Chapter 42 The Double Standard

Chapter 42 The Double Standard
Sunday was easily the best day of Julie’s week.
She could sleep in until nine, wake up to her mom’s homemade breakfast, and then bike over to her grandparents’ house. There were certain truths you only really understood when you were twenty-seven. At seventeen, her grandparents were still sharp, energetic, and healthy. But over the next ten years, time would press down on them like an accelerator pedal.
Their bodies would age far faster than she could grow up. Before she ever became the successful, capable adult she wanted to be, their hair would turn completely white, their hearing would fade, and their backs would bend.
Since she had been given an extra ten years, she refused to waste a single second of it.
She had infinitely more patience now than a real teenager. She happily pulled up a small stool, helping them prep vegetables for dinner, listening intently as they retold the same childhood stories for the hundredth time, nodding earnestly at every repetitive piece of advice.
After lunch, she biked home, packed her heavy backpack, and dragged her feet to her weekend tutoring center.
By the time she finally returned to campus that evening, she didn’t even stop by her dorm room. She went straight to the classroom, meticulously placing a premium, name-labeled envelope on every single desk.
The early-arriving students were thrilled. Nobody expected her to go all out with the packaging.
"Whoa!!" Tom Stait immediately tipped his glossy photos out of the envelope, his eyes going wide. "This is so good! It looks so natural! I love it!"
If there was one thing Julie never got tired of, it was praise.
She dropped into the chair next to him. "Right?! I think they turned out amazing!"
A few girls clustered around, eagerly swapping photos and comparing shots. The classroom was buzzing with chaotic, happy energy. It was obvious absolutely no one was going to focus on studying tonight.
Even Andrew Cantu was impressed. He hadn't realized Julie actually possessed administrative competence. He didn't hold back his praise, though he couldn't help adding a politician’s critique: "Julie, if you had this kind of skill, why didn't you step up sooner?"
If she had, Class 3’s sports meets would have been legendary for years.
Julie rolled her eyes. "Because this is our last one. I wanted us to go out with a bang."
If they had three more years of this, she would have laid low and played dead. She wasn't born to be a corporate workhorse!
She had one very important envelope left to deliver.
Slipping out of the noisy classroom, she headed straight for the teachers' office. Miss Bell had just returned from dinner and hadn't even taken a sip of water yet when a bright voice rang out from the doorway.
"Miss Bell!"
Bell peeked over a towering stack of workbooks. Seeing her student, she waved her in. "Come in."
Julie stepped into the office, her hands tucked behind her back, a massive, self-satisfied grin already spilling across her face.
"What is it?" Bell asked, raising an eyebrow. "Need to ask for leave?"
Julie’s smile vanished. Excuse me? Had her recent transformation into an academic martyr completely failed to register? Why was everyone still looking at her through the lens of her past life?
"No!" Julie beamed again, leaning forward. "Guess!"
Bell thought for a second. "The photos are developed."
"Bingo." Julie pulled the envelope out from behind her back like she was presenting a royal decree. "Miss Bell, you get VIP treatment. Everyone else only gets one solo shot. You get two."
Whoever holds the purse strings gets the most screen time. Corporate rules.
Bell took the envelope, a genuine smile touching her lips. But just as Julie turned to make her victorious exit, Bell’s voice stopped her dead in her tracks.
"Hold on."
Julie instantly snapped to attention, ready for her barrage of compliments.
Instead, Bell dropped an absolute ice bucket over her head. "Midterms are in two days. How is your prep going?"
"..." Julie’s smile physically melted off her face. "Miss Bell..."
She had made a massive miscalculation. She should have given the envelope to Andrew Cantu to deliver. He would have handled the political fallout, and he probably would have bought her another iced tea for the privilege.
Bell was laughing internally, but her face remained perfectly stern. "Focus on the exams. If you trip and fall, you need to scramble back up immediately. No one is going to carry you over the finish line. You have to figure it out yourself."
If teachers could take the tests for you, we would, Bell thought. Seeing students plateau or backslide gave the faculty more gray hair than anything else.
Julie hung her head, completely deflated. "I know."
Seeing her looking like a kicked puppy, Bell’s tone softened. She opened her desk drawer, pulled out a large, fresh orange, and handed it to her. "Head back to class. You did a great job with the sports meet. I'm noting it down as a contribution to the class."
Julie’s dark eyes instantly lit up again. She took the orange, holding it right up to her nose to inhale the sharp, bright citrus scent as she practically skipped back to the classroom.

