Chapter 25 Part 2

Speak of Yang Kuikui, and she appeared.

Bai Kou picked up her phone, which kept beeping “Didi didi.” Yang Kuikui asked: 【Bai Doudou, why is your house empty?】

Bai Kou immediately replied: 【We’re celebrating Christmas at Shijing Lake =3=】

Yang Kuikui: 【We?】

Bai Kou: 【Me and sis.】

Yang Kuikui: 【She didn’t go to evening self-study???】

Bai Yuqiao sat to Bai Kou’s left and slightly turned her head to see this message.

Then she looked at her little sister’s profile.

Bai Kou let out a “Hm hm” chuckle and typed back: 【Yeah, my sister loves me. She took leave to spend Christmas with me owo. No sister? Envy~ /penguin shaking head/】

Yang Kuikui: 【……】

Yang Kuikui: 【886.】

That night, Bai Kou and Bai Yuqiao sat at the stage until ten o’clock. Later, it got too cold at night, and Bai Kou felt her ears freezing. She huddled into a tiny ball next to her sister.

“Hu—” She kept breathing hot air into her palms.

Though reluctant, Bai Yuqiao took the initiative: 【Let’s go home.】

They caught the last bus home.

On the bus, besides the driver, there were only Bai Kou and Bai Yuqiao, but Bai Kou insisted on going to the back and sitting in the last row.

The bus was warm inside, the glass windows fogged up, making her sister’s figure especially blurry.

Bored, Bai Kou raised her right hand, half-fisted, wiped away a patch of fog to reveal her sister’s profile, then drew a big heart around that shadow. She dotted it with little stars below and finally scrawled “Marry Christmas” in a flourish.

After finishing, she turned and tugged her sister’s arm, showing off. “Sis, look!”

The absentminded Bai Yuqiao turned her head, first saw their faces, then noticed the heart amid the steam, following it down—

Her brows furrowed, then she suddenly laughed.

Bai Kou: “?”

The next second, her sister leaned right over her body and used her fingertip to circle the “a” in “Marry,” drawing outward flares below into an “e” shape, writing “e” inside.

“Marry Christmas”— “Merry Christmas.”

Bai Kou’s face reddened. She hugged her sister around the waist, pulling her close, and smeared away the two lines of English with her right hand.

“Unexpected, unexpected! That doesn’t count!”

Bai Yuqiao immediately became even happier. She pulled away Bai Kou’s hand that was blocking her lower back, sat back down, and turned her head to dodge while laughing.

Bai Kou grew anxious and reached out, originally wanting to poke her sister’s waist to stop her from laughing… but when she saw her sister’s profile, laughing so hard she couldn’t stop.

The smile on her face suddenly faded slowly.

She lowered her gaze.

Bai Kou didn’t know why her heart suddenly felt sour.

That evening, after Bai Kou turned off the lights and lay in bed with her eyes closed, she could still recall that scene.

Someone knocked on her door from outside. She pulled up the blanket and called out, “Come in—”

Bai Yuqiao’s shadow appeared in the door crack, then gradually widened as she entered her little sister’s room and placed a green paper crane by the bedside.

Bai Kou propped herself up halfway, took the paper crane, and looked at it—it seemed to be folded from notepad paper: “A paper crane?”

Her sister nodded, squatted by the bed, looked up at her, and gestured: 【For you, one wish.】

“One wish?” Bai Kou perked up. The blanket slipped from her waist as she knelt at the edge of the bed and looked down at her sister. “Do I have to say it now? Can it be anything?”

But Bai Yuqiao shook her head.

She rested the back of her hand against her chin, pointed at Bai Kou’s nose tip, then crossed her index and middle fingers, separated them, pressed down the middle finger to raise her thumb, formed an “eight” with her index finger, and finally made a fist with one hand while waving the five fingers of the other near the back of the fist.

【When you turn eighteen.】

“Ah? It has to be that long?”

Bai Kou plopped back down on her butt, pinched the tail of the paper crane in her hand, and made it fly through the air. “Alright… I’ll take good care of it!”

The next day was Saturday. Bai Yuqiao went out early to school.

Bai Kou saw her sister off at seven, then crawled back into bed for a solid two-hour nap.

A little past nine, she raised both hands from under the blanket. “Mm—” Completely satisfied, she stretched her body lazily.

Accustomed to the house being empty on Saturdays, Bai Kou cooked herself a sugar-hearted fermented glutinous rice egg, sat at the dining table, yawned while scrolling through QQ.

Tongtong had piano practice today… Pei Yue’s mom seemed to be home too… As she scrolled, Bai Kou locked onto her dear Yang Kuikui again.

Yang Kuikui had recently become obsessed with QQ Hall—the game where you bomb each other. Even her profile picture had changed to the bun character from QQ Hall.

Bai Kou had started playing before Yang Wanxi.

But ever since she once invited Yang Kuikui to team up, only to get chased and bombed to death by newbie Yang Kuikui all afternoon, she couldn’t win revenge no matter how she tried… She got so mad she uninstalled it on the spot and swore never to play such a boring game again.

Unexpectedly, once she quit, Yang Kuikui’s level kept rising, and now even her QQ avatar had changed.

Bai Kou stared at that innocent bun head, the memory of that afternoon’s crushing defeat still fresh.

Hm! She decided not to message Yang Kuikui! She’d draw at home by herself!

Beep beep beep.

The bun head messaged her.

Yang Kuikui: 【Not home.】

Bai Kou: 【Not here.】

Knock knock knock.

Someone knocked at the door.

