Charlotte Lee stood there in a daze for a while, looking a bit downcast, then turned and walked toward the teaching building.

In that moment, she suddenly wished someone could give Thomas Chase a good punch on her behalf.

On the way back to the classroom, Charlotte Lee heard footsteps behind her. She hesitated, then turned around and called out proactively, “Ray Cindy!”

Then she slowed her pace to wait for the other girl, smiling as she said, “Let’s walk together.”

Taking the initiative to be friendly, and conveniently pulling in an ally—there’s safety in numbers.

“Your class didn’t seem to be in great shape today.” Charlotte Lee found an excuse for Class One’s loss.

“Yeah, honestly, they’re just not very good. A bunch of idiots led by Thomas Chase, of course they’d lose.”

Charlotte Lee was taken aback: “Don’t say that.”

“Thomas Chase is terrible at basketball. Anyone from your Class Two could beat him.”

As Ray Cindy said this, her expression was calm. Charlotte Lee couldn’t tell if she was just being objective or if she really had a bias against Thomas Chase.

For a moment, neither spoke.

When they knocked and entered the classroom, everyone’s eyes focused on the two of them. Lucas Walter asked with a dark face, “Where did you go?”

Actually, the homeroom teacher’s history class had already started half an hour ago. Skipping class so openly was a bit much. But since teachers were usually more lenient with top students, Charlotte Lee felt she had some backing.

“We… there was something in our original class, so the two of us went back to discuss it…” Lucas Walter’s interrogating look made Charlotte Lee a bit flustered, so she spoke vaguely to buy herself some time.

“It was just a basketball game,” Ray Cindy suddenly cut in, “It was supposed to end quickly, but a fight broke out and we were breaking it up until now. Sorry, teacher.”

“A fight?” Lucas Walter frowned, nodded at Ray Cindy, and said, “Go back to your seats. Next time, remember to ask for leave.

You’re all class officers, set a good example… Even if there’s really something, you should discuss it first.”

After speaking, he gave Charlotte Lee a deep look.

Charlotte Lee looked helplessly at Ray Cindy, who had just exposed her, not knowing how to respond for a moment.

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10. Partly Clear, Partly Cloudy

Fastest updates for Hello, Old Times!

On the evening before the midterm exam, Zoe Young could clearly sense Ian’s mood swings. He made a huge racket as he flipped through his book, turning pages at lightning speed, his head swinging exaggeratedly from side to side, making it seem like he was reading at an incredible pace. But he kept flipping the same few pages back and forth, clearly not remembering anything.

“Hey, man,” Michael poked Ian lightly from behind, “Can you not do this? Calm down, will you?”

Ian turned around and gave an awkward smile: “Sorry, haha, but I’m not nervous.”

“Did I ask if you were nervous?”

Ian blushed a little, turned back around, and tried to control his flipping speed and noise, but his head still swung from side to side.

Zoe Young turned her face to look at him: “Let me ask you, are you nervous?”

Ian shook his head quickly, then nodded.

“It’s just an exam, not the college entrance exam. It’s no big deal. A year from now, you won’t even remember this test.”

Zoe Young tried to comfort him.

Ian’s eyes were bloodshot with fatigue again. He gave a half-hearted smile and lowered his head to keep flipping.

“Hey, man,” Michael kept poking Ian, “Are you flipping so fast because you’ve memorized it all, or are you just venting your frustration?”

Ian was always a soft-spoken guy. He turned around and looked seriously at Michael, the stubbornness and threat in his eyes making even Zoe Young a little nervous watching from the side.

“The exam’s tomorrow. Don’t bother me.”

Michael was dumbfounded, and Zoe Young wisely stopped trying to comfort him. Ian regained his flipping freedom.

Zoe Young thought of how, during class, Ian would busily highlight key points with colorful pens, and how he neurotically wrote down every word the teacher said in his notebook. Zoe Young seemed cursed—she fell asleep in every politics class, and Ian would always lend her his notes afterward. But those politics notes just kept getting longer and longer, and even Zoe Young was amazed when she looked at them. She couldn’t find any order in them to pick out the key points.

