Chapter 24 Part 2

She silently clutched the “weapon” that had once made her invincible, walking behind her sister and Yang Kuikui. Her eyes fixed on her sister’s back, arm linked with Yang Kuikui’s, while that kid’s words echoed endlessly in her mind.

When it ended, they first escorted Pei Yue to hail a cab.

The car pulled to the curb. Pei Yue stepped forward, gripped the door handle, her pursed lips reflected hesitantly in the window glass.

Unfortunately, the person she hoped for was head down, fiddling with a pebble on the ground, forgetting her habit, and didn’t hug her goodbye.

“Bang—”

By the time the door shut and Bai Kou looked up from her daze, the car had already driven off.

Left were Yang Wanxi, who had ridden the electric scooter, and Lu Tongtong, who grumbled about how there could be mosquitoes in winter.

Yang Wanxi still didn’t dare let Bai Yuqiao know she had secretly bought the electric scooter… and given Bai Kou a ride tonight.

While Bai Yuqiao was looking down at Bai Kou, she quickly typed a string of words on her phone and poked Lu Tongtong in the lower back.

“Hm?” Lu Tongtong turned her head, her eyes quickly scanning the phone screen. “Ok ok!” She nodded in agreement while making a hand gesture.

Yang Wanxi happily draped an arm around Lu Tongtong’s shoulders and called out loudly, “Sister Yuqiao, Bai Doudou, Tongtong and I still need to buy some things. You two go back first.”

Bai Yuqiao smiled and nodded.

Yang Wanxi then looked at Bai Doudou on the other side, who seemed deflated and exhausted. She chuckled inwardly. Was she really that tired?

She took a step forward, raised her arm, and gently kneaded Bai Kou’s face like kneading dough.

“Ouch, Bai Doudou, look at how tired your face is. Don’t drag me along next year, okay? Go back and rest early tonight, hm?”

“Mm.” Bai Kou responded listlessly in a low voice.

Yang Wanxi raised an eyebrow, exchanged a glance with Bai Yuqiao, then looked back at Bai Kou.

“I’m heading out?”

“Mm.” Bai Kou finally showed a slight smile. She looked at Yang Wanxi and also at Lu Tongtong. “Bye bye, be safe.”

Bai Kou’s bad mood persisted all the way back.

Back in elementary school, she had encountered this kind of situation several times, but she and her sister went to the same school and walked to and from together every day. Whoever dared to talk nonsense, she and Yang Kuikui could immediately stand in front of her sister to protect her.

After her sister started junior high and boarded at school, Bai Kou had worried for a while too.

But she heard from her mom that her sister was doing great at school and that everyone there was a big kid who wouldn’t make such a fuss.

In the back seat of the taxi, Bai Kou held Bai Yuqiao’s left hand with her right hand. She turned her head to gaze out the window and sighed. She thought that with just one offhand remark, she was already this upset. Her sister must have felt even worse.

The two got out of the car and walked toward the residential complex. Their footsteps were light and scattered, with their elongated shadows falling behind them.

Bai Kou was a bit stubborn and wouldn’t let go even when her sister wanted to set down her bag to fish out her keys.

Once the door opened, Bai Yuqiao let Bai Kou go in first. She followed a step behind. When she took off her bag, she saw her sister staring at her unblinkingly, so she smiled at her sister and drew a question mark in the air.

Bai Kou’s heart suddenly ached again. She took half a step forward and hugged Bai Yuqiao tightly.

It wasn’t until the living room TV turned on and the evening news started playing that Bai Kou’s foul mood began to improve.

She sat on a small stool by the coffee table, volunteered to peel kiwis for her sister while watching the news—the ones Bai Xiaochu had bought the day before yesterday. They were a bit sour, but they were said to be especially high in vitamin C… In short, they were great for the body!

Bai Yuqiao hadn’t been home long before she went into her room. Although she didn’t close the door, Bai Kou kept the TV volume and her own movements as quiet as possible to avoid disturbing her sister’s studying.

She peeled the skin halfway off two kiwis and placed them side by side in a bowl.

Bai Kou picked it up and tap tap tap—she politely knocked on the door three times like this.

The person sitting at the desk immediately turned her head to look at Bai Kou. She quickly folded a piece of paper in her hand and casually pressed it under a dictionary.

