(1)
Run. Sprint.
The small city was also big like that.
Streetlights and roadside trees were falling backward in rows.
The bustling shops lined up in queues turned into cold, desolate old streets with closed doors.
She kept running forward, not knowing where the destination was, just feeling that she could leave this saddest place forever this way.
“Hey! Wait a second!” A somewhat abrupt voice rang out, and then a soft but powerful little hand suddenly pressed down on Zhu Ying’s shoulder. “Wait, wait! Stop running. How long have you been running? Aren’t you freaking tired?”
The moment Zhu Ying stopped, the fatigue and lack of oxygen surged up all at once.
She supported her knees with both hands, panting like a broken bellows.
“Haa… Hoo-hoo…!!”
“Finally know you’re tired? I’m really freaking done with you.” The tone of that voice carried some helplessness.
Zhu Ying slowly raised her head and saw a green-eyed girl who wasn’t much taller than herself standing in front of her. Her face was filled with impatience as she rambled on and on in words Zhu Ying couldn’t understand: “Day after day, it’s always about this kind of trivial crap. What era is this? Why are kids still at this level? What kind of drama bullshit is this? Can’t you come up with something more creative? Running like hell—are you acting in a Japanese drama or what?”
“Who… who are you?”
“Never mind who I am. You’ll forget again in a bit anyway. For now I haven’t woken up yet, so I’ll tell you one last freaking time—really, it’s the last time I’m saying this to you—”
“Hoo… hoo… say… say what?”
“Stop. Freaking. Running!!”
“Huh? Huh?!”
Zhu Ying stared blankly at the girl before her, as if she didn’t understand what she meant at all.
“No matter what you face, running away will never solve the problem. Do you freaking understand that or not? Also, don’t magnify the negative emotions in your heart. Everything in this world is worse than you think. Everything in this world—is also not as bad as you think!”
“What does that mean…” The contradictory words left Zhu Ying bewildered once again.
Just then, a familiar shout came from behind her: “Xiao Ying, Xiao Ying, wait for me!”
She instinctively turned around and saw An Jing holding her lower abdomen, panting as she ran over here. Her speed wasn’t much faster than walking, but she was gritting her teeth and persevering.
When Zhu Ying turned back again, the green-eyed girl from before had vanished without a trace.
An Jing, who had been chasing her, finally reached her side, but at that moment she collapsed from exhaustion, a sharp stone cutting her knee.
“Xiao Ying…”
“…Why did you follow me?” Zhu Ying put on a cold face.
“Why… did you suddenly act like that?”
“Don’t you know it in your own heart?” Her cold voice carried a slight tremor.
“I just almost fell, and Wangwang caught me. That’s all. Compared to that, there’s something more important I need to tell you…”
“That’s not the problem at all!!” She finally couldn’t maintain that cold face. Hysterically she burst out, her sharp voice seeming to pierce An Jing’s eardrums. The tears that had been welling up in her eyes finally flowed down her cheeks. She sobbed, wiping her tears with her arm, as if all her strength had been used up in that last shout. Her voice gradually softened again. “It’s not that problem at all…”
“What’s wrong…” An Jing swallowed nervously, anxious and a little scared. “Why are you so angry…”
“Actually, you still prefer Wang Xinru, right… isn’t that so?” Her eyes were blurred by tears; no matter how she wiped her face, everything in her sight remained just as hazy. “You’re more natural, closer, more familiar, and more used to her. You have more connections. She knows more about your past. She still likes you that much. And yet because of me, you can’t betray anything. You must have complaints, right? You must… actually be unhappy inside, right?”
An Jing suddenly lifted her head and shouted anxiously: “Xiao Ying, what are you saying! I don’t—”
“You do. You must have thought about it. How could you not have? After all, she was the girl who accompanied your childhood. How could you forget her so easily…” Zhu Ying tried hard to lift the corners of her mouth, but her smile was uglier than crying. She grabbed the lamppost beside her and slid down to sit on the ground bit by bit, tears falling pat-pat onto the dry asphalt. “Compared to her, I came later. I’m the one… who shouldn’t have come…”
“That’s not it at all…”
“But it is! Why is it that when I do things to get close to you, you’re always so reluctant! Before, when you got drunk, you even got angry about this. The pictures I sent you, you weren’t interested in either. You’re only—only staying with me out of some sense of responsibility, right? Actually, you’re forcing yourself too, aren’t you? Do you really like me… Xiao Jing…”
Zhu Ying was already choking with tears.
The words she said afterward, even she herself might not have been able to hear clearly. It was just sobbing as she swallowed saliva and tears.
