The Little Duck 71

Chapter 71

Because she didn’t have much to do, after returning to Nanjiang, Jian Xin and Yan Lu’s schedules were briefly normal for a few days. They would go to bed early at night and wake up early during the day.

On New Year’s Eve, they had to put up the spring couplets. This year’s spring couplets, like in previous years, were handwritten by an auntie from Huang He’s workplace.

Her calligraphy was very beautiful, and it was always a pleasure to see them posted on the door.

But Huang He said that this was the last year. When she retired, she would be too embarrassed to ask for spring couplets again.

She said, then called out to Jian Changjiang, “You and Xin Xin go out and put them up.”

Just as Jian Changjiang had stood up from the sofa, Yan Lu had already walked to the door with transparent tape and scissors. “Jian Xin and I can do it!”

Huang He: “Then you two go.”

Jian Changjiang took a moment to process, and subconsciously wanted to go forward to help, but seeing the two girls happily carrying a stool out, as if they didn’t need a third person, he silently sat back down.

Outside the door, Jian Xin stood on the small stool and glanced at the spring couplets.

Wealth, luck, and fortune.

No worries, no troubles.

Horizontal scroll: Just be happy.

“Whoa! Auntie Zhang’s style of spring couplets has changed so much this year. In previous years, wasn’t it always ‘smooth sailing’ and ‘everything goes as you wish’?” Jian Xin said, shaking open the two spring couplets and showing them to Yan Lu. “Why is it like this this year?”

Yan Lu looked at them seriously and smiled. “Isn’t this very good?”

“Indeed, I like it very much!” Jian Xin nodded, her gaze a little dazed. “Which one is the first line?”

“They seem about the same,” Yan Lu thought for a moment and pointed to the one with “fortune.” “Should this one be on the left?”

“Okay!” Jian Xin replied, and handed the other one to Yan Lu first.

Yan Lu stood a little further back and started to help her see if the position was straight.

“Is it straight?”

“A little to the left.”

“Like this?”

“Too much, a little more to the right…”

“Like this?”

“Mmm!” Yan Lu cut a piece of transparent tape and stuck it to the back of Jian Xin’s hand with a corner.

As the two of them were putting them up, Xin Xin and Cauliflower squeezed out from the crack in the door and circled around them until the spring couplets were up, and then they were led back into the house like they were coaxing children.

“Xin Xin, come!” Huang He called from the bedroom.

Jian Xin subconsciously wanted to go forward, but before she could even take a step, she saw the dog beside her wagging its little tail like a feather duster, and with its four short little legs, it hopped to the door of her parents’ bedroom.

Huang He also walked to the door, holding a bone-shaped chew toy that she had bought at some point, and started to tease Xin Xin.

Jian Xin: “…”

Yan Lu laughed unkindly on the side.

Jian Xin put her hands on her hips and sighed. “Mom, why don’t you call me something else? One name for two uses, I can’t react.”

Huang He looked up at her. “Change to what?”

Jian Xin: “Anyway, if you call Xin Xin in the future, I don’t want to answer anymore.”

Huang He: “Jian Xin?”

Jian Xin: “…”

Why do I suddenly feel like standing at attention when I’m called by my full name?

Forget it, forget it, it’s just a name. It’s fine to be casual.

The chew toy that Huang He had bought was very popular with Xin Xin. Once it started chewing on it, it wouldn’t let go. The moment Huang He let go, it ran to the bedroom with it in its mouth, as if afraid that someone would come and snatch it.

For breakfast, Huang He cooked douhua noodles.

The douhua was just bought outside this morning, fresh out of the pot, and served with a homemade dipping sauce with a hint of fish fragrance, which tasted even better than the ones in the restaurants.

After breakfast, Jian Xin and Yan Lu both rested for a while, and only then did they call Xin Xin and Cauliflower to go downstairs for a walk.

Before they went out, Xin Xin was so engrossed in chewing on the chew toy that Yan Lu had to call it several times before it ran out with the thing in its mouth.

It was very clear that this brand new chew toy was, for the time being, a little more fun than a duck. Cauliflower had been out of favor for a long time, and at this moment, with its wings on its back, it had a look of disdain.

Jian Xin crouched down, took the stick out of its mouth, and seeing it whining and wanting to snatch it back, she couldn’t help but gently tap its little head with this thing. “It’s not that I’m not giving it to you. Let’s go downstairs first, and I’ll give it back to you when we come back!”

She said, then placed the chew toy on the shoe cabinet by the door—a position that Xin Xin could definitely not reach.

