Chapter 7
The desk drawer was crammed full of snacks and pink envelopes.
Reaching in, not to mention paper and pens, it might take half a day to find even an unused exercise book.
The exam paper that Guan Nan had been so anxious about, the most inconspicuous one, had long been lost in the narrow space of the desk drawer. It was at this moment that Guan Nan suddenly understood why Jiang Li couldn't find a single pen on the day of the exam.
Seeing her looking at him, Jiang Li reached into his desk and pulled out something. "Want some candy?"
Guan Nan paused for a moment, then shook her head and refused, "No need, thank you."
Upon hearing this, Jiang Li handed everything to Yu Shu, who retorted, "What a waste, I wouldn't dare eat this." He then quickly packed it all into a bag.
His portrayal of saying one thing and meaning another made Guan Nan want to laugh.
But when she pouted and Yu Shu appeared on the stage carrying a large bag of snacks, he clapped his hands to attract attention.
"Come on, everyone, Jiang Li is treating you to snacks!"
"I'll leave my things here, everyone can do as they please."
Instantly, classmates swarmed forward, thanking Jiang Li from afar.
The snacks were all gone.
"..." Guan Nan glanced at the podium, then at Jiang Li, and asked cautiously, "Aren't you angry?"
Yu Shu rushed over and casually asked, "What are you angry about?"
Jiang Li immediately leaned back and looked at her.
Guan Nan pursed her lips.
Clearly, Yu Shu misunderstood her meaning and said frankly, "What's there to be angry about? You don't know, during his entire first year of high school, those snacks directly fed our whole class."
"Huh?" Guan Nan opened his mouth, wanting to say that he had exaggerated his wording.
Yu Shu was very generous: "It's okay, if you want to eat it, I'll give you priority next time."
He went too far off-topic, so Guan Nan didn't dwell on the issue and simply said, "I don't like eating snacks."
"Are there really people who don't like snacks?"
Guan Nan nodded slightly and then turned her face away.
After finishing his phone call, Banban came into the classroom. Seeing that the seats had been changed, he told everyone to study on their own for the time being while he went to call the teacher.
At that moment, Guan Nan found a few candies with their red packaging, which looked very festive.
Jiang Li slightly raised his chin, indicating it was for her.
Just a second after saying he wouldn't eat snacks, Guan Nan, mimicking his method, slowly pushed the pen towards him again.
He pushed it towards him again.
Guan Nan looked up and glanced around, then at the podium, making sure no one was watching her small movements. She opened her notebook and, in a blank space, neatly wrote down, word by word.
—I don't want to eat it, thank you.
Jiang Li: "Really not going to eat?"
Guan Nan: "No."
"You're not even going to eat the wedding candy?"
Guan Nan hesitated immediately.
Right now, Jiang Li added, "My mom's wedding candy."
One sentence instantly pulled Guan Nan back to last night, and the words "Don't cause trouble at our wedding" echoing in her ears.
Jiang Li: "Really not going to eat?"
Upon hearing this, Guan Nan lowered her eyes and stared at the candy that had been pulled over again for a long time, her mind seemingly lost in thought.
After a few seconds, she reached out and clutched the few candies labeled "囍" tightly in her palm. "Thank you."
When the teacher arrived in the classroom, the rule of standing up and greeting was completely abandoned. The teacher went straight to the point and continued the lecture, connecting with the knowledge points from the previous lesson.
Guan Nan stared at the blackboard, adjusted her pace, and got into study mode.
During break, Guan Nan finished her homework and handed it to the student in front of her. She took out the leaves she had collected at noon, intending to put them in her flower collection book, but then she remembered something and stopped turning the page.
Guan Nan leaned to the right, unzipped his backpack, and reached inside.
"Guan Nan." Chen Aimei skipped over.
Subconsciously, Guan Nan put the leaf down, and the hand that was holding the item seemed to change angle, pulling out a ruler-shaped bag.
She looked up and smiled at Chen Aimei.
This behavior suggested a guilty conscience, and Guan Nan didn't know why.
Perhaps she didn't want Chen Aimei to know that she and Jiang Li had even the slightest connection. She also didn't want her hard-won friend to be misunderstood over such a small matter.
"You..." Standing beside her desk, Chen Aimei glanced at Jiang Li, stammering for a long time before finally finishing her sentence, "Could I borrow your exam paper for a moment?"
