Chapter 12: 11. Are You Really a Top Student?
On Tuesday, early in the morning, Zhang Luo woke up and crawled out of bed to make up his homework—
Yesterday, with his mind wandering all over the place, he hadn’t even had time to finish it.
As a result, when his dad pushed open the door and came in, seeing him actually doing homework, his eyes nearly popped out of his head in shock.
“When did you wake up?”
“Just now,” Zhang Luo said. “I forgot to do some homework. Don’t bother me, Dad.”
Hearing that was the reason, his dad finally put his heart back in his stomach.
After closing the door, his dad muttered to himself, “That’s what I thought. For a second there, I thought our family was about to produce a top scholar.”
Even though the door was closed, Zhang Luo still heard his dad’s grumbling.
He couldn’t help the corner of his mouth from lifting.
When it came to his studies, if his mom was the type who firmly believed “with enough urging and whipping, my child will definitely reach the next level,” then his dad was the free-range type who believed “people who can study don’t need to be told, and people who can’t study won’t listen even if you tell them.”
Zhang Luo rushed and scrambled, finally finishing his homework at 7:15.
His dad had already gone out.
He gulped down the porridge his dad had made, bit onto a bag of warmed milk, and hurried out the door.
Zhou Hengyu was eating breakfast at Jiang Xiaoyu Restaurant. When he saw Zhang Luo, he wolfed down the rest in a few bites and said, “Zhang Luo, wait for me. Let’s go together.”
Zhang Luo braked, planting one foot on the ground.
“Don’t tell me your bike still isn’t fixed?”
“It’s fixed, it’s fixed.” Zhou Hengyu slung on his backpack and pointed at the bicycle he had set off to the side.
Whoa!
Zhang Luo took one look. That bike didn’t look cheap.
Just then, Jiang Xiaoyu also came out with her backpack.
“Jiang Xiaoyu, how are you getting to school?” Zhou Hengyu asked. “Want me to give you a ride?”
Jiang Xiaoyu glanced at Zhang Luo.
Zhang Luo had originally wanted to say, How about I take you?
But then he looked at his own little beat-up bike. Even the rear seat was a bit rusty.
He couldn’t get the words out.
Jiang Xiaoyu smiled and shook her head at Zhou Hengyu. “No need. You guys go ahead.”
Zhou Hengyu nodded and said to Zhang Luo, “Then let’s go.”
Zhang Luo looked at Jiang Xiaoyu, wanting to speak but stopping himself.
Damn it.
It had always been like this before.
Time after time, he couldn’t open his mouth, couldn’t say it out loud.
The words he wanted to say, the love he wanted to express—all of it turned into knots inside himself.
Zhou Hengyu had already pushed off when Zhang Luo suddenly squeezed the brakes hard again.
“It’s so hot today. Aren’t you afraid you’ll sweat if you walk?” Zhang Luo turned back to look at Jiang Xiaoyu. “Get on.”
He braced himself and said those words in what seemed like a cold, aloof, cool manner, then turned his head back again, not daring to look at Jiang Xiaoyu anymore.
He was afraid Jiang Xiaoyu would refuse.
If she really refused, he swore he would absolutely pedal away at once.
“Oh.” He heard Jiang Xiaoyu respond, followed by, “All right then. Thanks.”
Zhou Hengyu, who had already stopped up ahead, opened his mouth in confusion.
Huh?
Jiang Xiaoyu hopped onto the back seat of Zhang Luo’s bicycle.
“Hold onto my clothes. Hold tight,” Zhang Luo said in a muffled voice. “Are you seated properly?”
Jiang Xiaoyu gave a soft mm.
Zhang Luo swallowed and rode forward.
He thought he was acting very cool. In reality, the fact that he never turned back to look at Jiang Xiaoyu even once only made his thoughts glaringly obvious.
Zhou Hengyu silently rode ahead and stopped talking too.
Just like that, they rode all the way to City No. 2 High School.
