Song Yu Meng stopped in front of Yi Ran and ordered imperiously: “Hey, Crazy Yi! You’re not allowed to vote for that green tea, do you hear me?”
Yi Ran slouched in her seat and asked cheerily: “Give me a reason why I can’t vote for her then?”
“Because, because…” Song Yu Meng had no good answer, and she retorted, “What are you asking so much for? If I don’t allow you to vote for her, you can’t vote for her!”
Yi Ran looked at her, bemused.
Song Yu Meng knew she was being unreasonable, so she quickly turned to leave. After walking a few steps, she turned around and reiterated: “Remember, Crazy Yi, you’re not allowed to vote for that green tea!”
Yi Ran looked at her retreating back and shook her head, smiling to herself: She knew it was an irrational request, but still came to demand it of me. What an unreasonable girl.
The class bell rang and Tang Xiang Ping asked each student to write their nomination on a piece of scrap paper before handing it in.
The sound of pens scratching on paper filled the room, plenty of people already knew who they wanted to vote for. Yi Ran was still deliberating, one hand propping up her chin and the other twirling the pen.
Song Yu Meng saw that Yi Ran wasn’t writing anything and she broke out in cold sweat. Honestly speaking, she knew she was being irrational as well, so she didn’t hold out hope that Yi Ran would listen to her.
After the majority of the students handed in their slips, Yi Ran stopped twirling her pen. She glanced at Song Yu Meng and smiled before scribbling her nominee down and passed the slip up.
Song Yu Meng was confounded: ??? Why did Crazy Yi look at me?
After all the slips were handed in, Tang Xiang Ping asked the students to work on their homework or revise while she was tabulating the votes.
When Tang Xiang Ping opened the last folded slip, she had disbelief written all over her face, glancing at Song Yu Meng.
Song Yu Meng looked frightened and asked herself: Why’s Tang Seng looking at me? Did she notice me zoning out?
Suddenly, Tang Xiang Ping stood up with the slip in her hand and asked: “Who voted for Song Yu Meng?”
Everybody in the class was astonished and looking at each other. Su Xiao Xiao scratched the back of her head, innocently thinking: Xiao-Yu didn’t go up to give a speech, why would there be someone voting for her?
But Song Yu Meng had already guessed the truth, no wonder Crazy Yi and Tang Seng had looked at her, it was because of this! She stared at Yi Ran from across the classroom.
Yi Ran looked back at her innocently and held her hands up as if she had nothing to do with it, but the moment she turned around, she broke out into a grin.
How could Crazy Yi be so annoying!!! Irritating! Song Yu Meng was flipping out mentally.
Tang Xiang Ping observed everything quietly from the platform, but didn’t say anything. She guessed that it was Yi Ran, but this prank……
After all the votes were counted, Xu Yuan ended up getting the role of class president. Song Yu Meng was incredibly unhappy with this outcome, cursing in her heart: Hmph, you just got lucky, green tea!
After class, Song Yu Meng didn’t say anything to Xu Yuan, opting instead to rush to Yi Ran and question her: “Crazy Yi, are you insane? Who asked you to vote for this lady? You’re purposely trying to prank me, aren’t you?”
Yi Ran held up her hands and said: “Oh please, you didn’t let me vote for Xu Yuan, but you didn’t say I couldn’t vote for you, so why couldn’t I?”
It was certainly a rational and reasonable answer, but as everybody knows, this young lady was neither rational nor reasonable.
“Stop trying to worm your way out of this!” Song Yu Meng pointed fiercely at Yiran, “hmph, if I knew you were going to vote for me, I would have voted for you!!”
Yi Ran put on a look of surprise and pointed at herself: “You want to vote for me? You want to support me to be class president?”
“Who’s supporting you, stop fooling yourself! If you applied for the role of garbage committee, I’d definitely vote for you!” Her reaction was particularly big.
Yi Ran chuckled, “what garbage committee? Jeez, they’re called hygiene committee, okay?”
“Not okay!!!” Song Yu Meng glared at Yi Ran again before returning to her seat.
……
The day before the exam, Tang Xiang Ping pinned up the exam seating chart and exam numbers near the rear door. The seating was based on grades, and Song Yu Meng realised she was sitting next to Crazy Yi at the last row.
When Yi Ran walked over to look at the exam numbers, Song Yu Meng purposefully put on an air of disdain and said: “Aiya, such bad luck, why am I sitting with you again!”
Yi Ran looked at her and calmly rebutted: “Yeah, it’s bad luck indeed. Whose fault is it that you came in last in the rankings?”
“You!!!” Song Yu Meng huffed in anger, “hmph, this lady isn’t going to take offence with the likes of you!” In reality, she just had nothing left to say.
Song Yu Meng searched for Liu Luo Yang’s name on the ranking list and realised he was tied for first place with Xu Yuan. She then hurried to see the seating chart and realised Liu Luo Yang was sitting behind Xu Yuan for the exam.
Folding her arms, she pouted and mumbled to herself: “Hmph, scheming woman. Don’t think you’ll be able to do anything because you’re sitting in front of Liu Luo Yang gege.”
Yi Ran, who was standing beside her, was lost for words: “What are you scolding the wall for?”
“What the hell do you care? For my own pleasure, can’t I?”
“I can’t be bothered with you.” Yi Ran rolled her eyes and left.
……
Song Yu Meng arrived at school earlier than normal on Thursday morning because she was too embarrassed to give Liu Luo Yang the bread she had toasted in person, so she always had to arrive early to stuff it into his desk.
When she reached, there was no one in the room, so she started walking to Liu Luo Yang’s desk, holding onto a corner of the transparent plastic bag used to contain the bread.
