Page 11 of Didn't See That Coming

The teacher waves at us without bothering to return the greeting. “You can sit.”

Everyone sits back down. Okay, that was interesting.

As the teacher takes stuff out of his bag, I use the chance to check out my classmates. Subtly, of course.

The differences from the kids at Mingyang are small, but they’re there. At Mingyang, we were allowed to wear whatever shoes, socks, and hairbands we wanted. But here at Xingfa, there’s a very strict dress code in addition to the sailor uniform: white socks (no visible brand names or logos), black shoes (again, no visible brand names or logos), and hairbands only in navy blue or black. All female students with hair past their shoulders have to tie it back. No “outlandish hairstyles” allowed. All male students have to maintain their hair above their ears. No dyeing of hair, no nail polish, and absolutely no makeup allowed. Mingyang has the same rule about makeup, but I know just about every girl wears something. Most of us wore tinted lip balms, at the very least. I usually darken my eyebrows too, because I have the unfortunate kind that only go half the width of my eyes before thinning out. Without eyebrow pencils, my brows would look like sad little thumbprints.

But here I don’t see any tinted lips or mascara-plumped lashes. Every face is naked. Unless these girls have fully mastered the art of natural makeup? But the teacher starts talking, so I’m forced to stop staring at my classmates like Joe Goldberg fromYou.

“Right,” the teacher says. “I hope you all had a wonderful holiday. Some of you may know me already. For those who don’t, my name is Mr.Francis Tan. I’m your Form teacher, and I’ll also be teaching you English Literature.” He pauses to give us all a small, businessy smile. I guess “Form teacher”here is what we know at Mingyang as our Homeroom teacher. I regard Mr.Tan more carefully.

As though reading my mind, Jonas turns to me and whispers, “Don’t worry, Mr.Tan’s chill. I had him for English Lit last year.”

“Jonas, we’ve been over this.” Mr.Tan sighs. “No talking in class unless I give you permission.”

Jonas gives him a sheepish grin. “Aye, Shifu.”

A handful of students laugh at Jonas’s calling Mr.Tan the Mandarin word for “master,” and Mr.Tan shakes his head with an affectionate smile. Then he seems to notice me for the first time. “Oh yes. And we have a new student joining us this year.” He pauses, scrolling through his tablet. “Kristabella Siregar?”

“Yes,” I say quickly. “Just Kiki will do.”

“We don’t do nicknames here, Kristabella.”

“Wow, okay,” I mutter, and immediately regret it. I hadn’t meant for it to come out so full of attitude. “I mean, sure, that’s fine.”

One corner of Mr.Tan’s mouth quirks up, though I’m not sure that I would call what he’s doing smiling. “I’m glad you think that’s fine, because those are the rules. Well, I hope you settle in here just fine. Anything you need, you can come to me.” He swipes down on his tablet and turns on a screen projector. “Right! We’re diving right in.” He glances over his shoulder at me. “I’m assuming you’ve read our guidebook?”

Negative. Very much so. Who reads those things anyway? Xingfa’s welcome booklet included a stupidly heavy guidebook, which I tossed aside and forgot about completely untilthis very moment. But I hesitate for only a split second before nodding with enthusiasm. “Yep, totally. Riveting.”

Next to me, Liam stifles a snort. I can’t tell if it’s a friendly one or a derisive one.

“Good,” Mr.Tan says. “So you know that Xingfa isn’t just an academically oriented school; we take pride in our students learning to think outside the box. Forty percent of Year Elevens’ final grade will come from projects instead of exams. Last term, we were assigned Science as our project topic, which most of you aced.”

A few students hoot. One of them shouts out, “Yeah, Jonas!” Jonas, in turn, gives a smug smirk. I think of the bulletin boards outside the classrooms and how Jonas dominates the one outside ours.

“This term, I’ve advocated really hard for Purity to be assigned an interesting topic. No Geography or, god forbid, History.”

There are a few snickers.

“I hope you didn’t get us assigned to Science again, Mr. Tan,” Jonas calls out.

A corner of Mr.Tan’s mouth quirks up, and he taps on his computer screen. The projector screen lights and brings up a vibrant collage of—oh my god—games. There are lots that I recognize:Borderlands, Assassin’s Creed, Stardew Valley, Fortnite,even lesser-known ones likeBugsnaxandSlime Rancher.

“Video games!” Mr.Tan says with an exaggerated flourish, and everyone breaks into applause.

“That’s awesome!” someone shouts out.

“Great job, Mr.Tan!”

I clap along with them, grinning hard. A project about games, heck yeah! That’s my jam. Maybe Xingfa isn’t going to be as dreary as I feared.

“I’ve assigned you to groups based on your seating chart.”

I meet Liam’s eyes and flush, breaking eye contact immediately. Am I glad to be in the same group as someone who’s obviously too beautiful to be human? I mean, I’m not NOT glad. But damn, it’s going to make focusing that much harder.

The projector goes to a different slide and shows our assigned groups. I’m in Group B: Kristabella Siregar, Liam Ng, Jonas Jayden Arifin, Peishan Wongso. The four of us look at each other, and Jonas grins.

“We’re going to kill this,” he says.

---