Nothing To Hide 2

Author's note

"The TikTok clip mentioned in Chapter 1 is real. It features a French literature teacher interviewed on RTL radio, discussing student cheating. You can find it by searching 'RTL triche' on TikTok."

Chapter 1

Anna hadn't planned to work that day.

She was scrolling TikTok, not searching, just evading, when the video caught her. A French journalist's voice, clipped and careful, played over subtitles.

"This literature teacher, who's been teaching for thirty years, says it's getting worse. That the only real way to stop students from cheating during exams... would be to make them take the test naked."

Anna turned the sound on.

There was no image of the teacher, only her voice, low, calm, matter-of-fact. She described how, during mock exams, they'd asked students to place their phones in a box before the test. Afterward, they found the box filled with decoys, old flip phones, cracked screens. The real ones, the students had kept.

They had cheated anyway. Quietly. Systematically.

The journalist continued: 560 candidates had been caught cheating the previous year. Fourteen percent more than the year before. Over half had used some kind of screen.

The clip ended there, as if the number spoke for itself.

Anna watched it again. Not for shock. For tone. That voice, not angry, not dramatic, just tired. Like a system giving out one sigh at a time.

She copied the link. Sent it to her editor with one word:

"France."

His reply came two hours later.

"You want it?"

She hesitated. It wasn't a real story yet. But there was something under it.

"There's a national exam in two days. Sorbonne. I could be there."

He didn't ask for a pitch.

"Go. Take David."

They landed Thursday, late morning. The sky over Paris was a clean gray, soft-edged. From the taxi, the city looked wide open, trees full and green, sidewalks damp but clean, bikes weaving easily through traffic. Flowerbeds overflowed on the medians. Along the Seine, people were walking, slowly, like they had time.

Anna leaned back, watching the city roll past. She hadn't been here in years. It felt lighter now. More porous. Less theatrical than she'd remembered, and somehow more sincere.

Their hotel was tucked into a quiet street in the Latin Quarter, a five-minute walk from the Sorbonne. The building was narrow, six stories, vines curling over the iron balconies. Her room was on the third floor, small, high-ceilinged, a desk facing a tall window with a view of the street below and, just beyond the rooftops, the rounded dome of the amphitheater where the exam would take place.

David's room was across the hall. They didn't make plans. She sent him a message to meet for coffee.

They walked to a corner café without talking much. It was cool in the shade, warm in the sun. The streets felt easy, lived-in. Patches of wildflowers pushed through the edges of the sidewalks. A delivery bike passed, quiet as a breeze.

She mentioned the video again. David hadn't seen it.

"We'll find the story on the ground," he said. It wasn't dismissive. Just how he worked.

Later that afternoon, they picked up their credentials at the Ministry of Education, a clean building tucked behind a quiet courtyard. Inside: polished tile, brass fixtures, large windows that let in too much light for a government office.

The woman at the press desk wore a navy suit and soft grey sneakers. She greeted them by name, efficient and polite.

"You've been approved for access," she said. "You may speak with candidates before and after the exam. Interviews must be conducted outside the amphitheater. A press conference will be held tomorrow at 2 p.m. at the Sorbonne."

Anna nodded.

The woman hesitated, then reached for a folder.

"One update. Tomorrow's session will include accredited observers inside the hall. No filming. No recording. But presence is allowed, for select outlets."

David leaned forward slightly.

"Observers?"

"Yes. To ensure transparency."

"And we're eligible?"

"You are. But there is a condition."

She passed them a printed document. No bold fonts. No red stamps. Just calm language, carefully structured.

"All observers must follow the same security protocol as examinees. No clothing. No personal objects. Full parity."

Anna read the page. It didn't use the word naked. It said device-neutral. Unencumbered. Uniform procedure.

David glanced at her. Then at the paper.

"You can decline," the woman added. "But you won't be permitted inside the amphitheater."

Anna folded the paper once, then again.

"We'll do it," she said.

David nodded beside her.

"Arrival is at 7:30 sharp. Courtyard entrance. Bring nothing."

Outside, the sky had cleared. Students biked past in singles and pairs, balanced and unhurried. The city breathed around them, vines climbing lamp posts, bees in the flowerbeds along the median, café tables spilling into the street without fuss.

