Chapter 1 The First Exam of the Second Year of High School and the First Monthly Exam...
After the opening exam and the first monthly exam of the second year of high school, the first parent-teacher meeting of the new semester was held.
On the surface, all classes at No. 1 Middle School are regular classes except for the competition classes, but in reality, there is a ranking system. Class 7 has good teachers and students, and its average score in this exam was fourth in the grade, which is average. There are quite a few high-scoring students, but unfortunately, the gap between good and bad students is too large.
The last period before the parent-teacher meeting was a self-study period. The homeroom teacher, Ms. Zhan, handed out a chemistry quiz on the spur of the moment, seemingly to make things more difficult for the already nervous students. She asked Fang Minzhou to collect the quiz after class.
The test wasn't actually that difficult; Fang Minzhou finished it and checked it in half a class period. When the bell rang, she got up to collect the tests, and this time she collected them quickly and easily.
Class 7 was on the second floor, and Teacher Zhan's science office was on the third floor. When Fang Minzhou knocked on the door and went in, there were only two teachers in the eight-person office. One of them was a middle-aged woman dressed in a fashionable manner sitting next to Teacher Zhan's desk. She must have been someone's mother who had arrived early.
Teacher Zhan took the test paper from her hand, pointed to the shelf next to her, and told her to count the new test papers. Then she continued to talk to the parents next to her, "Wang Kan has very poor self-discipline, and most importantly, his attitude is bad. It's been a month since school started, and he still hasn't gotten back into the swing of things. He didn't study much during the summer vacation either, did he?"
Ms. Zhan is nearing retirement. She is a seemingly easy-going but decisive old teacher. Under normal circumstances, she doesn't get involved in anything, but you can't afford to run into her.
Wang Kan's mother sounded embarrassed, "Yes, his father and I are quite busy with our business, so we haven't been paying much attention to him..."
Fang Minzhou silently counted the test papers.
24, 26...
The weather in Zhangcheng in September was still hot. An air-conditioned office was like paradise, and even the papers in your hands felt as comfortable as ice silk. But at this moment, Fang Minzhou didn't want to stay any longer.
Behind her, Teacher Zhan made no attempt to hide her presence: "Kids these days have their own ideas, and we should give them freedom, but this freedom should encourage them to move forward, not to think it's okay if they do poorly on a test and just laugh and joke around all day. How can they possibly do well on tests like that?"
“Teacher, you’re right. He’s always been a carefree and irresponsible person. I’ll definitely talk to him when I get back,” Wang Kan’s mother said apologetically.
Fang Minzhou had been a class leader since childhood and had never had her parents called in, but she often went in and out of the office and would often witness similar conversations. The scene in front of her was relatively peaceful.
She finished counting the papers, said goodbye to Teacher Zhan, and was about to leave when she was called back, "Minzhou, could you call Wang Kan over for me?"
“…Oh, okay,” Fang Minzhou replied.
Chen Hongshan vaguely remembered the name "Fang Minzhou". After the girl closed the door and left, she looked at the class report card in her hand and found it: fifth in the class and thirty-sixth in the grade.
Chen Hongshan sighed sincerely, "My child's total score is almost higher than Wang Kan's, even if I only look at one subject less." She felt ashamed every time she came to a parent-teacher meeting.
She continued to listen to the homeroom teacher analyze Wang Kan's grades. Since the exams wouldn't be held until next semester, the rankings were based on all nine subjects. If the humanities subjects weren't considered, her ranking would be higher. "But her English and Chinese aren't very good either. In the end, the college entrance exam will still depend on the core subjects. It will be too late to get high scores in her senior year."
Chen Hongshan nodded repeatedly, "Wang Kan is a rather lazy person, and he thinks he's a bit clever, but I believe that with such good teachers and classmates at No. 1 Middle School, he'll be influenced by his surroundings. So, I'll trouble the teachers to keep a close eye on him."
Zhan Minghua picked up his water glass and took a sip of tea. "I'll do everything the school is supposed to do, but this second year of high school is..."
Before he could finish speaking, the door was knocked twice and opened from the outside. Wang Kan stood in the doorway, knowing the answer already, and asked, "Teacher, you wanted to see me?"
When Chen Hongshan saw his sloppy posture, she was furious and wanted to go over and grab his ears.
Zhan Minghua waved to him: "Yes, I'm looking for you, come here."
Wang Kan sighed silently to himself, slowly dragged a chair to his mother's side, and as soon as he sat down, his arm was twisted. He winced in pain and his eyes widened as his mother whispered, "Sit up straight!"
Wang Kan straightened his back and placed his hands neatly on the table.
He never got called to the office for good news, so he developed a knack for dealing with it. He knew why he was there before he even arrived. It was just the entrance exam, but this time he really messed up. Oh well, he figured he was just here for free air conditioning.
He subtly adjusted his posture, trying to get as close to the wind as possible. He listened attentively, responded politely, and glanced around before his gaze settled on the report card on the table.
