Half-baked

3.
Later I realized that the person who talked to Duan Huaian that day was Duan Huaian's mother.
Mother Duan likes her mother, Huai Nian, very much, and she also likes Huai Nian very much. One year, on Huai Nian’s birthday, she received a birthday gift from Mother Duan.

But that was not "hiding" in the true sense. Although they lived under the same roof, they rarely interacted with each other.
I miss the time when I stayed in my room doing homework most of the time. I would only go out occasionally because I was thirsty to get some water, hungry to eat, or when my mother dragged me out for a walk or shopping when I had nothing to do.

She was the same way before Duan Huaian came here, and she remained the same after he came, without any change.
If there was any change, it was that every time she left the room, she would subconsciously look up and gaze across the high ceilings to the second floor. The door to the second floor was always closed.

In the midsummer after a typhoon passes, the cicada tide rises.
I miss coming back from the convenience store with a bag of popsicles in my left hand and a popsicle in my right hand.

From a distance, I could see a black car parked outside the door.
A middle-aged man in a black suit and white gloves stood outside the car.

I missed the slow pace of my steps and the slow licking of my popsicle.

After a while, two people were seen coming out of the villa one after another.

One is Duan Huai'an.

Another person she had seen at school was also a school celebrity. His name was Chi Jingting. However, the reason why Chi Jingting was famous at school was different from Duan Huai'an. Chi Jingting was the only student who dyed his hair yellow since the establishment of the affiliated middle school. He refused to change despite repeated warnings, and the school teachers could do nothing about him.
Flamboyant, unruly, and reckless.

Chi Jingting said nonchalantly, "If you ask me, your mother is really generous. She actually agreed to let the nanny's daughter live with you. What if something happens when a man and a woman are alone in the same room?"
"Although, I still hope that something will happen between you and her. It's not that I don't trust you, it's mainly because you are too pure and unselfish, making me almost doubt your sexual orientation."

Beside Duan Huaian was a tree with lush branches and leaves. The sunlight shone through the gaps between the leaves and flickered on his body, alternating between light and darkness. His expression remained indifferent and quiet.
The scorching sun and the noisy boiling seemed to be moving away from him.
He was like a cold spring falling down a cliff.

"She—" Duan Huai'an's low voice was hidden in the sharp sound of cicadas, highlighting a bit of gentleness, "It's too late to hide from me."

"No way? There are actually women avoiding you. Shouldn't they be chasing you?"

Duan Huaian frowned slightly.
Chi Jingting was curious: "Is that woman pretty?"
"..."
"I heard that she is also a student of our school, but I don't know which class she is in."
"..."

They walked towards the car while talking, and the driver half bent over and opened the door for them.
Chi Jingting walked towards the car near the gate, while Duan Huaian went around the rear of the car and got in on the other side.

Chi Jingting was still muttering, "Why is she hiding from you? Do you look scary or did you do something to scare her? Did you sleepwalk to her room in the middle of the night? I know that Duan Huaian looks like a decent person on the surface, but you are a pervert in private."

A breeze blew, and the branches and leaves flickered with mottled shadows.
I can't help but laugh at the memory.

Light and shadow flowed around her eyebrows, and light also splashed into Duan Huaian's eyes.
Suddenly, he turned his head and looked towards where the memories were.

The smile on his lips froze, his lips and teeth opened and closed, and he took a big bite of the popsicle.
Perhaps the popsicle was too cold, and the two dimples on her lips were frozen on her cheeks.

He just looked at her like that, his eyes devoid of any warmth or emotion, his lips moving as if he was talking to Chi Jingting, or to Huai Nian, "Don't talk about her, she's irrelevant."

"Hey, what you said--" Chi Jingting spoke up for Huai Nian, "We're classmates, and we can still say hello when we meet at school in the future."

"What do you mean by hello?" Duan Huai'an got into the car. "Just be a stranger."

"boom--"
The driver closed the door.

The car started, the engine roared, the tires rolled over the ground, and the car drove away.

Huai Nian stared calmly at the direction where the car was going. Long before Duan Huai'an moved into the villa, Huai Nian's mother had repeatedly told her not to tell anyone outside that she and Duan Huai'an were living together. The Duan family didn't like outsiders bragging about their family's name.

Huai Nian is very obedient, sensible and good at judging the situation.

She promised that she would stay away from Duan Huai'an when she was outside and pretend that she didn't know him.

Fortunately, Duan Huaian had the same idea as her.

So the two of them pretended to be strangers in front of outsiders.
I pretended like this from my second year of high school until my third year.
-
The bell rings.
The elective class on Saturday is over.

The lecture hall had doors in front and back, so Huai Nian and her roommates went out the closest back door. One of her roommates had a boyfriend who was also taking an elective course in this building, so she left them to go look for him.

The memory passed quickly, without caring whether Duan Huai'an had left or not.
Instead, Zhu Yutong called out to her, "Why are you walking so fast?"
Miss you didn't say anything.

