The break between the second and third period lasted exactly fifteen minutes.
Li Wenya had learned to use these fifteen minutes wisely. She would take out her notes, review whatever Peng Xiao had just destroyed her confidence with, drink her water, and most importantly, not look at the boy sitting beside her.
It was a solid system.
It had been working perfectly for the past two days.
Today, however, the universe had other plans.
She was in the middle of rewriting her notes when her pen ran out of ink. She clicked it twice. Shook it. Clicked it again. Nothing. She rummaged through her pencil case and realized with growing horror that every single pen inside it was either dried out, broken, or had mysteriously vanished.
How.
She stared into the pencil case as it had personally betrayed her.
She could ask Xu Jia. Xu Jia was right there, one row ahead, currently asleep with her cheek pressed against her textbook and absolutely no intention of waking up before the bell rang.
She could ask the chubby boy in the front row. But he was chanting under his breath again, and she didn't want to interrupt whatever spiritual ritual he was conducting.
She could not simply write notes and accept the consequences later.
Or
Her eyes drifted sideways against her will.
Xi Yanli was sitting beside her, writing something in his notebook with calm, unhurried strokes. Three pens sat lined up neatly at the top of his desk. Black, blue, and red. Perfectly arranged. Not a single one is running out of ink.
Li Wenya looked at her empty pencil case. Then at his three pens. Then back at her pencil case.
Absolutely not.
She was not going to ask the male lead to borrow a pen. That was ridiculous. That was exactly the kind of unnecessary interaction she had been carefully avoiding. She would rather sit here in complete silence and write nothing for the entire break.
Two minutes passed.
She picked up her dead pen and tried clicking it one more time.
Nothing.
She put it down.
Thirty more seconds passed.
Fine.
She turned slightly in her seat. Xi Yanli was still writing, completely unbothered by the internal war she had just fought with herself.
"Um," she said quietly.
He didn't look up.
She cleared her throat. "Can I borrow a pen?"
A pause.
Xi Yanli stopped writing. He looked at the three pens lined up at the top of his desk, then picked up the blue one and placed it on her side of the desk without a word.
"...Thank you," she said.
He returned to his notes.
Li Wenya picked up the pen and started writing. The ink flowed smoothly, and she told herself firmly that this was just a pen transaction. A thirty-second exchange that meant absolutely nothing. She would return it after class, say thank you once more, and that would be the end of it.
Simple. Clean. No complications.
She had written exactly four lines when his voice came again, quiet and unhurried.
"You're holding it wrong."
She stopped writing.
She looked at her hand. Then at him.
Xi Yanli was still looking at his own notebook. "Your grip. It's why your handwriting is uneven."
Li Wenya stared at the side of his face. "...You were looking at my notes?"
"Your paper was in my peripheral vision."
She looked down at her notes. Then back at him. "My handwriting is fine."
"It slopes left."
"That is a stylistic choice."
The corner of his mouth moved. Just barely. So slightly that she almost missed it entirely.
Was that... did he almost smile?
She blinked. By the time she looked properly, his expression was already back to its usual cool indifference, eyes on his notebook like the last ten seconds had not happened.
Li Wenya faced forward again and gripped the pen exactly the way she always had.
Her handwriting did not slope left. It was a perfectly acceptable slight leftward lean that many people found charming.
She wrote three more lines.
Looked at them.
It slopes left.
She erased everything and rewrote it with her grip adjusted slightly. The result was annoyingly, infuriatingly neater.
She was not going to acknowledge this.
When the bell rang for the third period, Li Wenya placed the blue pen back on his desk.
"Thanks," she said, looking straight ahead.
"Keep it," Xi Yanli said.
She turned to look at him. He was already pulling out his textbook for the next class, completely casual, as if he hadn't just handed her a pen like it cost him nothing.
"I have others," he added, not looking at her.
Li Wenya looked at the blue pen sitting on her desk. Then at the two remaining pens on his side. Then back at the blue pen.
"...Okay," she said finally.
She picked it up and put it in her pencil case.
Xu Jia, who had woken up approximately forty seconds ago and had witnessed the tail end of the exchange, was now staring at Li Wenya from one row ahead with the expression of someone who had just witnessed a historical event.
Li Wenya pointed at her very firmly without looking.
Xu Jia pressed her lips together and turned around.
That afternoon, Li Wenya sat on her bed and took the blue pen out of her bag. She looked at it for a long moment.
It was just a pen. A completely ordinary pen that a classmate had given her because she had run out of ink. This happens between people every single day. It was not significant. It was not a plot development. It was not a sign of anything whatsoever.
She put the pen in her desk drawer and closed it.
It slopes left.
She buried her face in her pillow.
Shut up, Xi Yanli.