By now, most of the class had arrived.
When Warren walked into the room, he immediately noticed the dark blue envelope sitting on his desk. The white crest of an ocean wave curled across the corner, and his name was written across the center in clean, deliberate strokes.
He didn't even put his backpack down. He just stood by his desk, staring at his name for a long, quiet moment.
When he finally sat down, he tipped the envelope over.
He hadn't expected her to pick this specific photo. It was a candid shot. He was looking slightly off-camera, talking to Gary. He couldn't even remember what they had been talking about, but in the photo, he was laughing. A rare, completely relaxed, unguarded smile.
Just as Julie had predicted, evening study hall was an absolute wash.
But what she hadn't predicted was the sheer teenage chaos that followed. Guys and girls were actually... trading their solo photos with each other?!
Hey! Do you little monsters not understand the painstaking effort I put into this?!
She fumed in her seat, practically ready to grab a megaphone and shut down the black-market photo trading ring. But as she scanned the room, she caught sight of a few girls blushing furiously as they carefully tucked a certain boy's photo into their notebooks.
Julie slumped onto her desk, defeated. Fine. I guess this is what youth is. She couldn't fight hormones.
A shadow fell over her desk.
Warren had paused in the aisle right beside her. He tapped his knuckles lightly against her desk.
She turned her head, resting her cheek on her arms to look up at him.
"Not feeling well?" he asked, his voice low enough that it didn't carry over the classroom chatter.
"No, I'm fine." She sat up, the exhaustion fading. A sudden, mischievous thought crossed her mind. "Warren, are you going to trade your photo with anyone?"
It was a stupid question. The only person in this room Warren was close enough to trade photos with was Gary Blacker, and the visual of those two seriously exchanging portraits was enough to make her want to burst out laughing. Still, she envied their bond. They were desk mates now, and in ten years, they’d be billionaires running a tech empire together.
"No," Warren answered immediately. Zero hesitation.
Julie smiled.
She thought the conversation was over, but after Warren took two steps down the aisle, he stopped. He turned back to look at her, his dark eyes locking onto hers.
"What about you?" he asked quietly.
"Huh?" She blinked, then realized what he meant. "Oh. Definitely not."
She wasn't trading her youth away. The only person who would truly appreciate, cherish, and fiercely protect the memory of seventeen-year-old Julie was twenty-seven-year-old Julie.
Warren held her gaze for a second longer. A faint, satisfied smile touched his lips. "Mn."
He turned and walked back to his seat.

The day before midterms.
Julie was violently determined to cram as much information into her brain as humanly possible. If she didn't hit the Rank 25 benchmark she had promised Miss Bell in her Guarantee Letter, she was actually going to die. She sacrificed her sacred afternoon nap, deciding to rely on sheer caffeine to survive the rest of the day.
She dragged herself to the campus convenience store. It was usually empty during the lunch hour, so she was genuinely surprised to bump into Warren and Gary standing in the aisles.
"Did you guys just eat?" she asked.
Gary nodded, opening his mouth to speak, but another voice effortlessly cut him off.
"The teachers needed help with something. It delayed us. We just finished eating. What about you?"
Gary slowly turned his head to stare at his best friend. Since when do you give fully detailed, unprompted daily reports of your schedule?
"I couldn't sleep. Exams are tomorrow," Julie sighed. She remembered the massive misunderstanding they had during her first week back. Her lips curved into a teasing smile. "I'm buying instant coffee. Actual coffee this time."
Gary was completely lost, but Warren let out a low laugh. "Right."
He stepped closer, his broad shoulders easily blocking out the rest of the store. "Pick whatever you want to drink. I'll pay."
Gary still had no idea what was going on, but Julie understood perfectly. Back when they were doing the chalkboard art, he had bought drinks for everyone, and she had joked about wishing he would buy her a drink before exams for good luck. He actually remembered.
"Well, I'm not going to turn that down!" she beamed.
"You can grab snacks too," he added smoothly.
"Just a drink is fine!" She spun around, her steps light as she headed down the aisle to debate between orange juice and Miranda.
The second she was out of earshot, Gary threw his arm around Warren's neck, aggressively pulling him down. "Are you two speaking some kind of secret code? Why didn't I understand a single word of that exchange?"
Warren shot him a cold, sideways glance. "Do you need to understand it?"
Gary scoffed. "You bastard. Fine. I want a drink too. You're paying."
"Drink poison," Warren replied instantly.
Gary wasn't even offended. Warren's baseline hostility was basically his love language. But the absolute double standard was staggering. "You are completely two-faced, you know that? To me, you're a tyrant. But to her—"
Gary lifted his hand, pointing a finger directly at Julie down the aisle.
He didn't even get his arm fully extended before Warren’s hand shot out. His grip clamped down like a vice over Gary's wrist, violently forcing his arm down.
"Don't point at her," Warren ordered.
"Fine!" Gary surrendered, rubbing his wrist. "I'm just saying, the way you treat me versus the way you treat her is chilling. It breaks a father's heart to see his son act like this."
Whether they were being too loud, or Julie just happened to look over, she suddenly turned her head. Her dark eyes drifted away from the rows of brightly colored bottles, landing right on the two boys.
Warren’s relaxed, casual posture vanished in a microsecond.
He dropped his hand from Gary’s arm, his face snapping into a mask of pure, academic intensity. He looked at Gary and said, loudly and clearly, "About the final question on yesterday's advanced physics exam? I'll write out the formula steps for you later."
Gary stared at him. "...?"
Who the hell asked you about physics?!?
Down the aisle, Julie heard the word "physics" and her brain practically short-circuited.
...?
Are you kidding me? Outside the classroom?! What kind of absolute psychopaths discuss advanced physics in a convenience store?!
Disgusted by their terrifying academic drive, she immediately looked away, returning her focus to the deeply important decision between orange soda and milk.
Seeing her attention safely diverted, Gary turned back to Warren, completely merciless. "You are a psycho. Does she know you're this much of a psycho?"
Warren didn't say a word. He just drove his elbow hard into Gary’s ribs, dropping his voice into a dangerous, lethal whisper.
"If she hears you, you are a dead man."