DF Chapter 20

Chapter 20 A hand quickly steadied her.

Chapter 20 A hand quickly steadied her.

Facts proved that Song Ji’an’s guess was correct. As soon as the two of them stepped off the stage, they were surrounded by enthusiastic classmates. Then, taking advantage of the crowd, they successfully escaped through the small door that Sheng Jia had already scouted out.

The auditorium had central air conditioning, which was cool and comfortable. But once they left the auditorium, the heat rushed to their heads. The two of them ran for a distance before stopping. When they looked ahead, they realized that this small path led to the playground.

The school didn’t want to delay the students’ dismissal time. The monthly exam summary meeting used the seventh and eighth class periods, and they could leave directly after the meeting. It was six o’clock now. In September, the sky had already turned orange, and fiery sunset clouds hung in the sky. Scattered students walked across the playground with their schoolbags on their backs, and there were also boarding students who had finished dinner early and were taking a walk.

The two of them were a little tired from running and leaned on the railing by the playground. The scorching wind swept over them, and the air was sticky.

“Oh no, I forgot to get my schoolbag,” Song Ji’an reacted. “If I go back to the classroom to get my schoolbag later, I’ll definitely be blocked again.”

Sheng Jia let out a breath and took out her phone from her pocket, glancing at it. “I’m not going back to the classroom to get my schoolbag.”

Anyway, she still had a part-time job now, and she couldn’t go home until ten o’clock every night. She also had review materials at home, so it didn’t matter if she didn’t bring them for one day.

Song Ji’an thought for a while, “Then I’ll ask Xu Lijing to help me get it.”

She had tutored Xu Lijing for so long, so Xu Lijing wouldn’t refuse her this small request. Xu Lijing’s class was on the top floor of the building for Class One, so it would be easy for her to bring her schoolbag home.

“Do you want me to bring yours over too?” Song Ji’an asked while making a phone call.

Sheng Jia hadn’t spoken yet when the call was already connected. She nodded slightly to Song Ji’an, and Song Ji’an asked Xu Lijing to bring both of their schoolbags to the playground.

The bell rang fifteen minutes after class, the chimes buzzing, and many students who had finished class poured out of the high school building of the second year.

Song Ji’an and Sheng Jia went into the playground and chose a place that wasn’t too hot from the sun to sit down.

It would take at least ten minutes for Xu Lijing to come over.

“Sheng Jia, in the future, will you always have to work part-time?” Song Ji’an suddenly asked, “The study load will be even more intense next semester. If you still choose to work part-time, will you not have enough time?”

She looked ahead, not at Sheng Jia, mainly because she was afraid of being discovered that this wasn’t her unintentional inquiry, but a probe.

The investment scholarship was to help Sheng Jia alleviate her financial pressure, but this was only Song Ji’an and Auntie Liu’s guess. She didn’t know if Sheng Jia needed more money.

With a monthly exam plus a midterm and final exam each semester, a total of five times, if Sheng Jia got first place every time, she could get a scholarship of more than five thousand per semester. Even if she didn’t get first place once or twice, she could still get around four thousand.

Song Ji’an wasn’t some rich second generation who didn’t know the value of money just because her family had a lot of it. On the contrary, Song’s Heavy Industry started from scratch, and every penny had to be calculated clearly. Her mother didn’t want to raise her to be high and mighty and unaware of the hardships of the world. From a young age, her allowance was definitely not as much as others imagined. She also followed her mother to understand the prices of various daily necessities. She had a rough idea of what a few thousand dollars could do in the lives of ordinary people and how long it could last.

The scholarship, plus Sheng Jia’s original living expenses, should be enough for a high school student to survive.

Even if it wasn’t enough, it should be able to alleviate most of the pressure and allow Sheng Jia to quit a few part-time jobs.

“Yes,” Sheng Jia told her frankly, “But I will still go.”

Song Ji’an’s eyes widened, “Why?”

“You said that your investment scholarship is to absorb talent, but in reality, you also want me to get the scholarship so I don’t have to work part-time, right? You want to help me alleviate my financial pressure?” Sheng Jia didn’t answer her question, but continued, “You don’t even dare to look at me. Haven’t you noticed? When you talk, you always like to stare directly into other people’s eyes, forcing them to look at you too. That’s your habit of sensing other people’s emotions, right?”

“When you don’t want to look at someone when you’re talking, then there must be a problem.”

Since the words had been spoken, Song Ji’an simply admitted, “I do see that you’re working very hard and want to do something to help you, but the scholarship isn’t just for you. You’re the starting point, but I like to pursue high efficiency when I do projects, and after thinking of this idea, I did treat it as a serious investment.”

