“But I didn’t participate. I’ve stopped posting random comments online for a long time. Just many people were discussing it, so I went to take a look.”
After speaking, Chen Lin went back to her other tasks.
Soon, the bell rang for class dismissal.
Everyone rushed out with their holiday assignments, welcoming the vacation. Before long, only two students on duty remained in the classroom.
Lin Zhexia waited for Chi Yao while opening the school forum.
Chi Yao’s popularity never seemed to decrease.
So she didn’t need to scroll down to find the new discussion thread; she could spot it immediately.
However, due to the nature of the content, the post title didn’t use their full names.
Instead, it used their initial code names: “sss” and “cy.”
11L: [Shen Shanshan, I think people from Class 2 mentioned that she was in the same middle school as Chi Yao.]
12L: [So it’s been years of secret love?]
13L: [That’s kind of shipper material… After all, in the competition team, she was the only girl, and the only one from Class 2.]
14L: [Indeed, they would make a good match. Both have excellent grades.]
…
Lin Zhexia continued reading.
Unexpectedly, among the flood of comments, she saw her name.
52L: [Isn’t Chi Yao very close to Lin Zhexia from Class 7?]
When she saw her name appear alongside Chi Yao’s, Lin Zhexia’s heart skipped a beat.
She scrolled down the screen.
Moving to the next page.
53L: [You’re overthinking. They’re childhood friends.]
54L: [Yeah, people discussed this at the beginning of the school year. These types are the least likely to get together. They’ve known each other for so many years.]
55L: [The saying that childhood friends can’t compete with newcomers isn’t without reason. The same applies the other way around.]
56L: [Forget about getting together—if a childhood friend I’ve known for so many years liked me, I would die of awkwardness.]
…
57L: [But Shen Shanshan isn’t exactly a newcomer, right? Looks like the confession wasn’t successful, and she’s already transferred schools…]
There weren’t many comments about her.
The discussion quickly returned to Shen Shanshan.
Lin Zhexia thought that day in the competition team, Shen Shanshan had sent away not just Xu Ting but others too. Probably some people guessed the situation and accidentally spread it.
By the time she finished reading the post and looked up, the classroom was empty except for her.
Even the students on duty had left.
Looking at the empty classroom, the nasal congestion from her cold suddenly intensified.
Her phone on the desk lit up again.
Chi: I’m coming over
Lin Zhexia didn’t reply.
She remembered that day when changing Chi Yao’s contact name, she could only secretly change it to “Chi.”
Because only she knew what this “Chi” meant.
Even if someone accidentally saw it, they wouldn’t easily figure it out.
When Chi Yao appeared at the doorway of Class 7, tears were welling up in her eyes.
He was about to say “let’s go,” but as he got closer, he saw Lin Zhexia blink, and tears unexpectedly fell from her eyes.
Chi Yao paused, and when he spoke again, his tone was much gentler: “Why are you crying?”
Lin Zhexia spoke with an obvious nasal voice: “I’m not crying. It’s just the cold making me uncomfortable.”
The feeling of liking someone should be sweet.
Lin Zhexia didn’t deny this.
But her sweetness seemed to vanish in an instant.
“My nose hurts,” her whole body trembled very slightly from sobbing, “My eyes hurt too.”
She didn’t want to cry.
But after the first tear fell uncontrollably, the rest were beyond her control.
Her tears seemed unstoppable: “…And I did terribly on the math exam.”
“I left two major problems blank.”