She stood up and walked toward her sister.

“Here.” Bai Kou handed over the bowl. “Sister, you have to eat them all up, okay.”

Bai Yuqiao took it, smiled with a frown, and placed her index finger near her nose: 【Sour.】

Bai Kou burst out laughing and put her hands on her hips. “Mom said sour means healthy.”

Her sister lowered her head and chuckled first, then raised her eyes, her brows softening. She pointed at Bai Kou and then made a gesture of eating with her right hand: 【You eat.】

Bai Kou made an X with her hands in refusal. “No, I’m already very healthy, and I’m not in senior year of high school either.”

Bai Yuqiao made no further gestures. She turned around, carried the bowl to her desk, and set it down.

After setting it down, she paused for a moment, then picked up Secret Garden from atop a practice test booklet—this was a recently popular coloring book. A classmate in Bai Yuqiao’s class had been caught coloring in it during class by the teacher. Later, when she went to the office to hand in some workbooks, she overheard the teachers laughing about how their own kids who loved drawing also had one, though it was the Chinese version.

Bai Yuqiao remembered that.

Upon inquiring further, she learned that the English original version was higher quality than the Chinese one, but it was expensive, over two hundred yuan.

After thinking it over, Bai Yuqiao still asked the ever-resourceful Ruan Yao to help her buy one.

But even if she loved her sister, she had her own temper.

When the book arrived, she was still mad, so she just left it in her room without giving it to Bai Kou.

Bai Kou watched her sister’s suddenly still back and grew curious. With her left hand on the door handle, she stretched her neck and softly called out, “Sister? What’s wrong?”

Bai Yuqiao brought the coloring book back in front of Bai Kou and offered it with both hands.

“Eh? Isn’t this Secret Garden?” Bai Kou took it delightedly.

The white hardcover cover was surrounded by all sorts of black-and-white outline flowers and leaves, with a circle left in the middle printing the large English words “Secret Garden.”

A light green colored pencil approached a leaf to the left of the “S.”

But in the instant before it touched the paper, Bai Kou’s hand suddenly paused and lifted higher.

Bai Yuqiao sat beside her watching, puzzled. Then, as if sensing her sister’s confusion, Bai Kou turned her head and explained methodically, “We still can’t color the cover first. What if it gets ruined?”

Bai Yuqiao smiled, hooked her index finger, and crossed her palms: 【Makes sense.】

With this task to focus on, Bai Kou finally stopped thinking about that kid’s words. Surprisingly, her sister didn’t go back to her room to study either. The two sat quietly in Bai Kou’s room, scratch scratch, the soft sound of colored pencils gliding over paper audible.

Don’t underestimate it just because it was simple coloring. When opened, the pages spanned two spreads, larger than an open language textbook.

Bai Kou was the type of “professional” who not only colored the flowers, plants, insects, and birds but also matched the backgrounds.

She had just finished coloring half a page when the time reached eleven-thirty.

She yawned.

Seeing this, Bai Yuqiao patted her sister’s arm: 【Sleepy?】 Then she interlaced her hands near her ear: 【Bedtime?】

“Mm…” Bai Kou frowned in distress. “But I want to finish this page…” She paused, looked into Bai Yuqiao’s eyes. “Why don’t you go to sleep first? You have to go to school so early tomorrow.”

【I’m not sleepy.】 Bai Yuqiao thought for a moment, then asked, 【Want me to help?】

“Sure! Are you interested too?” Bai Kou perked up instantly, slightly lifting her upper body to grab an acrylic marker from nearby. She said to her sister, “Then use this. It’s easier.”

Bai Yuqiao uncapped a light blue one but didn’t color directly on Secret Garden. Instead, she tested it first on the vein of her own wrist.

“Hey.” Bai Kou hurriedly pulled at her. “We have paper, why draw on your hand?”

Unexpectedly, Bai Yuqiao suddenly smiled happily. She looked around, grabbed a notebook from the desk, opened it, and wrote on a discarded math draft page with the light blue pen—

【Can you draw the moon?】

What? The moon? Bai Kou felt her sister was seriously underestimating her.

She answered “Of course” first, then suddenly stood up and went to the bookshelf. She tiptoed slightly and took down a black leather notebook from the very top.

It was filled with landscapes she had casually sketched with pencil before.

