A Perfect Score
Today was the day Lisa, who had been in the hospital wing all this time, was finally discharged.
Jiwoo had arranged to meet her in front of the dormitory so they could walk to class together. Lisa had recovered, sure, but her body might still be stiff — and if anything went wrong, Jiwoo wanted to be right there.
Lisa looked terribly apologetic about the whole arrangement, but she also looked happy. She said it was her first time ever walking to school with a friend.
And that went for Jiwoo too.
“Hey, look at those two…….”
The moment they stepped into the classroom, every eye in the room turned toward them.
Seol Jihyo and Lim Lisa. The two quietest students in the class, walking in side by side — it was quite the unusual sight.
“I-I'll just... go to my seat then…….”
Clearly self-conscious under all the attention, Lisa squeaked out the words in a voice like a mosquito's and scurried to her desk. Jiwoo gave her a small wave and then strode to her own seat.
Where, of course, her desk partner Moon Yujin was already sitting.
“…….”
“…….”
Their eyes met. As always, Yujin gave no reaction whatsoever — he simply flicked his gaze away.
“Good morning.”
Jiwoo greeted him first. Clearly not expecting that, Yujin turned back toward her a second time. His deep, ash-gray eyes seemed to be asking a question.
What's gotten into you all of a sudden?
Instead of answering, Jiwoo rummaged in her pocket, pulled something out, and set it down on his desk with a light tap.
“……?”
It was a pen.
“Back then, you lent Jo Bitna a pen on my behalf. I never paid you back, did I?”
“I didn't mind that.”
“Well, I did.”
Jiwoo nodded at the pen, as if to say take it already.
“Your pen looked pretty expensive — a good brand, too. Look it up, and if there's a price difference, bill me for it.”
Bill me…….
“Understood.”
Yujin slipped the pen into his pencil case without protest. But apparently Jiwoo still had business there, because she remained standing at his desk, rooted to the spot.
“...Was there something else?”
“During the Core Application class. You went to get the rescue team.”
That was it. That was what she'd been wanting to bring up all along.
“That day — you came back looking for us, together with the instructor. Didn't you?”
“I did.”
Yujin answered evenly and zipped up his pencil case.
“Sorry.”
Jiwoo apologized out of nowhere. He looked up at her.
“I think I misunderstood you a little, back then.”
“…….”
Yujin studied her for a long moment, then lowered his eyes back to his textbook.
“You're not going to ask what the misunderstanding was?”
“Doesn't matter. I get misunderstood a lot.”
Flip. He turned a page. And that was the end of the conversation.
It left Jiwoo with a vaguely unsettled feeling, but — well, she'd said what she came to say. She sat down without adding anything else.
...Incidentally.
There are a lot of empty seats in here.
Naturally so. Jo Bitna and her entire clique had been punished — all five of them.
Five. Including Gu Minjae. He hadn't actually been in the back garden that day, but for whatever reason, he'd been lumped in with the rest and suspended. Maybe his usual conduct had finally caught up with him, or maybe one of the group had thrown him under the bus to save their own skin. Who knew.
In any case, with roughly thirty students in the class, about fifteen percent of it had vanished in one stroke. And those five had been the most conspicuous people in the room — practically its center of gravity. The classroom feeling quieter than usual was definitely not Jiwoo's imagination.
But this isn't the end of it, is it.
...Even now, in this school — in this classroom — hostile eyes were still fixed on "Seol Jihyo." Jo Bitna's gang was gone, but the people who quietly froze her out were not.
How do I know?
All it took was a glance. Even with the clique gone, not a single person — Lisa excepted — looked at "Seol Jihyo" with anything resembling warmth.
“Hey, that's Seol Jihyo, right…….”
“No way. I heard she got in a huge brawl in the back garden. So why is she the only one who didn't get suspended?”
Jiwoo pretended not to hear the whispers swirling around her and prepared for the next class.
Then, mid-thought, she felt a gaze from beside her. She glanced over — and locked eyes with Moon Yujin once again.
How long has he been staring?
“...What?”
“Homework.”
“Huh?”
“Did you do the homework.”
“What homework, all of a sudden?”
He tapped a long finger on his own desk. A single printed sheet — fifteen math problems laid out on the white paper.
...Oh, right. Only now did Jiwoo remember the homework from last class.
“Two minutes until class starts.”
At the flat warning from beside her, Jiwoo quickly dug out her own sheet. Yujin, who'd been watching out of the corner of his eye as she scrambled through her pencil case for a pen, added:
“...Want to copy mine?”
“I'm good.”
Jiwoo's pen began to move, scritch scritch. His deep, ash-gray eyes drifted down to the math sheet on Jihyo's desk, filling in fast. She worked through each problem without a single hesitation.
“…….”
His long, level eyes narrowed faintly.
The moment Jiwoo set her pen down with a decisive tap, the class bell rang.
“Alright, everyone — homework first. Hand it in.”
The math teacher collected the sheets the instant she walked in. Jiwoo handed over the one she'd just finished.