When they reached the school gate, Jiang Xiaoyu jumped down from the bicycle and said to Zhang Luo, “Thank you.”
Only then did Zhang Luo glance at her and give a hum in response.
Jiang Xiaoyu asked, “Have you practiced the broadcast calisthenics properly yet?”
“What?” Zhang Luo didn’t react for a moment.
Jiang Xiaoyu lifted her chin slightly.
“If you still can’t do it, you can come learn from me.”
After saying that, she didn’t wait for Zhang Luo’s reply and turned to walk into the school.
Only then did Zhang Luo realize what she meant.
Fuck!
Sure enough, she had heard what Xu Shuiyun said yesterday!
For some reason, he felt horribly embarrassed!
Zhang Luo raised the back of his hand and wiped his forehead.
It was covered in sweat.
Zhou Hengyu looked over at him with a resentful gaze.
“Zhang Luo, you’re not dating Jiang Xiaoyu, are you?”
“What nonsense are you talking about?” Zhang Luo came back to himself. “Don’t spread rumors. Don’t let me hear rumors like that.”
Zhou Hengyu: “Heh.”
-
Maybe it was because today, for once, he hadn’t arrived right on the dot.
The look Xu Shuiyun gave Zhang Luo was slightly gentler, not as sharp as yesterday.
“Good morning, Teacher Xu.”
When Zhang Luo passed by Xu Shuiyun, he called out properly and politely.
Xu Shuiyun gave a hum.
Her face was still stern.
Five minutes before class, everyone had arrived.
It seemed the scene yesterday of Teacher Xu standing at the classroom door checking for latecomers had served as a wake-up call for everyone.
So today, everyone had left home earlier.
Xu Shuiyun announced, “Next Thursday and Friday will be the beginning-of-term exam. This is the first unified exam for our grade since enrollment. More than twelve hundred students in the entire grade will be ranked according to the results of this exam, so all of you had better take it seriously. Don’t regret it after the exam is over.”
A chorus of wails immediately rose from the class.
Zhang Luo was also stunned.
The first grade-wide unified exam was starting this soon?
That was right. One very important reason City No. 2 High School could maintain its college entrance exam results was that it held a grade-wide unified exam almost every month. Some were called monthly exams, some midterms, some finals—anyway, there was a ranking every month.
What position you were in, whether you had improved or fallen back during this period, was all clear at a glance.
Every student was spurred on by this ranking.
Later, Zhang Luo heard that high schools were no longer allowed to publicly announce rankings.
Zhang Luo felt very panicked.
Because he had already forgotten every last bit of high school knowledge.
Forget high school knowledge—even his junior high knowledge was almost completely gone.
Right now, he was in a state where he wouldn’t know how to answer anything on any exam.
His head hurt.
Under normal circumstances, when Zhang Luo was in his first year of high school, he could generally rank between 300th and 500th in the grade.
That range was roughly a position somewhat above the cutoff for an ordinary first-tier university.
It was also the result Zhang Luo achieved when he performed normally.
But that was under the condition that he hadn’t gone through more than a decade of time, hadn’t forgotten almost all his junior high knowledge, and had actually studied somewhat seriously.
Now?
Zhang Luo suspected he might not even make it into the top 1000 of the grade.
Stimulated by this news, Zhang Luo perked himself up again for the classes that morning, forcing himself to listen seriously and take notes.
If there was anything good about it, it was that when the teachers explained certain knowledge points, Zhang Luo absorbed them very quickly. After all, he had learned them before, and had once mastered them too. It was like a language: the difficulty of picking it up again was completely different for someone with no foundation at all and someone with a certain foundation.
This gave Zhang Luo a bit of comfort.
Only, the sight of him seriously listening in class and taking notes stunned his desk mate, Xu Da.
“Holy shit, you’re not really a top student, are you?”
At lunch, Xu Da finally couldn’t hold back his curiosity and asked.