Laia & The Transferee - Chapter 59

AS IF HE DIDN’T HAVE a huge bruise on his face, the asshat made his way towards the group of friends with a wolfish grin.

Placing his head above Shane who almost jumped in surprise, he addressed everyone in a playful tone. “What did I miss?”

The scowl that appeared on Jake’s face was immediate. “What the fuck happened to your eye?”

“Uh, this?” The asshat pressed on the bruise and flinched. He was quick to act like it didn’t hurt, flashing everyone a grin. “I was in a fight,”

“A fight?” Vivi made her way towards him and looked at the bruise closely with an anxious expression. “Who did you fight with?”

Brie and Laia exchanged worried glances. The two obviously shared the same suspicion on what happened.

The asshat’s father.

Jake angrily made his way to his friend and pulled him away without giving him a chance to make a decision for himself.

Shane worriedly watched the two boys leave and settle on the corner of their room where no one else was. “Who could have possibly fought with him?”

More like who could have possibly one-sidedly attacked him based on how the asshat didn’t have any wounds on his fist or how his clothes didn’t even seem like they went through a fight.

Laia sighs and looked away from the sight of Jake reprimanding the asshat who seemed like he couldn’t wait for the conversation to end but with how Jake was still looking more furious than ever, Laia’s sure that their conversation would probably last for a while longer.

“Is he often on fights?” Aiden asked.

Everyone’s attention went back to him and even Vivi walked towards his right side which was her original position before the asshat came in with a fresh bruise on his face without a single care. “No, he’s not much of a fighter,”

“Oh,” Aiden nodded but his eyes returned to where the asshat and Jake were. Laia followed his gaze and flinched when Jake suddenly punched the wall right beside the asshat. “Uh, someone should probably talk to Jake,”

Jake left in a fuming state, not caring when he almost bumped into their Mathematics teacher who called after him but to no avail.

“Brie,” Vivi gestures towards the door. “Go after him. I’ll distract our teacher,”

Brie’s eyes widened at Vivi’s sudden offer but immediately ran after her ex-boyfriend after thanking the other girl.

Vivi quickly distracted their Mathematics teacher by bringing up the exams and asking about the potential topics that may or may not appear on them even if their teacher had already elaborated on such a week ago.

Not that their teacher remembered since she seemed happy to discuss it with Vivi, giving Brie enough time to slip out of their room without their teacher noticing.

Shane settled down on the chair beside Laia. “Why did Jake run off like that?”

Laia’s eyes remained on the asshat’s sullen manner of walking as she responded. “They probably had an argument,”

“But they have never fought before, right?”

The short-haired girl shrugged. “There’s a first time in everything, I guess.”

Shane didn’t seem content with Laia’s answer but opted to not say anything else and instead focused on what their teacher was discussing in front.

Laia’s mood only soured further when their teacher decided to give them a surprise quiz, garnering angry reactions from the class regardless of their animosity being useless against the words of their teacher.

“It’s just a twenty-item identification quiz!” Their teacher said in hopes of calming her class down.

Unfortunately, it only made everyone even agitated.

“Don’t worry, we have already discussed the topic for this quiz last week,” She grabs a marker and started writing the questions on the board. “Just write it on your notebook so we can have you exchange them easily with your seatmates to get your scores,”

Shane sheepishly grins at Laia. “Uhm, I didn’t really listen to her discussion last week,”

Laia raised an eyebrow at the girl. Does that have anything to do with her?

She was about to say just that when Aiden spoke in hushed tones. “Don’t worry, I didn’t study as well,” He even grinned reassuringly at Shane who couldn’t help but smile back. “Let’s just answer the most random of things together–”

Laia couldn’t bear the thought of sitting in the middle of them both and spoke up. “It’s fine, I studied everything,”

The girl on her right noticeably brightened but Aiden looked at her with worry. “Are you sure it’s okay? You don’t have to, it was our fault in the first place–”

Laia raised a hand to stop him. She gently smiles. “Don’t worry, it’s a small thing,”

It absolutely wasn’t.

“It’s not like it’s the exams,”

But her results on all the quizzes within the quarter could still either help her retain her rank or lose it to someone else.