Yang Kuikui: 【Open up, got a gift for you.】

Gift in hand, Bai Kou flipped instantly: 【Coming! =v=】

She opened the door. Yang Wanxi stood there with her left hand behind her back and a bag in her right, looking down the hallway to the right.

The light leaking between floors illuminated half of Yang Wanxi’s face, making her look like a glowing angel—of course, mainly because this was an angel bearing gifts.

“Here.” Yang Wanxi didn’t enter, just raised the black hard-shell gift bag toward Bai Kou.

“What’s this?” Bai Kou pulled it open to peek inside—a box?

“The original signed disc of Thirteen Curses of the Broken Gate.” Yang Wanxi said it casually. “Just got it last night.”

“……!!!!!!!!” Bai Kou’s mouth gaped wide enough for an egg. After a long pause, she clutched the bag tightly to her chest and pretended to ask, “Th-this… you don’t want it? Isn’t it bad for me to take it? Maybe you should take it back—”

“Sure.” Yang Wanxi reached out. “Give it back?”

Bai Kou shook her head frantically.

After placing the signed disc nicely in her room, Bai Kou ran back to Yang Wanxi, who was still waiting outside the door. “Yang Kuikui, what do you want to do today? Wanna play QQ Hall? I can play with you!”

Yang Wanxi looked her up and down. “Didn’t you say last time you’d never play it in this lifetime?”

“Me?” Bai Kou played dumb and shook her head. “Probably not me. You must’ve remembered wrong.”

“Pfft.” Yang Wanxi saw through Bai Doudou’s feigned innocence and laughed. “Alright, stop pretending. I know you’re thanking me, but I don’t have time today. Got an audition this afternoon.”

Audition?

Bai Kou’s eyes widened slightly. She actually had a little wish like this.

She stepped forward.

Cupping Yang Wanxi’s face in both hands: “Can I come with you?”

The ad had gotten great feedback—that was what Song He told Yang Wanxi. Yang Wanxi herself didn’t feel much about it, aside from occasional questions from classmates. Otherwise, her daily life was as ordinary as if she’d never shot an ad.

So when Song He contacted her again, asking if she’d be willing to shoot a few more print ads, Yang Wanxi was puzzled for a moment—thinking, am I really that good?

But puzzled or not, since they were inviting her and she was willing, she agreed for this Saturday and headed over herself to try the camera.

And since she was going alone, just for a tryout…

Yang Wanxi looked at Bai Kou’s eager gaze for a bit, turned her face away, hesitated for a second, then said, “Fine, but it’s by train. Tell Auntie Bai. I’ll take you along.”

“Mm-hmm!” Bai Kou was super obedient.

Around eleven at noon, Bai Xiaochu dropped Bai Kou and Yang Wanxi off at the train station together and bought them tickets to the provincial city.

Before sending the two kids into the station, she was still a bit worried and kept reminding Yang Wanxi: “Little Xi, once you get off, contact Auntie Wang right away and have her take you to that set or whatever.”

“Okay.” Yang Wanxi held Bai Kou’s hand and nodded very seriously. “Auntie Bai, don’t worry. I’ll definitely take good care of Bai Kou.”

“Not just take care of Bai Kou—take care of yourself too.” Bai Xiaochu frowned and emphasized.

There were so many people coming and going in the station.

It was Bai Kou’s first time taking the train without an adult.

Yang Wanxi walked a step ahead, holding her tightly with her left hand from behind, while her right hand occasionally blocked oncoming strangers.

They boarded, found their seats, and Yang Wanxi put her arm around her waist: “You sit inside.”

Bai Kou scooted in obediently. After sitting, she turned to look at Yang Wanxi, who sat down a beat slower, and couldn’t help whispering, “Yang Kuikui, this is too happy! I feel like we’re going on a spring outing!”

“This is a winter outing.” Yang Wanxi took Bai Kou’s backpack off her lap as she spoke. “Two and a half hours. Sleep if you want to—just lean on me.”

Bai Kou couldn’t sleep.

As soon as the train started, the platform outside the window receded slowly. She pressed against the window frame, admiring the familiar yet strange city scenery through the rain-streaked smudges.

Yang Wanxi wasn’t interested in the view outside. She leaned against the seatback, expressionless as she scrolled her phone—a stark contrast to the silly Bai Kou. She thought this would make her look more mature, so bad guys wouldn’t target the two of them.

“Ah—” An hour later, Bai Kou’s excitement wore off, and she got sleepy.

The train’s clack-clack-clack had that magical effect.

She turned back and said, “Yang Kuikui, I want to sleep a bit.”

Yang Wanxi glanced at her faintly, sat up straighter, and kept her eyes on the phone screen: “Mm, go ahead.”

The noise lulled her easily. Bai Kou slumped onto Yang Wanxi’s right shoulder, her head sinking quickly as her face smashed straight toward Yang Wanxi’s phone screen—

Game Over!

“…” The game she’d been grinding the whole way ruined by one second of wrong input—all for nothing.

Yang Wanxi closed her eyes in frustration and took a deep breath.

She still couldn’t hold back, gritted her teeth, about to mentally dock Bai Kou a point…

In her sleep, Bai Kou let out a sticky “Mm…”, shifted her head closer to Yang Wanxi, and wrapped both arms tightly around Yang Wanxi’s arm.

Yang Wanxi froze. The annoyance that had just been building vanished.

She quietly turned off her phone, lowered her arm, and raised her shoulder a bit.

…Maybe this would let Bai Kou sleep more comfortably.