Zhu Yutong said with regret: "I didn't have time to look at Duan Huai'an a few more times when I left. This is the first time I have seen Duan Huai'an so closely. He is so much more handsome in person than in the photos taken secretly in Moments."
Nostalgia smiled and comforted him, "It's okay, you can still watch it next Saturday, then you can sit next to him."

"Is it really possible?" Zhu Yutong thought about the scene in her mind and shook her head. "Forget it. I'm afraid I'll be nervous. I think this distance today is good enough. How about next week, we can sit between Duan Huai'an and me as we do now?"
Another roommate, Jing Yue, interrupted and agreed: "I think it's okay. What if you two fall in love with each other?"

Hearing this, Huai Nian's eyelashes trembled slightly.
She was speechless and amused: "Do you think we seem to be attracted to each other today?"

The two were silent for a few seconds, then said in unison: "Not like it."

Zhu Yutong: "You two look like the strangest strangers."
Jing Yue nodded.

Soon they arrived at the dormitory, and Jing Yue suddenly said, "I'm quite curious."

Nostalgia: "What are you curious about? Curious about what kind of woman Duan Huai'an will fall in love with?"
Jing Yue: "No, I'm curious about what kind of man you would date?"

Nostalgia choked: "You are too curious, please control it."

"No." Jing Yue propped up her chin, raised the corner of her mouth, and looked up and down at Huai Nian with an aunt's smile, "Huai Nian, classmate, do you know what my first impression of you was?"

Huai Nian opened the closet and wore Duan Huaian's clothes. She still felt uncomfortable and wanted to take a shower and change her clothes.
She asked absentmindedly, "What?"

"A sweet and innocent girl next door."

Jing Yue's summary is concise and to the point.
There are many kinds of beauty. The beauty of nostalgia is very direct, with a pure and non-aggressive appearance. Almond eyes, oval face. When she smiles at you, you will unexpectedly find two shallow dimples on her lips, like the juice of a ripe peach accidentally squeezed and splashed, with a pure and natural sweetness without any industrial saccharin.

First impressions can easily be changed or even destroyed by spending more time together.
However, Huai Nian is not like that. She is a person whose personality and appearance are exactly the same.

Lively and easy-going, they have never met anyone easier to talk to than Huai Nian.

But girls next door all need care from others to some extent, but Huai Nian is attentive and considerate and knows how to take care of others.

Huai Nian took out the clothes, closed the closet, and sighed deeply: "I am one month older than you. I am your neighbor's sister."

"Sweet girl is a temperament and an attitude, not age." Jing Yue snorted and laughed, "I can guarantee that the only people who are willing to call you sister are the students in your tutoring class."
"Oh, by the way, is that little sister in the third year of junior high school?"

Missing the action of closing the bathroom door, she paused for a moment, and forced a smile: "Ah, yes, I'm in the third year of junior high school, and I'll take the high school entrance exam next year."

Tutoring classes are just a cover.
In order to hide the fact that I often spent the night outside the school.

According to regulations, freshmen must live on campus.
In Duan Huaian's eyes, the regulations that suit his taste are the ones that suit his taste, and those that do not suit his taste will be "automatically" changed to the ones that suit his taste.

Duan Huaian lives a life of luxury and has severe mysophobia, so naturally he would not live in school.
He has a house in a community ten minutes' drive from the school, and he misses the so-called "tutoring class was too late, and the students' parents were afraid that something might happen to me, so they let me stay here overnight" - in fact, he just stayed in Duan Huaian's house to accompany him.

I didn't miss staying overnight outside very often, maybe once or twice a week, but the sporadic times accumulated to dozens of times in a semester.

In the blink of an eye, she was a junior, and the students in her tutoring class had gone from being first-year junior high school students to third-year junior high school students.

She changed her clothes in the bathroom and took a shower.

She didn't get enough sleep last night, so she changed into pajamas, thinking about catching up on some sleep before going to lunch.

When Huai Nian came out of the shower, she found Jing Yue standing at the stairs in the middle of the bed.

Jing Yue was stunned: "Do you want to sleep?"
Huai Nian spoke with a slight nasal tone: "Well, I didn't sleep well last night."
Jing Yue hurriedly gave up his seat.

During the action, Jing Yue seemed to see something. She squinted her eyes and moved closer to miss it.

Nostalgia leaned out subconsciously: "What?"

Jing Yue pointed at the area about three centimeters below Huai Nian's collarbone and said, "Your area is red. Was it bitten by a mosquito?"

"..."
Guessing what it was, she found it hard to speak, her voice was dry: "Ah, yes, mosquitoes are more poisonous. I fought with mosquitoes all night last night." At the end of her speech, her teeth collided up and down, as if she wanted to bite each other to pieces.
Complaining, resentful, full of resentment.

She climbed onto the bed and pulled the curtains closed.

The bed curtains and walls enclose a narrow private space that belongs exclusively to her.

Huai Nian felt that Jing Yue had a wrong understanding of her. It was not that she had no temper, she just had a very bad temper.