They stopped at a café near Rue des Écoles. Ordered sandwiches. Sparkling water. Said nothing for a while.

Finally Anna asked:

"You sure?"

David didn't hesitate.

"We go in together."

At 2 p.m., the Sorbonne hosted the official press briefing in one of the old vaulted lecture halls, all stone arches, long echoes, and that faint chalk-dust scent that seemed to live permanently in French institutions.

About thirty journalists were present. Some local, some foreign, a few students with campus press badges. A row of folding chairs faced a modest table where a Ministry spokesperson sat with a stack of notes and a plastic water bottle already half-empty.

She was the same woman who'd briefed them at the Ministry. Composed. Dry-toned. Precise.

"This year's examination," she began, "is being conducted under a full-spectrum parity protocol, developed in collaboration with institutional partners and cognitive behavior specialists, in response to a documented rise in technological fraud."

She paused just long enough for pens to catch up.

"The goal is not surveillance," she continued, "but fairness. A rebalancing of attention. A return to the exam as a moment of thought, not competition."

She went on like that, fifteen minutes of polished phrasing. Nothing inflammatory, nothing quotable. A kind of bureaucratic poetry.

When the floor opened, a journalist from Le Monde asked if the protocol had been challenged legally.

"The framework was reviewed and cleared by the national ethics board," the woman replied. "Participation remains optional."

A German correspondent asked whether any international observers had been invited.

"Not this year," she said, "but the process has been documented for comparative study."

Anna raised her hand.

"Have any candidates withdrawn?"

The spokesperson flipped a page.

"Four, out of four hundred and twenty-seven;" she said. "As of this morning."

She paused, then added:

"They'll be taking the exam in an alternative location under standard conditions."

Anna raised her hand again.

"Has the protocol made accommodations for candidates who may be menstruating?"

The spokesperson nodded without pause.

"Yes. On the day of the exam, female candidates are discreetly offered a standardized protection kit and optional undergarment, provided directly during the intake process. Nothing is assumed or required, it's entirely voluntary, and medically approved."

She said it like it had been discussed a hundred times. Which it probably had.

That seemed to settle the room. A few more questions followed, mostly procedural, soft. One about how long the candidates would remain under the protocol. One about media access. The spokesperson nodded, answered, shifted forward to signal an ending.

Twenty minutes after it started, the briefing dissolved. Reporters stood. Chairs scraped. No one lingered.

Outside, the late afternoon light was warm and even. The façade of the Sorbonne glowed pale gold, and the square was quiet but not still, café tables filling, bikes passing, voices rising and folding back into the city.

Anna and David didn't speak as they walked back to the hotel.

They'd agreed. Tomorrow, they'd be inside.

Chapter 2

They left the hotel just after seven. The air was cool, the sun still low enough to cast long shadows across the street. A few cafés were just opening, chairs being pulled out, umbrellas raised by half-asleep waiters. The bike lanes were already busy, students in backpacks, a man in a suit, a delivery rider with a tower of bread strapped to his back.

They walked the short distance to the Sorbonne in silence.

The square in front of the university was already full. A long queue of students stretched out from the entrance, quiet, dense, waiting. Most were in sweats or gym clothes, no bags, no watches. Some held small plastic folders, ID, nothing else. The mood was focused. Not tense exactly, but closed in.

Anna and David set up just off the main path. David unfolded the camera rig without speaking. It was second nature now, him watching the frame, her watching the people.

She approached a group of students who looked relaxed enough to talk. Two girls, one boy, all under twenty, probably lycée Henri-IV or Louis-le-Grand. They agreed to speak on camera, a little shy but curious.

"How do you feel about the new protocol?" Anna asked.

The boy shrugged, then smiled.

"It's... strange. But I understand. No one wants to fail because someone else cheated."

"You're okay with the nudity?"

One of the girls laughed.

"Not really. But we're all doing it. That makes it less weird."

Their English was precise, fluent, almost unnervingly polished.

"Where did you learn?" Anna asked.

"Online," said the other girl. "YouTube. American podcasts. School helps, but... not much."

Anna glanced at David behind the lens. He was focused, steady. They moved on.