“I felt that you might not accept direct help, so I wanted to take a roundabout route.”

“You admitted it so easily?” Sheng Jia glanced at her and said softly.

Song Ji’an laughed, her eyes a little cunning, “I didn’t admit it before because I was afraid you would be unhappy if you knew, but now you’ve already gone on stage to receive the money, and you’ve guessed what I want to do, so why stubbornly deny it?”

“If you really wanted to be angry with me, would you still be able to come and chat with me calmly?”

Song Ji’an’s biggest fear before was that Sheng Jia would be stubborn, and that she would be angry and annoyed after knowing what she had done for her and not take the scholarship.

But now it seemed that Sheng Jia was accepting it better than she had imagined.

“You’re right,” Sheng Jia took the money out of the red envelope and put it into her wallet, slowly saying, “Why shouldn’t I take the results of my own hard work? But I still have to thank you.”

When she said this, her deep black eyes looked at Song Ji’an, and the corners of her eyes were slightly curved, as if she was smiling faintly.

Song Ji’an was slightly stunned by the sight, and then for some reason, her ears turned a little red. She was usually eloquent, but now she was a little embarrassed.

She was probably used to Sheng Jia’s cold expression, so she was a little surprised to see her looking so different.

She finally just raised her hand and patted Sheng Jia’s shoulder, smiling and saying, “There’s nothing to thank me for. Sheng Jia, you’re so excellent, you’ll definitely be a talent that different companies will be vying for in the future. If you really want to thank me, just give priority to my family if we have a suitable position for you in the future.”

Sheng Jia didn’t respond to this sentence, and Song Ji’an didn’t wait for her to respond either, because from afar, Xu Lijing, Zhang Jing, and Zhao Yijia had already run over with their two schoolbags. Song Ji’an didn’t notice that the question of why Sheng Jia still wanted to work part-time hadn’t been answered today.

“Why are you running so fast?”

Seeing them getting closer, Song Ji’an quickly got up and took her and Sheng Jia’s schoolbags, then handed them to Sheng Jia, who had also stood up.

“There was a parent and student arguing at the entrance of Class Two just now. We stayed there to watch for a while. Weren’t we afraid that you guys would wait too long? So we ran over quickly.”

As they spoke, the group walked side by side towards the school gate.

They were closer to another small door, so they chose to continue walking the small path that Sheng Jia and Song Ji’an had taken when they came.

“Huh? Arguing, why?” Song Ji’an couldn’t help but ask.

“We didn’t understand too much, but I’ve seen the person arguing. It’s that person we ran into when we went to Sky Restaurant last time, what was her name, Su Zhaolin. The person arguing today was her and that particularly beautiful woman who left early from the restaurant last time.”

Xu Lijing continued, “We didn’t hear the content of the argument very clearly, but the voices were very loud. When we squeezed to the front, the homeroom teacher of Class Two had already come out to mediate. That woman was saying something like ‘Don’t worry about her, let her go,’ and then Su Zhaolin really ran away. Later, it ended. Teacher Fang sent a student to find Su Zhaolin, and that woman was invited to the office.”

Hearing this, Song Ji’an opened her phone. As expected, there were already 99+ messages in the class WeChat group. High school students love gossip the most. The last time there were so many messages was when Xu Lijing tore apart the rumor-mongering boy, and Class One spent a day spamming “Cool Story,” and everyone agreed that Xu Lijing’s behavior was a real cool story female lead behavior.

This time, the protagonist of the gossip became Su Zhaolin, but there were too many messages, and she didn’t have time to scroll up before she stumbled because she wasn’t looking at the road.

A hand quickly steadied her.

“Ouch, Song Ji’an, are you okay? Don’t look at your phone when you’re walking,” Xu Lijing’s voice came to her ears, but when Song Ji’an looked up, she realized that it was Sheng Jia, who had been walking silently beside her, who had steadied her.

“Are you okay?” Sheng Jia asked when she saw her looking at her.

“I’m fine, thank you,” Song Ji’an stood up straight with the help of Sheng Jia’s hand, but Sheng Jia made a “shh” gesture.

Seeing this, Zhang Jing asked in confusion, “What’s wrong?”

They had just reached the edge of the clearing that Xu Lijing usually liked the most. Last time, Song Ji’an had eavesdropped behind the wall where they were standing now.

But as soon as her words fell, in the brief silence, everyone heard a suppressed and short sob coming from the other side of the wall.

Sheng Jia peeked out from the wall and saw that Su Zhaolin, who had just been the protagonist of the story, was lying on the steps, silently shedding tears.