CHAPTER 137: RESULTS SPY

CLARK POV:

I swear, the irony’s so thick it’s choking me. I’m the one biting my nails and pacing like a lunatic, while Clare—the person actually waiting on her results—was lounging on the couch with a bowl of cereal like it was a casual Sunday morning.

Meanwhile, my mattress was outside in the backyard airing out, because yes—Clare woke up early just to dump a bucket of freezing water on me while I was asleep, on my bed. Wet pajamas, soaked mattress, broken dignity—the whole humiliating package.

I changed into dry, warmer clothes because it turns out revenge makes you cold. Literally. And just when I thought the humiliation couldn’t get worse, Clare starts filming me dragging the mattress out like a defeated idiot.

"Say cheese, bedwetter!" she cackled from behind her phone.

"I didn’t wet the bed, you lunatic! You assaulted me with an Arctic tsunami!" I yelled back.

But nope—she didn’t stop. Instead, she posted it with some dumb caption like:

"Twin got nervous about results and peed the bed. Pray for him #FinalsFreakout"

Another video to delete. Great.

I swear, she’s the reason I’ll need therapy in college. If—no—when we both get in.

And I don’t even know what stresses me more:

The fact that Clare might not have passed, meaning the Memoville application I sent for her would go to waste.

That she did pass and would kill me for applying on her behalf.

Or that the internet now thinks I’m a nervous bed-wetter.

Take your pick.

Now I’m just watching the clock tick toward 4PM like it’s counting down to a bomb. And even though Clare’s the one whose life could shift completely in the next few hours, I feel like I’m the one sitting on a ticking time bomb.

Please, please let her pass.

Please let us both get in.

And please, let me delete that damn video before she finds a way to make it go viral.

So yeah, exactly at four, the moment of truth was here—and where was Clare? Curled up like a human burrito, dead to the world. In dreamland, probably cuddling her dumb pillow and drooling on it like she doesn’t have a future to worry about. Mom tried to wake her up. Knocked like a polite landlord. Nothing.

Then came the calling—me, mom, dad... hell, probably the neighbor’s dog barking at the noise. Still nothing. Clare was out. Honestly, sometimes I think scientist should study her sleep cycle. We could help people suffering from insomnia with that level of unconsciousness.We called her phone. It rang, echoed in her room, and then silence again. That girl could sleep through the apocalypse.

Mom finally gave me the look—the one that says "I’m about to do something morally questionable but very mom-justified." She goes, "I know it’s bad to check the result without her, but we need to know. Me, as her mother, need to know. So Clark, do your geeky stuff and tell me if my daughter passed or not."

Dad said nothing. Just sipped his tea with the calm of someone who has long accepted chaos as part of his life. That was a yes. Trust me.

And me? Already halfway through typing her credentials before she finished the sentence.

So, I got to work. Her login credentials were already saved—because obviously, I’m me.

Within minutes, boom. Results.

She passed.

Barely.

Five freaking points over the cutoff.

Mom shrieked with joy like she’d just won the lottery. She gasped and hugged me like I wrote the exam myself. Dad even gave a small nod, which for him is basically fireworks. And Clare? Still face-down in her pillow, probably dreaming of punchlines and pizza.

But me?

I sat there, staring at the screen. That knot in my stomach tightening.

She barely passed.

I was just... bummed.

I knew she could do better. I taught her better. I composed ridiculous songs, danced around like an idiot to explain battle strategies, even acted out entire historical events using snacks as props. And she passed by five points?

It didn’t add up. We studied. We crammed. I rewrote half of geography into a rap, and she actually remembered it. I know what she’s capable of.

And then it hit me.

That stupid night, halfway through studying, when she laughed and said, "I’ll just draw a cow for the questions I don’t like. That way I pass but not too well. If I do too well, you know how mom and the teachers will start—’Go to college! Be a lawyer! Change the world!’ I just want to pass and breathe. Everyone will expect me to go to college. I just wanna pass enough, but not be valedictorian, you know?"