She “mm”d and flipped to a page, pointing at a hazy full moon amid the clouds. “See, I drew this the other day. Pretty good, right?”

Bai Yuqiao’s fingertip slowly slid over the full moon.

She nodded.

Snap. Bai Kou closed the leather notebook, sat back down, picked up a colored pencil, and stared seriously at Secret Garden, poised to immerse herself in her coloring project again.

Bai Yuqiao quickly wrote a line on the scrap paper.

She pushed it to Bai Kou—

【Draw a moon on my hand.】

Bai Kou blinked. “On my hand?”

Bai Yuqiao nodded and wrote more: 【Crescent moon, make it small.】

When they were little, Bai Kou would draw wristwatches on both sisters’ wrists. Yang Wanxi would always say “ugh, so ugly” while playing along with her “What time is it?” game.

Her sister, on the other hand, quietly watched her draw. There wasn’t much reaction after it was done, and by mealtime, Bai Xiaochu would take her to wash it off.

She didn’t expect her sister to suddenly reminisce about childhood now!

“Sure, no problem!” Bai Kou gladly accepted. She picked out blue, cyan, yellow, and white markers from the box, grabbed her sister’s hand tightly to prevent escape. “No backing out halfway!”

Bai Yuqiao nodded quietly.

Drip drop, drip drop.

From beyond the unclosed bedroom door came the sound of running water.

While focused on drawing on her sister’s wrist, Bai Kou muttered, “Is the faucet not turned off properly…?”

She worked with practiced skill, her strokes quick.

A crescent moon, entwining vines, a lone star in the sky… All done in just two minutes.

“Done!” Bai Kou straightened up with a proud smile, her eyes curving happily as she looked at Bai Yuqiao. “What do you think?”

Her sister didn’t look at the drawing, only at her eyes—steady and silent, like a lake undisturbed by wind, devoid of any emotion.

It gave Bai Kou a start. After two seconds of eye contact, she looked away first, tidied the pens on the desk uncertainly, and said, “If you don’t like it, you can wash it right off—”

Suddenly, her sister grabbed her wrist, released it, looked into her eyes, brought her pinky near her lips, then pinched her ear: 【Sister.】 Her expression was somewhat serious.

Gulp. Bai Kou inexplicably swallowed nervously. “Mm?”

【I don’t care what others say.】

Bai Yuqiao gestured, raised her newly moon-marked wrist, pointed at herself, interlaced her fingers toward Bai Kou, then released to point at Bai Kou’s heart: 【I’m yours.】

She curved her hands with hollow palms facing each other, index finger to lips: 【And Mom’s.】

Then she quickly signed a full sentence: 【I’m yours.】

Finally, her fingertip tapped the pattern on her wrist.

【I’m your moon.】

…Sister, are you comforting me? Why are you the one comforting me? Bai Kou’s throat tightened. She moved her lips, but her mind went blank, unsure what to say.

However, the next second, her sister added: 【But I was mad earlier.】

【You messaged that you’d pick me up.】

【You went out to play.】

【Didn’t come.】

“Ah… I…” Bai Kou was even more at a loss for words.

Then she saw her sister smile, rub her cheek with a fingertip, wrinkle her nose tip playfully for once, and sign: 【Naughty.】

After signing, her sister stood up as if to leave directly.

Bai Kou panicked and hurriedly grabbed Bai Yuqiao. “Sister, s-sorry, I…”

With her hand held, Bai Yuqiao stood quietly with her back to Bai Kou for a moment.

Finally, she turned, looked down at her sister. There seemed to be a hint of detachment in her eyes. She withdrew her hand and signed: 【You have to make it up to me.】

Bai Kou nodded repeatedly. “Of course, of course! I… Sister, you say! Anything goes! I’ll definitely do it!”

Bai Yuqiao ruffled her hair, slid her right hand over her heart, and made a “5.”

Bai Kou: “Mm! Friday! And then?”

【We’ll spend Christmas together.】

“Mm mm, spend Christmas together, sure… Wait, don’t you have evening self-study on Friday?”

Under Bai Kou’s puzzled gaze, Bai Yuqiao didn’t answer.

She merely gently brushed the back of her hand against her sister’s cheek.

【I’m off to bed. You sleep early too. Good night.】