Lover
Tonight's fun English-themed activity at summer camp is called "Explanation." Each group receives a task slip with a clue on it. The group must follow the clues to the corresponding flea market stall, solve the puzzle, and obtain the next slip. The first group to complete all three tasks will receive different rewards based on their ranking.
The task had a specific requirement: all communication had to be in English. Therefore, the flea stalls currently set up on the playground are mostly run by foreigners.
“Xu Ting and I will go together, Sun Yuanyuan and the other two will go together, and you guys will go together at the end, okay? That’s how the mission rounds are divided.” Yan Songqi looked at Ruan Xiyan and Lu Er, and they both nodded.
Ruan Xiyan and Lu Er had nothing to do and were bored staying in the same spot, so Ruan Xiyan pulled her to the nearest flea market: "Flea markets are also for selling things, let's go in and take a look."
Selling local delicacies, exchanging old books, and displaying trinkets... Lu Er's gaze was drawn to the Chiikawa blind boxes on the corner of the table, and her body seemed to be involuntarily pulled towards them.
The stall owner was a Black man. Seeing Lu Er looking at the blind boxes, he quickly said a sentence in English.
Ruan Xiyan didn't understand what her older brother was saying, chuckled twice, and turned to ask Lu Er, "Want to smoke this?"
"Let me ask about the price," Lu Er asked in English. The man told her it would cost thirty yuan to smoke one.
She told Ruan Xiyan the price, hesitated for a moment, then took out her phone to scan the code and said, "I'll take one." She didn't know when it started, but she was developing more and more feelings for Chiikawa.
“Then I’ll draw one too, and buy two,” Ruan Xiyan said. “I hope I can draw Xiao Ba.”
Lu Er agreed; she also wanted Xiao Ba's.
Lu Er produced a pink fairy-like Ji Yi, while Ruan Xiyan produced a chestnut-headed Usachi and a conquering Usachi. He held the two little Usachi between his fingers and said in a tone that didn't sound much regretful, "How come Usachi and I are so destined to be together?"
Lu Er glanced at him out of the corner of his eye, then put the Usachi into his pocket and, still looking cheerful, moved on to another stall: "Let's go somewhere else."
This time, Ruan Xiyan stopped in front of a used bookstore. He wasn't interested in the books, but rather in the birdcage hanging from the stall owner's umbrella. A cockatoo was staring intently at him.
After a few seconds of eye contact, the parrot couldn't hold back any longer: "How are you?"
“It’s a cockatoo.” Yan Songqi and Xu Ting walked up. “I often see this kind of bird in Australia.”
The stall owner, also Australian, struck up a conversation with Yan Songqi. Lu Er asked Xu Ting, who was playing with the parrot, "Have you finished your mission?"
"Damn it, hurry up! It's all thanks to Yan Songqi's good English. That task was to do an English word chain game, eight rounds... It wasn't actually that difficult, thanks to me reminding Yan Songqi." After only two seconds of hesitation, Xu Ting naturally took the credit for himself.
"Did you give the next note to Sun Yuanyuan and the others?" Xu Ting shook her head, and Yan Songqi, who had just finished speaking, also said that they had to go back now. Lu Er called out to Ruan Xiyan, and the four of them walked back the way they started, two in front and two behind.
A sudden uproar erupted around her, accompanied by screams. Before Lu Er could react, she felt several people rushing past, jostling her and making her stumble.
"Teacher Xiaolu, hurry up." Ruan Xiyan naturally squeezed her hand from the side. He was tall and looked around. "I heard from them that a singer has arrived here."
Yan Songqi was also scattered by the crowd. In the time it took to dodge, Xu Ting had already disappeared: "Xu Ting also ran over with these people."
Once the storm had passed, Ruan Xiyan released her hand. This small gesture went unnoticed in the darkness. Lu Er raised her eyes to glance at Ruan Xiyan's profile, then quickly lowered them again.
Her heart was still pounding, and a sentence popped into Lu Er's mind like a pebble dropped into water.
A handshake is just holding hands; you must never let him hold your heart.
—
Neither Sun Yuanyuan nor Sun Yuanyuan were good at spoken communication, so it took them a little longer. They handed the third note to Lu Er, who opened it and saw a sentence written on it.
What is the thing that makes you older the more you eat
"What makes you age faster the more you eat?" Ruan Xiyan leaned over to look at the note. "This is a riddle."
Lu Er stared at the note, lost in thought. Objectively speaking, there's no food in the world that can physically make someone age faster the more you eat it. Therefore, such a thing can only be associated with age as a marker of aging. Aging also signifies growth, so the answer to the mystery is quite simple.
Lu Er gave the answer: "It's a birthday cake. We should go to the cake stand."
Ruan Xiyan and her friend looked around and found a flea market selling cakes at the edge of the playground. The stall owner was a German woman in her twenties with big eyes and a high nose; her smile had a magical quality that made people want to smile too.
"The first question: within ten seconds, say the English word for your dinner tonight. Ten..."
Ruan Xiyan had barely heard the question and before her brain could even process it, the stall owner started the countdown. She hurriedly called out, "Wait! Wait!"
The woman smiled innocently: "Nine, Eight..."
