Part 3The Diary of a Blue Gum

Sterling had said similar things to me.

My grades were lopsided. I excelled only in English and Creative Writing, having won several national writing competitions.

But my other subjects were barely passable, and my Math was a complete disaster.

If I was a natural underachiever, then Sterling was a natural genius.

His grades were incredibly stable, always ranking in the top ten of our grade.

The gap between us was like a chasm.

But I was delusional. I studied day and night, wanting to apply to Stanford with Sterling.

Sterling saw through my little ambition and laughed at me.

"Why torture yourself?"

"With your grades, forget about Stanford; you'll struggle to get into a mediocre state school."

My heart stung, and my eyes couldn't help but redden.

He then came to comfort me.

"Okay, okay, my bad. How about I tutor you to make up for it?"

During that time, for the sake of tutoring, we were inseparable.

I had attended cram schools and hired tutors, but Sterling was better than all of them.

His explanations were clear, and he knew my weak points. Under his tutoring, my math scores actually improved significantly.

When I got my report card, I excitedly hugged him and cried loudly.

His eyes held a smile.

But his gaze was wandering, landing somewhere in the distance.

At that time, immersed in the joy of progress, I was oblivious.

Only now did I realize.

The direction he was looking at back then was clearly where Aria sat.

Proactively helping me with tutoring.

The intimate interactions.

It was all an act.

Sterling indeed never confessed to me.

I thought we had a tacit understanding of mutual affection, just waiting for someone to break the silence.

But in Sterling's eyes, I was just a tool to make Aria jealous.