During the brief self-study period, the teacher finished grading at speed, and near the end of the period she announced the scores.
“Oh my, Jihyo. You've been studying hard, haven't you?”
The teacher sounded genuinely surprised as she handed back the sheet. Jihyo's grades had never been bad, exactly — but they'd never been remarkable, either. And now that very "Seol Jihyo" had earned a perfect score.
“Here you go.”
“Thank you.”
“Wasn't it difficult? Impressive. I honestly never expected a hundred from you, Jihyo.”
The teacher's eyes sparkled. Has this teacher ever looked at me like that before?
“I did some self-study while I was out of school.”
“That makes it even more impressive! Say — would you have any interest in the Math & Science club? I advise it, you know.”
“Hmm. I'll think about it.”
“Do think about it. You'd be more than welcome, Jihyo.”
Jiwoo bowed her head and was turning back toward her seat when the teacher, until then smiling warmly, suddenly caught her arm.
“Ah — wait, take these too.”
Candy.
“Three, for the perfect score.”
“...Thank you.”
Back at her seat, Jiwoo stared at her printout — the number 100 written large across the top — and the three pieces of candy beside it.
...Well, what do you know. This actually feels pretty good.
In truth, there was no such thing as being "first" in her lessons with Soyoung — she was the only student there. So naturally, she'd never known the satisfaction of having outperformed everyone else in a room.
Though once, a very long time ago — when her parents were still alive and they all lived together…….
“Goodness — our Jiwoo solved every single one of the addition problems?”
“Yeah! I did them together with Jihyo!”
“Well done. As a reward, Mommy will give you candy. Here — soda flavor for Jiwoo, banana for Jihyo.”
...Right. She had memories like that too.
If her parents had known she'd scored a hundred at school — even if it was only homework — they would have been so proud.
“Hey, was Seol Jihyo always good at math?”
“No idea. How did she do that? This one was brutal, right? Or was it just me?”
“Me too……. I got a thirty.”
The students around her stared at Jiwoo, half in envy and half in wonder. Her eyes met Lisa's, who sat diagonally nearby. Lisa was clapping silently — clap clap — and mouthing the words, You're amazing!
Truthfully, the problems were nothing worth marveling at. Jiwoo had covered this material ages ago in her lessons with Soyoung. What's more, because Gaon was a special school, its standard subjects — the ones unrelated to Cores — often lagged behind even ordinary high schools in difficulty.
In other words, problems like these were easier for Jiwoo than eating cold porridge. And yet everyone was astonished. Everyone thought it was impressive.
Come to think of it, the same thing had happened on her very first day — that footrace in PE class. Jiwoo had simply run at what felt like a normal pace, and the entire class had gone into an absolute frenzy.
After experiencing this a handful of times since coming to Gaon, Jiwoo had developed a rather pleasant feeling about it.
No — she'd even started to enjoy it, a little.
Really, though. Even if she'd spent practically her whole life locked away, who on earth would hate being told they were impressive?
I should tell Soyoung about this later.
She could picture it perfectly — Soyoung bouncing up and down, squealing, As expected of Lady Jiwoo!
Meanwhile, as Jiwoo fidgeted with the candy in her palm, the teacher handed back the last sheet.
“And of course, Yujin has a perfect score as well.”
Jiwoo, who'd been staring fixedly at her candy, lifted her head. She saw Moon Yujin's back as he accepted his sheet from the teacher.
“Now then — Yujin gets five.”
What. Why do I get three and he gets five?
“He came in first last time too, so consider it a bonus.”
Ah. I see.
“Thank you.”
Candy and printout in hand, Yujin walked steadily down the aisle between the desks and returned to his seat.
Unlike with Jiwoo, no one said a word. The reaction was one of of course he did — as if his perfect score were simply a law of nature.
Moon Yujin himself seemed to agree. He returned to his seat with utterly unimpressed eyes and set the candy he'd just received down at the corner of his desk without ceremony.
Then his gaze lifted — and met Jiwoo's, who was staring openly at him.
“...Want one?”
He held out a piece of candy.
“No.”
“Then why do you keep staring at me?”
“You don't look happy at all.”
“……? Ah.”
Yujin's reaction came a beat late.
“It was easy. It would've been stranger not to get a perfect score.”
Fair enough. It was easy.
But setting that aside — wasn't being first supposed to feel good? He'd even gotten five pieces of candy.
Then again... with reactions like that from everyone around him, maybe it really doesn't register at all.
Jiwoo knew the feeling from her own lessons with Soyoung. No matter how much Soyoung praised her, her words had long ago stopped producing any real thrill. She couldn't help it — it was simply what always happened.
And if that was how it was for Moon Yujin, too…….
“That sounds boring.”
Yujin, mid-motion of tucking away his printout, froze. Only his eyes turned, sliding a glance toward Jiwoo.
But Jiwoo had already unwrapped a piece of candy, popped it into her mouth, and turned to look out the window.
“…….”
Long after that, Moon Yujin's gaze lingered on her for quite some time — without ever realizing that his hand, mid-page-turn, had gone completely still.