My Girlfriend is a Cold and Aloof Sickly Beauty 132

Chapter 132: We Can Officially Start Dating Now 

“Xiao Luo didn’t come today either?” Jiang Xue asked, handing her bag to Sister Cheng and following her to the car.

Sister Cheng hesitated for a moment before replying, “Eldest Miss didn’t want her to come… but Xiao Luo insisted on coming to pick you up today since she missed yesterday.”

Jiang Xue paused, then wasn’t surprised that Xiao Luo would think that way.

If it weren’t for the pain from taking on the tribulation, Xiao Luo wouldn’t have missed a single pickup during the three days of her college entrance exam.

She got in the car with Sister Cheng. The air conditioning was on, and Xiao Luohan was curled up in the back seat, wrapped in a small blanket.

Seeing her eyes closed and her brow furrowed, Jiang Xue quickly closed the door and went over to her, first checking her forehead with the back of her hand to make sure she didn’t have a fever, then gently massaging her temples.

Sister Cheng started the car. As they turned a corner, Xiao Luohan, using the inertia, leaned against Jiang Xue, not wanting to move.

Since Sister Cheng was present, Jiang Xue resisted the urge to be more affectionate and silently massaged Xiao Luohan’s temples throughout the journey.

Xiao Luo must have taken on the headache she had experienced while doing the math test today. She must be exhausted.

As soon as they arrived home, she helped Xiao Luohan upstairs, intending to let her lie down in bed for a while.

Xiao Luohan didn’t refuse, letting her do as she pleased.

But just as Jiang Xue stood up to wash her face, Xiao Luohan couldn’t help but ask softly, “Are you okay?”

“…Shouldn’t I be the one asking you that?” Jiang Xue immediately sat back down, then answered, “This year’s math paper was truly very difficult, probably the most difficult in the past five years. But I think I did okay, I finished it seriously.”

Instead of “confidence,” Xiao Luohan sensed more of a “calmness” in her tone, a rational judgment based on a clear understanding of her own abilities.

She didn’t ask further, only nodding seriously and offering her sincere wishes: “You’ll definitely get good results.”

Jiang Xue washed her face to relax her eyes, tidied up a bit, and then went downstairs for lunch.

When she came back upstairs, she brought a bowl of black rice and peanut porridge for Xiao Luo—Xiao Luohan always lost her appetite for greasy food when she wasn’t feeling well, preferring light porridge with naturally fragrant ingredients.

She even wanted to feed Xiao Luo, but Xiao Luo glared at her and snatched the bowl. “Have you memorized all the English essays yet?”

There were two types of essays for the English college entrance exam: one was translating and expanding on a given passage, and the other was an argumentative essay, similar to the Chinese essay, with a standard format.

Compared to the rigid argumentative essay, Jiang Xue preferred the translation essay, but that also meant encountering more unfamiliar vocabulary, and the content was basically limited by the given passage, so the model essays and examples she had memorized were mostly useless.

“Of course I have!” Jiang Xue muttered softly, turned around, took the booklet of model essays she had compiled and printed from the bookshelf, and placed it in front of Xiao Luohan. “Do you want to quiz me?”

Xiao Luohan choked on her porridge and started coughing.

Jiang Xue hurriedly patted her back. “I’m just kidding! I’ll definitely review them again later!”

She thought that although Xiao Luo had learned a lot since arriving here, her English was probably still basic, and asking her to quiz her on model essays was a bit much.

But Xiao Luohan placed the booklet on the bed. “I’ll quiz you after I finish eating.”

She deliberately emphasized “quiz you,” and Jiang Xue, realizing what she meant, blushed and coughed lightly. “That… I’m not into BDSM…”

“I’m talking about quizzing you on the essays,” Xiao Luohan said calmly, scooping up the remaining porridge and drinking it.

Teasing Jiang Xue was quite fun, but unfortunately, there was still the last exam tomorrow, so she couldn’t tease her too much today.

She quickly finished the porridge, casually flipped through the model essays, found one she liked, and started reading the beginning clearly.

Jiang Xue then realized that Xiao Luo’s pronunciation was actually quite good!

When had she improved so much?!

After reciting the essay, Jiang Xue couldn’t help but pester Xiao Luohan for an explanation.

“It’s thanks to Teacher Sui,” Xiao Luohan answered truthfully. “Teacher Sui used to teach and administer exams for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language at the university. I just asked tentatively, and she agreed, and she didn’t even charge me, it was ‘teaching out of interest.'”

So during the guqin lessons, or during their breaks, they would often have conversations in English.

Teacher Sui was a good teacher, very patient. Xiao Luohan had initially been embarrassed to speak, feeling that her pronunciation was strange, but with Teacher Sui’s constant encouragement and corrections, she had unknowingly improved a lot over the past six months.

“Besides spoken English, I can basically understand high school level texts now,” Xiao Luohan said with a smile. “Don’t forget what the first ‘big gift’ you gave me was.”

If she hadn’t mentioned it, Jiang Xue would have almost buried that “dark history” deep in her memory.