Xin Xin let out an aggrieved whimper, and after being put on a leash by Yan Lu, the moment it went out, it was full of energy again.

A dog’s joys and angers are just that simple.

When it’s time to eat, when there are toys, or when it can go out, it can be very happy.

A little over an hour later, the two of them returned home with the duck and dog.

Unlike usual, today’s Cauliflower was carried all the way back by Jian Xin.

Jian Xin didn’t know if it was a hallucination, but she always felt that Cauliflower was not very happy walking today. It seemed to feel that the dog that was running so fast in front was bullying a duck. After chasing it a few times, it slowed down, and as if in a huff, it flapped its little wings in a very messy rhythm on the spot, and it was also quacking.

Although she couldn’t understand, the emotion was very in place, and it made people feel that it was just unhappy.

This little one was now an existence that needed to be worshipped for Jian Xin.

So she, without a second thought, directly crouched down, picked up Cauliflower into her arms, and coaxed it all the way, her attitude so pious.

Yan Lu, who was watching on the side, couldn’t help but ask her, “Are you trying to please it?”

“I guess so, it can also be considered a kind of metaphysics,” Jian Xin said, talking about something that was not very relevant. “Just like some people say that the probability of getting a good card is higher if you squat on the toilet, I always feel that if I coax Cauliflower well, the probability of turning into a duck will be much smaller.”

She was always like this, sometimes a little superstitious, and Yan Lu was also used to it, and would occasionally think along with her.

Sometimes Yan Lu would think, this little duck that she had taken home from a kind person, could it really have some particularly amazing identity.

She didn’t know if it was because of a mother’s eye, but Yan Lu did feel that Cauliflower seemed to be a little smarter than other ducks.

And looking at everything that had happened to Jian Xin, the more she thought about it, the more she felt that her own duck was not simple.

But such a not-so-simple duck, how did it come to her home?

She had actually secretly asked Cauliflower in the dead of night, but Cauliflower just looked like it didn’t understand anything, and she had not gotten any answer.

Jian Xin’s situation of turning into a duck had been alleviated, but there was still no solution.

They had prayed at a temple, and they had also asked for a consecrated Buddhist bead bracelet, but they had never found the root cause and could only continue to make do like this.

Actually, Yan Lu had thought about whether she should ask someone to find some spirit mediums, mediums, or sorcerers to come to her home to perform some rituals and see if it would be effective.

But in the end, she had been rejected by Jian Xin.

Jian Xin always felt that even though it would bring some trouble to her life, Cauliflower had helped them a lot after all, and it would be bad if she really found someone to hurt it.

Yan Lu thought about it and felt that it was true, so she no longer struggled with these things and just let everything take its course.

But today, on the way to walk Xin Xin and Cauliflower, Jian Xin had once again brought up this problem.

She said that after they had decided to get back together, the frequency of her turning into a duck seemed to have decreased a lot.

Is there a possibility that this curse of turning into a duck was actually to set them up.

Now that they were together, this curse had not yet been lifted. Could it be because there were still unfulfilled promises between them?

Yan Lu was taken aback for a moment and asked back, “What promises?”

“For example…” Jian Xin said with a grin, “we haven’t been to see the sea together yet.”

Yan Lu had every right to suspect that this person was actually using the name of turning into a duck to go on a trip.

But this time, Jian Xin really thought so.

She said that she had had a dream.

Jian Xin: “In the dream, you were standing on the beach alone, your back so lonely, as if you were waiting for me.”

Yan Lu: “You’re quite a dreamer, so narcissistic even in your dreams.”

Jian Xin: “Then what were you thinking when you were looking at the sea alone?”

Yan Lu: “…”

Faced with this question, Yan Lu was silent for a long time before she said softly, “I was thinking of you…”

“Then isn’t that it?”

“I was thinking that you’re a big liar.”

“…”

Yan Lu said that when she was looking at the sea alone, she was shocked by the vastness of the world, and she was as small as a speck of dust in the world.

And the promises of the past were just a brief moment in the speck of dust, and they were not worth mentioning at all.

But she just felt that Jian Xin was a big liar, who always made such big promises, but in the end, she couldn’t keep them, which made people believe in some unfulfilled promises with all their strength in their foolish years.

Actually, she knew that Jian Xin had already done very well. In her half-dead state back then, someone else might not have been able to do better.

But she just wanted to curse Jian Xin in her heart.

It was as if by cursing like this, and thinking more about the other person’s bad points in her heart, there would be a day when she could completely let go of her.

“Oh…” Jian Xin pursed her lips and nodded in agreement. “That’s how it is.”