Lu Er calmly replied, "Noodle." She nudged Ruan Xiyan's elbow and said in Chinese, "Just say any food name."
"Four..."
The more nervous she became, the more food-related words would slip into her mind like a prank. Fortunately, Ruan Xiyan still remembered one: "Rice".
"There are two more questions that you need to answer. Who wants to be the first?" The woman glanced at each of them.
Lu Er volunteered, "Me."
"The second question: Within twenty seconds, find two words that describe personality traits and begin with the letter S. Twenty, Never..."
“Sensitive”.
The woman made a checkmark gesture: "OK, Fourteen..."
Brave, Diligent, Calm… a second word starting with S? Lu Er’s brain was working at high speed. When the woman counted to twelfth second, she clearly uttered a word: “Sympathetic.”
The woman's smile held approval: "Yes, the next question is the third one..." Ruan Xiyan leaned forward, tensing up, trying to catch every word the woman uttered.
The woman spoke: "Please find two English words that are the antonyms of 'diligent' within twenty seconds. 'Twenty'..."
A word for diligence? No, it's the antonym, a word for laziness! Ruan Xiyan abruptly stopped herself from uttering "Diligent" and began to think, what are some words for laziness?
He was stunned. He searched his mind thoroughly, only to find it completely empty, as if someone had swept it clean.
"L...Lazy?"
“Yes. Thirteen…” The woman made another gesture, and Ruan Xiyan struggled to recall his English knowledge from high school, middle school, and even elementary school. Until the countdown ended, he couldn’t come up with a second word.
Lu Er reminded him, "Idle, Indolent, these are all fine."
"Sorry... I haven't heard of it." Ruan Xiyan looked dejected, but immediately perked up again. "Please, can I again?"
“Of course. Now for the third question. Within fifteen seconds,” just as Ruan Xiyan thought the next question would be another roundabout one, the woman spoke up, “find three words to describe your relationship.”
She started the countdown, and Ruan Xiyan paused for a second before quickly answering, "Classmate!"
"OK. Thirteen, Twelve..."
“Friend”.
"OK. Ten..."
What other relationship do they have? What else is there between him and Lu Er? Classmates, friends... what other relationship could there be?
As Ruan Xiyan answered, Lu Er's eyes remained fixed on him. When she heard the question, she reacted the same way as Ruan Xiyan—both were slightly taken aback.
What other relationship was there? Classmates, friends—he'd said everything he could. Lu Er raised her index finger to her chin, unconsciously wanting to touch her lips. Oh, she'd tutored him; she was his teacher…a teacher-student relationship.
Lu Er suddenly stared nervously at Ruan Xiyan. "Teacher, teacher," she thought, wishing she could grow an invisible tongue to whisper the seven letters in his ear for her. But even in her anxiety, she could only wait for him, hoping he would understand her gaze.
When the woman counted to three, Ruan Xiyan seemed to glance at her out of the corner of his eye, and then Lu Er heard him say, "Lover."
Ruan Xiyan felt that the people in front of her and those around her were completely stunned. It was a very obvious stunned silence, because neither of them moved.
“Because the characters we play in the play are lovers,” Ruan Xiyan explained without much reaction, making Lu Er and the stall owner seem quite surprised in comparison. “That’s not wrong.”
That's what they say. But a secret heat rose in his ears.
Lu Er also realized what was going on, and as if eager to clear herself of something, she added, "Yes, in the Twelfth Night we performed, Viola and her duke... ended up together. That's right."
In their panic, the two of them switched to speaking Chinese.
The woman seemed to be the one kept in the dark among the three. She looked at Lu Er and Ruan Xiyan, let out a deep "Ah", and then gave an understanding smile: "Okay, then congratulations on passing."
—
Ruan Xiyan's group, number six, was the third to finish. From the moment they left the cake stall until they went to find Teacher Mina to get their little red flags, Ruan Xiyan and Lu Er didn't exchange a single word.
When Lu Er and Ruan Xiyan arrived at the group's base, Yan Songqi was playing online Dou Dizhu (a card game) with Xu Ting and a few others. The moonlight didn't reach them, and no one noticed the two teenagers' unusual behavior.
"Finished?" Yan Songqi glanced at the two of them, not finding it strange, and continued playing Dou Dizhu.
Ruan Xiyan rested her right hand on her neck, her gaze casually drifting elsewhere: "The prize for third place is this bag of snacks. The teacher said none of us really want to eat it, so the four of you can divide it among yourselves."
"Okay." Yan Songqi took it, and seeing him take a step to the side, asked, "Back to the dorm so early?"
"Hmm... I'm a little sleepy. I want to go to bed early tonight," he mumbled in response.
Lu Er, who was a step behind, caught up with him after two seconds: "Ruan Xiyan, I have something I want to give you."
Ruan Xiyan didn't really want to face her at that moment, but he couldn't refuse her. So, under Ruan Xiyan's half-avoiding gaze, Lu Er rummaged in his pocket for a while, then opened a small blue and white octopus from his fist: "I bought another blind box later and got this octopus. If you like it, I want to give it to you."
Ruan Xiyan owns so many Chiikawa figurines that you can't count them on ten hands. To him, they're nothing special.
But he held it as if it were the first Chiikawa figure he had ever received: "Ms. Koji, thank you."
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