Another student, tall, nervous, wearing a threadbare Sorbonne hoodie, told them he hadn't slept. That he hadn't told his parents about the nudity clause.

"My mother would lose her mind," he said, laughing. "But if I get into Normale Sup, she'll forgive me."

By 7:30, they were ushered into the courtyard by a staff member holding a clipboard. The press point was a corner tent with a folding table, a large urn of coffee, and two Ministry representatives who looked like they hadn't slept either.

"You'll be entering in ten minutes," one said. "Please follow us to the preparation room."

The room was on the ground floor, facing the inner courtyard. A high-ceilinged former seminar room with coat hooks along the walls and folding chairs in a line. They were handed beige paper wristbands and a pair of sandals each, white, soft-soled, institutional.

"You'll leave everything here," the woman said. "Step through the partition when ready."

Anna turned toward David just as he was glancing at her.

He didn't look away fast enough. And she didn't either.

Neither of them smiled. It wasn't flirtation. It wasn't anything as clear as that. Just, awareness. The strange, quiet reality of being two bodies about to become two naked observers, side by side, among strangers.

They undressed in silence. Folded their clothes neatly, placed them on the bench. There was no protocol for embarrassment. Only the ritual of doing it because it had been written down.

The partition led to a short corridor, then a narrow door with a thick frame. A man waited just inside. Naked, holding a clipboard. Skin pale, feet bare on the cold floor. He didn't seem uncomfortable. Just alert.

"You're the observers?" he asked. They nodded.

He handed them a folder each, paper, a pencil, nothing else.

They stepped into the amphitheater.

The room was immense, circular, tiered like a theatre. Wooden benches, old and worn smooth by generations of students. High windows along the dome let in soft northern light. There was no sound but footsteps and breath.

Anna looked up.

This was the Grand Amphithéâtre de la Sorbonne. The name floated up in her mind like something from a textbook. Pasteur had celebrated his jubilee here. The first UNESCO conference had opened here, in 1946. In May '68, the ceiling had shaken with chants and tear gas. Now it held silence.

The seats were filling slowly. Students entered in groups of ten, each wearing the same soft white sandals, expressionless. No phones, no pens, no watches, no sound.

David sat beside her at the edge of the hall. His pencil hovered over his page, unmoving. For now, there was nothing to write. Just the room, and what it held.

At precisely 8:30, one of the proctors crossed the room and placed a stack of envelopes on the central podium. The room shifted, not a murmur, not a gesture, just a collective intake of breath.

A bell rang. One sharp note.

The proctors moved silently through the aisles, delivering the exam packets, one by one. Each envelope was cream-colored, sealed, marked only with a candidate number. Nothing electronic. Nothing coded. Just paper.

At the front of the room, suspended from a temporary steel rigging, a large analog clock ticked audibly. Its face was oversized, deliberately visible from every seat. Since watches were forbidden, the clock would be their only measure of time.

The amphitheater had been rearranged for the session. Normally built to hold over a thousand spectators, it had easily absorbed the 427 candidates. Seats had been spaced out in a staggered grid, each fitted with a folding tablet arm for writing, and a white towel placed on the wood, a minimal concession to the absence of clothing.

Anna sat against the far wall with David, notebook on her knees. Around her, the sound of envelopes tearing open, pencils scratching. Silence, structured and full.

She watched the bodies. They weren't remarkable, not beautiful, not grotesque. Just human. Some thin, some soft, some tense. Backs straight, shoulders hunched, legs crossed or stretched forward. Scars, stretch marks, tan lines, hair. A few students folded their arms across their chests. Others leaned in completely, forgetful already.

The nudity was fading. Not gone, but dulled, like background noise you'd tuned out.

She felt it too. The initial tension in her own posture had dissolved. Her arms moved freely. Her breathing had slowed. At some point, the nakedness had become less a condition than a detail.

The only thing that mattered now was the task.

She dropped her pencil.

It clattered once against the tablet, bounced off her thigh, and landed just under the bench.

She leaned forward, casually, instinctively, to pick it up.

And in doing so, gave David, seated just to her right and slightly behind, a full and unfiltered view of her from behind: her shoulder blades, the curve of her spine, and the precise geometry of her small, unthinking ass.

He made a sound, low, involuntary. Almost a cough, almost a growl. Somewhere between shock and need.

