Chapter 62 - 62: I Believe You Have The Ability To Do It

The exam started in the afternoon. As Sophia was completing her paper, she calculated how many points she would have to drop in order to avoid being put in the advanced class. For French, a composition usually wouldn't get a full score and so she could deduct ten points, plus she could get some subjunctives wrong and lose a few marks there. She wanted to get a max of 110 points.

Then she considered how much points she should get in other subjects. She didn't want to get a low grade, and she just didn't want to be in the advanced class.

Math… how about one hundred and thirty points? She wrote it down.

Ms. Acheson was invigilating. Walking past Sophia, she saw the number she wrote on the paper and immediately understood what she meant.

"You must be calculating how many points you need in all your subjects to enter the advanced class, right?" Ms. Acheson smiled, "Don't be nervous. Just do as you usually do. I think you have a chance of getting into the advanced class. You can actually set your math score up a bit. I believe you have the ability to do it."

Sophia could only smile. She couldn't tell Ms. Acheson the real reason she was making these calculations.

After school, Kevin asked Sophia when he passed her, "Sister, how do you think you did? Do you think you can get into the advanced class?"

"Definitely not… Come on now, Kevin. But I think you can do it!"

"Yeah, maybe."

Before Friday's exam, Melissa excitedly showed around a brochure, "Boss, I found a tour group to the Bridge Town over the same dates as our holiday! Their itinerary is well planned: it's just travel, no shopping and if we buy in a group we get a good discount."

Her family was rich, and she didn't care much about a discount, but she knew that her boss would be glad to hear that word.

Sure enough, Sophia's eyes lit up when she heard the word "discount." She had a look at the brochure and found that the itinerary planned by the tour group was pretty good. They were free to travel most of the time. And the tour group would have prepared the food and accommodation in advance. They could also eat somewhere else. It all looked good.

That said, however, the group purchase only applied to the purchase of a group of seven people or more. There were four of them, plus Kevin. They needed two more to qualify.

She had told Kate about the trip and asked her if she wanted to come too. However, Kate didn't like traveling and had asked Sophia to go with her classmates. Sophia did not know whether she really didn't like traveling, or was simply afraid of spending money. After a lot of persuasions, Kate still wouldn't agree, so she had had to give up.

"That's all right. I'll ask if anyone would like to join us." Melissa said.

As soon as she finished speaking, Louie Delgado, who sat next to Sophia, raised his hand, "I want to come traveling with you. Take me with you!"

Melissa's eyes lit up, "Really? You want to come?!"

She was very excited that such a hottie would be joining their group.

With Louie, they were now only one person short, and by the end of the day, Carol had also got Dave signed up.

When Carol told Sophia the news, she looked doubtful, "Did you threaten him?"

"No, absolutely not! I'm not that kind of person!"

And so they had their seven people.

Melissa and Sophia went to the travel agency to pay. The travel agency said they would need to meet at seven o'clock tomorrow morning in the same place.

Bridge Town was not very far away, so they would take a bus to get there.

The whole trip would take two days and one night. They would spend one night in a local hostel. Back home, Sophia packed some clothes and groceries and put them into her backpack.

***

The next morning, Sophia took the bus to the travel agency. As soon as she got to the door, she saw a coach parked outside and several early birds waiting outside.

Sophia walked up. None of her friends had arrived yet. The weather was already pretty hot. Afraid that it would be stuffy inside the coach, she didn't want to get on just yet and stood to wait outside.

The guide walked up and smiled, "Hello, everyone. I will be your tour guide. You can call me Katherine. We will be leaving in half an hour. Please don't stray too far while you wait to board."

As she was talking, a bus came to a halt at a stop nearby. Sophia watched as the passengers spewed out; she was sure her friends must be arriving soon.

And sure enough, she saw Dave step off the bus, and another student followed behind him.

Sophia knew him. It was Barry, the same Barry, who always wanted to fight with her.

"Hi, Green." Barry greeted Sophia with a smile from a while off.

"Hi." Sophia nodded in response. She wasn't sure why Barry was here. Was he here to fight her again?

Barry walked over with Dave. Dave explained, "Yesterday, I told my cousin that I was traveling. He was interested and signed up for the tour… The group hadn't been full up."

Before long, everyone else arrived. Kevin and Louie came by bus. Carol and Mariah were brought in by their families. Melissa had been driven there by the driver of her family.

"The time has come. Let's get on the couch!" Katherine said.

The tourists wandered onto the couch one by one. There were two and three-person seats on the bus. Sophia took a seat for two at random.

Kevin immediately ran over, intending to sit next to Sophia. But at the same time, Louie squeezed over and was also aiming for the seat next to Sophia.

The two boys looked at each other with hostility in their eyes.

Sophia was in a dilemma. These two boys just couldn't get along, and they always acted like enemies.

She pointed to the empty seats behind her, "You two… sit there!"

"No!"