Chapter 21: Nine Empty Pockets

She stared at the tiles as she walked. In order to keep her feet firmly on the tiles, she had to force herself to shorten her steps or take a bigger step. If she encountered damaged or cracked tiles, she would have to exert even greater effort to control her legs to cross them.

It was rare for her to be so focused, but something still distracted her and she stepped on the gap between the floor tiles.

According to that stubborn rule that came from nowhere, she should have been "dead" by now, but her eyes had already looked at the flower bed not far away.

The rain hadn't completely stopped, but the boy, without an umbrella, half-crouched beside the wet flower bed and whispered to the girl. Finally, a tabby cat trembled and crawled out of the flower bed.

The kitten looked no bigger than a tube of potato chips and appeared to be injured. The boy fed it a cat snack, then carefully picked it up, pulled up his T-shirt to shield it from the drizzle, and turned to walk onto the street.

She treaded the floor tiles randomly, following him from a distance like a chivalrous woman who had forgotten about life and death. She saw him searching along the way, and saw him walking into a pet clinic with a cat in his arms.

From that moment on, she decided to follow him.

…

That happened two weeks after Xia Cun announced to Ren Yi that she liked Jiang Song, and the current scene reminded her of that rainy day.

It was already afternoon, and the heat was thick enough to touch, but Jiang Song still squatted in the shade of the greenhouse without fear of the heat, drinking apple juice with one hand and feeding Tom with cat food with the other.

This was the first time Xia Cun saw him since they separated from the helicopter base, and she keenly sensed that some changes had taken place in him.

At least, he was no longer like the Jiang Song who did bad things with her yesterday, but the Jiang Song at that time seemed like her friend.

With this discovery, Xia Cun turned away expressionlessly, and finally squatted alone by the swimming pool with his back to the sun.

She had just woken up and felt like an empty bag.

She took a nap until 3:30 in the afternoon. In the morning, Emma somehow discovered that she was sick and asked the family doctor to see her. She took the medicine again and then slept until the afternoon.

I hate being sick. My throat feels like a carpet, and my eyes, nostrils, and ears all feel uncomfortable.

It's so hot outside, maybe it would be nice to be in the water.

So will she be stepping into a pool again this summer?

Her thoughts were in a mess and she saw more shadows in the swimming pool.

Then came the boy squatting to her right, bringing with him a light breeze and a natural, concerned voice: "Genki?"

Xia Cun saw two dark figures floating side by side at the bottom of the pool, nodded in response, and then found Tom sneaking between them. The boy simply sat down and, at Tom's request, gently tickled it with his left hand.

There are very few cats that like to be close to people like this one.

Speaking of which, is Tom blue or gray?

"Don't you want to talk to me?"

Xia Cun distinguished Tom's color and heard Jiang Song suddenly ask her this. She turned her head to look at him, and he still had that casual attitude, as if it was just a casual question, and no matter what her answer was, it didn't matter to him.

It’s really too much.

So, she pointed out to him in a somewhat hoarse voice: "You were the one who didn't want to talk to me first."

He had clearly noticed her when he was feeding Tom outside the greenhouse, but he pretended not to see anything and pretended she didn't exist.

That's why she was leaving, she hated him for doing that.

Jiang Song paused in petting the cat, perhaps to try to cover up after being exposed. His habitual lazy voice had a deliberate tone, like a sophistry: "Sonnako to naiyo..."

That's not the case.

Xia Cunhui replied with the original words.

She wouldn't believe it, but other than that, she felt no more emotion. No more anger, no more loss.

She thought it was because her emotions had been exhausted by the morning, and because of this lack of emotion, she had become less fond of Jiang Song. Or perhaps, her fondness for Jiang Song had dimmed with the malfunction of the magic carpet, no longer shining as brightly as it had yesterday. Or perhaps, her fondness for Jiang Song had suddenly been overwhelmed by an emotion heavier than just fondness.

Maybe confusion.

Why did Xiaolan say that?

Didn't she tell her before that selfishness is also a virtue? So why is she saying she's wrong now? What about Jiang Song? Is he also troubled by some kind of emotion?

"What are you thinking about now?" she asked Jiang Song.

"Tomさん looks like バイク...how do you say バイク in Chinese?"

They compared the meanings of "バイク" as if they were answering a question, and discovered that "バイク" in Japanese is the transliteration of the suffix of "motorbike," while "機ト" in Chinese is the transliteration of the prefix of "motorbike." So, the final conclusion is that Jiang Song thought Tom was like a motorcycle because it was so comfortable and rumbled all the time.

Are his thoughts so light and airy?

No, he just didn't want to tell her what else was on his mind.

Because he is a very dishonest person.

Xia Cun stopped talking, but Jiang Song seemed to be getting restless again. Tom became more like a motorcycle because of his rough massage technique, snoring non-stop.

He seemed to be waiting for her to speak to him.

But wouldn't it be too indulgent to talk to him now, as Mr. Mizuno said? And she had already spoken to him just now.

She was also very troubled. Why did she always have to go along with him?

Silence was like the water in a swimming pool. Perhaps she was already in the pool. As she was thinking, she heard the sound of a car driving into the courtyard.

The others came back.

-

There were slight changes in the seating arrangements of the teenagers at the dinner table.