Someone else being the asshat, of course.

Shane giddily hugged Laia. “Thank you, I promise I would definitely study for the next quiz!”

Laia fought the urge to roll her eyes. She’s definitely sure that Shane would only study IF she won’t be sitting next to Laia on the next quizzes.

The short-haired girl could only hope that Brie wouldn’t leave her side for the next classes to come. Even if Brie would ask for help at certain times, she would still study beforehand and would just ask Laia if her answers were correct or wrong and wouldn’t ask further regarding Laia’s answers.

It was still cheating but Laia learned to tolerate it as time passed by.

The quiz started and Shane didn’t waste time copying every single one of Laia’s answers. The only good thing about the whole thing was that Shane didn’t annoy Laia by asking whether she was sure with her answers or not.

Laia cringes as she remembered an elementary classmate of hers who would do such. She was seriously tempted to whack her classmate’s friend with her notebook but she always had a huge amount of patience so she settled on giving her classmate a bunch of wrong answers.

She remembered how delighted she was that day when her classmate cried upon receiving a zero when Laia got a perfect score.

They never talked after that but Laia couldn’t care less.

Her reminiscing was interrupted by their teacher asking them to exchange notebooks with their seatmates. Shane excitedly gave her notebook to Aiden while she settled for Laia’s. Laia got Aiden’s and her eyes widened upon realizing that their answers were different.

“Aiden, what–”

Aiden shook his head. “Don’t worry about it,”

“But–”

“Laia,” He smiles at her. “Don’t worry,”

“Your grade–”

“Shh,” The boy handed her a red ballpen. “It’s just one quiz. I’d rather fail than copy from someone who studied all night long to get a good score,”

Shane, who seemed to have overheard the conversation between Laia and Aiden, visibly tensed.

Laia ignored her. “Are you really sure? This is a twenty-item quiz,”

Aiden shrugs. “It’s not the first time that I flunked a quiz,” His grin widened when he saw the obvious concern in Laia’s eyes. “Don’t worry, it’s not a big deal,”

“But–”

“Who wants to answer number one?”

The conversation between the two ended there but Laia would steal occasional glances at the boy whenever she had to encircle the numbers on where Aiden’s answers were wrong.

Which was a lot.

When their teacher had finally answered everything on her own (since nobody volunteered to answer the questions with the exception of Laia who answered five questions) she asked for everyone to return their notebooks to their rightful owners and have everyone say their scores out loud to record their grades.

Just like how she expected, Laia got a perfect score.

Shane got the same score but looked crestfallen. Laia knew she should probably speak to the girl regarding what Aiden said earlier but she couldn’t help but think that it was right for the other girl to feel guilty and no amount of assurance would probably lessen the weight on her shoulders.

Aiden got ten over twenty, but he didn’t look worried about it one bit. On the contrary, he actually looked relieved, even smiling at Laia when he caught her looking at him.

Laia did her best to not blush in embarrassment.

“Laurie?”

Laia tilted her head to the side to gauge the asshat’s expression on his face.

He spoke in a loud voice as usual. “Twenty,”

The girl huffed. Not that she didn’t expect him to get a perfect score but it still stung whenever it dawned to her that he was really tough competition.

“Lopez?”

Everyone turned to Laia with curious expressions. Looks like Laia wasn’t the only one interested in the whole silent feud between the first and second ranks.

“Twenty,”

“Damn! Queen behavior, if you ask me,” Laia heard Vivi say from a few seats away.

Laia was barely able to stifle a laugh at Vivi’s words.

After recording everyone’s scores, their teacher made her way towards Aiden and gestured him to come with her outside.

“What was that about?” Vivi asked.

Laia turned to her with a perplexed expression. “Since when were you behind me?”

“Uhm,” Vivi thought for a while. “About a minute or so?”

“Why’d she call him?” The asshat appeared beside Vivi as well, his head already on top of Vivi’s head.

Laia can confirm by now that the asshat likes placing his head on top of those who are considerably shorter than him. It’s a relief that Laia was taller than both Shane and Vivi, as she reaches the asshat’s shoulders which would make it difficult for him to settle his head above hers.

Not that Laia would want that to happen.

Gross.