I thought she was joking. Just Clare being Clare. Lazy, dramatic, maybe trying to get out of studying early.

But now? Now I wasn’t so sure.

Maybe she actually did it.

Maybe she chose to tank parts of the exam. Self-sabotaged to keep expectations low. I mean... who does that?

Clare. That’s who.

I hoped she was joking. But now? I’m not so sure.

Did she actually sabotage herself just to avoid expectations?

I feel like a fool.

A fool who now has to wake her up and tell her that her dumb cow plan worked... and that her idiot brother still applied to Memoville for her anyway.

God help me when she finds out.

I should be relieved she passed. But all I feel is disappointment. Not in her—okay, maybe a little in her—but mostly in the wasted potential. She’s brilliant. Sharp. Unfiltered, yeah, but freaking sharp. And she drew cows on exam papers.

And me? I applied to Memoville University for her behind her back. Thinking maybe, just maybe, she’d change her mind once she saw the acceptance letter.

Now I’m not even sure if I did the right thing.

Guess we’ll find out tomorrow.

*******

Mom was too excited for her own good. She rang up all our relatives—even people I didn’t even know were relatives—and told the entire neighborhood how both her kids had passed. The news spread faster than wildfire. I was still trying to process how I’d gone from cold, wet, and pranked by Clare to being the golden boy of the house.

Dad, of course, played along like it was his moment too. He stood in the kitchen, all proud, arms folded like some motivational speaker. He was all stoic, nodding along with the phone calls, but you could tell he was proud. He responded to phone calls mom shoved to his face, going something like, "Yeah, you know, gotta work hard. Since both my kids passed, we’ll have to get into college." Like he was the one who stayed up nights forcing Clare to do mock exams while she tried to bribe me with cookies just to be let off early.

Now here’s the thing—they still believed we could actually convince Clare to go to college. Like it was that easy. Like all she needed was a family meeting and some heartfelt speech. It was so stupid and so bound to fail. Especially now that everyone was in on it.

See, Clare’s stubbornness doesn’t respond well to everyone being on the same page. No—if you tell her to do something, she’ll do the exact opposite, even if it’s something she actually wants. Clare’s stubbornness is like a natural law. The more you push her, the harder she digs her heels in. If Mom and Dad had banned it, she probably would’ve thrown herself at it out of pure spite. I told Mom this once. I told her we needed to pull a reverse psychology trick. If we told Clare not to go to college, she’d be the first one to march into Memoville with a protest sign and her application in hand. But did anyone listen? Nope. They chose the good ol’ "This is best for you" parent approach. I could already smell the defeat a mile away.

Anyway, around 6:30 PM, Clare finally woke up, yawning and grumbling like a bear who hibernated with a grudge. Her hair was a mess, and she looked like someone who fought sleep and lost.

"I’m hungry," she said, already heading toward the fridge. Then, like an afterthought, she added, "And since I didn’t get to view my results, nobody’s gonna know anything until the school releases the report forms."

I almost choked on my juice. Dad and I locked eyes, silently asking "Should we tell her?" Then we both turned to Mom, hoping—just hoping—she’d be the mature adult in the room and take the heat.

She had no idea we already checked. Dad and I exchanged glances. We both looked at Mom, expecting a confession. But nope—Mom went full defense mode.

She betrayed us faster than a movie villain switching sides in the final act. With that innocent smile she uses when pretending she didn’t eat all the cookies, she looked Clare dead in the eye and said, "Darling, you passed! Your father was just so worried that you’d be sad because you overslept and didn’t get to check your result, so he asked Clark to check it for you."

She even patted Clare on the head like she was some purring cat. I swear, I saw Clare’s eyes spark with betrayal, and I could feel my soul leave my body.

Now I know where Clare gets her evil side. It’s inherited.