Guan Nan was easy to talk to. After listening to Chen Aimei explain her needs, she lowered her head and rummaged through the exam papers in the desk drawer.
She accidentally bumped her elbow into her deskmate, who was engrossed in her phone, and the pen on the edge of the desk slid off.
Guan Nan bent down, supporting herself on the table with one hand, to pick it up.
Suddenly, a hand came across and casually rested on the sharp corner of the table.
Picking up the pen and standing up, Guan Nan glanced at the hand, her eyelashes trembling slightly. The fingertips that her hair had just brushed against were slender and long.
"Thank you," Guan Nan said curtly.
Jiang Li didn't speak, but casually raised his chin before lowering his head to continue staring at his phone.
Guan Nan silently turned around, took out the folder, and asked her, "Which subject do you want?"
Her exam papers were folded together, with a folder at the top center of the page. Each subject was labeled and categorized, and the folder was marked with transparent labels and stuck one centimeter from the top of the exam paper.
Chen Aimei gave her a strange look, glancing at her and then at Jiang Li.
Then, she leaned close to Guan Nan's ear and deliberately lowered her voice to ask softly, "Didn't you say you didn't know Jiang Li?"
Guan Nan frowned slightly; she had never said such a thing.
But seeing Chen Aimei's less-than-ideal expression, Guan Nan didn't say anything more and nodded.
After a pause, Chen Aimei regained her cheerful expression and pretended to flip through a few pages of the test paper. "Can you lend me your English test paper?"
"Okay." After flipping through a few pages, Guan Nan closed the test paper and gently reminded her, "Tonight's self-study session is with the English teacher, so the test papers won't be handed out until tonight."
As if she had just remembered, Chen Aimei exclaimed "Oh!" in sudden realization.
Jiang Li, sitting next to Guan Nan, put down his phone, leaned back against the desk, and tapped his fingertips on Guan Nan's desk.
Just then, Chen Aimei glanced at Jiang Li again, stuck out her tongue, and said apologetically, "Sorry, Nannan, I forgot."
"It's alright," Guan Nan said with a smile, then turned to look at Jiang Li.
Jiang Li said lazily, "Hey deskmate, what's the homework? Let me copy it."
The classroom was noisy, and the students were running around, laughing and playing on their tiny patch of land.
Before Guan Nan could speak, Chen Aimei spoke first, her voice sweet and slightly adorable yet domineering: "Hey, Jiang Li, you're already in Class One and you're still copying homework!"
Upon hearing this, Yu Shu, who sat behind him, stopped playing on his phone and joined in the teasing, "Yeah, Jiang Li, he's in the same class as everyone else and he's still copying homework."
In an instant, these words sparked a commotion among familiar faces, and the class became lively and bustling.
The situation grew increasingly awkward. Guan Nan looked at Chen Aimei's flushed face, frowning, unsure how to stop this farce from unfolding. This kind of situation, where people are gathered in the center yet left helpless, is the most unbearable.
Guan Nan thought this was really wrong. At the age when people care most about their reputation, she was put in such an awkward and embarrassing position.
She moved her lips, wanting to ask the group leader for her homework back, so that she could lend it to Jiang Li to copy in order to ease the tension.
The next second, Jiang Li raised his eyebrows and smiled arrogantly and unrestrainedly: "What, you want to help me write it?"
Jiang Li couldn't possibly have been unaware of such a sensitive atmosphere.
Guan Nan secretly glanced at Jiang Li, and seeing his nonchalant and carefree attitude, her brows furrowed even more.
In desperation, Guan Nan forced herself to call out, "The teacher is here."
The moment the commotion started, they scattered like a swarm of bees.
Guan Nan didn't notice Jiang Li's expression at that moment, because she had already turned around when Chen Aimei tugged at her sleeve.
It was at this moment that she agreed to let Chen Aimei, who was still standing there with a flushed face, sit in her seat during evening self-study and look at the English test paper.
The students gradually returned to their seats, and after a while, amidst furtive peeks and whispers, the school bell rang.
Immediately, the classroom erupted in a chorus of curses and swears.
At the same time, Jiang Li's voice was low and somewhat displeased: "You kiss her but I kiss you?"
Guan Nan took out the cold laminating film, paused for a moment, and instead of answering him directly, said in a low voice, "She is my friend."
"Am I not?" This made her even more unhappy.
