Before Xie Ying’an said he wouldn’t participate, Qingran truly hadn’t considered the possibility of not participating at all.
If she had known not participating was an option, she certainly wouldn’t have participated either.
The trope of a ’school celebration’ is almost clichéd in youth campus literature, but it doesn’t feel out of place in real life.
The focus of the school’s twentieth anniversary celebration was more on the speeches to be prepared by the school administration and a few outstanding teachers than on the performances the students were concerned with.
After signing up for the choir, Qingran put it out of her mind, since everyone would rehearse together and no one would be left out.
For now, her plan was to make sure that Xie Ying’an morized classical Chinese poetry and prose.
Before the sumr vacation, there would be another exam, and she didn’t want to spend the whole holiday copying ancient poetry at ho.
But seeing Xie Ying’an’s sowhat indifferent attitude, Qingran felt that getting him to morize poetry would be a tough battle.
In the morning, Old Wu had ntioned the school celebration, and before afternoon classes, he ca back to the classroom to talk about the parent-teacher eting.
The final exams were over, and the mid-term parent-teacher eting, which normally would take place, was rescheduled by Old Wu to the end of the term.
"This Saturday’s parent-teacher eting, all parents must attend, and if it’s really impossible to co, it’s the usual rule—ask your parents to call and let know," Old Wu said before walking away.
The classroom erupted into a chorus of whining and complaining from the students.
Qingran, sitting close to the back table and Zheng Chunming, heard her complaints first—
"Oh my gosh! I’m dood! My ranking dropped by twenty-three places in the final exams; my mom’s going to kill if she finds out!"
Her deskmate, Li Ce, also sounded defeated: "Isn’t that the case for everyone?"
The neighboring classmates’ voices were similarly filled with lants, and even Wen Shiyi, who had good grades, turned pale upon hearing about the parent-teacher eting.
Just when they thought they could enjoy a month of holiday, this cos along, ruining everything.
Class 1, equivalent to a key class in the second year of high school, is filled with high-achieving students, which is why the competition has intensified. The top three students of the grade are in Class 1. Now, the fourth ranked student of Class 1 isn’t even in the top twenty of the grade—what does that say about the competitive atmosphere?
It’s just like a chaotic battlefield.
During each parent-teacher eting, the parents of the top five students in the class are the envy of others, while parents of the average and below-average students have to keep their emotions in check.
Qingran, however, wasn’t worried about this; her dad, despite his busy work, always made ti to co to her parent-teacher etings.
Moreover, this ti the parent-teacher etings were scheduled separately for her and her brother; Class 3 had their eting right after the mid-term exams.
At that ti, Mr. Li even asked Qingran why there wasn’t a parent-teacher eting for her class.
Qingran didn’t expect Old Wu would schedule it at the end of the term.
Xie Ying’an, out of sheer boredom, twirled a pen in his hand, carefree. For soone who was consistently first in his grade, he wasn’t worried about the parent-teacher etings since it didn’t really matter whether his parents showed up or not.
If they ca, his grades wouldn’t improve much next ti.
If they didn’t, his grades have never slipped.
However, Zhao Yan, who had been away for a while, was about to return and would probably make it to the parent-teacher eting in five days.
Before the evening self-study session, Song Shize swaggered into Class 1 again, lazily leaning on the rear door and calling out Ruan Ruan’s na, getting louder with each shout.
Hearing his voice, Qingran turned to look and wondered—Song Shize, who never used to visit Class 1 for weeks, why has he co twice in one day today?
Song Shize saw Qingran turning her head and winked at her flirtatiously, even going as far as to cheekily form a heart shape with his hands.
Qingran: "..."
Song Shize is really the type who can’t forget to flirt no matter where he goes.
Xie Ying’an also turned to glance at Song Shize and just happened to see him cheekily making a heart shape toward him, his expression slightly cold as he put his hand in front of Qingran, who was still looking back, blocking her view.
With her vision blocked, Qingran subconsciously reached out to push away Xie Ying’an’s hand that was in front of her eyes.
At the back door, Song Shize started to babble loudly, "Xie Ying’an, what the hell are you doing? You’re going too far, you—"
"Shut up!" Ruan Ruan, who had arrived at the back door, interrupted him, her face showing a bit of disgust, "Can you not embarrass yourself here?"
"You’re saying... I’m embarrassing myself?" Song Shize pointed at himself, utterly incredulous.
When has F High’s famous Second Generation Son ever been pointed at and accused of being embarrassing?
But no sooner had he finished speaking, Ruan Ruan had forcefully dragged him away from the back door and out.
In the hallway, with her arms crossed over her chest and a look of indifference, Ruan Ruan asked Song Shize sharply, "What do you want?"
"What do you think?" Song Shize didn’t look too pleased either, slumping against the wall as if boneless, right after Ruan Ruan had pulled him up from the back door.
Ruan Ruan was having none of his antics: "If you have nothing to say, I’ll go back to the classroom."
With that, she turned to leave for the classroom.
"Damn it!"
When had Song Shize ever been so brazenly disrespected? He imdiately lost his cool and stood up, grabbing the back of Ruan Ruan’s collar, "Back your ass up, I obviously ca to talk to you if I ca looking for you."
Caught by the collar, Ruan Ruan now found herself unable to walk away even if she wanted to. Despite struggling, the height difference was too much, and she couldn’t quite wriggle free.
Enraged, Ruan Ruan couldn’t help raising her voice, "Song Shize, are you sick? Let go of !!"
Song Shize had no intention of letting go. Leveraging his height advantage over Ruan Ruan, lifting her was as easy as picking up a chick, he sneered, "Have I been too nice to you recently? Dare to block ?"
Ruan Ruan scoffed but stopped struggling, letting Song Shize lift her by the collar, only regretting that she wore a T-shirt with a collar today.
"Today I’ll give you two choices," Song Shize said in a patronizing tone, stretching out two fingers and wagging them in front of Ruan Ruan, "One, take off your blacklist and apologize to , and I might begrudgingly forgive you."
Ruan Ruan couldn’t even bother to scoff at that, "Song Shize, have so sha. Also, think about who was the first to block whom that day?"
"I blocked you first," Song Shize said, righteously indignant, his words hitting new heights of infuriating, "I can block you whenever I want, but you definitely can’t block !"
Damn! Ruan Ruan cursed internally: If murder wasn’t illegal, she’d be the first to take down this arrogant, presumptuous jerk.
"And the second choice?" Ruan Ruan asked.
The first option was already useless; she might consider removing Song Shize from the blacklist, but apologize? Ruan Ruan would rather die than do that.
"As for the second option..." Song Shize finally let go of Ruan Ruan’s collar, his eyes rolling around before he firmly declared, "Break up, let’s break up right here and now, and from now on go our separate ways, unrelated in marriage or anything else."
That’s not how you use ’in marriage or anything else’, buddy!
"Fine by !" Ruan Ruan straightened her wrinkled collar, looking at Song Shize with detachnt, her tone just as detached, "From today on, you’ve been dumped by , bye!"
With that, she didn’t look back and returned to the classroom.
Song Shize: "..."
It took a while for Song Shize to recover. He rushed to the back door of Class One, but the sentence "So we’re breaking up amicably," upon seeing the crowded hallway of Class One, was ultimately swallowed back down.
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