Chapter 90
Chaeyeon grumbled about not wanting to go, stomping through the piled-up snow.
On this kind of cold day, she should be curled up under the covers scrolling through social media. The fact that she was currently dragging herself toward the prison known as the academy made her feel like she was wasting her time.
But what could she do?
Even if she said she didn't want to go, her mother wouldn't let her off the hook.
"Haah..."
She let out a deep sigh.
The warm air inside her body escaped, forming a puff of steam.
Even wearing a thick padded jacket, the cold cut straight through.
If she'd known it would come to this, she would've studied harder.
The problem was — no, it wasn't bad luck. It was good luck. By ending up in the same class as Jihoon in her third year, she'd spent all her time having nonstop sex.
It wasn't just Chaeyeon either. Nayeong, Mijin, and even Eunbi — unlike in second year, they'd all ended up in the same class together, so the time she got to receive his love had increased a bit. But with so many people, the difference was negligible.
So to make up for that gap,
To receive all the pleasure she'd missed out on in second year at once, she'd practically drained Jihoon dry as he cried out that he was exhausted, and she'd frittered away the entire third year. As a result, her grades had hit rock bottom.
Originally she'd been somewhere in the mid-to-upper range, but now she was stuck in the lower ranks, nowhere near even the middle.
When her mother saw her final report card, she grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and forced her into the academy.
She convinced Chaeyeon that grades were absolutely essential to prepare for graduating and entering a new school.
Honestly, since her boyfriend Jihoon had plenty of money, she didn't need to stress about grades.
She was sure he wouldn't abandon her, even if she did nothing but play around instead of studying.
But Jihoon, busy because of the year-end and even busier because of the New Year, had been away throughout the entire winter break.
So Chaeyeon, with nothing better to do, reluctantly agreed to her mother's encouragement and started attending the academy — which turned out to be a big mistake.
"I wanna have sex... sex... sex...!"
Even on her way to the academy, since she couldn't skip it, the thought of how long it had been since she'd had sex kept spilling out of her mouth.
Her thick padded jacket completely hid her alluring figure, but Chaeyeon's appearance had only grown more radiant as she reached the tail end of her third year — a year that felt both long and short.
Her baby fat was nearly gone, and she had become a young woman radiating maturity.
You'd expect pretty words to come out of such a pretty girl's mouth, but instead, it was "I wanna have sex."
The people walking near her and those coming from the opposite direction were startled by her words, but after a moment of wondering if they'd misheard, they went on their way.
"Ah."
Chaeyeon stopped in front of a certain building and let out a short sigh.
No surprise, since she'd arrived at the academy she hated so much.
She pushed up the sleeve of her padded jacket and glanced at the watch wrapped around her slender wrist.
For the record, she didn't know exactly what brand it was, but Jihoon had bought it for her as a birthday present.
Anyway, the short hand of the watch was just a hair away from pointing at 9.
Today, too, she'd deliberately timed her arrival to barely make it before class started.
She entered the building and passed by Class A, which was full of smart kids.
She passed Class B too, where kids who weren't as good as Class A but were still bright were gathered. Only then did she reach Class C, which was noisy in contrast to the quiet of the other two rooms.
It was probably obvious without saying what kind of kids were in Class C.
Chaeyeon opened the door with a face full of annoyance.
As if it had been waiting for her, the classroom's bustling atmosphere went silent in an instant.
The kids' gazes focused on Chaeyeon, who had just stepped into the room.
Then, as if they'd been waiting, some girls approached her.
"Haha. Hey. Yeah. You too, hey. Today? It was really cold... That's why I came in this thick jacket."
The face that had been so full of annoyance moments ago was gone, replaced by a bright smile as she naturally continued the conversation.
Soon after, the bell rang and the academy teacher appeared.
Only then did the girls who had surrounded Chaeyeon like fish swarming for food move away.
"Phew."
She let out a deep sigh and sat down.
There was hardly anyone she particularly wanted to get close to.
But as if to show that looks are everything in school — more than money or status — the place was full of girls with ulterior motives, clinging to Chaeyeon, who was exceptionally pretty, hoping to pick up whatever scraps might fall their way.
What scraps could there possibly be?
This was why she tried to keep to herself as much as possible.
If Jihoon had been by her side... or even if she didn't dare ask for Jihoon, if at least Nayeong or Mijin were here, she wouldn't have to suffer like this.