One was because of Mr. Mizuno’s arrival, the second was because of Zhuo Manyi’s departure, and the third was because of the temporary joining of Lin Jiaci and Shi Yu.

After learning that Jiang Song and Xia Cun left by helicopter, Zhuo Manyi immediately called her family to send a helicopter. She had to leave no matter what, and Shen Xing of course went with her.

As for Lin Jiaci and Shi Yu, they followed as a matter of course after getting off the boat, and Mr. Mizuno seemed to have no objection to this.

Mr. Mizuno announced at the dinner table that he would stay in the villa for the next week and would handle various matters for everyone during that time. The meaning was roughly the same as what he had said in the group before. No matter when they wanted to leave, he would help them arrange everything, including communicating with their parents.

The only difference was that this evening, his words hinted at another meaning: Jiang Song would be staying here for the next week. And this was more of a statement specifically for Jiang Song than for anyone else.

Jiang Song sat at the table, seemingly listening with boredom, but the growing impatience between his brows revealed his irritation. Finally, his dissatisfaction poured out at a certain moment, and he asked slowly: "Mizuno-san, are you saying that I have to stay here for the next week?"

"That's right."

"What?"

He spoke in Japanese, as if he didn't want the others at the table to understand. But there were several teenagers at the table who knew Japanese, and they more or less understood what he meant. "Ah, this is so troubling... What if everyone else leaves?"

Would Jiang Song be troubled by such things?

He simply didn't want to be like them, the one who was "ruthlessly abandoned."

The table was completely silent, with only Mr. Mizuno's calm voice ringing out, "Then you'll have to be a little lonely."

Jiang Song remained silent for a while before putting down the tableware: "もう食べた、じゃあね (I'm done eating, bye)."

After saying that, he stood up and left the table.

Everyone watched him leave, while Mizuno continued to dine elegantly. He seemed to be intentionally leaving space for the young men, and soon after, he declared himself finished and left the table to return to the second floor.

The boys seemed relieved.

Lu Xu was the first to speak, but he only muttered softly: "Didn't you say you were just a life assistant? Why do you have such a strong aura?"

Zhou Yun spoke across from him, "How could you have been that guy's assistant for five years without a strong aura? Anyone else would have been tortured to death long ago."

"That's right. It is said that the longest the previous assistant stayed there was only fifteen months. Judging from this, he must have been a ninja in his previous life." Lin Jiaci teased with a smile, as if he was not worried that such words would reach Mr. Mizuno's ears.

"Shao Pin." Zhou Yun finished speaking and asked him, "Didn't your mother forbid you from interacting with him? It's fine if you were on the boat, but why did you come here after getting off the boat?"

"Since I'm here, I want to play with you guys too. Besides, he's my cousin after all, and I want to get to know him a little bit..."

Zhou Yun was speechless: "He's still your cousin, do you think he cares about you?" He couldn't help but ask, "Where did this naive gene come from in your family?"

After hearing Lin Jiaci's words, Xia Cunze turned around and glanced at him. Lin Jiaci seemed very perceptive, and his eyes immediately fell on her and he smiled at her. She withdrew her gaze, silently put down the tableware, and stood up to leave.

Like before, no one spoke to her at the table, not even Miao Wen, who just sat opposite her, looking at her hesitantly for a few seconds, without saying a word or sending her a message.

Since she left the yacht, she hadn't heard from Miao Wen and Ren Yi. Maybe Xiao Lan was right, because she seemed to be really running away.

She didn't want to ask them why they wouldn't talk to her.

At least she knew that if Ren Yi didn't say anything, it meant she was really angry.

Xia Cun had seen Ren Yi truly angry before, that was during the summer vacation of his second year in junior high school.

That holiday, Ren Yi was trying to join an off-campus band as a drummer. She carried her drums to the base for practice every day, and Xia Cun occasionally accompanied her. The band's lead singer was a high school student, a popular and handsome boy at the base, and also served as the band's leader. He decided to spend five days assessing Ren Yi, but on the very day he made his decision, Xia Cun posted a photo she had secretly taken of the lead singer picking his nose all over the base. The final result, of course, was self-evident.

It was then that Xia Cun first realized that Ren Yi wouldn't be mean to her when she was angry. She could have defied Aunt Han Fu's "imperial decree" long ago, and no longer be forced to be her friend.

Would this incident also make her so angry?

Why?

Xia Cun sat in the living room, swallowed the medicine prepared by Emma, ​​and then returned to the third floor.

As she walked out of the door, she heard someone talking in the open-air garden a few steps away, with a cold voice.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?"

Turning around, I saw a vague figure walking out from the hazy night into the bright area of ​​the corridor lights. It was He Shizhao.

-----------------------

Author's note: Good news, I've finished writing a new chapter after deleting over 3,000 words of scrapped manuscript! [Shy]

Now I declare the growth line officially open! I may re-divide it into volumes later, I will consider it while I write. [Hug]

Bad boy Xiao Jiang, please be careful. We have babies who can secretly film people picking their noses. [Milk tea]

Finally, thank you all for following me! I made 4 yuan on the clip today!

Yes, as long as I can write, my mentality is terrible. If I can't write, I will just break it into pieces :-I