Indeed, that’s how it is.

In the years after they had broken up, she had also been trying to find all of Yan Lu’s flaws, wishing she could magnify them to the point of being dazzling, to prove that she was actually better off without her.

So in her heart, Yan Lu was cold, ruthless, and a woman with a heart of stone that she couldn’t win back with any amount of tears.

She had told herself countless times in her heart that Yan Lu had never liked her, and that the initial confession was just a kind of illusion created in her protection and companionship.

Actually, in the days when she had just reunited with Yan Lu, she had also thought so.

If it weren’t for the fact that she had personally stumbled upon the past traces that had always been with Yan Lu but were deeply hidden, she would not have known that this “cold and ruthless” woman, just like her, was calm on the surface, but in reality, had never truly let go of the past that belonged only to them for so many years.

“Then should we go to see the sea? I said after the New Year, I heard that the winter in Haicheng is not cold,” Jian Xin asked, and couldn’t help but mutter, “You’ve already gone to see it by yourself, and I haven’t.”

“Okay,” Yan Lu replied softly.

And then they took the two little ones back home.

On New Year’s Eve, they rarely shrank back to their own small rooms, but sat on the sofa, eating fruits, cracking melon seeds, and holding the duck and dog, and watched the Spring Festival Gala with their parents.

The Spring Festival Gala is getting more and more boring now.

In a very distant memory, a family watching the Spring Festival Gala would all be laughing at the TV.

Now it’s different. What really makes people laugh are the silly netizens who are watching the Spring Festival Gala together on Weibo.

The jokes about the Spring Festival Gala are much funnier than the Spring Festival Gala itself.

Jian Xin read them to her family one after another, and the laughter also filled the entire living room.

When the Spring Festival Gala was almost at an end, her parents took out their phones and started to send red envelopes in the [Family] group.

This was an old tradition. The number of red envelopes sent was the same as the number of people in the family, and everyone, including the person who sent the red envelope, had to grab one to see who had the best luck.

Ever since Yan Lu had quietly disappeared, the number of red envelopes sent in the family every year had become only three.

But this year, the red envelopes had become four again.

After Jian Xin had subconsciously grabbed one, she found that there was one extra red envelope that no one had grabbed, and she subconsciously looked up at Yan Lu.

“Xiao Lu, come and grab a red envelope,” Huang He said before she could.

Yan Lu was taken aback for a moment, and it took her three seconds to come back to her senses. “Ah? I… I’m not in the group.”

The WeChat account from before had been lost along with the phone from before, and now she couldn’t log in even if she wanted to.

Jian Xin, without a second thought, pulled her current account into the group.

And so the number of group members went from 4 to 5—and two of them were Yan Lu.

“What a big face, one radish, two pits~~” Jian Xin said casually, and the next second, with a tap of her finger, she had grabbed six yuan from a two-hundred-yuan red envelope.

At the same time, from the same red envelope, Yan Lu had grabbed over one hundred and forty, and was the king of luck.

Jian Xin: “Ahhh ahhh ahhh!”

Yan Lu: “What a dark face, grabbing six yuan from a two-hundred-yuan red envelope~~”

This was intentional, definitely intentional!

This person had even imitated her tone just now, ahhh ahhh ahhh, her mentality had exploded!

As if to comfort their own daughter, Huang He and Jian Changjiang sent a few more red envelopes, and it wasn’t until Jian Xin finally got the king of luck once that they finally stopped.

The sound of the fireworks outside was gradually getting so loud that you couldn’t hear the sound of the Spring Festival Gala.

Jian Xin lowered her head, stared at her black-screened phone for a long while, and after hesitating for who knows how many times, she finally mustered up the courage to say the words that had been on her mind for a long time.

“Dad, Mom… actually, actually, Yan Lu and I are together.”

Huang He’s and Jian Changjiang’s gazes both turned to her at that moment.

Yan Lu also couldn’t help but widen her eyes, clearly not expecting Jian Xin to suddenly bring up such a thing at a time like this.

But actually, a long time ago, Jian Xin had wanted to tell her parents these words.

But before she could even open her mouth, Yan Lu was no longer by her side.

This time, she had seriously thought about the consequences, and she felt that she could bear them no matter what.

She hoped that this relationship between her and Yan Lu was something that did not need to be hidden, and that could stand in the sunlight.

So at this moment, she mustered up her courage, and in front of Yan Lu, she confessed everything to her parents.

After a long silence, Huang He asked back, “What do you mean? You’re only telling us after you’ve gotten the red envelope?”

