Chapter 4

For the next month, I went to class during the day and studied at home every night.

Seeing me push myself this hard, Mr. and Mrs. Morton cooked me something delicious in a new style every day.

Rebecca, coasting on the knowledge still stored in this brain, slept through class and vanished the moment the bell rang.

The top student who used to nail herself to her desk every single day now, when she went wild, wouldn't even do her homework.

The top student's parents got called in for the first time, and when my mom came out, her face was so dark it was unbearable to look at.

The next day, Rebecca showed up at school with heavy dark circles under her eyes.

I knew she must have been made to copy her homework a hundred times, up all night.

After I started junior high, I never got this kind of punishment again.

This was the first time I'd ever seen myself like this, as an outsider.

There was no gloating, only the sorrow of one sufferer pitying another.

And my hard work finally started to show.

Before, I could only guess a third of the questions right on a paper at most; now, I could already get half of them right.

The other students all talked about it behind their backs.

"Is Rebecca really working this hard to compete with Margaret Cox?"

"What are you thinking? At her level, even a top student who didn't study for a whole year would still leave her ten streets behind."

"So what? Gaining one point still counts as improvement, but she's not getting out of dead last."

Someone turned the topic straight to Rebecca.

"What do you think, top student?"

Rebecca seemed pretty confident in her own pig brain and didn't take me seriously at all.

Still, after being punished, she'd toned down her talk quite a bit.

"Let's stick to encouragement, everyone. Her being willing to study is the biggest progress there is."

"But studying isn't about rote memorization. Don't wear yourself out trying to catch up to me."

The classroom broke into laughter.

"Catch up to you? How? You two are worlds apart, one in the sky, one on the ground, a hundred thousand miles apart. Not even a rocket could catch you."

"Top student, you're too modest. If she could really catch up to you, the sun would rise in the west."

Rebecca smiled smugly. "Don't be so hard on Rebecca either. How about this: if Rebecca closes the gap between her ranking and mine by ten places this time, I'll treat the whole class to the Ocean King 999 seafood buffet. How's that?"

Everyone jeered.

"Top student, you're not being sincere about treating us. She's a hundred points behind even the second-to-last kid. Moving up one place is a struggle, let alone ten. She'd have to cheat!"

"Exactly, that's not fair. If we're betting, everyone bets. If Rebecca doesn't move up ten places, then the Ocean King 999 seafood buffet is on her!"

Someone jumped in right away.

"Agreed!"

"Agreed, plus one."

"Rebecca, don't chicken out. You brave enough to bet?"

All eyes turned to me. Rebecca watched me at her leisure, the mockery at the corner of her mouth completely undisguised.

I nodded. "Fine, but I want to add a condition."

Rebecca raised an eyebrow. "What condition?"

I looked at her and said slowly, "If you don't take first place in the whole school, you apologize to me in public and admit you're a pig brain."

Her face changed, and she glared at me coldly.

"Fine, I agree. But if I take first place in the whole school, you have to kneel down and kowtow to me and bark like a dog in public."

The classroom broke into an uproar.

"This is so exciting. I can't wait to watch someone bark like a dog."

"The top student takes first in the whole school like it's nothing. Rebecca's just asking for it."

"Thanks to Rebecca's pig brain, now we've got a good show to watch."

I didn't say a word. I just quietly worked through practice problems.

Soon it was the day of the monthly exam. When I walked into the exam room, Rebecca was still chatting and laughing with people at the door. When she saw me, she deliberately raised her voice.

"Certain people had better not bomb too badly. Raising your score by more than two hundred points isn't something you can pull off just by grinding a few practice sheets."

"Or just skip the exam. For old times' sake as classmates, kowtow and bark like a dog right now, and I'll cover your seafood buffet."

The students howled with laughter.

I ignored them and walked straight to my seat.

The first exam was the language section, and I filled in as much as I could, turning my paper in last.

The second exam was English, and I checked it over and over to make sure every blank was filled.

When I handed it in, the proctor glanced at me.

The next day was the math exam. I filled five sheets of scratch paper and turned mine in with a minute to spare.

Rebecca, on the other hand, was the first to hand in her paper every single time.

Even the proctors couldn't help praising me. "Margaret Cox is as steady as ever."

In the days waiting for the results, my classmates had already picked the spot where I'd kneel and apologize—right in front of the athletic field's platform.

They'd even made a banner that read, "Rebecca Barks Like a Dog, Live."

They'd even started reserving spots at the seafood buffet, ready to bleed me dry.

On the day the results were announced, the grade sheet was posted to the class group.

Nobody looked at their own grades; the whole class went straight to check my ranking.

"Scroll down further, she's definitely dead last."

"Holy crap, she's not dead last?"

"Not second-to-last or third-to-last either, she did this well?"

"Relax, she moved up five places tops. This seafood buffet is on her for sure."

Even down to tenth from the bottom, my name still wasn't there, and the class couldn't sit still anymore.

"What's going on? Her grade didn't get thrown out, did it?"

"Here, I see it, thirty-seventh place..."

The classroom went silent in an instant.

A full five seconds passed before someone cried out.

"Thirty-seventh place? She jumped a whole fifteen spots?"

Rebecca's face had already gone pale.

"Looks like she won't be treating us to the seafood buffet. But what about barking like a dog? The top student's got to be number one in the whole school."

Just then, someone shouted, "The school rankings are out!"