"..." Guan Nan hesitated for a moment, then asked tentatively, "Us, are we?"
Jiang Li: What do you think?
What do you think?
If you say so, then it is.
Guan Nan pursed her lips. Her words made it sound like she had the upper hand, but…
Are we friends?
How could she not know that she and Jiang Li were friends?
It's quite surprising to think that she could actually become friends with Jiang Li.
They're the kind of friends who are practically unrelated.
Jiang Li: "Speak."
Guan Nan bit her lip. If Jiang Li hadn't urged her, she might have just kept quiet and gotten away with it.
Now, it's obvious that we can't fool them anymore.
After a few seconds, Guan Nan lowered her head and said softly, "I don't know."
“Oh,” Jiang Li said, “then let’s try a different approach. How can I become your friend?”
“I…” Guan Nan hesitated, “I’ll think about it.”
Jiang Li chuckled, his tone drawn out and not very serious, and said slowly, "I'm just making friends with you, not dating you, so what are you thinking about?"
Guan Nan's earlobe turned red and hot in a matter of seconds.
She pretended not to hear the middle sentence and forced herself to remain calm, saying, "My standards for choosing friends are very high."
Jiang Li said coolly, "I didn't see that coming."
"·····"
Guan Nan ignored him.
I didn't even want to give him the finished piping decorations.
The teacher hadn't arrived yet. Yu Shu, who sat behind Jiang Li, poked Guan Nan with her pen. Suddenly remembering what Chen Aimei had secretly told her, she couldn't contain her gossip: "What did she say to you?"
"What?" Guan Nan stared at the words on the leaf, as if she hadn't reacted yet.
Yu Shu gestured, "What did she say to you?"
Upon hearing this, Jiang Li also looked over.
Guan Nan gave a vague answer: "It's nothing."
"Impossible!" Yu Shu asserted. He lowered his voice and played the classmate card, "Class monitor, we are all your classmates. You can't show favoritism when you have something good to do. It's not fair to hurt your classmates' feelings!"
Yena, who sat next to her, parroted: "That's right."
"·····"
He was exaggerating, and Jiang Li just stared at them, making Guan Nan feel a little awkward.
In order to prove that she did not have such thoughts, Guan Nan had no choice but to honestly tell them what Chen Aimei had just told her.
“She sits here during evening self-study, so where do I sit?” Yu Shu asked with a strange expression.
What does it mean to say, "She sits here, I sit there"?
Tonight, when the English test papers were handed out, Chen Aimei said she wanted to sit in her seat because she needed to borrow the test paper. Guan Nan thought it was reasonable, and the teacher probably wouldn't say anything.
Guan Nan was stunned: "Huh?"
She hadn't attended evening self-study sessions, so it was understandable that she was suspicious of the random seat changes during those sessions.
Jiang Li, sitting next to him, reached into his desk drawer, pulled out a pile of things, stuffed them onto the table, and said unhurriedly, "He's sick."
Seeing his serious expression.
Guan Nan paused for two seconds, then followed the lead and said, "Oh."
The teacher hadn't arrived in the classroom yet, and Yu Shu, who was indignant, was wailing. When no one paid any attention to him, he wisely shut up.
Guan Nan wondered what Jiang Li was up to; his desk was piled up like a storage room. She turned to look at him several times, wondering why he was making such a racket while writing, his test paper crumpled into a ball.
Guan Nan felt like she was looking at a trash can.
“You,” Guan Nan hesitated for a moment, then asked, “Do you need help?” because he was a bit bad at organizing things.
"Weren't you just trying to distance yourself from me?" Jiang Li said lazily, slowly going over the score with her for a second.
This guy, even though people are trying to help him, he still holds a grudge.
As if sensing Guan Nan's dissatisfaction, Jiang Li stopped joking and said with a hint of amusement, "You said it yourself."
Guan Nan glanced at him and pursed her lips: "Mm."
The textbooks for both of them were stacked on the left and right sides, leaving the middle empty. Suddenly, a pile of things was pushed from the right table to the middle, moving a bit towards Guan Nan.
Guan Nan glanced at the question again, slowly put down her pen, and helped him sort the envelopes of various colors.
--love letter
Make sure you understand the content in both Chinese and English, as well as the cursive and regular script.
For a moment, Guan Nan felt embarrassed by his recklessness.
Guan Nan paused for a moment, then said, "Aren't you going to look at this?"