Who would give an English-Chinese Dictionary as a first gift to a transtemporal pen pal?! And such a thick one at that!

She had regretted it after sending the gift—it meant that her pen pal could just look up unfamiliar words in the dictionary instead of asking her.

Jiang Xue awkwardly looked away, thinking about how to respond, when she heard Xiao Luohan continue, “I really liked that gift.”

It was one of the first things that enlightened her about this world. From then on, she understood that even women could learn so much, not for the sake of “bonus points” for marriage, but because the world wanted girls to achieve their full potential.

She liked it very much, so she was willing to put in her best effort in learning everything about this world.

Her genuine, bright smile unknowingly dispelled the slight knot in Jiang Xue’s heart.

So that’s why, Xiao Luo liked her gift so much!

She secretly breathed a sigh of relief and smiled back. “Then I have to thank Teacher Sui properly after the exam.”

Since the end of winter break, she had been busy preparing for various exams and hadn’t been able to participate much in Xiao Luo’s progress and growth, only having some conversations with her before bed. The biggest contributor to Xiao Luo’s journey was actually Teacher Sui.

After being quizzed on a dozen or so model essays, Jiang Xue drank a glass of warm water, took out a practice test, and started timing herself.

Although both English and Chinese belonged to the liberal arts category, Jiang Xue felt that Chinese required more focused review, while English was more like “you’ll naturally get better with more exposure.” After all, the non-listening sections of the English exam were mostly reading comprehension, so the more vocabulary and grammar you knew, the easier the test became.

She was actually more looking forward to the “CET-4 and CET-6” exams in university. Her older sister still had the past papers in her study, and the question types were more diverse than the college entrance exam.

Although the English review was relatively relaxed, Jiang Xue didn’t dare slack off during this final stage. She did listening practice for two hours before going to bed and even planned to do another set for twenty minutes in the morning to “warm up her ears.”

Xiao Luohan, having slept for most of the day, was now energetic, but she knew she couldn’t disturb Jiang Xue’s rest, so after Jiang Xue turned off the lights, she also closed her eyes to rest.

But less than an hour later, she heard Jiang Xue murmur, “Xiao Luo?”

“What is it?”

“Nothing, it’s just the last exam, I can’t sleep.” Realizing that she was still awake, Jiang Xue turned over, her eyes gazing at her in the darkness.

Xiao Luohan turned on the small bedside lamp, and the soft, warm orange light enveloped them.

“Are you nervous?” she asked.

“Not entirely…” Jiang Xue propped herself up on her arms. “I think it’s more the excitement of being ‘completely liberated.'”

And a bit of anxiety about the unknown future.

“After the exam today, when I came back, I saw everyone tearing up their books and test papers, celebrating,” Jiang Xue recalled. She had been holding this in all day and could finally share it with her girlfriend. “I guess there will be more tearing tomorrow.”

In her opinion, this was like smashing a cake on someone’s birthday. She didn’t know when this trend started, but her peers seemed to enjoy it.

“If you also want to tear them up, I’ll join you,” Xiao Luohan offered.

“I won’t use that to vent my frustration!” Jiang Xue chuckled. “I even kept my elementary school Chinese textbooks, although they’re stored in the attic now.”

Influenced by Ms. Wei, she cherished her textbooks, seeing them as a record of her past. After all, textbooks were revised every few years, and her elementary school textbooks had been “out of print” for many years.

Of course, there was no need to keep the workbooks. Sister Cheng would always deal with them after each graduation, turning them into a small amount of pocket money, which she would transfer to Jiang Xue’s account.

Seeing Xiao Luohan lost in thought, Jiang Xue put an arm around her neck. “Don’t think too much, we can plan after the exam, and I think A-Xi will also have some ideas.”

Although she hadn’t interacted much with Xie Xitong these past two days—Xie Xitong would enter a strange state during major exams and snap at anyone who disturbed her—she had already seen Xie Xitong change her WeChat username from “XiXi Can’t Move (College Entrance Exam Sprint Edition)” to “XiXi Xixi Xixi Xixi.” And since English was Xie Xitong’s strong suit, she must be very relaxed today.

Xiao Luohan thought for a moment. “Then… do you want to hear about my summer vacation plans?”

Her so-called “plans” were just a list of the promises she had made, jokingly or seriously, recorded in her notes app, similar to what Jiang Xue had listed during the Qingming Festival holiday.

But Jiang Xue listened attentively and added what she considered the most important point: “We can officially start dating.”

Although they had confirmed their relationship almost half a year ago, they had used their studies as an excuse, their intimacy limited to touching.

Neither of them mentioned it, nor explored further. They tacitly guarded the final line, even though crossing it wouldn’t necessarily change anything drastically, but young people always insisted on these strange “rituals.”

Xiao Luohan also understood this. That’s why, even though she had already found out what that pink dolphin was on the day it arrived, she had continued to pretend to be oblivious, only placing it on the sink as a prank, driven by her desire to tease Jiang Xue.

She was truly curious and wanted to know how Jiang Xue would introduce it to her after tomorrow’s last exam, her tone, expression, and wording.