The name in the fifth line: Fang Minzhou.
He was chatting with his friend in the hallway when this person walked straight towards them and said, as if typing a command into a robot, "Professor Zhan wants to see you in her office."
They didn't say who they were looking for, and the remaining group looked at each other in bewilderment before finally pushing him forward, saying, "We'll definitely be looking for you."
Wang Kan knew that Fang Minzhou was the chemistry class representative, but class representatives were usually just low-level students. He was surprised that Fang Minzhou's grades were so good. He had done so poorly on the test that he didn't care who was in the front row.
It's true what they say, people can't always be the same... Well, she does seem to be quite good at studying.
Thinking of Fang Minzhou's deliberately expressionless face, Wang Kan suddenly found it a little funny.
At the same time, the conversation around me stopped.
Wang Kan: "..."
He suppressed his unconscious smile. His mother was glaring at him angrily, while across from him, Master Zhan leisurely picked up her white porcelain teacup once again.
Chen Hongshan: "Did you hear what the teacher just said?"
Wang Kan: "I heard you."
Zhan Minghua: "What did I say?"
Wang Kan cleared her throat and spoke clearly and loudly: "Teacher, I will definitely study hard from now on and never hold the class back."
I almost got beaten up.
Finally, the time for the parent-teacher conference arrived, and Wang Kan was freed from the office to take his mother to the classroom. Chen Hongshan warned him in a low voice, "I'll settle the score with you when we get back."
"Okay, okay," Wang Kan urged her to go inside quickly.
A girl came out through the back door, and her mother exclaimed in surprise, "Hey!" and said affectionately, "Minzhou, right? I'm Wang Kan's mother."
“Hello, Auntie,” Fang Minzhou said politely and reservedly.
Wang Kan: "..."
"Hello, hello. I asked you to call Wang Kan over earlier. I'm sorry you had to see him."
“…No.” Fang Minzhou shook her head with a smile.
Wang Kan was utterly humiliated. "...Mom, hurry up and go inside. Don't block the doorway."
"I know." Chen Hongshan glared at Wang Kan with dissatisfaction, then praised Fang Minzhou a few more times. Only after some familiar parents greeted them did they walk into the classroom together, leaving Wang Kan and Fang Minzhou standing to one side, their eyes meeting.
“My mom…” Wang Kan touched his nose, wanting to explain, but didn’t know where to begin. Fang Minzhou gave a very perfunctory smile, turned around and left.
Wang Kan raised an eyebrow.
He watched Fang Minzhou's departing figure, her high ponytail swaying slightly with each step.
It was probably not his imagination; his chemistry class representative, Fang, didn't seem to like him very much.
Wang Kan began to think seriously, but still couldn't recall when or what he had done to offend her. It had only been a month or so since the start of the semester, and aside from her calling him to her office just now and her collecting his homework, the two had basically had no interaction.
Oh, and the day the report came out.
His name had caused him a lot of trouble since he was a child. Wang Kan was so used to it that he took the initiative to say "'kàn', fourth tone" while signing his name.
She seemed not to notice him. His sudden voice startled her. She stared at him for a moment, then looked at his signature before closing the dictionary as if she had just realized what was happening.
That expression was quite funny.
"I am Wang Kan." He pointed to himself and introduced himself. Just as he was about to ask her name, the teacher, Master Zhan, returned. The girl acted as if nothing had happened, gave her seat to Master Zhan, and went back to her seat.
Wang Kan was quite puzzled at the time, but later learned that her name was Fang Minzhou. He even looked it up and found that "Minzhou" was a word that meant quick-witted and thoughtful.
I don't know if he's physically agile, but he's quite intelligent. However, I have doubts about his "thoughtfulness." Would a thoughtful person be so impolite?
It was only then that he realized that Fang Minzhou had always omitted any form of address for him, as if he had no name at all.
Wang Kan guessed that either Fang, the top student, looked down on the underachievers, or that someone with such good grades was too self-conscious and felt that being caught looking up obscure characters was beneath her dignity. Otherwise, he couldn't think of any other reason. In short, Wang Kan felt that this girl was not easy to get along with.
After the parent-teacher meeting, Wang Kan and his mother walked towards the school gate with the flow of people. Suddenly, his mother tugged at him and pointed to a mother and daughter in front of them, "Aren't they your classmates?"
Which one?
"That one, the one with the ponytail and the black backpack, Fang Minzhou."
Wang Kan was getting a little impatient. So what if it is, so what if it isn't? "Why are you so concerned about others?"
"What's wrong? Can't I pay more attention to someone who gets good grades?" his mother said.
Wang Kan was puzzled: "What does her good grades have to do with you? Besides, she's not the best student in our class."
His mother smacked him on the neck, "Her good grades are none of my business, but your bad grades are a disgrace to me! Is this how you are? Are you going to continue like this? Are you going to switch seats with me? With your grades, you're just waiting to be assigned to a corner of the trash heap. What are you laughing at? You'd be happier if we put you in some remote corner, wouldn't you?"
