Chapter 8
Chapter 8
When I got home, it was the same as always: a late-night snack already made, and a mother nowhere to be seen.
It was almost funny. Ever since I got here, I still hadn’t met anyone in this family.
When I was a ghost, all I could think about was finding someone I could possess as soon as possible so I could investigate the truth.
But now that I had possessed someone, I couldn’t remember where my own home was, or even how I had died.
Still, it seemed that as long as my mind remained, no matter what body I was in, everything transferred over easily.
The problems I had always been good at were just as easy to solve in Sun Shuyi’s body.
By the time the monthly exam was over, I could pretty much say for certain that I had this one in the bag.
The subjects Sun Shuyi had chosen happened to be the same ones I had chosen before.
It was like a fish returning to water.
There wasn’t a single question I didn’t know how to do. Aside from not being completely confident about Chinese reading comprehension and the essay, I finished every other paper early and simply waited for the bell to ring.
When I passed Xiao Ling’s classroom, I deliberately glanced inside and heard him discussing a math problem with the teacher.
Xiao Ling sounded a little regretful as he said, “I was just one step away from thinking of that point.”
“Don’t worry. No one in our school could solve this problem, so you don’t need to take it too hard. You already did very well. Good job!”
I was in a fantastic mood. On the way home, I bought myself an extra-large milk tea.
But unexpectedly, when the rankings came out, Xiao Ling was still first. As for my name, I searched the entire document and couldn’t find it anywhere.
I also looked for Zhou Yanfei’s name. He was ranked two hundred and twenty-fourth.
That was when the homeroom teacher called me to his office.
I already had a feeling what was coming.
The homeroom teacher took a sip of tea, then spat out a bit of tea leaf foam.
His small eyes stared at me through thick lenses.
“Tell me. Why did you cheat?”
I took a deep breath and said calmly, “Sir, I did not cheat.”
“Heh…” The man in front of me stood and moved closer.
“You went from being ranked one thousandth in the whole school… to first place. Heh… How do you expect me to believe you didn’t cheat?”
“Sir, you can ask the proctors whether they actually caught me cheating during the exam.” I looked him firmly in the eye. “I won’t admit to something I didn’t do.”
“What use is it if you don’t admit it? So what if the proctors didn’t see anything? Couldn’t you have found a way to steal the exam papers?”
I laughed out of sheer anger. “Where would I steal them from? All day, I’m either at school or at home.”
“That, I don’t know.”
“If you don’t know, why are you forcing it onto me?”
The homeroom teacher was enraged. His face hardened, and he slammed his teacup down on the desk so heavily that tea sloshed out.
“No one can go from not even understanding basic questions to suddenly getting a perfect score!”
“Sir, accusations need evidence. I didn’t do it. I simply got first place. You can take out any math paper right now and test me, and I can still get full marks.”
My fingernails dug into my palms.
“Ridiculous. Now you’re ordering a teacher around?!”
He took out his phone and began making a call.
When Mom arrived, it was the first time I had ever seen this woman. She was thin and small, probably around forty, but she looked fifty.
She kept bowing and apologizing to the teacher.
“Shuyi, hurry up and admit your mistake. Apologize to your teacher!”
My eyes reddened at once.
In a situation like this, what else could I say?
It was the first time I had ever suffered such an injustice. I stayed silent for a long time.
In the end, I still said, “Sir, I was wrong. I won’t ever do it again.”
On the way home, I sat on the back of Sun Shuyi’s mother’s electric scooter and asked her, “Mom, do you think I cheated too?”
She only said, “You need to study hard. That way, you won’t have to suffer like we do in the future.”
I looked at the supermarket uniform on her back, with several holes worn through it, and said softly,
“Mom, don’t worry. I will definitely get into a good school.”
Even if it wasn’t for myself.
For the Sun Shuyi who had left, I wouldn’t let them bully us like this.