Zhou Tingzhao had never cheered up a girl before, and he wasn’t sure if this approach would make Sang Ru less angry.

She took the paper and read it silently for quite a while. Suddenly, she raised her eyes to look at him. Those eyes curved gently, filled with laughter. She said, “Zhou Tingzhao, you’re so cute.”

He objected, “I am not.”

“You are.”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

Zhou Tingzhao was left speechless. Even after thinking about it for a long time, he couldn’t understand how a 182cm tall guy could be associated with the word “cute.”

Changing seats only took half of the class period. For the remaining half, Teacher Zheng simply assigned weekend math homework for everyone to work on.

Two sets of test papers. Sang Ru placed her textbook and supplementary materials aside to tackle the problems, filling in knowledge gaps as she went along.

She could remember some high school knowledge points. Though slightly fuzzy, they were clearer than what she remembered after working, suggesting a partial continuation of her body’s original memories. But she still wasn’t fully accustomed to returning to the high school test-grinding lifestyle, and the first set of papers proved somewhat arduous.

As class was ending, Zhou Tingzhao handed her a set of papers she hadn’t seen before: “These are mock exam questions from the neighboring school. Do you want to try them?”

Only then did Sang Ru vaguely recall that Zhou Tingzhao’s parents were both teachers at their school, so getting these papers must have been easy for him.

“Yes.”

Zhou Tingzhao gave her the papers and lowered his head to continue working on problems. His facial features were handsome with strong lines, making Sang Ru feel a flutter of excitement.

She lowered herself closer to him, resting her chin on the crook of his arm, but controlled her weight so she wasn’t pressing down. Looking up, she said, “Tomorrow’s the weekend.”

It sounded like she was being coquettish.

Zhou Tingzhao just looked at her with slightly downcast eyes, saying nothing, waiting for her next sentence.

“Do you have plans?”

Zhou Tingzhao shook his head slightly.

They were too close.

“Well, now you do,” Sang Ru retreated to sit properly and tapped her finger on the test papers she had just received. “Let’s solve problems together, Zhou Tingzhao. We’ll time ourselves like in an exam. Let’s compete.”

Sang Ru applied light makeup using Madam Jiang’s cosmetics. When she arrived at the entrance of the city library, Zhou Tingzhao was already waiting.

He was easy to spot—white shirt, black pants, radiating freshness. With his glasses and serious expression, he exuded an additional air of restraint.

Later, Zhou Tingzhao would often wear shirts too, but with a tie and suit, maintaining the restraint but with less youthful energy.

During their moments of urgent desire, Zhou Tingzhao would sometimes wear this kind of outfit, only releasing his hard member to enter her. When proper clothes became stained with the scent of chaos, he would gently rub her nipples and chuckle, “These clothes are unwearable now.”

Sang Ru would pretend to kick him, saying, “Take them to the dry cleaner.”

It was different, yet Sang Ru was surprised to find that she liked both versions of him very much.

She even wanted to know what would happen if she made Zhou Tingzhao’s current white shirt dirty.

Although it was still early, the library already had many people. They found a self-study area, and Sang Ru quickly claimed a single desk in the corner. Zhou Tingzhao paused for a moment, then sat down across from her.

It began with playful thoughts, but they unconsciously became serious when working on the problems.

Zhou Tingzhao took off his watch and placed it between them. It was so quiet they could hear the ticking of the second hand.

Competitiveness made Sang Ru unwilling to lose badly. Last night, she had completed both assigned math papers to get back into practice, so now she worked smoothly. She was just finishing the last problem on the front page when she heard Zhou Tingzhao turn the page. Sang Ru thought, I’m not far behind; I’m still pretty good.

The mock exam wasn’t difficult. After careful calculation, she solved the final question too. As a corporate drone, she’d discovered that solving problems was truly a good way to relieve stress. Sang Ru finished and let out a sigh of relief. When she looked up, she met Zhou Tingzhao’s gaze.

She didn’t know when he had started staring at her. Caught in the act, his eyes showed some evasiveness, but he remained fairly composed.

Sang Ru was in a good mood and smiled at him, silently mouthing: “Done.”

Zhou Tingzhao wrote on scratch paper: “Want to check the answers?”

He pushed it over. Sang Ru replied below: “Yes.”

Zhou Tingzhao had brought sample answers and began checking.

In the end, he had all the correct answers again, while Sang Ru missed one fill-in-the-blank question.

Sang Ru moved over the paper with their conversation and deliberately wrote: “Did you secretly look at the answers?”

Zhou Tingzhao wrote methodically: “No.”

I was already quite distracted. Getting everything right was just luck.

Zhou Tingzhao pressed his lips together tightly, realizing he’d been rather unfocused lately. This wasn’t good.

His thoughts were suddenly interrupted when he found his right foot trapped, unable to move. Looking down, he saw her leg had crossed over to trap his, like a childish game kids would play.

She wore a skirt today, the hem reaching mid-calf. With her leg extended to his side, more of that fair skin was exposed.

His mind grew unfocused again. He looked at her and, for the first time, silently mouthed: “Let go.”

She raised her eyebrows slightly, her expression both proud and smug, like a little peacock: “No.”

The next moment, it was Sang Ru’s turn to be stunned.

She suddenly felt pressure against her leg as Zhou Tingzhao tightened the gap, trapping her. The fabric of his pants rubbed against her exposed skin, tightening inch by inch.

She instinctively pulled back, but Zhou Tingzhao moved forward to follow, restraining her more tightly.

As they moved, the friction between them made Sang Ru feel weak all over.

Yet they had barely done anything.

She looked at him and saw that Zhou Tingzhao’s ears had turned red, but he didn’t back down. The deep ink color in his eyes was almost enough to drown in—

Later, there should be another bonus chapter from Bai Zhu. Thank you, everyone, for liking these two.

I enjoy reading your comments, they’re very cute too.