Vivienne and Percival were in the office discussing when to start PE classes.
Class Eighteen was smashing through the coursework much quicker than Vivienne had estimated. In just a week, they'd already started on sophomore year material.
Charlotte's learning progress was faster. Because of her poor foundation, Vivienne had one-on-one individual tutoring. And now she was tackling junior year material.
Still, Vivienne decided to keep her with the rest of the class in sophomore year material, saving herself the extra tutoring.
Class Eighteen had a good student base. They loved goofing off, but when push came to shove, they buckled down and worked even harder than the honors classes.
Vivienne decided to add Physical education lessons to the daily curriculum, but the students volunteered not to take Physical education lessons. There reasons were the same. They felt they'd missed too much school in the past, and with only three months until entrance exams, they wanted to pour everything they had into getting into college.
They didn't have high hopes of getting into a top-tier university, just a regular one would do.
They figured PE would eat into their study time, so they unanimously requested to skip it. Vivienne, however, shot them down.
She argued that while academics were important, so was physical health. You needed a healthy body to sit through entrance exams. If you faint on the day of the exam, all that hard work goes down the drain.
Seeing her stand firm, the students backed off.
"We'll have Physical education class first period Wednesday and last period Friday. We'll stick with that for now and I'll adjust later," Vivienne told Percival after setting the schedule.
Percival nodded in agreement.
Vivienne nodded back then looked at his legs and asked, "Are you sure you don't need the wheelchair anymore?"
When Percival first arrived, he'd planned on teaching as a disabled person. But now he'd publicly announced his legs were healed and he didn't need the wheelchair anymore.
Vivienne wasn't sure who exactly Percival was, but anyone who could keep up a disability charade for so long must have some serious backing. Whether his decision to reveal his healed legs was a good or bad move was unclear.
Percival had a sister, Isolde, who'd been poisoned because of him. Although the poison was neutralized, it was uncertain if Percival's enemies would target Isolde again.
Vivienne was fond of the little girl and sincerely hoped nothing would happen to Isolde.
Seeing her concern, Percival assured her softly, "Don't worry, I've got everything under control."
Vivienne nodded, not pressing further.
Percival paused, then said quietly, "Vivienne, my legs shouldn't have 'healed' this soon."
Vivienne waited for him to continue.
"The Hawthorn family is in chaos, so is the Ellington family. If my legs didn't get better, the Ellington name might have been lost," Percival said in a calm tone, but Vivienne saw a glint of coldness in his eyes.
"I see."
After a pause, Vivienne looked up and said seriously, "Whatever you do, don't involve my family. Mr. Ellington, I hope you understand that our engagement isn't based on feelings, and we won't be marrying in the future."
Percival's lips tightened, and after a moment he spoke in a hoarse voice, "I understand."
He'd known from the start that Vivienne didn't genuinely agree to their engagement.
She wanted something from him.
And he wanted something from her.
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