Strawberry Kiss Mark (草莓印)🍓 by Bu Zhi Shi Ke Cai (不知是颗菜) ~Chapter 17

No, why does she stroking her head?

Why does she do it?

She unexpectedly strokes her head?!

Lu Xing Yan watches Chen Xing Ruo for few seconds and gasps in amazement. He just refutes unconsciously: “I am not……..”

Wang You Fu and other students are looking at him with their gazes that say: “No, you are.”

Lu Xing Yan likes to be late, get into fight, and skip the class. He has been getting a lot of detention by several teachers countless time. But he never feels that he is wronged.

He still wants to say something but that time he is perfectly speechless. He turns around to look at Chen Xing Ruo and notices that this ‘white peacock’ is roaming on top of the lotus flower on the pond.

———

Because of the tic-tac-toe, at first Wang You Fu would get into the conclusion quickly but now he has a new topic. No one knows why that day Wang You Fu is really passionate to express himself and to talk. He starts to talk, chatter, and critic Lu Xing Yan and 11.1’s naughty and mischievous male students.

From time to time, his words are powerful and resonating but his tone is full of resentment toward those students for failing to meet expectation; Occasionally he is talking endlessly without getting to the point. He asks them to change and transform themselves.

It just creates fifty students’ faces turn cold and detached.

After all, the school would deduct points for the naughty and mischievous students. If it keeps on happening, they would be dropped out. These insignificant teaching and critiques are much more frequent than menstruation.

But everyone knows that as long there’s no one to ‘ignite the fire’, the school wouldn’t drop them out. So the point deduction is just “ultimately useless luxurious set meal.”

So, could this anxious homeroom teacher just let them, young naive and kindhearted students, go home and have a meal????

———

In the afternoon 06:00 p.m.

Other classes’ student have gone home completely and 11.1 just be liberated.

Perhaps because this ‘liberation’ is too difficult to be achieved, the students just disperse quickly. They are afraid that Wang You Fu would remember something else so quickly. They are afraid that he would say: “Wait, I’ll talk for two minutes more”.

Chen Xing Ruo tidies up her backpack and notices that half of the class is empty.

She turns her head and looks at the cleaning duty table

Lu Xing Yan is quite good at memory. After being scolded by Chen Xing Ruo for two times, now he remembers very well.

After Wang You Fu announces the class is dismissed, he just goes to the cleaning room and takes the brooms. He gives one broom for Chen Xing Ruo’s broom.

Everyone is surprised. They don’t know whether it’s because of Wang You Fu’s long ‘lecture’ or because he wants to ‘wash his heart and renew his face’ or he wants to prove that he really doesn’t bully weak ‘Chen Dai Yu’.

———

Both of them are done cleaning up when it’s already 06:30 p.m.

The sunset glow is warm.

Grade 11 classrooms are empty, the sport fields are empty.

Both of them exit the school gate and don’t meet anyone that they know. So both of them don’t go separate way.

They both are walking while talking, Lu Xing Yan says: “This afternoon my ma called me, she said that today she would go to the saloon. She needs to several beauty treatments more, she would be home so late”

Chen Xing Ruo: “I know about it, Pei Yi (Auntie Pei) also would call me again.”

Pei Yue is doing this for coming to Chen Guang Yao’s wedding.

Lu Xing Yan and Chen Xing Ruo know about it clearly so they don’t really talk about it.

Liu Shu (Uncle Liu) stops the car on the corner of Shu Xiang road. Because of Wang You Fu’s ‘lecture’, he, who is the innocent person, has been waiting there for almost two hours.

Lu Xing Yan opens up the backseat door and signals using his hand to let Chen Xing Ruo gets in first.

Chen Xing Ruo glances at him.

Lu Xing Yan just stands on the side relaxedly and looks at her: “What are you looking at?”

Chen Xing Ruo is calm and says: “Great, you are quite gentleman.”

Lu Xing Yan smiles.

———

Di Jia Jing doesn’t go home for the weekend, she has made appointment with her friend from another class to go to the city center to eat out.

Both of them changes their clothes and comes out from the dorm. They would take a public transport.

At first they were chatting about the restaurant and joking around. Suddenly Di Jia Jing notices a car and watches it.

“….. Jing Jing, Jing Jing? What are you looking at?”

She is unfocused: “Ah, nothing. It seems I see my classmate.”

“Where?” That female student is curious too.

Di Jia Jing doesn’t answer and just looks at the car. She sees Lu Xing Yan is smiling and Lu Xing Yan closes the door. That car just leaves and disappears in front of her.

No one knows what she is thinking. She just straightens her lips and says nothing else.

———

The time they arrive back to the Lu Xing Hu’s house it’s already an hour later.

On Friday during the peak hour, the traffic jam is too heavy..

Liu Shu (Driver Liu) keeps on looking on his watch, Chen Xing Ruo and Lu Xing Yan notice it. They ask whether he is hurry.

He waves his hand and says nothing is matter.

Till they almost reach the mansion, he asks two of them: “What kind of cake flavor is more delicious?” —— He just leaks out that his young daughter is turning five this year. He promises to buy her little cotton-padded jacket and cake back home. He would celebrate her birthday together.

Liu Xing Yan: “Liu Shu, just stop the car here. It’ll be easier for you to make a turn. We could walk in.”

“But…”

Chen Xing Ruo also speaks up: “It’s okay, Liu Shu. Now the traffic would be worst. You should drive safely.”