Then, a small hand gently reached out, as if wanting to touch the tears on her cheek.
But she pushed it away forcefully.
Even so, the owner of that small hand insisted on reaching out again, even using the other hand to block Zhu Ying’s resisting hand.
Zhu Ying bit her lip tightly, stubbornly lifting her tear-streaked little face.
And An Jing gently wiped the tear stains from the corners of her eyes with her thumb.
She knelt in front of her, smiling tenderly and peacefully.
“Xiao Ying, you know what? When you first confessed to me, I was really… flattered, and also very scared… scared of losing. Unlike those vague feelings from childhood, you made me taste the flavor of love for the first time.”
“If you say that, is it fair to Xiao Ru…?”
“Maybe it’s not fair, but my first true love… I gave it to you. For me, Wang Zhu from childhood was more like a sister who liked to follow around, more sensible but seemed to have no opinion of her own…” An Jing blinked hard, holding back the tears in her eyes. “When I was sure that you liked all of me, not just a simple appearance, I was really moved, and also… happy. Thank you for liking all of me. Thank you for loving all of me. I’m not a perfect person; I have so many flaws. But your liking… your love for me, that love overflows to the point where I sometimes even feel panicked, not knowing how to respond.”
Zhu Ying opened her mouth several times and closed it again, as if she had a lot to say, but when the words reached her lips, her mind went blank.
“That time I got drunk, I wasn’t angry at you. I just thought that as a guy, at least—at least an ex-guy—I should be more manly. I shouldn’t be happy about those… those unmanly things. But now I think, maybe whether a person is manly enough has nothing to do with those external appearances. Even if I seem to have accepted the role of being a girl, I’m still me. I won’t become cowardly or fragile. If you can only define a man by whether he looks manly or not, then the creature called man would be way too pathetic.”
“Xiao Jing isn’t a man, so it’s okay not to be manly…” Zhu Ying’s hands slowly dropped.
“The core of being manly lies in being strong, independent, and optimistic. But you can’t resist others’ care for you because of that, or ignore your own need to be loved and taken care of.” An Jing used both thumbs to wipe the tears from the corners of her eyes at the same time. “This kind of good quality can be had by both men and women… Hmm… So, I really wasn’t angry at you that time. If anything, I was angry at myself. Actually, Xiao Ying knows that too, doesn’t she?”
“Mm…”
“Also, about… about the pictures you sent me…” An Jing’s little face flushed bright red at a visible speed. “I’m not uninterested! I, I… I’m actually really interested!”
“But you clearly acted like you weren’t interested at all! You looked like you were brushing me off!”
“I, I was just feeling guilty!” An Jing whispered in her own defense. “Actually, actually, I set one of my favorites as my wallpaper, and I was nervous all day long, afraid someone would see it…”
“Why?”
“Be, because that’s for my eyes only! Why would I let anyone else see it? That one… the one where you’re in front of the mirror lifting your arm to show your armpit. I really love it… I looked at it several times over…”
“But you said you only looked at it once.”
“I… I was lying! I mean, I couldn’t bring myself to say something like that!” An Jing suddenly raised her voice, looking like ‘since we’ve come this far, I might as well throw caution to the wind.’ “I’m really interested in Xiao Ying’s body! I never get tired of looking at it! I especially, especially want to kiss every single part of it! Every time I think that it belongs to me, I feel so, so happy! But how could I just say that? That would make me seem really shallow, like I only like you for that kind of thing! So I, I have to hold myself back!”
“…Pervert Xiao Jing!”
“See, if I say that, I’ll definitely be disliked. You, are you hating me now?”
“Silly Xiao Jing!”
“Wh, what do you mean…”
“Then do you like me because of your liking for me?”
“Of course I do… I like everything—” An Jing swallowed. “I like the sound of your voice, the way you eat, your little habits, the way you write, the style you name things in games, the way you cause trouble, you look pretty in all kinds of clothes… I like it. I like joking with you… I even like your bad personality… I, I like being bullied by you…”
“Thump!”
“Ah…!”
Zhu Ying pushed An Jing down onto the ground forcefully, hugging her body tightly, as if trying to merge the two into one at that moment.
“I like Xiao Jing too. I like Xiao Jing playing the hero. I like Xiao Jing protecting others. I like those little resistant movements. I like how you’re always so optimistic, so strong, always making people believe there’s still hope… Xiao Jing… I like you the most.”
It’s been a long time since I begged for monthly tickets. Rolling around begging for monthly tickets and long reviews! Do you all like the recent storyline?