Chapter 6 I Dropped Out Before the Gaokao
I dropped out in my senior year.
After the Gaokao ended, I spent a week serving drinks at Hui Huang Ren Jian.
"What are you pretending to be so high and mighty for? You came here to sell, didn't you? I'm giving you face tonight!"
When the drunk customer pressed me down on the sofa and tried to rip open my skirt, Xiao Cui kicked open the private room door.
She smashed a wine bottle on the spot as a weapon, forcing that man back before dragging me out.
Xiao Cui told the manager I had been frightened and couldn't work for the next few days, and I needed paid leave.
Those nights, I sat alone in the smoky employee lounge.
I didn't cry. I didn't speak.
I just held my old phone, refreshing the Gaokao questions published online.
I picked up a eyebrow pencil, copied the questions on the back of a "Princess" promotional flyer from Hui Huang Ren Jian, and wrote down the answers I could think of.
Until the sky outside grew bright.
Because of that, I still remembered most of the Gaokao questions from that year.
The next day, using the five thousand yuan the manager returned to me, I bought every available Gaokao simulation test and past real exam papers from the bookstore.
The days after that, besides school and sleeping and eating, I spent all my time doing questions.
After finishing them all, I took several blank sheets and, based on vague memories, linked similar question types and exam points, writing down whatever I remembered.
Finally, I managed to piece together this year's "targeted practice paper."
When I carried those papers full of correction marks into the living room, Gu Cheng was sitting on the carpet.
His primary school homework was already done, and he was quietly reading an English original book.
Under Lu Congzheng's arrangement, Gu Cheng had already transferred to the public primary school in the city.
But it was not the private international school with six-figure tuition that I had tried so hard to send him to in the previous life.
It was just another ordinary public school in the city.
Of course, that was not because Lu Congzheng was short on money.
Lu Congzheng had been reborn. He naturally remembered the talented young man from the previous life who had publicly severed ties with me at that so-called "engagement banquet."
The Gu Cheng who showed no mercy or contempt for his so-called "brother-in-law."
So, was this revenge?
Or was it some kind of training?
To cut off Gu Cheng's possible arrogance at the source, make him get used to being ordinary, and have no reason to be arrogant toward anyone.
I was not sure.
I only knew that Gu Cheng himself had no opinion.
Every day he carried his little backpack to school, came home and did his homework seriously, never mentioning anything about school or showing any extraordinary talent.
He seemed like... a true, ordinary little student.
Except now.
He had corrected my "targeted practice paper" in less than an hour.
The red pen moved steadily in his small hands, marking one "X" after another.
Finally, he pushed the paper back toward me.
"Sister, at your current level, you can only attend an ordinary first-tier university."
Gu Cheng looked up at me. His eyes, clear and contrasting, still carried a focus that did not belong to a seven-year-old child.
"Sister, what university do you want to attend?"
"...Hua Qing."
I said the name I had never dared to dream of in the previous life, my voice dry.
Gu Cheng's expression did not change at all, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
"Hua Qing." He repeated it once, then nodded. "I know."
Gu Cheng quickly drew a mind map on the paper.
"From today on, we start over. The first step is not doing questions, but building knowledge frameworks."
"Sister, look here."
"Start from the beginning."