Wang Kan straightened his face and said, "No way."
Chen Hongshan sighed deeply, feeling utterly disappointed.
Wang Kan also groaned, rubbing his neck with one hand and massaging his mother's shoulders with the other. The mother and daughter in front of them had already walked out of the school gate.
Compared to most of her classmates, Wang Kan did not have much academic pressure.
He didn't have high expectations for himself, and neither did his parents. They thought it would be a miracle if he could get into No. 2 Middle School. In the end, his middle school entrance exam score came out and he just barely made it into No. 1 Middle School. The couple began to suspect that there might have been some activity at each other's ancestral graves recently.
"Can you do better on the next test so I don't get called in by the teacher again?" his mother said.
“Okay,” Wang Kan readily agreed.
He has so much room for improvement.
After the weekend, Chen Hongshan will be returning to Nancheng. Over the years, she and Wang Kan's father have been traveling between Zhangcheng and Nancheng for business. The thought of leaving Wang Kan alone at home again makes her feel a little sad.
Before leaving, Chen Hongshan remembered that her elders had gone to the temple to get a good luck charm for Wang Kan, and she wanted to tie it to his schoolbag. However, the boy didn't appreciate it at all, which made her so angry that she was about to scold him again. She only stopped when Wang Kan stuffed the charm into the inner pocket of his bag.
"Is this alright?" Wang Kan had no words to express her frustration. Who hangs a sachet on their backpack? Especially a red one!
When Wang Kan returned to school on Sunday afternoon, as Master Zhan zoomed in on the latest seating chart on the computer screen, she wondered whether the sachet in the bag had worked or not.
One name is almost entirely composed of horizontal and vertical strokes, while the other is a combination of left-falling strokes, right-falling strokes, and dots. The two names look extremely awkward even when placed side by side.
If the purpose of the academic talisman is to make him sit next to the top student, but... is that considered safe?
The seats were the ones everyone sat in at the beginning of the semester. Wang Kan was sitting in the last row in the middle of the class when a boy across the aisle tapped him on the shoulder: "Wow, you and Fang Minzhou!"
Wang Kan had no idea what he was so excited about. "What's wrong? Do you want to sit with her?"
"Of course I want to, don't you?" The other person's eyes held a deeper meaning.
"Then I'll switch with you?"
"Really? Can I exchange it?"
Just then, Master Zhan on the podium said that if there were any problems with the seating chart, they should come to her. Wang Kan gestured to her, but she clicked her tongue and seemed a little embarrassed. While she was hesitating, Master Zhan had already left with her teacup, telling the class monitor to supervise everyone to change seats and then study on their own, and to discuss whether to sit inside or outside the classroom.
"Forget it, that would be too obvious."
Wang Kan gave a cool laugh.
Some were moving tables, others were moving books; the noise and chaos were like a game of chess that had been scrambled. Wang Kan found Fang Minzhou, who was actually sitting diagonally in front of him to the right. This time, they were going to move together to the fourth row by the window.
Wang Kan watched as she put everything on the table into her schoolbag, filling the desk to the brim. He was considering whether to go over and help her move the desk to show his so-called gentlemanly manners and to bridge the gap between classmates when, suddenly, Fang Minzhou's gaze met his through the crowd.
The two stared at each other silently for a few seconds. Wang Kan didn't receive any signal from the other party, but he still stood up. As soon as he moved, Fang Minzhou turned her face away coldly, as if she didn't see him. She put on her backpack and pushed the desk aside with both hands and feet, obviously intending to be self-reliant.
Wang Kan was speechless; there was no point in trying to win him over.
This seating chart is seriously flawed, but he wouldn't actually go to Master Zhan's place, and based on his experience, the teacher wouldn't agree anyway. His status in the class is clearly lower than Fang Minzhou's, so there's no need for him to humiliate himself.
It's the most troublesome for people sitting in the middle to change seats, as everyone is stuck together from all sides. Fang Minzhou was stuck halfway, while Wang Kan moved over from the back row much faster.
He was bored and pleased with this small victory, but still maintained his composure: although the view from the window was nice, it was inconvenient to get in and out, so he took the initiative to arrange the table next to the window and moved his own chair over to make room for his new deskmate.
When Fang Minzhou finally pushed the table to the finish line, Wang Kan saw her purse her lips.
Wang Kan wanted to ask her what was wrong, but Fang Minzhou had already silently moved her desk next to his.
The two tables have different wood grains, clearly indicating they are not from the same group, like a naturally formed boundary between Chu and Han.
Now there's no need to draw the 38th parallel anymore, Wang Kan mimicked her pouting.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other person staring at him coldly.
So Wang Kan sat up straight, rested his chin on his hand at a ninety-degree angle, and turned to look out the window.
A note from the author:
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