10 Entry #10: Next lead

JASMINE'S POV

“Are you guys hungry?” our handsome Math teacher asked.

“Yes, Sir! It's lunchtime!” the rowdy boys at the back answered.

"I don't want the section Fortitude to starve," he sweetly said.

Hearing that, I started putting my things inside my bag, ready to take my leave once the teacher got out.

"Therefore, I’ll feed you with another set of problems," he supplicated.

I literally stopped in the middle of putting my things in my bag. I stared at our teacher in disbelief.

How brutal…

We all loudly sighed in frustration and complained, but Sir Castro only chuckled at our reactions.

"You're section Fortitude, right?" Sir threw a random question.

"Yes, Sir!" Someone from the class answered.

"Do you know what Fortitude means?"

Well, not me. I had no idea what it meant.

When Nickle raised his hand, my eyebrow raised too. Well, there was the intelligent guy right there. I wished he was a little less cranky than he actually was.

"Yes, Nickle?" Sir Castro urged him to speak up.

"It means courage," Nick said.

Sir Castro smiled widely, which indicated that Nick said the right thing.

"That's right. Courage to stand up for what you believe, and courage to endure adversity."

So? What exactly was he trying to say?

"So these math problems? They're nothing. You're Fortitude. You can do this."

When the whole class finally understood what he was trying to say, we complained in unison.

“You still have 10 minutes before the bell. If you can't finish within that time, it’s okay. Your class president can collect your papers and submit them to me before the lunch break is over. Okay?”

When the girls gladly agreed, I rolled my eyes in frustration. If it wasn't Sir Castro, they would complain instead of agreeing.

When the teacher left the classroom, I had an intense staring competition with the dizzying geometry problems on the board. I shamefully lost the battle.

I picked up my activity notebook in Math, stood up, and snuck near Nick's table. I took a peek at his answers but failed when he turned his head.

I immediately pretended I wasn't trying to cheat, and I probably looked stupid, but who cared?

He constricted his eyes at me accusingly.

"Are you done answering?" he asked.

"Uh? Uhmm… yeah!" I lied.

"Let me see your answers." He reached out his palm to ask for my notebook.

I hid my notebook behind my back. I couldn't let him see my blank notebook.

He shook his head in disbelief. "Let me finish this. I'll teach you after."

My eyes gleamed with happiness. "Thank you, tutor!" I sincerely said.

He placed his index finger on his lips to shush me. "If others find out, they will ask me to tutor them too. I don’t welcome such hassle."

I chuckled.

Nick was stingy when it came to giving answers or assignments. He was the type who was rigid about his principle of not cheating and not letting others cheat.

Sometimes he was kind enough to tutor me, mainly because I would force him to.

"You’re so choosy when helping," I teased. "Very exclusive and not universal."

"Feeding your classmate with answers won't help them," he answered without looking at me. He still kept his focus on answering the last math problem. "They have to learn it themselves. It's not about being stingy with my answers. Sure, if you're being spoon-fed, you'll get a high grade. But that's only a short-term effect. Think about the long term. "

I guessed he got that rigid principle because he could. I mean, students like him who were excellent in school, they could afford to not cheat.

Meanwhile, students like me, who sucked at studying, sometimes live off of others' brains.

"Then why don’t you tutor them instead?" I asked.

He put down his pen and looked up at me.

"Jas, our classmates are all well-off. They could afford a private tutor if they really wanted to learn."

"Not everyone, though," I said. "There are others who aren't well off."

Like me…

"Like Brita and Josie."

"Well," he shrugged, "they're smart enough to earn a scholarship for themselves."

Then I came into thinking.

"So because I'm poor and because I'm not smart, is that why you agreed to tutor me sometimes? Is that it?" I exclaimed in disbelief.

He snatched my notebook from my hand and said, "Stop talking nonsense. Sit down."

Woah! I couldn't believe he just implicitly said I was poor and dumb.

I dragged my chair near him and sat down. While I waited for him to finish solving, my mind wandered around to Angel's case.

I muttered, "What if Simon lied?"

"Did you really think that nerd could kill a person?"

I frowned. "How could you be so sure of that? It's just your feeling."

He closed his activity notebook and stared at me.

"Of all the things in this world, there's only one thing I am always sure about."

"And that is?"

He stared at me intently, making me feel awkward.

Until he said, "My feelings."

I scowled. How was I going to argue with that?

"If he is S.T., he shouldn't have been in school that day. He should've been absent like Angel."

Right… Why didn't I think of that?

I pursed my lips in frustration. "Who on earth is S.T.?"

I always knew solving a case was difficult, but I didn't know it was this confusing. There was literally no direction to take.

I was wavering. Was there even any case to solve in the first place? Was I making a fuss out of nothing?

I sighed loudly, took the diary from my bag, and read an entry that might lead us to something. This entry bothered me for days.

"September 30, 20XX," I read aloud, "S.T. took me to the Science Lab, and Patricia almost caught us. It would've been a disaster."

Nick stared at me blankly.

"Didn't you say Patricia was Angel's best friend?"

He nodded his head slightly.

"Okay! She's our next lead!" I declared thoughtlessly.

I was troubled to see Nick look disconcerted.

Then he said, "But… what was she and S.T. doing in the Science Lab? And why would it be a disaster if Patricia saw them?"

It made me think too. Until I saw his face, frowning and disheartened.

'Don't tell me…'

I crossed my arms and gasped exaggeratedly. "Are you seriously jealous right now?"

He answered me with another frown.