Hobby

Hesta frowned and ignored her.

Lin Jiao turned sideways. "How did your little speech go this afternoon? Smoothly?"

"...Xiaoshu told you?"

"I happened to look it over while she was helping you revise it," Lin Jiao said softly. Then she suddenly leaned half a step closer. "That part about Red Velvet was from personal experience, wasn't it?"

Hesta gave a quiet acknowledgment.

"Pretty good. I boarded at school when I was a teenager too... though I didn't get any good roommates." Lin Jiao stretched her shoulders and arms. "Did Teacher Chen give you any feedback this afternoon?"

"There was no speech," Hesta said quietly. "Zuo Wentao came by to sit in on the class this afternoon. I don't know what he said to Teacher Chen, but Teacher Chen didn't ask me to go onstage afterward... Yesterday, a young teacher from the supervisory group came to me. She wanted to contact Zuo Wentao so we could settle privately, but I waited around for two hours, and Zuo Wentao never showed up."

Lin Jiao laughed. "Not surprising."

"Yeah, I know."

"You know?"

"This is what happens when you try to handle these things through the usual channels," Hesta said in a low voice. "He's been in this system for a long time and knows the rules from every angle... Otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to push me around."

"You're taking it rather well." Lin Jiao studied Hesta's expression. "I thought you'd get hung up on it."

"What counts as getting hung up on it?"

"Thinking about it day and night, getting angrier the more you think, crying to heaven about the injustice...?" Lin Jiao considered it. "If you couldn't find a solution, wouldn't you feel stifled?"

"Who said I couldn't find a solution?"

"And your solution is...?"

Hesta looked ahead. "I