But before she got there, someone turned on the lights, flooding the room with bright light.
Song Yu Meng turned around and saw Yi Ran standing at the front door, then she dumbly asked: “What are you doing here?”
“Isn’t it a very normal thing for me to come to class?” Yi Ran’s gaze dropped to the bread in her hand.
The bread was in the shape of a semicircle, with the outer parts being toasted golden brown and a buttery centre. It looked absolutely delicious.
Yi Ran knew this must be the bread that Song Yu Meng brought for Liu Luo Yang, and her heart tightened for some reason.
Licking her lips, a thought occurred to her since she hadn’t eaten breakfast yet.
She walked over to Song Yu Meng and smiled nastily before snatching the bread from her hand.
Song Yu Meng panicked: “Crazy Yi, what are you doing? Give that back to me!”
Before she finished her sentence, Yi Ran had already ripped open the bad and taken a bite of the bread inside.
The fragrance of the toasted bread and the richness of the butter spread in Yi Ran’s mouth. It was truly very good, and if Song Yu Meng wasn’t currently throwing a tantrum, Yi Ran would have raised a thumb.
She didn’t realise a pampered miss like Song Yu Meng could actually toast bread so nicely.
On the other hand, Song Yu Meng pointed at the still-munching Yi Ran and shouted, half in shock: “You, you, you, you actually ate it?! Crazy Yi, you asshole!!!”
She raised a fist, intending to swing at Yi Ran’s shoulder, but Yi Ran dodged and retreated a few steps.
Swallowing the mouthful of bread, Yi Ran held out an Erkang[1] hand and pleaded: “Don’t! I just took one bite of your bread, does it really warrant you killing me???”
“What do you think!!!” Song Yu Meng raged.
“I’m wrong, it’s my fault!” Yi Ran teased her: “How about this, I’ll give you back your bread. Why don’t you be magnanimous and forgive me?” She held out the bread to Song Yu Meng.
The bread was puffy and round, but after Yi Ran bit into it, there was a crescent-shaped hole and even teeth marks.
Song Yu Meng saw the fruits of her labour reduced to such a state and she angrily said: “Scram! You already took a bite, what are you giving it back to me for? You ridiculous lunatic!”
Yi Ran chuckled. She absolutely did not mean to, but the sight of this scaredy-cat throwing a tantrum was too funny.
Why did she never realise Song Yu Meng was this fun when she was reading the novel?
“You’re still laughing? You’re shameless, Crazy Yi!” Song Yu Meng was on the verge of tears.
“Okay, stop being so angry, you’re going to end up crying.” Yi Ran wanted to stroke Song Yu Meng’s head like Liu Luo Yang did, but Song Yu Meng dodged away and gave her a look of warning.
Yi Ran withdrew her hand awkwardly and took another bite of bread.
Fine, so be it!
……
After the morning self-study period ended, the students all lined up with their pencil cases to enter the exam hall.
Song Yu Meng hated queuing up the most, so every time, she was the last one to enter the exam venue. She just took a gel pen and walked to the last exam hall. Once in there, everybody stared at her as the exam invigilator was checking her with a detector[2].
Ignoring everybody, Song Yu Meng raised her chin as she walked towards her seat, even rolling her eyes when she walked past Yi Ran.
Looking at her devil-may-care attitude, Yi Ran was dumbfounded and could only think: How arrogant…
There was a total of forty two seats in the venue, with the last two empty seats at the last row of the second and third group. Seated there were Song Yu Meng and Yi Ran, one on the left and one on the right.
The exam papers and answer booklets were handed down, and everybody started scribbling down the answers. Yi Ran, however, spun her pen in her hand and couldn’t make heads or tails of the questions.
First, it was textual comprehension[3], three long paragraphs of dry and boring content. Yi Ran’s eyes wanted to shut just looking at it.
It was really a boring exam. Yi Ran sighed silently and started on comprehension.
It was a novel, which was at least somewhat interesting. Yi Ran read it a few times and filled up the answers. She looked at the clock on the wall, there was still two hours and fifteen minutes left. So she started working on her essay and finished the multiple-choice questions.
As for the classical Chinese translations and writing of ancient poems from memory, she really was hopeless. She didn’t plan on attempting them either, they were left blank every exam.
Yi Ran worked quickly and by the time she was done, there was still an entire hour left on the clock. She sat at her seat, feeling bored beyond belief.
Song Yu Meng was still attentively scribbling down her answers and it caught her attention, so she rested her head on one hand and glanced over.
Song Yu Meng was currently working on her essay and even though Yi Ran couldn’t see the exact words, she could see the bold handwriting, just like the owner. Yi Ran’s handwriting was also messy, but with a hint of elegance.
The invigilator on stage caught sight of Yi Ran looking at Song Yu Meng’s answer booklet but said nothing. The further back you sat, the worse your grades were. Even if the two of them were copying answers, the second last ranked person copying the last ranked person wouldn’t affect anything anyway.
Song Yu Meng suddenly felt someone’s gaze on her and she looked up to see it was Yi Ran. Immediately, she curled her arm around the paper, as if to ensure Yi Ran couldn’t see.
Yi Ran’s lips curled. This scaredy-cat wasn’t too bright after all, who would copy someone else’s essay?
[1] 尔康手 – This is a pretty famous meme from a drama that was super popular when I was a kid (yeah, I watched it on TV too). Here’s how it looks like.
[2] 检测仪 – I’m not sure if students in China actually get checked with a detector to prevent cheating during exams, but yeah.
[3] 文本性阅读 – Breaking each word down, it’s like… reading to understand the actual meaning of the text. If someone can correct me here, it would be much appreciated lol