"I don't need to look at it, just put it in my bag." Jiang Li also raised his head, flattened the test paper, and stared at a certain spot for a long time.
If you're not going to look at it, why accept it? Isn't that a waste of someone's good intentions?
Guan Nan didn't understand, and then asked, "Then why didn't you refuse?"
Jiang Li remained silent.
No sooner had the words left her mouth than the English teacher, who arrived late, stood on the podium. The usually impeccably dressed teacher looked somewhat disheveled, as if she had really rushed over to cover the class: "I'll cover one class for your homeroom teacher."
"Also, tonight's self-study session is mine. I'll go over the test as soon as it's handed out. If you have any questions, come to my office after class. Don't waste my class time."
As soon as she finished speaking, the classroom, which had been somewhat noisy, instantly fell silent.
Guan Nan handed the neatly packed envelopes to his elbow, and when he didn't react, she gently poked him with her pen.
Out of the corner of her eye, Guan Nan caught sight of the math test paper he was looking at. Her pupils constricted, and she quickly lowered her head, whispering, "Here, you can put it here yourself."
Jiang Li turned to the side and thoughtfully hummed in agreement.
"You're all tired this afternoon, aren't you?" The English teacher glanced at the class, stopped after only a few minutes of lecturing, and rested one hand on the podium. "Then let's get something more energetic."
As she spoke, dozens of pairs of eyes in the class looked at her expectantly.
Only her classmates who knew her well had a bad feeling.
"Have you all finished previewing Unit 1?" The English teacher smiled, and some students below the podium answered her in a silly manner, which made her laugh even harder.
Have any of her students asked her if they wanted to play games?
"I speak Chinese, you speak English. I speak English, you speak Chinese. I speak loudly, you speak softly. I speak softly, you speak loudly." The English teacher nodded, smiling exceptionally kindly, and explained the rules of the game, "No restrictions on vocabulary, texts, or compositions, only the first unit is allowed."
Upon hearing the rules, everyone deflated: "Ah—"
Starting with the first group of the first large group, the whole class began to feel anxious because the game was not played in accordance with the usual rules and the students were jumping around randomly without any regulations.
The message was still some distance away, so Guan Nan took advantage of the short time to quickly review the vocabulary.
I quickly divided the text into sections, focusing on certain questions and vocabulary, as well as tenses and voices.
Because of the teacher's occasional misleading remarks, everyone was on edge, feeling confused and anxious.
Finally, we arrived at the second large group, the third small group.
Guan Nan focused all her attention on the textbook, flipping through it repeatedly to reinforce her memory of the vocabulary.
"Next."
Seeing that no one reacted, the English teacher tapped on the podium and said, "Next, the student next to her, please remind her."
Jiang Li patted Guan Nan on the shoulder, "Your turn."
"Hmm?" Guan Nan looked up, her face full of questions.
Seeing this, Jiang Li pointed to the blackboard, indicating that she should look ahead.
Guan Nan looked in the direction the finger was pointing.
He stood up abruptly and continued the relay smoothly without any lag, then passed it on to another classmate.
The message was passed from one table to another until it reached Jiang Li.
"Fake news," the English teacher said.
Jiang Li immediately followed up: "We should be a judgemental news reader."①
“when wee across such ······of the nwes reports givees false information.”②
The English teacher seemed satisfied, nodded, and gestured for him to sit down.
The anxiety continues to spread.
Guan Nan originally thought she couldn't relax and would have to help Jiang Li save the day, but she didn't expect him to be even more outstanding than she imagined.
He answered with ease, appearing relaxed and carefree.
Guan Nan stared at Jiang Li for a few seconds, somewhat surprised.
After class, Guan Nan went to the restroom and returned, and the two met in the hallway.
Jiang Li tugged at her ponytail. "Are you busy later? If not, come with me to buy something?"
His movements were neither painful nor itchy, and Guan Nan wasn't angry. She smoothed her hair and asked suspiciously, "What are you buying?"
Meeting her gaze, Jiang Li continued smiling and slowly said, "Calligraphy copybook."
"..." Guan Nan was speechless for a moment, suppressing her embarrassment, and said calmly, "Why didn't you ask Yu Shu to accompany you?"
"No way," Jiang Li said lazily, dragging out his words.
Guan Nan: "?"
"His handwriting is bad," Jiang Li said pointedly. "I need to find someone—"
"Her handwriting is beautiful."
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