He Qing sent off the letter, then put the matter of Ou Lianlian out of her mind.
A few days later, the time for school registration arrived.
She took her tuition money and went to the only high school in Ling County — Lingshan Middle School.
Although she hadn’t been there for many years, she still remembered the general situation of the school.
She walked through the school gates as if she knew the place well and headed straight for the senior year registration area.
Along the way, she passed by quite a few students who had finished registering and were leaving, most of them boys.
When she reported her name and class at the registration desk, the teacher in charge was dumbfounded.
"Returning to school after nearly a year’s suspension? Directly to the senior year, with the college entrance exam around the corner, can you keep up?"
"Thank you for your concern, teacher, I have no problems."
In this era, not many people were willing to spend money on education, so after some thought, the teacher didn’t give her a hard time and simply registered her.
Anyway, their school’s college advancement rate wasn’t that great. One more student not getting into college wouldn’t make much difference, plus it was another tuition fee earned.
After completing her registration, Xia Chuyi picked up her books and turned to leave the school.
She hadn’t gone far when she suddenly heard an exclamation nearby.
"Xia Chuyi, what are you doing at the school?" It was a girl’s voice.
She turned around to see a girl with a high ponytail, wrapped in a red scarf, and two patches of red on her cheeks, looking at her displeased.
"Aren’t you already dropped out and married off? Why are you back at the school again?"
"Hmph, our school doesn’t accept married women!"
The girl was very rude.
Narrowing her eyes, Xia Chuyi looked at her for several seconds and asked, "Who are you?"
"What did you say?" The girl was taken aback.
She couldn’t help it, it had been too long, and she really didn’t remember who this person was.
Soon, an even more disgruntled expression appeared on the girl’s face, and she said loudly, "Xia Chuyi, you..."
Before she could finish, someone behind her called out loudly, "Liu Chunya!"
Xia Chuyi raised her eyebrows in surprise, finally remembering who the person in front of her was.
Liu Chunya, one of the very few high-fee students in the class — those who had not passed the normal entrance exams and had paid a large choice fee to attend the school.
In her memory, Liu Chunya was a pretty girl with some charm, conspicuous among the modestly dressed students due to her family’s wealth and her love for fashion.
She looked Liu Chunya up and down and realized that the patch of red on her face was not the high-altitude flush she had previously thought it was; considering the large red scarf around her neck and the very distinctive Bangs Mountain fringe...
Honestly, it was all too normal that she hadn’t recognized this was Liu Chunya.
"Xia Chu?" Just as she was silently reflecting on the vast differences in aesthetic preferences over the years, the student who had called out Liu Chunya’s name stared at her in surprise and asked, "How come you’re at school?"
Xia Chuyi looked at the person.
Well, this person, she had no recollection of.
She smiled faintly at the student, saying nothing, responding to the ever-changing with the unchanging.
Unexpectedly, this reaction immediately provoked Liu Chunya’s intense dissatisfaction, "Xia Chuyi, what’s the meaning of this? So now that you’re married and know how to dress up, you think you’re too good for us?"
In her mind, many similar scenes suddenly emerged.
"Xia Chuyi, you country bumpkin, who do you think you are acting all high and mighty?"
"Xia Chuyi, you country bumpkin, don’t think just because you’ve got a bit of beauty, you can behave improperly!"
Her decision to drop out back then was not solely because of He Qing; it was more about her not fitting in at school.