Jian Xin: “Uh…”

Yan Lu: “…”

Huang He: “Do you two think you’ve hidden it well?”

Jian Changjiang, on the other hand, shook his head, clearly not surprised at all.

Jian Xin opened her mouth, speechless for a moment.

Yan Lu: “Auntie, Uncle…”

Huang He: “Now that it’s out in the open, are you still not going to change the way you address us?”

Yan Lu quickly reacted, hesitated, and tentatively, she spoke again, “Dad, Mom?”

Huang He pouted and suddenly stood up.

Jian Xin and Yan Lu were so scared that they didn’t dare to make a sound.

However, the next second, she just asked loudly, “Do you want to go to the rooftop to set off fireworks!”

Jian Xin also asked back loudly, “You still bought this?”

Huang He: “Of course! Your dad knew it would be lively this year, so he specially bought them!”

And so, amidst the sound of fireworks, Jian Xin pulled Yan Lu, and followed her parents, and happily climbed up to the rooftop.

The fuse was lit, and they covered their ears, watching their own fireworks shoot up into the sky and bloom in this brilliant night sky of fireworks.

The sound of the fireworks was so loud that it seemed like it could drown out everything.

But Yan Lu suddenly leaned closer to Jian Xin’s ear and said softly to her, “Did you know, the first time I saw you was actually in junior high, on the roof of the academic building.”

This sentence was so light, yet so clear.

Jian Xin was taken aback for a moment. When she came back to her senses, Yan Lu was no longer by her side, but had been called over to the unlit fireworks by Huang He, and was cautiously trying to light the fuse.

Huang He protected her as she ran back, and the fireworks exploded with a “bang,” accompanied by their completely unrestrained laughter, lively and beautiful.

Jian Xin looked at this scene and couldn’t help but think, Yan Lu’s secrets are a little too many.

But it doesn’t matter. A lifetime is long, and she will slowly get to know her.

Before that, she had to give her a present first.

They finished setting off the fireworks, slowly returned home, ate a meal of dumplings made by Huang He, and went back to their own small room.

“Yan Lu, I have something for you.”

Jian Xin said, and mysteriously opened the wardrobe, and then opened one of the drawers.

Yan Lu watched on the side with some curiosity.

The next second, Jian Xin turned around, and two tightly hugged, fluffy little duck pendants hung from her fingertips.

“Ta-da!” she hummed a tune of something making a grand entrance, and hopped to Yan Lu in two steps.

Yan Lu stared blankly at the two little ducks.

Perhaps they had been hidden in the cabinet for some days, and their fluff was a little messy.

They were clearly two pendants, but their heads were touching, and they were hugging each other, well-behaved and cute.

Yan Lu remembered them. A long, long time ago, they had also been placed in a messy suitcase.

Jian Xin: “Are they cute?”

Yan Lu: “Mmm.”

Jian Xin smiled. “I wanted to give you one back in my junior year of university.”

She said that because someone had missed the concert, she had stuffed them into her suitcase.

When they had met on May Day, she should have given them away, but she had forgotten in a fit of pique.

When Yan Lu had left back then, she had deliberately separated the two little ducks, one on the far left of the suitcase, and one on the far right, as if to say—they would be in different places from then on.

She had been so angry at that time that she had directly left the pair of ducks at the homestay.

So many years had passed, and she still thought they were so cute.

So she had bought another pair, hoping that this time, they would each have one, and they would never lose them again.

The two little ducks were of different colors, one pure white, and one beige.

Their two beady eyes seemed to be looking at their new owner very seriously.

Yan Lu’s nose tingled for a moment. She silently chose the beige one, placed it in her hand, and gently smoothed its soft fur.

She said that she liked it very much.

Actually, those two little ducks, she had remembered them for a long time.

And even for a long time after, every time she thought of them, she would regret not having taken one directly.

Of course, the regret was because she felt that if they had continued to stay with Jian Xin, they might have been hugging each other every day again.

Jian Xin couldn’t help but laugh after hearing this.

She asked, “Then does your raising this duck have anything to do with this?”

Yan Lu just looked at her, sat on the bed, and said with a smile, “Guess.”

Jian Xin sat down beside Yan Lu, let the two little ducks hug each other again, and muttered, “I’m very narcissistic. If you want me to guess, then it does.”

Yan Lu did not refute, just looked at her with a smile, a faint smile in her eyes, as if it were some kind of invitation.

The lights were dim, and the night was very deep.

The little duck in the cardboard box sighed silently and closed its eyes.

—Sigh, these two really, there’s still a duck in the room, and they don’t even know how to be a little more discreet!