He indeed feels so worried and wants to get home soon. So he just lets them get off in front of the mansion gate and turns around.

———

07:30 p.m., the sky is not yet fully dark.

But the lights around are on at 07:00 p.m., so it’s quite bright.

Lu Xing Yan and Che Xing Ruo walk front and back to pass the door.

Chen Xing Ruo suddenly speaks up: “Liu Shu is really good toward his daughter.”

Lu Xing Yan just answers casually: “He only has one precious daughter, of course he would be good to her.”

He doesn’t notice the change of mood in Chen Xing Ruo’s self. He continues: “The time Liu Shu was thirty years old, his oldest daughter passed away because of the car accident. That time his black hair just turned white. When he was forty years old, he just got a small daughter so he loves her so much.”

Chen Xing Ruo: “Oh.”

Lu Xing Yan glances at her and just notices something is wrong with her. He feels like he is saying something that he shouldn’t say.

He feels awkward: “Ay, I don’t mean that way.”

Chen Xing Ruo turns her head to look at him: “What do you mean?”

Lu Xing Yan: “…..”

———

They are not talking anymore. They enter the house, the house is so quiet.

Lu Xing Yan is too hungry and pretends to be calm. “Zhou Yi (Auntie Zhou), Auntie Zhou?”

Chen Xing Ruo puts down her backpack and gets into the kitchen. She looks around and comes out again. “Zhou Yi is not here. She also doesn’t prepare us any food.”

“What is this condition?”

Lu Xing Yan looks at his phone and notices that Pei Yue’s voice message, which she sent half hour ago. She said that Zhou Yi’s daughter-in-law is pregnant so she asked for a day leave. Pei Yue asked them to have dinner first before coming back home.

Lu Xing Yan is speechless, he sways his phone and says: “Ay, Da Xiao Jie (Big Miss), Zhou Yi asked for leave. Let’s order a takeaway. What do you want to eat?”

At first Chen Xing Ruo was a bit hungry, now she isn’t.

“Whatever, I could eat anything.”

Lu Xing Yan finds a random restaurant: “Stir-fried vegetable with three delicacies, aubergine braise in soy sauce, corn spareribs soup, steamed perch?”

Chen Xing Ruo nods.

The time he is done ordering, she says: “I didn’t expect you to eat so light flavor.”

Lu Xing Yan is ‘physically paralyzed’ on the sofa and playing with his phone. He doesn’t think too much and just asks: “Don’t you usually eat light flavor food?”

He says it and his movement just pauses

Chen Xing Ruo doesn’t feel there’s something wrong. Each one of them just return to their own bedroom and change out of their school uniform. Then they return to the living room and sit on the sofa.

It’s better when they are talking. When they are not talking, the atmosphere is very silent.

Chen Xing Ruo peels an orange and eats it while looking at the ceiling. When she just finishes half of it, she seems to remember something. She looks at Lu Xing Yan and asks: “Do you want some?”

Lu Xing Yan lifts up her eyes and says: “Em.” He takes it.

Chen Xing Ruo reminds him. “It’s a bit sour.”

Lu Xing Yan doesn’t think too much of it, he just stuffs it into his mouth a small bite ——

“…….”

D*mm*t, is this really a little sour.

How could she eat this sour thing without any change in expression?

Lu Xing Yan is questioning this trivial human question?

Chen Xing Ruo just watches him and for a moment he doesn’t know how should he act. He just feels that he also pretends that this thing is not sour so he just chews and swallows it.

A minute later, he is successful in swallowing it.

Chen Xing Ruo says calmly: “You are good at eating sour thing.”

Lu Xing Yan couldn’t determine whether she is mocking or complimenting or it’s just random expression.

Anyway now he feels like his body is losing it’s ability to move. He feels that night newspaper of Xing City could publish a headline: “Ming Li’s Grade 11’s student is losing his life because of eating too sour orange in the mansion”.

He says nothing, he also couldn’t say nothing. He just returns to his sofa without any expression.

After ten minutes, he just regains himself.

In ten minutes, Chen Xing Ruo has successfully finished another orange.

But maybe because orange could stimulate appetite, she feels that she is hungry. She raises her head and asks: “How long would it take for the takeaway to arrive?”

Lu Xing Yan picks up his phone and says calmly: “Now it’s a peak hour. A lot of people are ordering food. Supposedly it would be a little late.”

He sounds reasonable so Chen Xing Ruo accepts his

After half an hour, she asks her once again: “Is it coming?”

Lu Xing Yan is also feeling so hungry that he ‘see stars’, but he couldn’t show it in front of this ‘white peacock’.

He looks at her and says disapprovingly: “Why are you so worried? I would take a look where is he now?”

Suddenly there’s a dead silence.

Lu Xing Yan looks at the phone intensely and just sits up.

D*mm*t, it’s too unscientific.

How could this order just stops in the payment page. It doesn’t show that it has exceeded the time to pay so the order is cancelled?!

Chen Xing Ruo looks at him for a while, she questions him.

Lu Xing Yan puts down his phone, he has digested what have happened. He is deliberating on what excuse he should make: “Maybe you would not believe me, I forget to make the payment.”

“……..”

Chen Xing Ruo turns silence three seconds: “No, with your IQ, I believe you.”

Lu Xing Yan has no way to debate, he just says: “Okay, my own fault. Let’s go out and eat.”