For reference, she excluded Eunbi because she doubted she'd be much help.
Anyway, her desire to always remain a pretty and kind image for Jihoon made things incredibly tough.
Sometimes she just wanted to let it all out like Mijin did.
Truth be told, that kind of behavior was closer to Chaeyeon's real self. The way she treated everyone well regardless of age or gender was all a facade.
"Haah..."
Another sigh escaped her as she opened her book.
She didn't even know if the page they were studying in class was the right one, but she opened it to some random page anyway and quickly lost interest in the lesson, resting her chin on her hand.
Her thick padded jacket wrapped around her, keeping the warmth from escaping.
The heater, turned on because of the cold winter, had the classroom toasty warm.
With her surroundings warm and the ultimate sleeping pill known as the lesson combined, her eyelids grew heavy.
Her head kept nodding, and her vision gradually dropped.
Her eyes, which had been facing the teacher, were now pointed at the book spread on her desk — and with that, her sight went dark.
...
,,,,,
,,,,,,,
She'd fallen asleep, unable to overcome her drowsiness. She didn't know how much time had passed.
"Today's lesson... ends here... By the next class... do the assignment..."
The bell signaling the end of the lesson woke her hazily.
The teacher, who hadn't been able to keep track of time properly because he was absorbed in the lecture, hurriedly ended the class and left the room, leaving behind what sounded like homework instructions.
As soon as he left, the classroom quickly grew noisy again.
"Chaeyeon...! Chaeyeon...!"
In the midst of the commotion, the sound of someone calling her name fully woke her from her drowsy state. She looked at the girl who had called her with bleary eyes.
That girl was the only one Chaeyeon had genuinely become friends with.
"Ah... Class is over?"
"Yeah, it's all over."
"I see... That's right... Hooaah..."
She'd wasted the first class of the day, even though she was paying money to attend this academy. And she'd even taken the second seat from the front, intending to study at first.
Three-minute enthusiasm, they called it.
For Chaeyeon, who couldn't even last two days and had made sleeping through class a daily occurrence—
The problem was that since C class was made up of kids who didn't study, more than half of them were sleeping besides Chaeyeon, so the teachers had given up and didn't bother waking them.
As mentioned earlier, since most of them didn't study, they'd rather not waste precious time waking them all up.
So the students were happy not to be woken up, the teachers didn't have to interfere, the clueless parents kept paying money — that was the strange dynamic of Class C.
"Oh, right. Did we have homework?"
"Yeah, we did."
"He said to do pages 79 through 87."
Despite not interfering when students slept during class, these ridiculous academy teachers would contact the parents if homework wasn't done.
So she absolutely had to do her homework.
Chaeyeon quickly flipped through the textbook and landed on page 79.
Predictably, it was full of problems.
Just looking at pages 79 and 80, there were easily over ten questions.
Assuming an average of five questions per page, ten pages came out to a whopping fifty problems.
How was she supposed to solve all this? She stared at problem number 1 and let out a deep sigh.
The textbook's mascot character was grinning cheerfully, telling her the error rate was under 10%, but she didn't even understand that.
Even the easiest problem, number 1, was beyond her. Could she possibly solve the problems that came after?
"Jaehyeon. Jaehyeon...!"
"Huh?"
Chaeyeon urgently called the boy named Jaehyeon sitting next to her.
Pen in hand, Jaehyeon was staring intently at the problems, probably planning to finish the day's homework during the short break.
He wore glasses and had a small build, but he was the smartest kid in Class C.
For the record—
"Could you maybe let me see that after you finish?"
...
An outright request to copy the homework.
"Um... okay."
But Jaehyeon nodded.
He had no choice.
Chaeyeon pretended not to notice, but Jaehyeon already had a crush on her.
She could tell from his reactions, having been the object of many guys' affections before.
Unlike other guys who recklessly charged in with devious intentions, Jaehyeon was still a guy — he occasionally sneaked glances at her face and her body, meaning her chest and legs — but still,
He'd show her his homework, and he seemed to keep his distance, thinking he wasn't on her level. Chaeyeon liked that about him.
Not as a romantic interest, but purely as a friend.
"Ah! Thanks! Jaehyeon!"
"U-uhh...!"
He snapped his flushed face away.
His transparent reaction was kind of cute.
Not as much as Jihoon, though.