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________I carefully wrote down the phone number of Catherine, the girl who had helped me so much during the wait.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________“Hey, honey!” I said, hugging my seven-year-old, Jean Prince, as she got off the bus. “How was school?” I asked her as I always did.
“Well, not so real good,” she replied, looking sad. “Everyone has their pictures on the Reading Bulletin Board (布告栏) but me. I never get my picture up, not for math or reading or anything.” Her shoulders fell suddenly, and her chin began to shake clearly.
I’d like to believe that, with enough educational treatment, visits to the doctor, experimenting with different medicines for ADHD (多动症), and drill, practice, and patience at home, I can turn my Jean into a teacher’s “dream child,” the skilled and intelligent kid who gets everything right and never colors outside the lines.
But I can’t. And every failure is yet another blow to me, as well as to Jean. Taking a deep breath, I turned on the “building self-esteem (自尊)” mode. “Well, honey, I’m sorry. But I’ll bet something good happened to you today, didn’t it? What was the best thing that you did today?” Jean took her own sweet time, thinking things through. To my relief, she wasn’t, however, on the edge of tears anymore.
Finally, she brightened a bit and said slowly, “Yes, when I passed the gate of the park, I saw a little girl who was walking with her mother and she fell down and cried because her knee bled, I hurried home and took my Barbie doll and gave it to her. She loved it and stopped crying, her mother said thanks to me and I felt good.”
“Sweetie, that’s great!” I said excitedly.
“It is you who have told me that I should be kind and learn to share good things with others,” Jean replied.
I learned that Jean had saved from her allowance (零花钱) for the past month to get that doll, which was her favorite, so I thought to myself, “I will tell all these to Mrs Doe, Jean’s teacher.”
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Later that night, after driving Jean home, I hurried to Mrs Doe’s.
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At 4：30 the next afternoon, Jean rushed to me happily at the school gate.
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Referred to as my hero, Jack, my brother, held significance in my life. Since he did everything before me, he always guided me and shared with his experiences I would have never had otherwise. As a master of learning and sports, he always accompanied me to study and take exercise. And he even got me through difficulties in life.
My first steps into high school were exciting but nervous, and I believed my extracurricular grades would be seen and valued by colleges. However, this sudden shift was difficult for me. Luckily, my brother noticed it all.
During that time, Jack was beginning his senior year and was finished with all the stressful subjects from junior year while I was studying for my very first math exam. Rather than just break into my room and sit down next to me, he let me decide by myself. He didn’t want to bother me because having someone sit next to me and micromanage my every move made me feel uncomfortable, leading to more stress and a feeling of distrust. Knowing this, he would leave me chips and snacks by my door, so I could pick them up whenever I felt like taking a break. He was there to help whenever I needed. With his encouragement and company, I became more confident while doing my homework.
The workload was just a major struggle for me during high school. Homework from advanced classes began piling up, and I was often stressed about different projects and deadlines. Moreover, there was also a math competition that my parents valued a lot, which needed plenty of practice every single day.
Even though I liked the time my brother gave me to figure out things on my own, it was reassuring to always have somebody who was willing to help me when I was stuck on an unsolvable problem. He would help me memorize formulas, explain different terms to me, and point out traps in different questions. And with his reputation as the best math student in our school, he could make those topics and questions simple to understand.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
I began to spend hours at my desk focusing on getting a good score in the math competition.
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Later Jack and I went to the same college and joined the same sports club.
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Aunt Evie had a dollhouse. It had many toys there. Every Friday afternoon, I went to Aunt Evie’s home with my parents. The adults would sit around a table in the dining room, eating pie and talking, while I played in the dollhouse for hours.
Sometimes I would pick up these lovely toys and place them in different positions. It was really fun. One time I asked Aunt Evie where she got the toys so that I could buy some, too. To my disappointment, Aunt Evie said that most of them were specially handmade gifts from her friends and couldn’t be bought anywhere. One such toy was a little bear, which was my favorite. It was so beautiful that I wanted to own it badly. “If I take it, Aunt Evie may not notice it. ” I said to myself.
Therefore, on a Friday afternoon, I attempted to take the little bear away from Aunt Evie’s dollhouse. I had to wait until nobody was watching me, ‘and it took me hours to get the courage to put the little bear in my pocket. Once I got the little bear, I couldn’t wait to go home. I had to hide it somewhere at home, so that no one would know I took it. That night after I went home with my parents, I couldn’t go to sleep. “What a bad person I am! I stole something from my loved Aunt Evie.” I thought. When I woke up the next morning, I felt awful, but I couldn’t tell my parents, let alone return the little bear to Aunt Evie. I was embarrassed about my behavior. At some point, I started to hate the little bear and myself. And I knew if I didn’t do something, I wouldn’t get away from those bad feelings.
注意：
1. 续写的词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式作答。
So I decided to tell my mom what I had done.
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My hand was shaking when I rang the doorbell of Aunt Evie’s house.
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Jonathan had been wandering on the streets for almost a whole day after angrily running away from his home in the morning. Thinking of his quarrel with his mother for his study, he still felt depressed and hopeless.
It was freezing and snowing at dusk on such a winter day. And the sky was dark. He was walking down an empty set where there were no passers-by, because people must have locked themselves at home for warmth. Jonathan was walking to a crossroad when suddenly he encountered a little boy stuck in the middle of the road alone like him.
Jonathan had meant to turn a blind eye to him at first. But the boy’s sad crying and the worry that he might be hit by cars made Jonathan just not walk away. He approached, saying, “Hey! What are you doing alone here? Where is your mother?”
“I want to go to mama and papa. Please take me home,” the boy replied, bursting into tears. Jonathan led him away from the crossroad. Then, he asked worriedly, “How did you come here? What’s your name?”
“I’m Leo. I was playing with my cat. He ran away, and I ran after him for a long distance. But when I turned back home, I lost my way,” cried the boy. Feeling pity for the boy, Jonathan decided that he couldn’t leave the little boy alone here. With no cellphone and considering the police station was far from here, Jonathan decided to help him first.
He took him to different neighborhoods, aiming to look for his home. But things didn’t go that smoothly as he had expected. It was getting darker, and Jonathan thought he had to find Leo’s home. He knocked on every door, noneffective. Exhausted and starving, he realized Leo must be as hungry as him. He offered him the chocolate he had bought with his rest money. It was snowing more heavily, and he removed his coat and put it around Leo.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Suddenly, a police car was drawing, and Jonathan waved with excitement to it.
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Seeing Leo and his parents off, Jonathan was lost in thought.
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