Like now.
She took out her cell phone and opened the chat interface.
Typing rapidly.

Miss: [I told you to be gentler! ]
Miss: [Duan Huai'an, do you have no ears and can't hear or have you never kissed anyone? ]

Once the message was sent, the other party replied almost instantly.

DHA: [Well, I’ve never kissed anyone.]
DHA: [Have you forgotten? When I kissed you for the first time, I told you that it was my first kiss.]

Miss: "..."
-
I miss sleeping with a full breath, and going to the cafeteria to eat with my roommates after waking up.
The afternoon classes were lab classes, group labs, and everyone was fighting for the top three GPAs in the major. She was a truly good student, with good grades and was also the president of the college student union. She was liked by teachers and classmates.

Laboratory classes usually end when the experiment is over. Today's laboratory class started ten minutes later than usual.

She missed leaving the laboratory building and parting with her roommate. She walked outside for a long time before she slowly took out her cell phone.

Duan Huaian sent her a message half an hour ago.

He said he was waiting for her at the old place.
He asked her how much longer.
He said there’s no rush, just take your time.

The old place that Duan Huaian mentioned is the building opposite the school subway entrance.
Duan Huaian’s car is easy to recognize; the most expensive and luxurious one is his.

The nostalgia stays there and has not passed.

Of course Duan Huaian didn't come down to pick her up, as they had already made three rules.
Act like a stranger at school.
Pretend to be unfamiliar at home.
The last one is a little hard to say... do it no more than five times a week.

There was a huge flow of people at the subway entrance near the school. Huai Nian stopped at the bus stop nearby. As soon as she stopped, she received a call from Duan Huai'an.

Without waiting for him to speak, nostalgia came straight in: "I want to take the bus back."

As expected, he objected: "Why do you have to take the bus when there is a car?"

"You'll have to do it to me again when we get in the bus." She was the only one at the bus stop. There were cars speeding past her. In the noisy environment, Hua Nian's voice was suppressed and gentle. She usually spoke like a spoiled child, but now it was even worse, mixed with a little grievance, a tone that made people soft-hearted. "My waist hurts a lot today, and so do my legs. And I told you many times not to bite me, but you still did. When I was taking a nap in the dormitory today, my roommate saw the kiss mark."

Duan Huai'an didn't feel the slightest bit of guilt, and even laughed vaguely: "How did you explain it to them?"

"Bitted by a mosquito."
“So I’m a mosquito.”
"..."
"Come here, I won't mess with you." Duan Huaian said in a tired tone.

"I don't." Huai Nian's tone rose and his attitude was firm.
But this arrogance did not last long.

Her name rang out from the receiver of the phone, and Duan Huai'an said calmly, "——Miss you."
This was a sign that Duan Huai'an was getting angry. He was always like this when he was in a bad mood, calling her name directly with a cold voice.

Suddenly a bus stopped in front of me, and it happened to be the bus I was about to take.
"The car has arrived." Miss Nana.
"you--"
The words stopped abruptly.

Duan Huaian held the disconnected phone and looked outside the car with dark and vicious eyes.

The street is empty, where is her?
As always, I'm hiding from him faster than from a monster.

"Uncle Li." Duan Huai'an said to the driver, "Follow that bus."
-
Leaving Duan Huai'an behind, I miss him and feel great.
It was mid-October and the sun was shining brightly.

I miss sitting by the window, humming a song.

There is a red light ahead.
The bus stopped.

Huai Nian rubbed his dry eyes, his eyelashes drooped, and there was a reflective gray shadow in his peripheral vision.
She turned her head slowly and in disbelief. The bus was tall, and the car parked next to it looked small. The rear seat of the car was facing the window where she was sitting, and the anti-privacy glass window was lowered.

The sunlight was floating in the air, and it felt like an electric current was running through her body filled with nostalgia, making her stiff.

The red light is fast.
The bus started moving again.
The car next to it also started.

At the next intersection, there was another red light, and outside the zebra crossing, the stopping distance was the same.

Huai Nian couldn't bear it any longer, so he took out his cell phone and called Duan Huai'an.

She stared at him and took a deep breath: "Can you please stop following me?"
Duan Huai'an also stared at her, his eyes raised, and his smile was surprisingly gentle: "What do you mean by following me? I want to go home. This is my way home."

Nostalgia: "Who drives a Bentley at 40 mph? There's no speed limit on this road."
Duan Huai'an: "You have to ask Uncle Li about this."

Uncle Li, who was in the driver's seat, had long been accustomed to the way they got along. He said calmly to the road with few vehicles, "There's a traffic jam, drive slowly."

"The light is green, Uncle Li, you have to drive faster later." Duan Huai'an said in a leisurely tone, "But——"
"I'm afraid that every time I stop, I can see your car following behind me. Tell me, who is following whom?" He looked her up and down, and then put on an expression that said, "So you are the stalker."

Miss: "..."

(End of this chapter)