This attire and overall appearance, paired with her exquisite features, truly stirred Yang Haoran’s heart. Yet, recalling the scenes from noon, his heart gradually cooled. He frowned slightly: “You were the one who asked to meet me?”
“Mm-hm!”
Xiao Shaowan gave a slight nod, her clear eyes fixed intently on the youth before her, as if afraid his figure might vanish from her sight. Her voice was somewhat cool, yet seemed to carry an indescribable complexity of emotion: “You hid it too well. I never once thought it would be you.”
“Xie!”
At this word, Yang Haoran immediately fell into silence. After a short while, he slowly walked to her side, and together they looked down at the scenery below. The figures downstairs were indistinct, their faces unclear, their genders indistinguishable. A gentle breeze brushed against the youth’s cheek, like a lover’s caress, tender and soft.
After a long while, Yang Haoran seemed to have found resolution and said slowly: “What difference does it make now, whether it is or isn’t? The little bird in the cage has already spread its wings, ready to fly.”
Xiao Shaowan seemed not to hear these words at all. “Still, I am a bit curious. How did you find out?” Yang Haoran slightly turned his head to look at the girl’s cool and beautiful profile.
“You were the one who told me.”
Xiao Shaowan’s cool voice was calm and unhurried: “From the fragments of past conversations with Xie, I concluded long ago that you were a student at Yulin High School. But the scope was too large; I still couldn’t find you.”
“I saved every single chat log. I analyzed them again and again, narrowing down the scope each time, until finally it was reduced to just our class. Even then, I suspected many boys in our class, but I never once suspected you.”
Xiao Shaowan turned her head slightly, her starry, profound eyes gazing at Yang Haoran. Her expression revealed an elusive complexity of emotion, as if she were re-evaluating the youth before her.
The boy in this class who had repeatedly paid her attentions and the Xie online formed a stark contrast; they seemed like two completely different people.
Xie was domineering, cold, mysterious, and possessed perverted desires. Yang Haoran had poor grades, was an academic failure, had a flighty personality, and was thick-skinned, but overall seemed more like an innocent youth.
Anyone who had seen how Yang Haoran acted towards her before would think the youth clearly harbored an infatuation for her, appearing as if he dreamed of nothing more than having her.
Precisely because of this, it misled her earlier self, causing her to rule him out early on. To Xie, she was his pet, kept in captivity. He could have her effortlessly; it was utterly impossible for him to behave like the youth before her.
“And then?” Yang Haoran felt he had hidden himself quite well and looked at her curiously.
“Xie, his demeanor during chats was very aggressive, very domineering, and also possessed a suffocating sense of possessiveness.”
Xiao Shaowan spoke dispassionately, as if it had nothing to do with her: “He would not tolerate me, his captive pet, having intimate relations with others. So I found Han Hongfei, arranged to walk with him on the sports field, letting all the classmates see it with their own eyes.”
“When the news reached Xie’s ears, no matter how well he was hiding, I was certain that upon hearing this, he wouldn’t be able to stay seated.”
“A few boys who were pursuing me came to question me during that time. I tested them; they didn’t understand what I was saying.” “I thought it would take another three to five days for Xie to appear, or that I would incur Xie’s punishment. I never imagined your possessiveness would exceed my expectations.” Xiao Shaowan took a deep look at the youth before her.
“At noon, from the moment you appeared, I observed your every word and action, including testing you with my words. I was sure you understood what I was saying. But even then, I still couldn’t believe it was you. Hence, that note, and also you, just now, confirmed it for me.”
As she spoke, Xiao Shaowan suddenly let out a light laugh, as if surprised that Xie could be so “foolish.”
Hearing this, Yang Haoran was slightly stunned. So that was it.
He had been “tricked” by her!
“You went through all this trouble to find me for what? I don’t owe you anything, do I?”
His identity was exposed. Although unexpected, Yang Haoran remained composed, because in this unequal relationship, he held absolute authority.
“Yes, you don’t owe me anything. On the contrary, one could say I owe you.”
Xiao Shaowan’s expression was complex.
“I am very grateful to you. At the same time, that doesn’t stop me from also hating you.”
These words seemed abstract, but Xiao Shaowan’s cool voice carried a tone of gritted teeth. As if recalling something, the look she directed at the youth held an added note of hatred.
As the instigator, Yang Haoran understood what she meant. He felt no shame and said with composure: “From the very beginning, I told you, there’s no such thing as a free lunch in this world. To gain something, you must pay something.”
“Don’t forget, who saved your mother? Who provided the carefree life you have now?”
Though his actions were somewhat sordid, he felt he had done nothing to be ashamed of towards her.
“Yes, I am very grateful to you. Even though I said it online, now, face to face, I still want to say to you a belated thank you.” Though she said thank you, there was no trace of gratitude on Xiao Shaowan’s beautiful face.
She could not forget what the youth before her had done to her, how he had changed her life and changed herself.
After she finished speaking, the two of them fell into a temporary silence, each understanding the other’s meaning.
After a long while, Xiao Shaowan slowly began to narrate.
“I was born in a remote village. On the day my mother gave birth to me, my father was working away from home. He got the news and was rushing back when he was accidentally hit and killed by a passing car. At that time, the gossipy women in the village all said I was a jinx, that I had caused my father’s death.”
Xiao Shaowan gazed at the distant, gradually disappearing sunset, murmuring her story: “Because of this, my grandparents never treated me well from childhood. They also believed I had caused their son’s death, and even more so because I was a girl, unable to carry on their family line.”
“Fortunately, I still had my mother. My mother paid no heed to the village gossip. When I was seven, despite my grandparents’ opposition, she sent me to school. She, a widow, raising me alone was already very difficult, yet she still had to pay for my schooling. And my so-called grandparents not only didn’t give her a shred of help during that time, they even frequently beat and scolded her and me.”
“I still don’t know how my mother made it through those days. In my memory, she went out to work very early, and I still wouldn’t see her back by evening. Sometimes late at night, I would be woken by the noise of her returning, and only then would I get to see her.”
“Although my mother was a farm woman, she had strong ideas. She told me from a young age that only studying could allow me to escape that home, escape that environment. She encouraged me to study hard, and I lived up to her expectations by testing into this school.”
“My mother and I left that home because of this, and we never planned to return. She took temporary jobs in the city to cover our daily expenses. Occasionally during holidays, I would go to help her. Originally, if life had continuedๅนณๆทกๅฐ like that, I would have been quite content.”
“Until that day arrived. She had taken the meager wages her boss gave her and was coming to bring me my living expenses.”
Remembering that period, Xiao Shaowan looked into the distance. The afterglow of the setting sun dyed the horizon magnificently andๅฃฎ่ง, yet her sparkling eyes shimmered and gradually welled with tears: “On her way here, she was hit by a car that ran a red light. The hospital treatment required a high cost. The hit-and-run driver fled. How could a girl who had just started high school possibly have that much money?”
“I was in utter despair then. I even remembered the words from the village: that I was a jinx, that I had caused my father’s death, and now I was about to cause my mother’s death. I thought about ending my own life, but I couldn’t abandon my mother who had given everything for me. She was a woman with a tragic fate. She was still lying in bed, waiting for me to save her. How could I cowardly commit suicide and escape?”