But whether it was a quiz or workbook exercises, Zoe Young could tell that Ian’s grades weren’t ideal.

She wanted to tell Ian that sometimes, if you’re wound too tight, the pressure will make you snap. “You reap what you sow” is actually the biggest lie.

But she didn’t say anything. She knew that right now, Ian wouldn’t listen to anything.

As she was thinking, her phone suddenly vibrated. Two messages came in at the same time.

“How’s your review going?”

Andrew Lane, Ray Cindy.

Zoe Young replied to Andrew Lane: “Pretty good, I should have no problem getting third place.”

Then replied to Ray Cindy: “Not good, not bad, no real feeling.”

What she told Andrew Lane was the truth, but what she told Ray Cindy was actually the phrase Ray Cindy often said to her. Zoe Young wasn’t very keen on playing these little mind games and word games among top students, but after sending lots of texts, she’d figured out the pattern: if she said her review was going well, the other would reply, “So annoying, I’m a mess over here, waiting for you to get first place”; if she replied, “My review is terrible, a complete mess,” the other would reply, “Yeah right, stop pretending.”

The closer you are, the more casual the tone of the texts, but the basic content never changed. For the two years from ninth grade to tenth, Zoe Young and Ray Cindy always had these pointless back-and-forths before exams, and she gradually came to like the phrase “not good, not bad.”

Those four words.

As she expected, Ray Cindy didn’t reply, but Andrew Lane responded quickly.

“Third?”

“Yeah. Third means there’s a first and a second ahead of me.”

She could just imagine Andrew Lane’s nose wrinkling in annoyance.

“Do you think I can beat Thomas Chase this time?”

Zoe Young was stunned. Andrew Lane’s straightforwardness made her a little envious. Andrew Lane, who never let anyone hold him down, must really want to surpass Thomas Chase, right?

She smiled and replied, “Second place is great, I like second place best.”

Zoe Young truly felt that second place was a wonderful spot—no matter how big the storm, the first place takes the brunt, and there’s still plenty of room to improve.

More importantly, those days of always getting second in the grade were the happiest times in Zoe Young’s short life.

Andrew Lane took a long time to reply. By the time Zoe Young had finished skimming through all the political theory, her phone finally vibrated softly in her pocket.

“Then I’ll always get second. You said it yourself, so remember it.”

What did I say? She felt a bit confused.

For the first time, Charlotte Lee felt nervous before an exam.

As she reviewed geography one last time, she asked Jennifer Lewis, who sat behind her, to randomly name some coordinates so she could try to locate them in her mind.

“40°N, °E?”

“That should be near Beijing, North China.”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

She let out a long breath, as if she hadn’t just been quizzing herself, but choosing which wire to cut on a bomb—red or blue.

During the afternoon self-study period, she felt a constant sense of unease. Even when reading history, every time she came across a point she wasn’t familiar with, she felt both frustrated and ashamed, yet also relieved.

Deep down, Charlotte Lee felt that everyone was paying attention to this midterm, everyone was guessing who would be the top liberal arts student. Charlotte Lee thought of Thomas Chase—would he do well in the liberal arts class’s first big test?

She couldn’t lose face, absolutely not.

What’s more, Charlotte Lee now deeply felt that if she didn’t get first place, she’d be worthless. Right now, Lucas Walter already had some issues with her, and many transfer students in the class, egged on by Patricia Lucas, were constantly making trouble for her. She needed this exam, she needed to be first in the grade to smooth everything over.

The Chinese basics and error notebook she’d organized might not get finished. Charlotte Lee was torn between going to bed early to rest up, or staying up late to finish reviewing her mistakes.

While she was still spacing out, the bell for the end of evening self-study rang.

Ray Cindy felt she wouldn’t finish reviewing, so she decided to skip dinner in the cafeteria and eat some bread to save time. Carrying her water bottle to get hot water, she saw Thomas Chase and Andrew Lane standing side by side at the windowsill, tearing open the seasoning packets for their instant noodles.