By the time she sat back up, he had his notepad pressed vertically against his lap. Too quickly. Too precisely.

His face was flushed. He looked at the clock like it had accused him of something.

She glanced at him. Then at the notebook. Then back at his face.

A pause.

She gave him a look, not mockery, not scolding. Something quieter. A half-smile. Indulgent. Almost tender. With just enough promise in it to make him shift again on the bench.

And then, just as quickly, they were still.

The room carried on without noticing. The pencils scratched. The clock ticked.

Nothing had happened.

But something had happened.

Time didn't pass. It swelled.

The room was so quiet it almost felt underwater. The only sounds were the dry slide of pencil on paper, the distant creak of benches, an occasional throat being cleared with exaggerated care.

Anna had stopped taking notes. She held the pencil like a prop now, resting it lightly on her thigh, still conscious, just barely, of the strange fact of her skin touching wood.

There was no air conditioning. The temperature rose slowly, evenly, as if the breath of four hundred people was enough to warm the stone. It wasn't unbearable. But it was intimate. She could smell the room, not unpleasant, but present. Warm skin, paper, a trace of dust from the windowsills.

On the third row, a boy scratched his side absentmindedly, over and over. Another had his eyes closed, lips moving, reciting silently before answering. One girl chewed her pencil until the paint flaked onto her fingers. Everyone had their rituals.

A few fidgeted, but most were still. Fully focused. Or emptied out.

One girl adjusted her towel with the mechanical grace of someone who had done it five times already and knew no one was watching. Another candidate rested her head for a few seconds on her forearm, eyes open. Not tired, just... paused.

The nudity had become irrelevant. Not invisible, but quiet. No one hid. No one flaunted. It was like the room had decided, all at once, that this was neutral territory.

Anna felt it too. The absence of fabric no longer registered. Her back itched faintly where she leaned against the wood, but it didn't matter. Her body existed, but distantly, like furniture.

Somewhere behind her, a sandal squeaked against the floor. Someone coughed into their elbow. A pencil rolled. A sigh, almost theatrical, rose and disappeared into the dome.

Time continued. Not forward. Just outward.

She looked at the clock again. Forty minutes left.

And still, nobody had moved in or out. Nobody had cried, or panicked, or broken.

This room was a machine. Warm, naked, breathing.

And working.

With twenty minutes left on the clock, a proctor came to them quietly and nodded.

Anna glanced at David. They both stood.

They left the amphitheater in silence, the way you exit a church during a sermon, careful not to disrupt whatever force was holding the room together.

Back through the corridor, back into the partitioned room where their clothes waited neatly folded. They dressed without speaking.

Outside, the air felt sharper, almost cold against their skin, now clothed again. It took a moment to readjust to the sound of shoes, the weight of fabric.

The courtyard was beginning to stir. Press badges, microphones, small cameras being reassembled. But not many. Fewer than expected.

Most journalists hadn't entered the exam hall. A few had arrived for the press briefing, taken some footage of the line, and left. One British reporter had refused outright, "Not going to strip for a segment, thanks." Another had quietly disappeared after the protocol briefing.

The doors opened at 10:45.

The students came out slowly. Dressed again, but a little off, shirts wrinkled, hair flattened, socks mismatched. Some held their envelopes like they weren't sure what to do with them. Nobody talked much at first. A few stretched their arms. One guy lit a cigarette with a hand that shook a little.

Anna and David were already in place, just to the side of the entrance. Two other reporters stood nearby, cameras out. Waiting.

But the first wave of students didn't stop. They walked past the press like they didn't see them. Or didn't want to. One girl looked directly at a journalist holding a mic and said:

"Were you in there?"

No answer.

She kept walking.

Then a group passed near Anna. A boy slowed down. Looked at her.

"You came in, right?"

She nodded.

"We both did."

He tilted his head. Not quite a smile.

"Okay."

That's all it took.

Another student came over. Then two more. David didn't need to call anyone, they just turned toward him, like that was the direction gravity pointed.

The questions weren't formal. Anna didn't open her notebook right away. She just asked,

"How was it?"

Shrugs. Tired looks.

"Weird."

"Long."

"Felt like being underwater."

Someone muttered,